MISSOULA — What a difference a year can make. And in the case of Bob Stitt and the Montana Grizzlies, the debut of a second season certainly will be a different sort of memory than the first.
A year ago, Stitt made as resounding a debut as any head coach in Montana history, unveiling his high-flying offense in front of a national television audience to rave reviews. In his first college start in his new head coach’s heralded offense, Brady Gustafson threw for 434 yards and three touchdowns as Montana toppled five-time defending national champion North Dakota State.
In Stitt’s Year 2 debut at Washington-Grizzly Stadium, what played out was entirely different. Saint Francis, a tiny school of less than 2,000 students in Loretto, Pennsylvania out of the Northeast Conference, came to Missoula with what most thought was a snowball’s chance in hell to compete with the perennially powerful Grizzlies. Instead, the Red Flash brought pressure from all angles defensively, forced three UM turnovers in the first half and played with no fear throughout, leading for most of the first 42 minutes.
Montana head coach Bob Stitt/ photo by Jason Bacaj
Still, Montana’s halftime adjustments, Gustafson’s regained composure, Montana’s unrelenting defense and the ability of Stitt’s up-tempo offense to wear out an opponent led the Griz to a 41-31 win in front of a crowd of 26,002 here on Saturday night. The attendance number ranked as the 10th-highest in the history of the venue.
“It’s different than last year because we are more comfortable with what’s going on and you are never going to top what happened last year,” said Stitt, who won for the ninth time as he begins his second season at the helm. “(Last year) was the perfect storm and you couldn’t have scripted it better. But this is a great win for us, an opening win and you had a lot of positive things to be proud of. You always want to get better after a win. You don’t want to get come in on Sunday and try to get better after a loss.”
Gustafson fumbled on Montana’s first possession and threw an ill-advised interception on its second. His fumble in the second quarter allowed Saint Francis to take a 10-3 lead with 2:28 left in the half.After halftime, the 6-foot-7 senior out of Billings West settled in, capping Montana’s first drive of the second half with a 12-yard touchdown scramble, punching in a second TD on a sneak in the fourth quarter and throwing touchdowns to redshirt freshman Justin Calhoun, senior Lane Hovey, and Keenan Curran after intermission.
“Straight up, flat out didn’t play to the best of my ability,” Gustafson said. “No nerves. I know I can play better and frankly we will get better going on. To quote the great Mick Delaney Jr., a win’s a win’s a win’s a win.”
Montana senior quarterback Brady Gustafson runs for a first down Saturday night/ By Jason Bacaj
Gustafson threw for 242 of his 353 yards after the break. He completed 15-of-22 second-half passes and 28-of-43 overall. The Griz gained 368 of their 520 yards and ran 47 of their 86 total plays in the second half.
“We were calling the same plays, it was just getting the ball where we needed it to go,” Stitt said. “Brady did a fantastic job. And him using his legs (10 carries for 29 yards), he did a great job of that. You need to do that when people are going to play backed off as deep as they were.”
Montana cut the Red Flash lead to 10-6 at intermission and took a 13-10 advantage after a crisp drive to open the second half capped by a Gustafson touchdown run. The drive included a pair of completions for 25 and 17 yards to H-receiver Josh Horner that helped soften the middle of SFU’s two-deep zone defense, in turn setting up big plays on the outside later on.
But SFU again took the lead as Lorenzo Jerome — the FCS’ leading kick returner last season and a standout safety who added two pass breakups and an interception — ripped off an 86-yard kick return inside the 10-yard line. Sophomore Evan Epperly chased down Jerome down from behind, but SFU quarterback Zack Drayer scored on a QB sneak three plays later to give the Flash a 17-13 lead with 10 minutes left in the third.
Montana answered as Gustafson settled in. He engineered a four-play, 81-yard drive capped by a 16-yard touchdown pass to Hovey, a graduate transfer from Nebraska playing in his first game at UM. The score put Montana up 20-17 and the Griz never trailed again. The Griz defense buckled down as junior cornerback Ryan McKinley notched his first career interception and sophomore Josh Buss notched his second sack of the night and the evening.
“Defensively, we played lights out, exactly how I wanted us to play,” Stitt said. “It kept us in the game. It was a great team effort. It kept us in it long enough to win the ball game and get our offense going.”
Montana held Saint Francis to 253 yards of total offense despite defending short fields all evening and playing for more than 31 minutes, including 22 minutes in the first half.
“First half, special teams, field position, bad situations backed up in our own end-zone but it really just came down to everyone being focused, letting it go and focusing on our responsibilities and playing to the best of our ability,” said Buss, a sophomore from Boise who was one of 11 Griz making their first career starts on Saturday. “Second half, stepped up and played lights out.”
Montana capitalized on Buss’s second sack as Gustafson executed a play-fake and found a streaking Curran for a 75-yard touchdown along SFU’s sideline. Curran, a sophomore making his first start, finished with four catches for 107 yards.
“I honestly thought I was going to get caught,” Curran said with a laugh. “Beautiful ball by Brady, great call by the coaches and it’s my job to make a play.
“We saw some things we could exploit in the first half and then went into halftime and made some adjustments, taking some shots. We have the talent to do that on the outside and it worked.”
Saint Francis safety Lorenzo Jerome snared two interceptions and returned a kick for a TD in Missoula on Saturday/ by Jason Bacaj
But Jerome would not let Saint Francis surrender. He snared the interception of Gustafson in the first half and broke up two other passes in man coverage. After getting SFU the ball back following McKinley’s interception with a diving pick of his own, Jerome continued to show his formidable kick returning skills. After Curran’s touchdown, Montana attempted a squib kick that Jerome scooped up and took to the house 75 yards for a touchdown to cut the Montana lead to 34-24.
“I ignored the crowd all night,” said Jerome, a native of Cleveland who is among the top NFL kick returner prospects in the country. “My teammates did an excellent job of blocking for me on those returns.
“We have to learn how to finish. That’s what we always preach. We have to regroup. We lost, it’s over with, there’s nothing we can do about it, gotta move on.”
The Griz offense again responded, marching 70 yards in 10 plays and four minutes, 15 seconds, capped by Gustafson’s second rushing touchdown of the evening, one more than he had in his entire career entering the game.
Again, the Red Flash struck back as Drayer hit a streaking Junior Ajayi for a 73-yard touchdown to cut the lead to 41-31 with just over two minutes to play.
“It’s football so you can’t be too focused on one lead or one loss of a lead,” said Drayer, a 6-foot-4 senior who completed 13-of-25 passes for 184 yards and two touchdowns. “Adversity is going to happen. We tried to stay level-headed no matter if we were up three points or seven points.
“This was definitely a good experience playing in front of a big crowd. I wish I could say that I could ignore the crowd like Lorenzo but it’s a lot different when you can’t hear anything on offense. We weren’t coming out here for the experience. We wanted to win.”
The No. 13 Grizzlies travel to Cedar Falls, Iowa to face No. 5 Northern Iowa next week. The Panthers posted a landmark 25-20 victory over Big XII member Iowa State on Saturday night.
“I didn’t hear they had beat Iowa State tonight so thanks for sharing that. I had planned on going and getting a good night sleep,” Stitt said. “They are a good football team and they are so similar to North Dakota State. I think it’s a great matchup for us early because if you want to be great in the FCS, you are going to play teams like that once you get into the playoffs. This is a chance for us to go on the road and redeem ourselves after the playoff loss (37-6 to NDSU). No one felt great about that. We have to be able to go on the road and have a better showing.”
