Both the Eastern and Austin Peay football teams will be without key players in this weekend’s Ohio Valley Conference match-up.

The Panthers will be without their team leader in receptions, junior wide receiver Kenny Whittaker, who was dismissed from the team Wednesday for a violation of team rules.

Also dismissed from the team by Eastern head coach Bob Spoo was senior defensive lineman Michael Letton, who has recorded nine tackles so far this season.

With the absence of Whittaker, the Panthers will most likely have junior wide receivers Jeremy Rykard or Chavar Watkins lined up in place of Whittaker.

For the Governors, they will be without their starting quarterback, Jake Ryan, who has been ruled out for Saturday’s game with a sprained MCL. Ryan suffered the injury in Austin Peay’s loss last weekend to Southeast Missouri.

Freshman quarterback Landon Curtis is expected to make the start for the Governors. Curtis had not seen the field prior to filling in as relief for Ryan.

Austin Peay head coach Rick Christophel said he has full confidence in his inexperienced back up quarterback.

“Landon, is he ready to play?” he said. “Probably not as a freshman, but is he capable? Yes, he’s very capable.”

Christophel said Curtis is an athletic quarterback who understands the game, and can put a nice touch on the ball with his passing ability.

He stressed the importance of keeping Curtis healthy, as the Governors’ third string quarterback, Jacob Sexton, is also a freshman.

“We’ve got to keep (Curtis) healthy because we don’t have too many more (quarterbacks) after that,” Christophel said.

The Panthers are still winless in the OVC, following last week’s loss to Tennessee-Martin, and are on a seven game losing streak.

“We’re struggling at this point, but we’re trying to get back on track the best we can,” Spoo said.

Spoo said that one of the key deficiencies of the Panthers was their ability to force turnovers, as well as prevent them in their own offense.

“We’re pretty much to the bottom of our conference in turnover margin and that’s never good,” he said.

Eastern has the second to worst turnover margin in the OVC, in front of only Austin Peay.

On defense, the Panthers have only two interceptions this season, both coming by the hands of red-shirt senior safety Nick Martinez.

Spoo also said the Panthers have been unable to stop the run on defense, and to run the ball on offense.

“We’ve allowed a lot of teams to run on us extraordinarily well, and we’ve been very poor running the football ourselves,” Spoo said.

Eastern stands as the worst in the conference in rushing offense and rushing defense.

The Panthers average only 68.2 rushing yards per game, well below any team in the OVC. The Panthers also give up an average of 242.6 rushing yards per game on the ground.

Following this game, the Panthers will return home to take on Tennessee State, in what will be Spoo’s final game at O’Brien Field.

This weekend’s game will kickoff at 4 p.m. in Clarksville, Tenn.

Dominic Renzetti can be reached at 581-7942 or dcrenzetti@eiu.edu.