BOZEMAN — Montana State lost in narrow fashion to a ranked team yet again on Saturday. The 16-14 defeat at the hands of No. 25 Kennesaw State at Bobcat Stadium dropped MSU to 4-5 this season, effectively ensuring the Bobcats will not return to the FCS playoffs for the third straight season.
Yet as Jeff Choate’s second season at the helm winds down, MSU could still have an influence on the league title race and playoff picture. And with a 4-2 mark in Big Sky Conference play, Montana State remains on the fringe of potentially claiming a share of its fourth league title this decade.
First up is a trip to Flagstaff to take on league-leading Northern Arizona. The Lumberjacks fell into a three-way tie for first place at 5-1 in league play after losing 17-15 at Montana last week. NAU All-American sophomore quarterback Case Cookus was ejected for a targeting call early in the first quarter, a key factor in Northern Arizona’s first league loss this season to a Montana team also playing short-handed with fourth string quarterback Makena Simis taking most of the snaps.
An MSU win Saturday at J. Walkup Skydome would move the Bobcats into a tie with NAU in the standings. No. 15 Southern Utah plays at UC Davis this week while No. 14 Weber State, the third 5-1 team, plays at Portland State. The Thunderbirds finish at home against Northern Arizona. Weber’s season finale is in Ogden against Idaho State.
MSU is tied at 4-2 in the standings with Eastern Washington, losers of two straight, along with Sacramento State and rival Montana. MSU lost 31-19 to EWU earlier this year while the Eagles beat Montana 48-41. EWU’s 52-31 win over Sac State is one of the Hornets’ two league losses but Eastern has lost two straight, falling to SUU and Weber in consecutive weeks.
Montana’s other loss came to Weber State two weeks ago before the Griz rallied for the crucial win over NAU. EWU plays at North Dakota before hosting Portland State in its finale. Sac State, who’s league losses are to EWU and NAU, finishes its season with two straight in-state games, the first this weekend at Cal Poly and the second at home against rival UC Davis in the Causeway Classic.
Montana hosts Northern Colorado before playing its regular-season finale at Montana State.
“These last two games remind me of last year’s last two games,” MSU sophomore quarterback Chris Murray, the leading rusher in the Big Sky Conference, said on Wednesday. “We were searching for our first Big Sky win. We needed to get some momentum before Cat-Griz. What’s a better momentum starter for Cat-Griz than going into the No. 1 Big Sky opponent and beating them at their place and coming back home for Cat-Griz? This is a tremendous way to end the regular season. If we take care of our part, some special things will happen for us in the league.”
In Choate’s first season, MSU got off to a 2-1 start only to lose six straight Big Sky contests. The Bobcats ended 2016 on a high note by beating UC Davis the week before a memorable 24-17 win at Montana to keep the Griz out of the playoffs for just the third time since 1993. The Cat-Griz victory helped Montana State carry momentum into the off-season despite a 4-7 record, the worst for the program since an 0-11 campaign in Mike Kramer’s first season in 2000.
“We all know the game in two weeks is an important one,” MSU senior captain Mitch Herbert said. “To get some momentum going into that would be huge and for those younger guys, getting momentum going into the off-season will be important too. But we have to focus on this week first.”
The potential scenarios are seemingly endless but Weber State and either SUU or NAU are the only teams with the possibility of finishing with only one league loss. A 6-2 mark could get MSU a share of the conference crown if other factors fell in their favor regardless of what co-champion earned the Big Sky’s auto-bid into the playoffs.
Montana State will need to win two straight to avoid a third straight losing season after a streak of 14 consecutive winning campaigns ended in 2015. MSU cannot get to the baseline of seven Division I wins this season but depending on how the rest of the top half of the league finishes, the Bobcats could somehow sneak into the playoffs with the league’s automatic bid.
“We are just worried about going 1-0 on Saturday,” Choate said. “We have to focus on a really good football team in a tough environment. I think there’s some similarities to what they do on defense to what we just saw with Kennesaw State. There’s some things we did not do well that we can improve upon.
“As I told the players, the good news is they are kind of like Kennesaw State in some ways. The bad news is they are kind of like Kennesaw State in some ways. We have to put together a really concise plan.”
The stylistic transition will be stark for MSU’s defense. The Bobcats go from an atypical non-conference game in November against a team that runs the triple option back to Northern Arizona’s diverse, explosive attack.
“In typical Big Sky fashion, now you have to flip the script and go back to some normal-type offense,” Gregorak said. “That’s how the Big Sky is. You see a different look and a different picture each week from offenses. We have to flip the script and go down to play a very, very good NAU squad.”
“Their play call list is probably a mile long, especially in the red zone where they run different things,” MSU senior cornerback Bryce Alley said on Wednesday. “If we can capitalize on Case’s small amount of mistakes and make them at worst earn it but get off the field on third down, it will be a rough day for NAU.”
Montana leads the all-time rivalry series against MSU 72-38-5. Since both schools joined the Big Sky as founding members in 1963, UM enjoys a 30-23 advantage. Since Montana State snapped Montana’s 16-game streak in 2002, Montana leads 9-6. The Bobcat win in Missoula last year snapped a three-game losing streak in the rivalry.
“(Cat-Griz) is on our minds because of what it means to Montana but we have to keep it disciplined,” Alley said. “We have probably had this one circled for a long time just like everybody else does but we have to play NAU in a couple of days so we have to worry about them right now. Cat-Griz will come soon.”
Brooks Nuanez contributed to the reporting of this story. Photos by Brooks Nuanez. All Rights Reserved.
