With its 14-11 victory over Illinois State Saturday, the SIUC football team got its first win in the Gateway Conference in two years. Now the Salukis will look for consistency.

The Dawgs have three wins this year, which matches the Salukis total for the past two years, and the team is looking to put back to back wins together for the first time since 1992.

After the Dawgs two previous victories, the squad has followed that game with a tough loss.

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SIUC opened the season with 30-27 upset victory at Southeast Missouri State then followed up the win with a 35-3 loss at home to border rival Murray State.

Following a14-9 loss at Division I-A Arkansas State, in which the Salukis had a solid performance, the Dawgs came back home and crushed Nicholls State 48-20.

Unfortunately for SIUC, Indiana State rudely welcomed the Salukis to Terre Haute, Ind. with a 52-3 loss. The Dawgs worst loss in Gateway history.

The Dawgs rebounded with Saluki head coach Shawn Watson’s first ever league win against Illinois State in front of a large Parent’s Weekend crowd of 12,600 at McAndrew Stadium.

Watson said the challenge his team responded to this past week is what can keep the Dawgs playing at a high level.

You get a gut check in this business all the time, and last week was a gut check for myself, the whole staff and for our kids, he said. This experience we came out of this game (Illinois State) is the kind of experience that turns the program around and I don’t know what that means for the rest of season but I tell you one thing there will be more wins this season and I’m looking forward to it.

Saluki freshman tailback Karlton Carpenter, who rushed for 107 yards Saturday against the Redbirds, said the key to continued success is to improve upon on every facet of the game especially the offensive point production.

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We have to continue to work hard, he said. We can’t get all happy with victory we’ve got to work harder.

We have to do a better job of putting points on the board consistently.

Carpenter said another help in the Salukis newfound confidence was the large home crowd.

The crowd was really exciting and drove me to do something in this (Illinois State) game, he said.

Senior offensive lineman Chris Myers, one of the men up front who led the Salukis to a 159-yard rushing day, said Saturday’s victory over Illinois State will be the confidence-builder to carry SIUC through the rest of the season.

It’s what coach Watson always tells us adversity is going to meet us but it is up to us to answer the challenge, he said. This is my first time since my freshman year I’ve been a part of a conference win at home and this is the greatest feeling.

This, by far, is our greatest win of the year and it’s going to give us so much confidence going into conference.

The Salukis hope the wins and crowds keep coming when SIUC hosts Southwest Missouri State on Homecoming, at McAndrew Stadium Saturday, at 1:30 p.m.