Linebacker Ben Holt knows Western Kentucky’s defense didn’t play up to its standards last week at Charlotte.

“Obviously, Saturday was embarrassing for our defense,” the redshirt junior Holt said Wednesday. “We’re not going to let that happen again. We know we need to come back to work.”

The Hilltopper defense allowed its most points all year Saturday in a 40-14 loss to the 49ers.

WKU (1-5 overall, 0-2 Conference USA) hadn’t surrendered that many points in a game since a 41-17 loss at Florida International in November 2017.

Coordinator Clayton White’s unit will try to get back on track Saturday against Old Dominion (1-6, 0-4).

Kickoff from Houchens-Smith Stadium is set for 6:30 p.m., with the game broadcast by ESPN+.

“We’ve got to perform better on Saturdays and obviously, our standards are very high, and they’ve always been high,” the second-year coordinator White said. “Our players know that Saturday was not the type of effort we want to put out. We’ll try our best not to do that again.”

Going into last week, WKU allowed three straight opponents – Louisville, Ball State and Marshall – to score 20 points apiece. That marked the first time in program history the Toppers held three straight FBS squads to 20 points or less.

That streak was emphatically broken Saturday at Jerry Richardson Stadium.

Charlotte’s first offensive play set the tone. Running back Benny LeMay burst through a gaping hole in the left side of the O-line, broke a pair of tackles and went 35 yards for the game’s first touchdown.

LeMay ran 17 times for 121 yards and two touchdowns in the 49ers’ victory. He posted the most rushing yards of any opposing running back since Wisconsin’s Jonathan Taylor ran Aug. 31 for 145 and two TDs on 18 carries.

As a team, Charlotte’s 211 rushing yards were the most by a WKU opponent since Wisconsin (234).

Meanwhile, the 49ers’ 9.1 yards per pass attempt were the most an opposing offense has tallied against the Toppers since Georgia State (9.9) in the 2017 Cure Bowl.

Coach Mike Sanford, White and Topper defenders all pointed to missed tackles as an issue in the loss.

“You can’t expect to win football games when we have the tackles that we missed,” Sanford said. “That’s an area where we’ve been very strong as a defense.

“I think that Ben Holt even mentioned (Sunday), he came up to me and said, ‘We’re going to get guys to the ground.’ We have to.”

Nickelback Ta’Corian Darden led WKU at Charlotte with 10 tackles (five solo) while tallying his sixth pass breakup of the season. He said swarming to the football and finishing tackles have been emphases this week in practice.

“Tackling is always important,” the redshirt junior Darden said. “The first man to the ball, you want to make that tackle. We didn’t do too good the last game. This game, we want to make an improvement on that.”

As a team, the Hilltoppers rank seventh among Conference USA squads both in points per game allowed (27.5) and yards per play allowed (5.61).

Holt (51 tackles) and Darden (43) are the team’s two leading tacklers, followed by safety Drell Greene (40), linebacker Masai Whyte (35) and safety Devon Key (35). Holt’s six tackles for loss lead the defense, while Whyte and D-tackle Jaylon George have team-best two sacks apiece.

“Coming into this week, we’ve got everything fixed from last week and we’re coming in with a new mindset,” the Russellville native Darden said. “We’ve got a new goal coming into this game – being more physical and ready to play.”