Northwest Missouri State's defense continues to be a work in progress.

But there's some cause for hope.

Against Southwest Baptist on Saturday night, the defense was able to put some pressure on elusive quarterback Steve Gachette.

Tyler Roach recorded two sacks of Gachette for losses of 14 yards and added another tackle for a loss of 2 yards in his best performance of the young season. The junior defensive tackle had only 1 1/2 tackles for loss and just a half sack in his first two seasons as a Bearcat but seemed to around the football a lot more this time around.

And the linebacking corps grabbed some of the spotlight this time around. Maligned for its inexperience, the group was led by Willie Horn, who recorded one bone-crushing sack for eight yards and 1 1/2 tackles for loss among his six tackles.

That group may have found a solid contributor in Chad Kilgore, a freshman who had his redshirt pulled this week.

Kilgore, brother of Bearcat tight end Kyle Kilgore, recorded three unassisted stops in his first collegiate action.

“I thought Willie Horn played pretty good,” Northwest coach Mel Tjeerdsma said. “Adam Kilgore made some plays, and Chad is going to make plays. He runs really well and is very aggressive. He's going to help our football team.”

While things looked brighter, the inexperienced defense still struggled somewhat with the quick tempo that Southwest Baptist maintained.

“I thought our first defense did pretty good, but some of our depth people – some of our twos – when they got in there, they were lost,” Tjeerdsma said.

Tjeerdsma said it is hard to coach a defense against such a fast-paced offense. He was almost apologetic when talking to Baptist coach Keith Allen after that game about using his own offense to maintain some breathing room.

“I told their coach after the game that we're not trying to run up the score, but we have to score, because they can score so quick,” Tjeerdsma said.