Game Recap

Hornets out-execute Griz in first-ever win at Washington-Grizzly Stadium

on

Bobby Hauck sat in his regular press conference seat — center of the table, Montana Grizzlies logos dotting the backdrop behind him — fidgeting with a red Sharpie and keeping his answers short.

Hauck was at a loss for words after Sacramento State came to Washington-Grizzly Stadium and put up 456 yards in a 28-21 win over No. 5 Montana on Saturday. The Hornets’ two-quarterback system kept the Montana defense baffled and Sac State’s swarming defense, coordinated by former Griz linebacker Andy Thompson, made life hell for the Griz offense all day.

“Yeah, we made some plays,” a dejected Hauck said in the post-game press conference. “It’s just, you know, when you come up short, it’s not good enough.”

Montana’s offense was inconsistent at best and stagnant at worst, as it has been for most of the season save a Week 2 shellacking of Western Illinois.

For the second straight week, redshirt freshman quarterback Kris Brown and the Griz offense to a first-half touchdown. Montana trailed 14-6 at the break before Brown ran for two scores in the third quarter, a 2-yarder and a 23-yarder, to tie the game at 21-21 and give him four rushing touchdowns in two games since becoming the starter.

Brown finished 29 of 36 for 188 yards and ran for 24 yards to go with his two scores — the Bozeman native’s rushing total was incurred by Sac State’s four sacks — but Brown threw a crucial interception during a wild sequence early in the fourth quarter.

Montana sophomore quarterback Kris Brown/ by Blake Hempstead

With the Griz down 28-21, Brian Buschini hit a corkscrewing punt that Sac State returner Marcus Fulcher, battling the spin and the sun, muffed. Levi Janacaro recovered for the Griz at the Hornets’ 16-yard line, but on the very next play Brown, looking for senior all-conference wide out Sammy Akem over the middle in the end zone, threw an interception to lurking Sac State linebacker Marcus Hawkins.

The Grizzlies ran just 12 offensive plays and had two first downs, one of which came on a penalty, the rest of the way. Brown was sacked on consecutive plays on third and fourth down with under a minute left to end it after Montana had been gifted with a fourth down stop thanks to a generous spot.

“Our team is resilient,” Sac State second-year head coach Troy Taylor said. “There were many times where the game could have turned one way or another. We talked about playing through the ebbs and flows.

“Obviously, this is a difficult place to play. … People talked about this place and the energy and the fans and they were in it, they were in it the whole game. So it was a great challenge against a really good team and a really well-coached team, and I just couldn’t be more proud of our guys.”

Sacramento State quarterback Jake Dunniway against Montana/ by Blake Hempstead

If Montana’s offense kept rolling on its same track, so did the Grizzlies’ special teams — which meant they mostly dominated.

Sac State didn’t even bother to return Buschini’s kickoffs, electing to fair catch and take the ball at the 25 rather than deal with the Grizzlies’ ferocious coverage unit.

Garrett Graves had a 41-yard kickoff return and Keelan White had a 31-yard punt return (and a 67-yard touchdown return wiped out by a penalty). By the second half, the Hornets were squibbing their kickoffs, giving the Griz the ball at the 35 or better to remove the risk of a big return.

But Montana could not take advantage, a detriment given the momentum-based style Hauck favors that almost always derives its surges from special teams.

Kevin Macias made both his field-goal tries, including his first make from over 30 yards this season, a 31-yard boot on the final play of the first half. Buschini had a career-long punt of 62 yards, and his punt that handcuffed Fulcher looked likely to be the turning point in the game until Brown’s interception on the very next play.

“When you’re in a one-score game, every play’s a key situation,” Hauck said. “It’s a shame we gave the ball back to them there after making that good play by our coverage team. You know, they couldn’t handle our kicking game stuff, it was outlandish, but we have not been able to capitalize. You get presented opportunities in games to either do or don’t, and they did more than we did.”

But the most mystifying facet of Montana’s loss was the defense. In season-opening wins over Washington, Western Illinois and Cal Poly, they looked like possibly the best unit in the country, a mind-bending amalgam of speed and intensity that brought pressure from everywhere, swarmed to the ball and overwhelmed offenses with effort and energy.

Against Sacramento State on Saturday, the Griz defense looked like a dying star, all that energy used up in their supernova start to the season.

Facing a Sacramento State offense that played a lot of two-back formations and two quarterbacks consistently in an attempt to keep an extra blocker in the backfield, Montana got home for just one sack and four tackles for loss. That’s about one-fourth of its normal production.

Jake Dunniway threw for 227 yards and three touchdowns for Sacramento State, including two highlight-reel scores to Jared Gipson. He led the Hornets on a drive to open the game that kept the Hornets in the league for the duration of the historic win.

Sac State quarterback Jake Dunniway with an option pitch against Montana on Saturday/ by Blake Hempstead

Asher O’Hara, the other half of Sacramento State’s quarterback platoon, completed 8 of 9 passes for 75 yards and ran 17 times for a team-high 72 yards along with an acrobatic touchdown on which he took a hit at the goal line and flipped into the end zone.

“We knew how active and tough (Montana’s defense was), and that they were going to bring it all four quarters,” Dunniway said. “But, you know, I have 100% confidence in each one of my O-linemen. They played a hell of a game, first and foremost. And then on the perimeter, we knew that we could attack their secondary and, you know, establish the run.”

After Montana went three-and-out on the possession following Brown’s interception on the goal line, the Hornets killed six minutes of clock with an 11-play, 52-yard drive that ended with Dunniway getting called short of the marker on a fourth-and-1 quarterback sneak. That gave Montana just two minutes, 11 seconds to try to respond, and the Grizzlies couldn’t.

Sacramento State finished 9 of 15 on third downs, a situation that Montana’s early-season defense dominated (although, name a situation they didn’t).

The troubling drop off — Montana’s defense has now given up 10 touchdowns in the last three games after surrendering just two in three games to start the season — could be the result of injuries and attrition. Defensive ends Joe Babros and De’Ari Todd and safety Gavin Robertson returned to the lineup Saturday, but their multiple-week absences stretched Montana’s depth. 

Babros, Todd and senior defensive end Justin Belknap all went in and out of the lineup, as did defensive tackle Eli Alford with what appeared to be cramps during a mid-October day in which temperatures hovered in the low to mid-70s.

Also unhelpful was the fact that, for the fourth time in six games, Montana’s defense faced more plays than the opposition Saturday, with a margin of 82 to 65 in the Hornets’ favor. That disparity has certainly limited UM’s ability to get into an offensive rhythm.

Defensive tackle Eli Alford and Todd were among multiple Grizzlies to go down with what looked like cramps in the second half.

Sac State quarterback Jake Dunniway jukes Montana linebacker Jace Lewis/ by Blake Hempstead

It might just be that it’s impossible to maintain early-season intensity through the grind and nagging injuries of multiple months — a problem for Montana’s flying 3-3-5 defense, which is uniquely built to rely on that intensity.

Whatever it is, the defense, source of Montana’s early invincibility, now looks ominously vulnerable.

Hauck didn’t offer many theories as to why in the postgame press conference. Then again, he didn’t say all that much about anything else either.

“It was good by them. Not as good by us,” Hauck said. “I thought we had a good week of preparation. I like our football team. I like our toughness, I like our effort level, I like our competitiveness. … We were focused all week long and into the game, and we just have to play better.”

Photos by Blake Hempstead. All Rights Reserved.

About Andrew Houghton

Andrew Houghton grew up in Washington, DC. He graduated from the University of Montana journalism school in December 2015 and spent time working on the sports desk at the Daily Tribune News in Cartersville, Georgia, before moving back to Missoula and becoming a part of Skyline Sports in early 2018.

Recommended for you