Tartans End Three Game Road Trip With Contest at Hiram

(PITTSBURGH, Pa.) – Carnegie Mellon University's football team will look to pick up its second road win of the season as they end a critical three game road stretch on Saturday at 1:00 pm against the Hiram College Terriers.

The two teams have met on the gridiron 26 times with the Tartans holding a huge 21-5 lead over Hiram, including winning the last eight.

The Tartans are fresh off a 35-14 victory over Kenyon College, in which they totaled 541 yards on offense.   Hiram is 1-3 on the season, and the only win they have picked up was a 16-13 defeat of Kenyon.

Once again, Carnegie Mellon will try to play the spoiler to the home team's homecoming festivities.  In order to do that, head coach Rich Lackner's Tartans will look to establish their dominating rushing attack upon the Terriers.  

Junior running back Patrick Blanks (Cincinnati, Ohio/ Moeller), fresh off being named the University Athletic Association (UAA) Offensive Player of the Week, will be looking for another solid performance for the Tartans.  Blanks came away from Kenyon with a career high 145 yards, while adding two touchdowns.  That raises his touchdown total to seven on the season, and he has scored in all four games this fall.

Hiram has allowed on average 191.5 yards per game to its opponents running attack.  The Cardinal and Gray will certainly look to expose that weakness in the Terriers' defense. Carnegie Mellon will look to maintain the potent offense they had against Kenyon as they look to outpace the Terriers for the ninth straight meeting.

Lackner discussed what went right in last Saturday's win over Kenyon to stop his Tartans' two game losing skid and what his team will need to do to improve to 3-2 on Saturday.