In No. 19 Eastern’s 21-6 loss to No. 8 Southern Illinois Saturday, the Panthers tried to use special teams to spark a comeback in the NCAA Division I-AA football playoff game but fell short.

After Eastern kicker Tyler Wilke made a 34-yard field goal, the Panthers knew that time was running out as the offense struggled and they trailed 14-6 with 13 minutes remaining.

On the ensuing kickoff, Eastern tried to catch Southern off guard with an onside kick. Wilke chipped the ball high toward the Eastern sideline and about 20 yards downfield. The Panthers outside coverage rushed down the sideline and an Eastern player tried to tip the ball back into play as it was headed out of bounds.

Eastern recovered, but the officials ruled the ball out of bounds, which is an illegal procedure penalty, and the Salukis took control on the Panthers’ 44-yard line.

“We had to do some things at the end there that were just trying to find something and get something positive,” Eastern head coach Bob Spoo said.

With good starting field position, Southern marched down to the Eastern 21 before its drive stalled. Saluki kicker Craig Coffin attempted a 39-yard field goal with a heavy wind at his back but missed wide left, giving Eastern the ball.

With 10:37 left to play, it looked like Eastern’s luck was changing after a long afternoon filled with dropped passes and penalties. Unfortunately, the Panthers couldn’t convert on third-and-4, and deep inside Saluki territory it looked like Eastern was headed for a three and out.

That’s when Spoo took a chance.

Eastern lined up in its normal punt formation and when the ball was snapped, the Panthers’ Tom Schofield changed from a punter to a quarterback.

“They dropped out and covered our main guy, (linebacker Clint) Sellers. So I just had to scramble a little bit, and basically threw it up,” Schofield said. “Luckily, (wide receiver Ryan) Voss almost came down with it, and we almost made it.”

It wasn’t the first time Schofield had run the play in a game, but it was almost three years since he last attempted it.

“I passed one time on a punt my freshman year at Kansas State. It was just an overall bad play. We don’t want to talk about that one,” Schofield said.

“We’d been running it in practice all this week, and it had been going good. We decided to go after it one time,” Schofield said. “We had to take a shot and make a play; hopefully, it would work.

It didn’t work. We had to try it.”

The play call was one that, if it had worked, it would have been a huge momentum swing and preserved the Panthers’ hope of a comeback, but instead the Salukis took over on the Eastern 26.

After having just made a defensive stand on the previous drive, the Panthers would once again have to take the field with their backs to the wall. Five plays later, the Salukis extended the lead to 15 points when Arkee Whitlock ran the ball in from 3 yards out for his third touchdown of the game.

“We were taking a chance at that point and just trying to get something going. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. It didn’t in that instance,” Spoo said. “And, that’s my call. If you think it’s a bad call, that’s your opinion. We had to do it because we wanted to get something going.”