North Alabama started October against West Florida losing 24-19. The Argonauts were sitting at four wins and one loss. The Lions have three wins and two losses.

UNA started out the game with a trick play. Redshirt junior running back Terence Humphrey passed to Christian Lopez for a 28-yard first down. Junior quarterback Christian Lopez threw a   12-yard touchdown pass to redshirt freshman Cortez Hall for the first score of the game.

West Florida drove the field to retaliate with a field goal to make the score 7-3 at the end of the first quarter. UNA followed with another drive to set up senior kicker and punter Chandler Carrera for a 41-yard field goal to make the game 10-3.

UWF got the ball back with 1:59 left to play in the half. A 60-yard drive allowed them to tie the game 10-10 to end the first half.

To start off the second half, North Alabama recovered a fumble and moved all the way to the UWF 13-yard line before penalties stalled the drive and made Carrera kick from 30-yards out, putting the Lions up 13-10. The Argonauts answered with a rushing touchdown from their quarterback two yards out, taking the lead 17-13 with eight minutes left in the third quarter.

UWF began their drive at the end of the third quarter and finalized it in the fourth with a touchdown. The 10 play, 80-yard scoring possession placed them ahead 24-13 14 seconds into the fourth quarter. Eight minutes later, Lopez led a drive down to the UWF 11 yard line where senior running back Damon Cox ran in from two yards out. The Lions did not achieve the two-point conversion leaving the score at 24-19.

Penalties affected the Lions in this game, as well as their previous home game. North Alabama was penalized 13 times for 128 yards total.

“Well once again, I think penalties hurt us,” said head coach Chris Willis. “We escaped last time when we did it, we didn’t escape this time. Outside of one play in the first half,, I thought we played really good defense. We have to be able to score more points when we get down in the red zone. Penalties, false starts, late hits, they ended up making more plays than we did.”

North Alabama plays again at home Oct. 13 for their homecoming game against Mississippi College.