As the saying goes, offense sells tickets but defense wins games. And it was exactly Linfield’s defense that gave fans their money’s worth on Saturday.

The No. 5 Wildcats (11-0) defeated the No. 9 Mary Hardin-Baylor (10-2) of Belton, Texas, at home 53-21 in the second round of the NCAA Division III playoffs. The win propelled Linfield into the quarterfinals, which they will host next Saturday when St. Thomas of Minnesota comes to town. Kickoff for that game is slated for noon in McMinnville.

Defense was the spark plug all afternoon. The Wildcat defense forced seven turnovers and piled up 220 yards of turnover returns in scoring three defensive touchdowns. And most impressively Linfield held MHB, a team that came into the game averaging over 330 yards a game on the ground, to just 206 rushing yards.

“You gotta give credit to Linfield, but you can’t expect to win a ball game, especially of this magnitude, with that many turnovers,” said Cru coach Pete Fredenburg.

Despite what appears to be a lopsided win, the Wildcats got quite a scare in the first two quarters of play. The Cru came out hot from the get-go, scoring touchdowns on their first two drives of the game. After receiving the kickoff, it took only four plays for the Cru to get on the board on the back of Quincy Daniels’ 24-yard dash to the house.

Linfield answered with a field goal on their first possession, but MHB scored their second score of the contest on the heels of quarterback Kyle Noack. Noack took a quarterback keeper from five yards out and dove into the corner pylon to give the Cru a 14-3 advantage.

But that’s where the scoring would stop for the Cru until the fourth quarter. Linfield nailed another field goal early in the second quarter. The Wildcats got their first touchdown of the game after Trevor Patterson fumbled a pass on the 1-yard line and Buddy Saxon fell on it in the end zone. The teams entered half with a MHB leading 14-13.

The defense got things rolling in the second half. Taylor Skore picked off a pass less than two minutes into the half and returned it to the MHB 10-yard line. Three plays later, the Wildcats found themselves in a third-and-eight situation. Quarterback Aaron Boehme had no receivers down field, but the offensive line bought the gunslinger all kids of time. So Boehme scrambled into the end zone himself. That score put Linfield up for the first time in the afternoon, 20-14.

On the Cru’s next possession, Eric Hedin laid down a massive hit on Cru quarterback Kyle Noack. That hit forced the quarterback to fumble and Hedin himself recovered and returned it 37 yards for a score.

And it was Hedin again that forced yet another Cru fumble with a couple minutes left in the third. This time, Christian Hanna picked it up and returned it 84 yards for a score.

“I didn’t realize how far it was until I got there,” Hanna joked after the game.

MHB got one more score in the game when Ervin Johnson caught a 14-yard pass from LiDarral Bailey. But Boehme answered with a 70-yard touchdown pass to Trevor Patterson. And Bryce Hayunga put the icing on the cake with a 37-yard interception for a touchdown for the final of 53-21.

Hedin was the defensive MVP in the win. Hedin tallied 12 tackles, 4.5 of those for a loss. He forced three fumbles and recovered one for a touchdown. Drew Fisher tallied eight tackles, while Kole Krieger followed up with seven. Nate Dixon, on top of six tackles, had two interceptions. Skore and Hayunga had Linfield’s other two interceptions. And Tyler Steele added in a fumble recovery of his own.

Offensively, Boehme tossed three touchdowns on 20-of-32 passing and 260 total yards. Patterson recorded 207 yards on 11 catches and a touchdown. Saxon chipped in two touchdowns. Aaron Williams was the lead rusher with 42.

The Wildcats finished with 318 yards of total offense, seven less yards than the Cru ended up recording.