Game Preview

FIRST LOOK: ‘Cats play Governors for first time ever with Final Four bid on the line

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BOZEMAN, Montana — Montana State is entering unchartered territory in the Jeff Choate era. And the Bobcats have a chance to extend a historic season on Friday night in Bozeman.

But advancing to the Final Four of the FCS Playoffs for the first time since 1984 will come with its challenges for the No. 5 Bobcats.

The first challenge will be adjusting to play on Friday night at 6 p.m. The second will be preparing for the first-ever matchup with Austin Peay State, a team in the FCS playoffs for the first time ever.

The Governors have been the surprise team of the postseason so far. The Ohio Valley Conference co-champions thrashed traditional FCS contender Furman 42-6 in the first round. Last week, the Governors went to Sacramento State and jumped all over the No. 4 seed. AP built a 21-0 lead aided by an onside kick in the first quarter and then kept rolling on the way to a 42-28 victory.

“Every single team in this tournament at this point is a really good football team,” Choate said after his team won its second playoff game in as many seasons. “We will have to be ready.”

Montana State head coach Jeff Choate on Saturday December 7, 2019 vs. Albany in the second round of the FCS Playoffs

And the Bobcats will have to be ready a day early. MSU has won one playoff game in each the 2006, 2011, 2012 and 2018 seasons. But Montana State had not posted multiple postseason wins since winning three straight to claim the 1984 Division I-AA national championship. That quest for a postseason winning streak will get underway six days after a 47-21 win over No. 25 Albany to move into the quarterfinals for the first time since 2012.

“I’ve done this a lot, not in recent years but I’ve done this a lot,” Choate said. “When we worked at Boise State (2006-2010), we played every night of the week. All you did was we trained ourselves, this isn’t really Monday. This is Tuesday. We had to make a decision yesterday if we were going to treat Sunday like Monday but we chose not to.

“We felt like with finals this week – that’s the other curveball thrown is not just the short week but our young men preparing for their finals — so we thought it was better for them to have more time on Sunday and do more of our normal Monday today.”

Fifteen years ago, Austin Peay was playing in the non-scholarship Pioneer Football League. Earlier this decade, the Governors were historically bad. AP lost 45 of 46 games, including a 29-game losing streak and an 0-11 season in 2016.

Montana State wide receiver Travis Jonsen (10) looks for space Saturday December 7, 2019 vs Albany in the second round of the FCS Playoffs/by Brooks Nuanez

Four years later, the Govs are on their first playoff run in program history. Led by a senior quarterback, a diverse, multiple offense and a defense that ranks seventh in the country against the run, Austin Peay is one of the hottest teams in America.

“It’s a tough challenge for us. We just flew out 2,000 miles to California, flew back, about enough time to take a shower, get back on the plane and go back out to Montana,” AP first-year head coach Mark Hudspeth said.

“I’m just excited for our players because some of the guys on our team were part of the last team that went 0-11. Now to see them walk out of here with an OVC championship ring and at least two playoff wins is pretty exciting for these young men.”

QUICK HITS

Location: Clarksville, Tennessee (population: 153,205)

Nickname: Governors

Founded: 1927 on a site that has been occupied by a succession of Tennessean educational institutions since 1845, the precursor of the university was established in 1927 and named for then-sitting Governor Austin Peay (further honored with “Governors” as the name of the university’s athletic teams).

Affiliated with the Tennessee Board of Regents, it is now governed by the Austin Peay State University Board of Trustees as of May 2017. The university is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) and, in 2012, was the fastest-growing university in Tennessee. In 2019, Austin Peay officially hit 11,000 students enrolled.

Enrollment: 10,723 students, including 9,835 undergraduates and an endowment of $22million.

Stadium: Fortera Stadium opened in 1946. The 10,000-seat venue has been known as Municipal Stadium and Governors Stadium over the last 73 years. The field was most recently renovated in 2015, the second renovation this decade. The first came in 2004 when the school officially purchased the stadium from the city of Clarksville.

The Govenors averaged 6,780 fans in seven home games this season. Montana State is averaging 17,747 fans in seven home games this season. MSU drew 12,947 last week for its second-round win over Albany.

The Coach: Mark Hudpseth, first year at Austin Peay. The former North Alabama and University of Louisiana head coach has taken the reigns on a startling turnaround at Austin Peay.

Will Healy, a 34-year-old rising starts in the coaching business and the head coach at Charlotte, was the head coach for the Governors during a losing streak that reached 29 games by the beginning of the 2017 season. The longest losing skid in Division I included an 0-11 campaign in Healy’s first at the helm. AP lost 45 of 46 games between 2012 and 2016.

Austin Peay won eight of its last 10 games to finish 8-4 that season, including a program record seven wins in the Ohio Valley. The lone league loss came to Jacksonville State, the only playoff team from that league that season.

After last season, Healy left for a $700,000 annual payday and Hudspeth took over. The veteran head coach — he won 95 games before taking over for the Governors — has led Austin Peay to new heights. The 11 wins marks a school record. The tie for the league championship marks the first as a Division I member and the third in school history. Hudspeth was the Ohio Valley Coach of the Year this season.

A 42-6 win over Furman in the first round of the playoffs and a resounding upset win by a score of 42-28 last week at No. 4 Sacramento State have the Governors farther along in the postseason than ever before.

Hudspeth played at Delta State (Mississippi) in the early 1990s, starting at safety as a junior and quarterback as a senior. He started his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Central Arkansas in 1992 before Rick Rhoades’ staff as the wide receivers coach at Nicholls State in 1994.

Hudspeth returned to his high school alma mater in 1996, leading Winston Academy from a program that produced one win in the previous two seasons to a 25–1 record in his two seasons and the 1997 Mississippi Private School Association Class A state title.

That helped him earn a shot as the defensive backs coach at UCA in 1998 and a gig as the offensive coordinator at Delta State in 1999. He was the offensive play-caller at Navy in 2001 before taking his first college head coaching job at North Alabama in 2002.

At UNA, he led a program that won three straight Division II national titles in the mid-1990s to the semifinals of the Division II playoffs in 2003, 2005 and 2008. North Alabama won at least 10 games in five of Hudspeth’s seven seasons and posted a 66-21 record overall.

Hupspeth took over as the head coach at Louisiana Lafayette of the Sun Belt Conference in 2011. That season, he led the Ragin’ Cajuns to a 9-4 record and a berth in the New Orleans Bowl, the first bowl bid in program history. Louisiana defeated San Diego State for the first bowl win in school history.

However, in 2015 Louisiana–Lafayette vacated eight wins including their New Orleans Bowl victory due to alleged major NCAA violations. Hudspeth lead Lafayette to the New Orleans Bowl four more times, with wins in 2012 and 2014. But results from the 2011-2014 seasons were vacated. The Cajuns fired Hudspeth at the end of the 2017 season.

“He was a very successful coach there,” Choate said. “In fact, I’m actually kind of scratching my head as to why they made a change. He had a really good run there and really was critical in them taking the next step in their program, building some new facilities, taking them to multiple bowl games.

He spent 2018 as the assistant head coach and tight ends coach at Mississippi State under Dan Mullen.

“He has a really good reputation as an offensive coach, spent some time in the SEC at Mississippi State and has really reinvigorated and revitalized this Austin Peay program. There is a renewed emphasis on football there and you can see that.”

In his career, Hudspeth is 106-63, including 4-1 in Bowl games. He has led his teams to shares of four conference titles 10 seasons of nine wins or more in 15 years as a head coach.

THE OFFENSE – Players to watch

Javaughn Craig, quarterback, 6-2, 210, senior — The Ohio Valley’s first-team all-conference quarterback lost each of the last two seasons to injuries. When Ohio Valley Preseason Offensive Player of the Year Jeremiah Oatsvall went down with what ended up being a season-ending injury, Craig took over and flourished.

Oatsvall threw for 2,779 yards and 27 touchdowns in two seasons as Austin Peay’s starter, earning OVC Freshman of the year honors in 2017. He also rushed for 970 yards and 12 TDs.

Craig has almost matched those numbers in 13 starts this season. The dual-threat from Chattanooga, Tennessee has thrown for 3,035 yards and 27 touchdowns. He has also rushed for 731 yards and nine more scores.

“He’s the guy who makes the whole thing go,” Choate said. “They get everything going through him with the plus-1 run game. They have what we call punch read, power read with the quarterback. A lot of it is triple option-esque even if it’s not what you think of as triple option. There’s always options in the play and that’s tough to plan for.”

He threw for 264 yards and three scores in Austin Peay’s 42-6 win over Furman in the first round of the FCS Playoffs. Last week in the 42-28 blasting of Sac State, Craig threw for 204 yards and two scores while rushing 12 times for 164 yards and a touchdown.

In his career, Craig has rushed for thrown for 3,813 and 33 touchdowns. He has rushed for 1,599 yards and 18 scores, averaging 6.1 yards per carry.

DeAngelo Wilson, wide receiver, 5-8, 165, junior — The small but speedy native of Bowling Green, Kentucky emerged as one of the Governors’ big-play threats last season. He averaged 17.1 yards per catch, hauling in 28 balls for 478 yards and seven touchdowns.

This season, he earned second-team All-Ohio Valley honors after catching 83 passes for 1,446 yards and 14 touchdowns. He has six 100-yard outings, including an eight-catch, 132-yard outburst that included a 40-yard touchdown last week against Sac State. He has caught at least one touchdown in 10 different games.

“I feel the pain of teams that have to prepare for us because there is a lot of similarities in what they do and what we do on the offensive side of the ball. They have a lot of variety in their run game. They have a ton of different formations, a lot of different people handling the ball. You can get your eyes mixed up in a hurry and it can be very, very challenging. You combined that with the level of personnel they have and it’s interesting.”

Kentel Williams, running back, 6-0, 190, senior — The Knoxville, Tennessee native earned first-team All-Ohio Valley honors for the second straight season this fall. The 2018 Associated Press third-team All-American followed up on that by surpassing 1,000 all-purpose yards for the third time in his career.

This season, Williams has rushed for 886 yards on 168 carries (5.3 yards per carry) and 11 touchdowns. He has caught 32 passes for 326 yards and three more scores.

In his career, Williams has 2,819 rushing yards and is averaging a robust 6.2 yards per carry. He has scored 24 rushing touchdowns. He also has 63 catches for 628 yards and five receiving touchdowns.

“I think he is excellent not only as a running back but as a punt returner,” Choate said.

THE DEFENSE – Players to watch

Kordell Jackson, defensive back, 5-11, 163, junior — In the FCS, only Elon’s Greg Liggs Jr. has more interceptions than Jackson’s seven picks this season. And that’s with Jackson not having a pick for four games in a row.

The native of Birmingham, Alabama has taken three of the interceptions back for touchdowns and has 159 overall return yards this season.

The first-team All-Ohio Valley selection has seven tackles for loss among his 43 tackles. He has 35 solo stops.

“I thought last week, there was a team speed advantage for us against Albany,” Choate said. “I don’t think that exists this week. They have athletic guys who make plays on the ball.”

Josephus Smith, defensive tackle, 5-8, 285, junior — In his first year in the starting lineup, the portly interior defensive lineman has been a headache for opposing offenses.

The first-team all-conference selection had at least two tackles for loss in seven games during the regular-season, including a season high 3.5 against Murray State. He has not notched a tackle for loss in the playoff and did not have any stat against Sac State. But he still has 19.5 tackles for loss, the 12th most in the country.

He has 48 tackles, 7.5 sacks and a fumble recovery this season.

“”They are very stout and hard to move on the interior of their defensive line,” Chaote said. “I really like their inside linebackers, No. 10 (Pat Walker) and No. 18 (Jack McDonald). They are faster, more athletic but maybe not as big (both are 6-foot, 210) but maybe not as big as guys we have played in recent weeks. They are faster and more athletic and that’s a theme of this team.”

Juantarius Bryant, safety, 5-10, 205, redshirt senior — The former walk-on from Nashville earned second-team All-OVC honors in 2018 and a first-team all-league nod this season.

The hard-hitting box safety has made at least eight tackles in six different games. He has 98 total tackles, the second-most on the Governors, including 55 solo tackles and 1.5 tackles for loss. He has also broken up four passes.

Photos by Austin Peay Athletics or Brooks Nuanez and Jason Bacaj. All Rights Reserved.

About Colter Nuanez

Colter Nuanez is the co-founder and senior writer for Skyline Sports. After spending six years in the newspaper industry with stops at the Missoulian, the Ellensburg Daily Record and the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, the former Washington Newspaper Association Sportswriter of the Year and University of Montana Journalism School graduate ('09) has cultivated a deep passion for sports journalism during his 13-year career covering the Big Sky Conference. In August of 2014, Colter and brother Brooks merged their passions of writing and art to found Skyline Sports.

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