LONDON, Ont. – The Western Mustangs have secured the top spot in the OUA once again, defeating the Carleton Ravens by a 51-14 score on Friday night at TD Stadium to guarantee a first place finish in the OUA standings.
 
"Good win, resilient win for our team," said Mustangs head coach Greg Marshall. "I think it was a really good win to give our guys confidence. I knew our guys were confident going in, but they knew Carleton was a good football team."
 
The win moves the Mustangs to 7-0 on the year, and secures home field advantage throughout the OUA playoffs, as well as a bye into the semifinals. Carleton falls to 2-4, and are tied for seventh place alongside the Queen's Gaels.
 
Western put up 699 yards of offence in the win, utilizing a balanced attack that gained 336 yards through the air and another 363 on the ground, all while holding the Ravens to less than 400 total yards.
 
Three hundred of those passing yards came from Chris Merchant who completed 20 of 34 passes with two touchdowns and two interceptions in the victory.
 
Alex Taylor racked up his third consecutive 100+ yard game, rushing for 142 yards on 15 carries with one touchdown. He also caught four passes for 50 yards and one score.
 
Western's other receiving touchdown came at the hands of Harry McMaster, who hauled in a 46-yard pass from Merchant on the Mustangs second drive of the game. McMaster finished with five catches and 114 yards to lead all players in both categories.
 
"I think the offence played great today," said Cedric Joseph, who recorded two touchdowns and 81 rushing yards on 10 carries. "The offensive line had another great day, we did a good job establishing the run game, and I think it opened up the pass game pretty well to let Merchant and the receivers do their thing through the air."
 
The Mustangs offence weren't the only ones putting points on the board though, as Marc Liegghio continued his stellar season, going 5-5 on field goals to make it 18 consecutive attempts without a miss. Along with his impressive streak of success, Liegghio now holds the Western record for field goals in a season with 25 and is one off the U SPORTS mark established by Guelph's Daniel Ferraro in 2014.  
 
Defensively the Mustangs held a Ravens offence that had been averaging nearly 500 yards a game to just 358 yards. A key part of the defensive effort was stopping the Ravens vaunted rushing attack, with the Mustangs holding the OUA's leading rusher Nathan Carter to a season-low 23 yards.
 
"We take a lot of pride [in stopping the run]," said Mustangs linebacker Jean-Gabriel Poulin, who led the Mustangs with 6.5 tackles and one sack. "Last week against Laurier they ran the ball a bit, so this week there was a lot of emphasis on making sure that they can't do it anymore."
 
Much like they had in each of their first six games, the Mustangs picked up points on their first drive of the night, with Joseph running it in from three yards out to give Western an early 7-0 lead.
 
The purple and white offence continued to roll on their next possession, with Merchant tossing a 46-yard pass to McMaster to extend the Mustangs lead to 14 points less than five minutes into the contest.
 
That score would remain the same until the early moments of the second quarter when Joseph finished off a six-play 63-yard drive with a two-yard touchdown run. Just as they did in the first quarter the Mustangs added another seven points on their second drive of the frame, with Merchant finding Taylor on a 10-yard touchdown pass to make it 28-0 midway through the second quarter.
 
Despite the deficit, the Ravens continued to battle and responded with their first major of the day on their next possession, with quarterback Michael Arruda connecting with Kyle VanWynsberghe on a four-yard pass to cut the Western lead to 28-7.
 
Liegghio extended that lead to 31-7 on the final play of the half, hitting a 46-yard field goal to send the Mustangs into the locker room with a 28-point lead.
 
Western would go on to add another 19 points in the second half thanks to a one-yard touchdown run from Taylor and four field goals from Liegghio before the Ravens rounded out the game's scoring on a 12-yard touchdown pass to Phil Iloki to make the final 51-14 in favour of the Mustangs.
 
With week seven of the schedule now behind them, Western now heads into a much-deserved bye week before taking on the Ottawa Gee-Gees during the final week of the regular season.
 
"I think the bye week is going to be really big for us, especially for people who are banged up a bit," said Poulin. "It's been a long stretch of seven games so I think having a week off like that is going to help us a lot."
 
Game time for Western's Homecoming contest is set for 1 p.m. on Saturday, October 21, at TD Stadium. Fans can tune in live on Rogers Cable 13 and OUA.tv, or on Radio Western 94.9 FM and Newstalk 1290 CJBK with Tom McConnell and legendary Mustangs coach Larry Haylor calling all the action.