MISSOULA — When Brady Gustafson went down and Chad Chalich took over for the first time in 2015, the bubble screens became more prevalent but Montana’s offense largely looked the same.
Two years later, Montana head coach Bob Stitt and his coaching staff practiced something that has become old hat with two weeks left in Stitt’s third season. The Griz prepared a backup, or in this case, third and fourth-string quarterbacks with the No. 9 team in the FCS coming to Washington-Grizzly Stadium for a crucial Big Sky Conference tilt.
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Unlike when Chalich, and later Makena Sims, guided Montana in 2015 while Gustafson was on the shelf with a broken leg, this time the Grizzlies emerged with a whole new look. Stitt and company prepared junior Caleb Hill, a 6-foot-4 southpaw who joined UM from the junior college ranks in the off-season, as the starter with a specific design for Simis, a now-hulking senior who has spent most of the last two seasons playing H wide receiver.
On the first series against NAU, Montana drew a false start flag. Immediately after, Hill failed to look to the sideline to get the new call from Stitt, the coach said following the game. On the next series, the Griz inserted Simis. The offense proceeded to evolve from Stitt’s lauded up-tempo spread system into a throwback offense filled with zone read option plays and designed quarterback runs.
Simis, who last played quarterback for an extended stretch during a game in UM’s 33-27 overtime win at Idaho State in 2015, looked much more like a power run quarterback in the form of Tim Tebow than like the sophomore who tied a school record with six touchdown passes in his first career start against North Dakota in 2015.
The fifth-year senior moved to 3-1 as Montana’s primary quarterback in his career by helping lead the Griz to a 17-15 victory that Stitt called “gritty” on multiple occasions following the win over the Big Sky-leading Lumberjacks.
“He did exactly what we asked him to do,” Montana quarterbacks’ coach Andrew Selle said. “It was the type of game we knew that offensively, we knew we had to do just enough and we had to help our defense out with the way our defense was playing. Makena did a great job of what we were asking him to do.
“And just the fire, the tenacity he plays with. You can see it on the field that he willed that offense to go.”
The ability to adjust on the fly, especially after the first quarter ejection of NAU All-American quarterback Case Cookus on a targeting flag, helped Montana move into a desirable position. If the Griz can win their home finale against Northern Colorado on Saturday and beat rival Montana State in Bozeman in two weeks, UM will have an 8-3 record and solidify a spot in the FCS playoffs.
“We proved we can be multiple identities, which is really important,” Simis said before Wednesday’s practice. “We can shift identities if we need to. It just builds confidence. The more of those things you can be able to adapt to and overcome, we are feeling pretty confident right now.
“It’s a plus for us to have two different styles of offense,” added Stitt. “It proves to us that we can go in and run the ball at people, especially with a weapon like Makena now. We can use him in the open field and not just as a plus-10 (goal line) type thing.
“With Makena at 235 pounds, I think it’s a weapon and I think it’s difficult for a defensive coordinator to prepare for both.”
The Boise native showed his physical development — the 6-foot-2 former and reemerged gunslinger put on 20 pounds in the off-season to tip the scale at 235 pounds — rushing for 101 yards on 19 bruising carries to help Montana win a game despite the absence of talented freshman quarterback Gresch Jensen, who missed the game because of a concussion suffered against Weber State.
“Offensively and as a whole team, Coach (Stitt) talks about it all the time, you are going to take on the personality of your quarterback,” Selle said. “When you have a guy out there that is being tenacious and running guys over, the guys will rally around that.”
Jensen has been the starter for the duration of Montana’s Big Sky schedule after taking over for senior Reese Phillips, a former Kentucky transfer who suffered a gruesome leg injury in Montana’s non-conference schedule. The Griz initially prepared Hill as the starter but those plans changed after three plays with the lefty operating the offense.
“Makena has a lot of leadership ability,” Stitt said during his weekly press conference on Monday. “He’s been here a long time and guys appreciate what he’s all about. We knew that putting Makena on the field… everybody was going to rally and play harder. We knew offensively, they were going to do that, we knew defensively, we were going to do that because of how they feel about him.”
Simis himself admitted that going back to playing quarterback for a crucial conference game felt “weird.” He said the most challenging part was calling out pass protections before the snap — he completed 6-of-15 passes to go with his 19 carries — but he said adhering to the run-first game plan felt “natural.”
“I was rusty throwing for sure,” Simis said. “In practice, I was doing really well throwing the ball but when it comes game time and the guys are actually trying to hit you when you are stepping up and moving around in the pocket, yeah I was (rusty) and that was frustrating at times but it had been two years so I couldn’t have expected too much out of the passing game.
“Having not thrown that much, my shoulder motion probably wasn’t as fluid as it needed to be and it was a little sore throughout the week.”
Simis has proven to be a capable thrower, like his six-touchdown performance in his debut on homecoming to lead UM to a 42-17 win over North Dakota two years ago. He will take reps at quarterback this week in practice but the Griz are optimistic that Jensen will be able to pass concussion protocol and play this week against UNC.
“We’re hoping it’s Gresch,” Stitt said on the Big Sky coaches’ teleconference on Wednesday morning. “He got out there and threw the ball around a little bit (Tuesday). We definitely, we want Gresch to be the guy. Makena’s got his stuff and Caleb’s definitely can go both ways with both packages. You definitely want to be back to scoring points.”
Montana’s season reached tenuous territory when UM fell behind 31-0 in the first half of a 41-27 loss at No. 14 Weber State. The Griz turned the ball over five times, giving the hosts a short fields on a handful of occasions.
Simis said he thought his team turned a corner by winning the second half 21-7, however, then carried that mindset into the NAU game. Now the Griz will try to send Simis and his 15 senior classmates out on a high note with a win in their home finally, a win that would bring UM one step closer to securing an FCS playoff berth and potentially one more home game.
“It doesn’t even seem real right now that this is the last regular season game,” Simis said. “Hopefully, if we can win out, we can have another one here in the playoffs. At this point in the season, you just really have to start soaking things up and enjoying every second because time is limited.”
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