Perhaps the marquee game of the 2025 season, at least to date, takes place this Saturday in Bobcat Stadium Saturday night when Montana State hosts South Dakota State.
One of the two teams has played in the last four FCS title games, but not against each other. They’ve played twice in the semifinals with each taking a win. That win for MSU came in 2021 and is the only one for the Bobcats since the two teams started playing on a more regular basis in 2017. The Jackrabbits have taken four of five.
Montana State football has a long history of playing its developing rival Dakota neighbors – North Dakota State and South Dakota State – dating back to the mid-20th century. MSU beat North Dakota State in the Grantland Rice Bowl that also served as the semifinal of the Division II playoffs in 1976. The following week, the Bobcats defeated Akron for their first outright national championship and second overall (the first came in a tie).
The Montana State-Dakota State matchups tailed off in the 80s and 90s. Then in the mid-2000s, the Bobcats began to schedule the Dakota schools again as they started their transitions to Division I-AA. The past seven seasons have seen an uptick in regularity due in large part to the success of the Bobcats, who have methodically inched their way towards joining the Bison and Jackrabbits as the most successful teams in the FCS.
MSU, however, has taken more than its share of lumps on the chin along the way. The three teams have seemingly been in a conference of their own since 2017 in terms of the number of times they’ve played. MSU has played each team five times during a span of seven seasons, which is the same number of games it has played against several Big Sky teams due to the unbalanced scheduling the Big Sky Conference has employed.
Only the University of Montana (7) and Eastern Washington (6) have faced MSU more often than NDSU and SDSU.
Despite their overall success, the sledding has been rough for MSU when it has gone head-to-head with NDSU and SDSU. But the Bobcats have made progress despite their efforts not showing up in the win-loss columns. Here are the standings since 2017 excluding the 2020 Covid year:
NDSU 10-5 (5-5 vs SDSU; 5-0 vs MSU)
SDSU 9-6 (5-5 vs NDSU; 4-1 vs MSU)
MSU 1-9 (0-5 vs NDSU; 1-4 vs SDSU)
That’s a house of horrors for MSU by any metric and not much of a rivalry on the Bobcats side of things. MSU was in total rebuild mode from 2016-18 under head coach Jeff Choate (2016-19), while NDSU and SDSU were building steam. In 2016, the Bobcats went just 4-7 and improved slightly to 5-6 in 2017.
Choate got MSU into the playoffs in 2018 and his 2019 team made the semifinals, but its passing game needed a lot of work as MSU’s 52-10 and 42-14 losses at NDSU shed light on. MSU was just 13-22-1 for 150 yards (80 on two plays or that would be 11-20-1 for 70 yards) and one TD. From 2017 to 2019, MSU was 0-4 with two losses to each team and only once within striking distance of a win.
After giving SDSU a scare in the 2017 Gold Rush, the Bobcats lost 45-14 in Brookings in 2018 as Choate suffered a burst appendix.
Montana State’s lone win over SDSU since 2017 came in 2021 when the Bobcats earned a 31-17 win in the national semifinals to secure its first title game appearance in 37 years. A year later, the Jackrabbits overwhelmed MSU 38-19 in a national semifinal game en route to their first FCS national title.
The two met in a regular season game again in Brookings early in 2023 and it was a classic, yet a bitter loss for MSU. The Bobcats led 10-0 at haltime and held a 16-13 lead with just 2:04 to play only to see Jackrabbit’ star quarterback Mark Gronowski connect on two long passes, the second of which put SDSU up 20-16 with just 1:30 to go.
Sean Chambers then pieced together a drive that started at MSU’s own 10-yard line down to the SDSU 19. After a false start, Chambers found Clevan Thomas, Jr. for the go-ahead touchdown with just :01 to play. The play went into review and was reversed amid some controversy as replays didn’t appear to show Thomas, Jr. landing out of bounds or bobbling the ball.
That other Dakota State school, NDSU, has been an even bigger thorn in the Bobcats side. MSU has lost all five encounters with the Bison since 2018, all in the playoffs or national title game, although the outcomes have become less one-sided over time. MSU started out losing a second-round game in Fargo in 52-10, then a semifinal game in the same locale the next year 42-14.
In 2021, the team met in the national title game with NDSU taking a 38-10 win. The teams skipped a season before the Bobcats saw a blocked extra-point in overtime hand them a 35-34 loss, followed by last season’s 35-32 loss in the national title game.
That sets the stage for this game between the No. 2 and No. 3 teams in the preseason FCS polls. It’s the first time since 1984 that two teams ranked in the top 3 in the country will play at Bobcat Stadium.
The Bobcats are coming off a title game appearance, while the Jackrabbits lost out in the semifinals, with both teams losing to NDSU. Both teams lost numerous players to graduation and the transfer portal with SDSU losing its head coach Jimmy Rogers, who took over a dozen of his players with him to Washington State.
“We certainly have history with them over the last four years, playing them three times,” MSU head coach Brent Vigen said. “They’ve been at the top. Two-time champion, four-time semifinalist in just the last four years alone.
“They’ve had a lot of turnover this past year with coach Rogers leaving and coach Dan Jackson coming in. A lot of players leaving, but they have a lot of coaches and players returning and a lot of continuity.”
SDSU beat Sacramento State much worse than its 20-3 score indicates. The Jackrabbits failed on fourth down inside the five-yard line early in the game, then missed two field goals later. Defensively, they limited the Hornets to just 131 yards and seven first downs. Quarterback Chase Mason was an efficient 17 of 23 for 190 yards and a touchdown. Running back Julius Loughridge ran 22 times for 159 yards.
“It’s important that we corral Chase Mason,” Vigen said. “Chase is a senior and he’s been in this program. This is his first opportunity to be the guy. Last year he was on the field, and he threw 46 times for about 460 yards. Last week he was impressive, good command and his athleticism showed up as he got out and ran.
“Julius Loughridge is a bigger version of what they’ve had. He had a real successful first day out. At Fordham he rushed for over 3,000 yards and he had over 150 the other night. It’s a mixture, he can certainly go inside-outside.”
This is SDSU’s second trip to Bozeman for the annual Gold Rush game. The last time in 2017, MSU battled back from a 24-7 deficit with two Chris Murray touchdown passes to make it 24-21 and forced SDSU to attempt a field goal with just over four minutes to play. That’s when one of the biggest plays in the series turned control over to the Jackrabbits. Expecting to get the ball back down 27-21 with a chance to win the game with a touchdown, the Bobcats were caught off guard when kicker Chase Vinatieri took the snap and sprinted 31 yards for a touchdown and a 31-21 lead. MSU would get a touchdown with 1:59 to play but couldn’t get the ball back.
“We’re really looking forward to a chance to play at home,” Vigen said. “Gold Rush is always a scene. It’s an event and beyond that it’s going to be a tremendous game.
“The Oregon game wasn’t going to make or break us,” Vigen said. “We gotta right the ship and a game like this is really going to help us sort out who we are. It’s our hope that our performance against Oregon isn’t who we are.”
Like 2023, the expectations for this game are high. The winner will have the inside track to a vital top two seed, which ensures homefield advantage throughout the playoffs until the championship game. Game time is set for 6:00 at Bobcat Stadium.
