BOZEMAN, Montana — When Jay Hill’s Wildcats got the snot knocked out of them in Missoula by the Grizzlies late in the 2019 season, Weber State’s head coach said he looked forward to a rematch with Montana.
Weber got one a few weeks later and earned payback, posting a 17-10 win over UM to advance to the semifinals of the FCS playoffs for the first time in school history.
Hill was emotional following his team’s 43-38 loss at Montana State on October 22 of this year. He didn’t mention a rematch.
But no one could’ve blamed him for hoping his team got one. And the Wildcats do get another shot at MSU, although it is a round or two earlier in the playoffs than most would’ve predicted when No. 3 Montana State beat No. 5 Weber State five weeks ago.
On Saturday, the Big Sky Conference champion Bobcats host the Wildcats at Bobcat Stadium in a matchup between the fourth seed in the FCS playoffs and the ninth-ranked team in the nation. Both teams are 10-win squads — MSU is 10-1 while WSU is 10-2 — and each has had playoff success in recent years; Weber went to the Final Four in 2019, as did MSU while the Bobcats raced all the way to the FCS national title game last fall.
Weber State earned the rematch by jolting to a 24-0 first half lead against North Dakota before hanging on for a 38-31 victory.
MSU is riding an eight-game winning streak capped by a 55-21 blowout of rival Montana to sew up its first league title since 2012. Montana State’s first playoff game of Brent Vigen’s second campaign comes against one of the best teams in the country.
“There’s some benefit to the familiarity and understanding they have the same familiarity on their side as well having played each of the last two years,” Vigen said. “The way that game played out, I assume they see themselves differently here in December and I know we do as well.
“You look back on that game certainly with a different lens than you look at with any other opponent. You try to look at the things we do well and the things we allowed team to do well and you try to correct as much as you can.”
Kickoff from Bobcat Stadium is scheduled for 1 p.m. MST. Weber State is 6-5 under Hill in the playoffs and 8-7 overall. Montana State is 3-1 in the FCS Playoffs under Vigen and are 12-10 all time in the post-season
WEBER STATE FOOTBALL
NICKNAME: Wildcats
LOCATION: Ogden, Utah
FOUNDED: 1889
ENROLLMENT: 26,681
FAMOUS ALUMNI: Damian Lillard, point guard; Ben Howland, basketball coach; David Kennedy, former Secretary of the Treasury
LAST MEETING: Montana State emerged with a 43-38 victory over previously undefeated Weber thanks in part to four Grant Sands snaps out of the back of the end-zone, resulting in safeties and two points for the Bobcats.
HEROES & SCAPEGOATS – Mellott’s record day overshadowed by errant snaps in insane Top 5 shootout
THE COACH
Jay Hill (ninth year at Weber State, 64-37)
Over nearly a decade at Weber State, Hill has engineered one of the biggest turnarounds in the FCS. The Wildcats were 2-10 in his first season and haven’t been under .500 since. The rebuild peaked with three-straight double-digit win seasons from 2017 to 2019 and an FCS semifinal appearance in the latter of those.
Weber State was 5-1 in the COVID spring season to claim a fourth Big Sky title in five years, but lost in the first round of the playoffs, and slipped to 6-5 against a tough schedule in 2021. Hill has brought the Wildcats back to the very top of the FCS again in 2022, with an eye-opening blowout of FBS Utah State in non-conference and three straight conference wins before the setback at Montana State. WSU’s other loss this season came at Sacramento State, so the Wildcats lost to the only two teams in the Big Sky that didn’t lose.
PLAYERS TO WATCH – OFFENSE
QB Bronson Barron (6-3, 215, So.)
Barron has a great arm and has stepped forward this year. He’s thrown for 2,447 yards, 20 touchdowns and just seven interceptions so far this season.
RB Dontae McMillan (5-11, 190, So.)
The Wildcats have plenty of backs in the stable with Damon Bankston and former All-American Josh Davis. McMillan is the home-run hitter with 60 yards per carry and eight rushing touchdowns, although Bankston averages 5.8 yards per carry and has 693 rushing yards compared to McMillan’s 745.
McMillan surpassed 100 yards against Montana (100) and Idaho State (139), while Bankston and Davis both went over 100 yards last week against UND. Davis had 21 carries for 129 yards and two touchdowns last week. If that production is sustainable, WSU has three elite running backs, each who are a threat to surpass the century mark at any time. And it’s feasible that multiple could do it in the same game, just like last week, for an offense averaging 200 yards per game on the ground.
WR Ty McPherson (6-0, 190, Sr.)
The second-team All-Big Sky selection finished eighth in the league in catches (53), third in yards (941) and second in touchdowns with 10 scoring grabs.
PLAYERS TO WATCH – DEFENSE
KR Abraham Williams, 6-1, 170, sophomore
The speedster from nearby Salt Lake City has four kick returns for touchdowns this season, each one for 100 yards. He’s just the second player in NCAA history with at least four kickoff returns for touchdowns of triple digits. One of those came against Montana State. His four total kickoff returns for touchdowns are a single-season record according to the Big Sky Conference media guide. Bashir Levingston (1998) and Jesse Hoffman (2010), each of Eastern Washington, held the previous Big Sky record of three KR TDs in one season.
CB Eddie Heckard, 5-10, 195, Jr.
The demonstrative Heckard was a two-time returning first-team all-Big Sky player entering the season and now a three-time first-team all-league selection following this year. He’ll have a real shot at earning first-team all-league honors four times by the time his career is over.
LB Winston Reid, 6-1, 230, Jr.
Twitter had a few former and current Wildcats clamouring that Reid deserved Defensive Player of the Year honors. He has 101 tackles, 11 tackles for loss and four sacks plus four forced fumbles, a fumble recovery and an interception so far this season.
