The Kirksville Tiger football team climbed to 3-0 Saturday with a 43-26 win over O’Fallon Christian at Spainhower Field. Quarterback Jaden Ballinger led the way again for the Tigers with five touchdowns, three passing and two rushing. Christian took the opening kickoff and scored the game’s first touchdown on an 18 yard run by Kaden McMullen with 7:42 to play. The Tigers blocked a Christian punt which put KHS at the Christian 31 yard line, and capitalized with a 28 yard run on 4th down with 10:28 to play in the second quarter to tie the game at 7-7. Kirksville fumbled a punt return with 3:15 to play in the first half, setting up another touchdown run by Christian’s McMullen on fourth down to give the Eagles a 14-7 lead with 2:06 to play. The Tigers answered right back on an eight play, eighty yard drive, which included a huge fourth down pass to Clay Vice, and the Tigers capped off the drive with a 50 yard touchdown pass from Ballinger to Brock Burchett with :57 seconds to play to tie the game right before halftime 14-14. Kirksville opened the third period with a quick three and out, and Christian put together a 15 play, 89 yard drive and scored with 5:05 to play in the third to give the Eagles a 20-14 lead after the PAT failed. Kirksville’s Landon Yardley scored on an 8 yard run with 2:00 minutes to play in the third and that gave the Tigers their first lead of the game after Andrew Nothdurft kicked the PAT, 21-20. Christian took the lead right back on the ensuing possession on a 65 yard touchdown run. The two-point try was no good, leaving the score 26-21 in favor of Christian. But then the Tigers would score the game’s next three touchdowns, all in the fourth period. Ballinger threw a 21 yard scoring pass to Noah Copeland on fourth and fifteen with 10:32 to play. The successful two point conversion gave Kirksville the lead 29-26. Aiden McKim scored on a 22 yard pass from Ballinger with 6:31 to play to make it 36-26. Ballinger then put the game away on a 28 yard touchdown run with 2:12 to play to give the Tigers the 43-26 victory. Kirksville finished with 449 yards of total offense, 228 on the ground. Ballinger finished with 221 passing yards, 162 rushing yards, two tackles on defense and a huge interception in the fourth quarter. Kirksville is scheduled to open conference play Friday at arch-rival Moberly at 7:00.