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The Wabash College football team's motto "One at a Time" has served it well to this point in the 2013 season. The Little Giants are undefeated with three regular season games remaining. With two very big games in the following weeks, this Saturday's against Hiram (2-5, 1-5 NCAC) could become a classic "trap" game.
 
"I think for the most part, each week we've been pretty focused," Coach Erik Raeburn said. "We've had great concentration at practice and it's resulted it in pretty good effort on Saturdays."
 
However, the second half of Last Saturday's 27-10 win at Oberlin served as the 2013 season's least-productive 30 minutes offensively. The Little Giants (7-0, 6-0 NCAC) sputtered in the red zone multiple times, including twice on the goal line. Wabash converted just three out of seven trips inside the 20-yard line for the game, scoring only one touchdown.
 
"What we were most disappointed out was mental errors down in the red zone," Raeburn said. "Most of the time, it wasn't one of their guys beating one of ours. It was us not attempting to block a guy. That was really frustrating."
 
The offense will need a sharper mental focus Saturday. The Terriers employ a hybrid 3-4 defense meant to confuse the offensive line and quarterback.
 
"With their base defense, they only have three defensive linemen so they have potential to do a lot of different things with pass coverage," Raeburn said. "They can bring pressure and really mix up their looks. They make you really grind it out and work for everything."
 
The nose guard is one of the most important players on a 3-4 defense, and Raeburn praised Hiram's talented freshman, Zayd Mabin.
 
"He has a great motor and is in the backfield a ton," Raeburn said. "He helps the linebackers as well because he occupies so many blockers."
 
Mabin has 32 tackles from the middle including 4 tackles for loss.
 
Raeburn said a lot of the mental decisions rest on quarterback Michael Putko's shoulders. Putko has completed 65 percent of his passes and thrown 9 touchdowns with only 3 interceptions.
 
"No matter who we play, there's a lot put on the quarterback," Raeburn said. "He's (Putko) has made really solid decisions this year. For the most part, mentally he's pretty locked in and doing the right thing. It's just a matter of us executing and running the plays properly."
 
Defensively, Hiram will challenge Wabash to contain the big plays. The Terriers are gaining 15.5 yards per completion.
 
"The thing that scares me the most about them offensively is their explosiveness," Raeburn said. "That puts a lot of pressure on you defensively because if you make one mistake, that seven or eight-yard gain turns into a 40 or 50-yarder."
 
The Wabash defense makes its own big plays. The Little Giants have scored a defensive or special teams touch down in six of the seven games this season. Last week, corner back Eddie Cmehil scored on an interception. His 44-yard return was one of 8 Oberlin turnovers. Raeburn attributed the success to forcing the Yeomen into third-and-long situations.
 
"I felt like it started with being really good on first and second down," Raeburn said. "We talk about first-down efficiency all the time. I think we had 2 or 3 first-down plays the entire game where we weren't efficient on first down. Part of the success we had in creating those takeaways was due to winning first down."
 
Even if Wabash wins on first and second down, Hiram still possesses the ability to convert third-and-long. Nickleback Denzel Wilkins said it is still up to the defense to make the stops.
 
"(Wide receiver) Richard Simpson is their best athlete and their running back is pretty agile," Wilkins said. "But as long as we play our game, we should be able to contain them and we'll be fine."
 
Simpson leads the Terriers in touchdown catches and has the second longest play from scrimmage (71 yards).
 
Wilkins will try to play physical to disrupt the passing game.
 
"Our key is to put our hands on them," he said. "Receivers don't like to be touched. Once they do, they get thrown off their routes and it messes them up."
 
Wilkins has 19 tackles and 2 interceptions on the year, including one last week.
 
Kickoff will be at 1 p.m. Saturday from Byron P. Hollet Little Giant Stadium. The game will be broadcast live over the Internet here. Live statistics will be available here.