Montana State head coach Jeff Choate has strived all season to lead Montana State to what he calls a “program-defining victory”. Time and again in 2017, the Bobcats have come up short.
On Saturday in Flagstaff against yet another Top 25 opponent, Choate’s Bobcats had its best chance yet. And a victory could’ve spoiled revered longtime Northern Arizona head coach Jerome Souers’ final home game in his 20 years at the helm. MSU came literally two yards short of the victory it covets.
Behind a powerful rushing attack that totaled 300 yards and an opportunistic defensive effort that kept the score close, MSU engaged in its first shootout of the two years under Choate’s direction. With 32 seconds left, sophomore Chris Murray hit sophomore Kevin Kassis for a 21-yard touchdown to cut the host’s advantage to 37-36.
Choate and his staff elected to go for two points. Murray rolled to his right after being flushed by Damahny Whittle. He fired a throw to freshman running back Troy Andersen that fell no good. Montana State attempted an on-side kick that NAU recovered. The Lumberjacks escaped with a 37-36 victory in front of 6,187 fans on Saturday night at Walkup Skydome.
Montana State senior running back Nick LaSane
The win boosts Northern Arizona to 6-1 in Big Sky Conference play, 7-3 overall with a showdown at rival Southern Utah looming next week. SUU posted a 47-27 win at UC Davis to move to 6-1 in league play, 8-2 overall.
The loss drops Montana State to 4-3 in league play, essentially eliminating the Bobcats from the league title race. MSU enters its rivalry game with Montana in Bozeman with a 4-6 overall record.
The Bobcats battled throughout this coaching staff’s first trip to Flagstaff thanks to a dominant run game paced by a breakout performance from senior running back Nick LaSane. The much maligned bruiser ripped off a 74-yard gain on the second play of the second half before getting chased down on the goal line. The next play, he punched in a one-yard touchdown to give MSU a 23-16 lead.
That touchdown sparked a back-and-forth between one of the Big Sky’s most explosive passing offenses in NAU and one of the league’s most diligent and dedicated rushing attacks in MSU. Behind sophomore quarterback Case Cookus, NAU answered with two 10-play drives, the first capped by Cookus’ 7-yard rope to Chancellor Brewington and the second finished by Cookus’ four-yard touchdown run.
Murray threw a 36-yard touchdown pass off a play-action fake to Jabarri Johnson to tie the game at 30 with 13:18 to play. The scoring toss was Murray’s second of the game. He finished 12 of 19 for 155 yards. He also rushed 16 times for 85 yards, giving him 1,025 yards this season. He is one of only three Big Sky quarterbacks, joining Portland State’s Connor Kavanaugh (1,060 yards) in 2011 and Cal Poly’s Chris Brown (1,265 in 2014 and 1,084 yards in 2015) to rush for 1,000 yards.
Murray scored a 20-yard touchdown to stake MSU to a 7-3 lead and a 25-yard touchdown to give Montana State a 14-10 advantage with 41 seconds before halftime. But NAU answered with Joe Logan’s 75-yard touchdown run. On the ensuing point-after try, MSU blocked the kick and Bryson McCabe scooped it up before racing 98 yards to take the score to halftime tied 16-16.
Montana State’s attention now turns fully to rival Montana with simply a chance to ruin the Grizzlies’ playoff aspirations on the line.
