FAIRMONT, W.Va. -- The Fairmont State defense made a pair of defensive stands in the final 4:54 of Thursday night's Mountain East Conference Game of the Week to pick-up a 23-19 victory in an entertaining top 25 matchup against Notre Dame College at Duvall-Rosier Field.
 
With the win, 20^th-ranked Fairmont State improved to 9-0 overall and 8-0 in the Mountain East Conference. The Falcons will now prepare for a showdown with the undefeated and third-ranked Rams of Shepherd next Saturday in Shepherdstown. The game was announced as a Division II Showcase Game on Thursday afternoon and will be televised to a national audience on American Sports Network at 12 noon next Saturday. Notre Dame suffered its second loss of the season, both against ranked teams, and falls to 7-2 on the year and 6-2 in the league.
 
The first FSU defensive stand came at the 1:24 mark of the fourth after a nine-play drive that took Notre Dame down to the FSU 26-yard line. On a 4th-and-five play, Malik Grove was flushed from the pocket and stepped out of bounds, allowing FSU to take over on downs.
 
Fairmont State attempted to run out the clock on offense, but Notre Dame used its timeouts and held FSU without a first down to force a punt after just 23 seconds had elapsed on the drive.
 
The FSU punt was muffed and only traveled eight yards, giving NDC the ball back inside FSU territory with just over a minute remaining in regulation. Following an incomplete pass on a throw-away by Grove on first-down, the FSU defense forced a turnover on second down when Quincy Redmon and Marcus Porter sacked Grove for a 16-yard loss, forcing the ball loose and allowing Jordan Adderley to come up with the game-clinching fumble recovery.
 
Porter had a monster game for the FSU defense, recording a game-high 13 tackles. Redmon was also a force for FSU with nine total stops, a sack-fumble and a fumble recovery. Antonio Harris and Dalton Inman also recorded sacks. FSU broke up seven passes on the evening.
 
Laurence King was once again a playmaker for FSU, returning a kickoff for a touchdown and catching another to help lead Fairmont State to the victory.
 
King scored a first quarter touchdown on a 24-yard reception, and then after Notre Dame tied the score he took the ensuing kickoff 99 yards for a touchdown.
 
Late in the second, James Oliver added a short TD run for FSU, and then Notre Dame managed a score just before the end of the half to make the score 20-13 in favor of Fairmont State going into the locker room.
 
After 33 points scored in the opening half of action, the second half was a defensive struggle with just nine total points scored, all of which coming in the fourth quarter.
 
Greene scored his second touchdown of the night on the first play of the fourth quarter from two-yards out, but FSU blocked the point-after attempt for the second time in the game to cling to a 20-19 lead. Midway through the fourth, Sam Keil connected on a 31-yard field goal to push the FSU lead to 23-19, which turned out to be the final points of the evening. Keil's field goal capped a 15-play, 64-yard drive that took nearly seven minutes off the fourth quarter clock.
 
King finished with 106 yards receiving with one touchdown to go along with his second kickoff return for a touchdown in as many weeks. Cooper Hibbs completed 24-of-39 with 268 yards and a touchdown in the win. In addition to King's performance, Andre Hall also chipped in seven receptions for 79 yards and Jeff Iweh pulled in four catches for 48 yards in the absence of Fabian Guerra who missed the game due to injury.
 
The FSU rushing attack struggled for much of the night, totaling just 46 yards on 25 carries.
 
Grove was 15-of-31 for 230 yards and a touchdown. Mitchell Shegos had six catches for 87 yards. Onslow Williams had seven tackles on the night, including two for a loss to lead the NDC defense.
 
Fairmont was outgained 358-314 in the game and NDC recorded eight more first downs, finishing with a 20-12 margin. However, FSU did not commit a turnover in the win and forced two on defense.