Concordia College Alabama took a seven-point lead into halftime Saturday against Lane College during its home opener at Memorial Stadium, but the Hornets couldn’t hang on in a 17-14 loss.

The Hornets’ Kristofer Kimble fumbled a kickoff return inside Concordia’s 10-yard-line to set Lane up for the game winning score in the third quarter. The Dragons took advantage as quarterback Marcus Reynolds ran it in from 6 yards out to put Lane up 17-14 with 7:54 left in the third quarter.

Neither team would score the rest of the way.

“We talked about that in the beginning — the team that does not make the foolish penalty usually will win and we had too many,” said Concordia head coach Stanley Conner.

Both offenses struggled to move the ball the majority of the game.

Lane struck first on a 61-yard touchdown pass thrown by Terrance Ayers to Omari Hamilton, who appeared to take the ball away from a well-positioned Hornets’ defender on the play. The score gave Lane a 7-0 lead with 5:10 left in the opening quarter.

Concordia put together one of its best drives of the game to answer. The Hornets’ run game accounted for 42 yards on the drive and running back Matthew Rowser capped the drive with an 11-yard score to tie the game with 1:14 remaining in the first quarter.

The teams traded possessions until the final minute of the first quarter, where Concordia caught its biggest break of the game.

Lane’s Roderick McKee fumbled after catching a pass at the 16-yard-line and the Hornets’ recovered. After stalling out, Concordia’s Pablo Grajales’ missed a field goal attempt from 30 yards out.

However, the Dragons was called for roughing the kicker on the play, which set the Hornets up with a first down at the 7-yard-line with just under 10 seconds left. With a second chance, Concordia sent its offense back on the field to take a shot at the end zone.

Quarterback Jarvis Chambers connected with Deangelo Stewart on a 7-yard touchdown strike to put the Hornets up with 3.7 seconds left in the second quarter.

The second half was all Lane, thanks to some poorly timed mistakes by the Hornets.

After throwing an interception in the end zone on their first drive of the second half, Lane took advantage of a poor Grajales’ punt to get back on the scoreboard.

After the punt, the Dragons started with the ball at the Concordia 33 and moved in position for a field goal from kicker Carlas Moore Jr. to pull within 14-10.

On the ensuing kickoff, Kimble fumbled and the Dragons recovered at the 3-yard-line.

Reynolds ran it in for a score three plays later to put Lane on top for good.

During Lane’s game deciding possession, Concordia called its third and final timeout of the second half. The timeout came with 8:47 left in the third quarter and not having a way to stop the action really hurt the Hornets down the stretch.

After Reynolds’ touchdown, Concordia had numerous possessions but could not move the ball into scoring range.

The Hornets’ final possession came with under three minutes left and the ball at their own 5-yard line. After two running plays went nowhere and a sack on third down, the Hornets punted with under two minutes to play despite having no timeouts.

“Just [playing] field position… we were looking for a break,” Conner said.

No break would come as the Dragons ran out the clock to end the contest. Concordia (0-2) will play at Stillman next week.