After falling behind early in the game, West Liberty University's football team found the wake-up call it needed, scoring 24 unanswered points to spark a 40-23 victory over the University of Charleston in Mountain East Conference action Saturday afternoon.
Much like they had in the first two games they won this season, the Hilltoppers trailed to start the game, facing a deficit of as many as 10 points early in the second quarter.
"We've battled all season like that. I don't know if our kids like playing from behind or what, but we kept fighting," West Liberty coach Roger Waialae said. "I'd like for us to get going a little faster, but we seemed to settle in and make the plays when we needed to."
Charleston looked strong at the start, setting the tone with its defense on the opening drive. After a penalty brought the Hilltoppers back to their own 6-yard line, defensive end Khazin Daniels got the first of his two sacks in the contest, taking down Conwell in the end zone for a safety and a 2-0 lead.
The Golden Eagles kept the foot on the gas on the ensuing drive, marching down the field to go ahead 9-0 on a 10-yard touchdown run from Marvin Elam.
"We got off to a nice start, but we just didn't play good enough to win after that," UC coach Pat Kirkland said. "That's a good football team. After we got out to that lead, we weren't able to keep capitalizing on it and put more points on the board."
West Liberty wasn't going to go away without a fight, with Conwell leading the way as the Hilltoppers stormed back into the game.
On the sloppy day at UC Stadium, Conwell was able to use his arm to get WLU's rally started. He started by connecting with Dan Monteroso for a 26-yard touchdown pass late in the first quarter.
After Charleston extended the lead to 16-6 on a 35-yard touchdown run from Joey Augustin out of the Wildcat formation, West Liberty came back with a quality drive of its own that ended in Monteroso's second touchdown catch of the half - a diving grab on a 10-yard pass from Conwell to cut the lead to three points before the Hilltoppers were able to grab their first lead of the game with Conwell's 1-yard run with 4:19 left in the second quarter.
"We started the game in slow motion," Waialae said. "We had a good mix there when we started to play better. This group knows what they have to do.
"We just knew we had to stay positive and move on and try to win the next play, and thankfully that's what we did."
The Hilltoppers were able to keep the pressure on in the second half. West Liberty got a field goal from Christian Morris to extend the lead in the third quarter before Tyler Peterson's 21-yard touchdown made it 30-16.
UC showed one final glimpse of life when Anthony Fontana hit Augustin for a 77-yard touchdown pass.
After that, West Liberty kept control - getting another field goal and touchdown run in the fourth quarter while holding UC to two turnovers on downs and a lost fumble on its final three drives of the contest.
"We just couldn't get off the field on third downs and we gave them too many opportunities," Kirkland said. "Then when we got it back they stopped us. They played hard. They did a nice job and we needed to execute better."
Conwell threw for 301 yards and two scores, both to Monteroso, who finished with nine receptions for 162 yards.
Augustin led UC with 128 yards on six catches.
Contact Michael Carvelli at 304-348-4810 or michael.carvelli@wvgazettemail.com. Follow him on Twitter @carvelli3.