Western Kentucky’s second scrimmage of fall camp looked nothing like the first.

The weeklong theme of the Hilltoppers defense dictating live practices switched to the offense making big plays under the lights at Houchens-Smith Stadium on Friday night as WKU put a bow on the camp portion of fall practices.

Tyson Helton will move his team into a mock-game week with the season opener against Central Arkansas approaching Aug. 29. The first-year coach enters that portion of August with performances that made “for an even football team.”

“Early on, the defense got a couple of three-and-outs and the offense found a way to make a couple of big plays and they kept swinging,” Helton said. “So my hats off to the offense, they really came out. Would’ve liked to have seen the defense find a way to make a play and get the momentum back on their favor, but that didn’t happen tonight. Defense got the offense last week in the scrimmage and today the offense got the defense.”

Helton pointed to a long touchdown reception by Quin Jernighan that highlighted a good night by the wide receivers. He also credited the running backs for converting fourth-and-short situations and a motivated offensive line controlling the line of scrimmage.

“The first couple of series, we just couldn’t make a play and all of a sudden somebody made the play and we got the momentum,” Helton said. “That’s what offense is about, getting momentum in their favor and making big plays and I thought they did a good job sustaining that.”

A week after Helton called quarterback play “poor,” he thought Friday night’s performances were “night and day.” The coach said last week the starting job is down to two candidates. Graduate transfer Ty Storey and redshirt junior Steven Duncan have the most experience ahead of redshirt sophomore Davis Shanley and redshirt freshman Kevaris Thomas.

Helton didn’t say who he’s leaning toward starting the season opener in less than two weeks, but a decision will be made in the next few days.

“I thought early on it was a little shaky but they started coming on and I was really proud of all our quarterbacks, I thought they performed well today,” Helton said. “We’ll go back as a staff and watch this film, give it a couple of days and start to wind it down. Hopefully sometime this week coming up, we’ll start to make our decisions. Where we’re at now, I feel good that we have a couple of guys that can help us win and we’ve got to find roles for all those guys.”

The Hilltoppers have Saturday off before an afternoon practice Sunday to mirror game-week preparation for a nontraditional Thursday night opener.

“I thought it was a good camp,” Helton said. “We got some guys with some bumps and bruises tonight and hopefully it’s not anything to worry about. We’ll try to get them healthy this week so we’re in good shape going into game week.”{&end}