Romanelli Earns Great West Honor on Offense; Mustangs Break Records

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. -- Senior fullback Jake Romanelli, who established new career highs of 36 carries and 179 yards in Saturday's 53-51 triple-overtime loss to Eastern Washington, has been named Great West Conference offensive player of the week.

Romanelli, who scored once on a one-yard run in the second quarter, has five 100-yard games rushing this season and six in his Mustang career. He also has a total of 10 games of 90 or more yards rushing in his career.

Playing in his final home game, Romanelli moved to within 34 yards of a 1,000-yard season, which would be Cal Poly's first since James Noble ran for 1,009 yards in 2006. Thirteen previous Mustang running backs have broken the 1,000-yard mark in rushing for a season.

His 1,943 career rushing yards places him ninth on Cal Poly's all-time career rushing yards chart and Romanelli needs 69 yards to catch No. 8 Brian Gutierrez (1982-83).

North Dakota defensive lineman Ross Brenneman notched his seventh sack of the season and a tackle for lost yardage among his three total tackles to earn defensive player of the week honors. North Dakota beat UC Davis 14-7 in a Great West game.

Southern Utah kick returner Austin Minefee earned 330 all-purpose yards in a 34-21 loss at No. 5 Northern Iowa and was named special teams player of the week. He returned six kickoffs 203 yards, including one for 99 yards and a touchdown, rushed 15 times for 67 yards and caught six passes for 60 yards.

Cal Poly (5-5) wraps up its 2011 season Saturday at South Alabama (6-3).

The Mustangs lost to Eastern Washington despite breaking three school records, including a pair of 40-year-old marks, and an NCAA Football Championship Subdivision standard.

Cal Poly rushed 95 times for 405 yards against the Eagles. The 95 rushing plays shatters the school record of 70 set against Montana in 2005 and also breaks the NCAA mark of 90 established by VMI against East Tennessee State in 1990.

The Mustangs called 107 total plays (12 passing) in the game, which breaks another school record of 100 set twice, first against Cal Western in 1968 and tied against Humboldt State in 1971. The NCAA mark is 116.

The other all-time school record broken Saturday was accomplished by junior quarterback Andre Broadous. His three touchdown runs, all one-yard sneaks, elevated his season total of rushing scores to 17, eclipsing the mark of 16 set by James Noble in 2005.

As a result, College Sports Madness has named Broadous as Great West Player of the Week for his exceptional performance. The Madness identifies the highest impact player nationally and one from each FCS conference each week.

In addition to his three rushing touchdowns, Broadous also threw a pair of scoring passes. He was seven of 10 passing for 96 yards, rushed 32 times for 81 yards and is now No. 3 in the nation (FCS) in scoring, averaging 10.20 points per game.