BOZEMAN, Montana — The Bobcats have long been built from the inside out.
Montana State has a rich history of strong play along both the offensive and defensive fronts.
The Bobcats have been particularly consistent along the offensive front during the 21st century. Part of that stems from the fact that Mike Kramer, a head coach credited with restoring upward trajectory to the program and snapping the streak against the rival, was a former standout offensive lineman himself.
“The Bobcats wanna run the ball, they wanna lean on the front,” said Eastern Washington head coach Aaron Best, who played offensive line under Kramer in the late 1990s when Kramer was the head coach at Eastern. “They’re built from the front back as always. You gotta win along the lines of scrimmage to beat them.”
Kramer hired Jason McEndoo, who went on to become the longest tenured and most beloved assistant coach in school history. A starter Washington State’s 1998 Rose Bowl team, McEndoo coached under Kramer for 2003 until 2006 before working for Rob Ash from 2007 until 2014.
Coach “Mac” mentored a variety of some of the best offensive linemen in school history. Brent Swaggert and John Weidenaar were two of the most durable offensive tackles in Big Sky Conference history. Jeff Bolton won the Rimington Award as the top center in the country while Jeff Hansen was a multiple time All-American. J.P. Flynn competed on a couple of NFL practice squads. Mike Person played nine seasons in the NFL.
Of all the things that ailed Montana State when Ash was let go following a 54-35 loss to rival Montana in Bozeman in November of 2015, the offensive line was far down the list of issues for Bobcat football.
MSU has had three offensive line coaches since McEndoo. Jason Eck, now the head coach at Idaho, spent the 2015 season working with a veteran group that clearly missed Mac, yet still saw Weidenaar earn All-American status.
Brian Armstrong coached the offensive line in 2016 before moving to offensive coordinator. Josh Taufalele took over for two seasons before leaving coaching, giving way to Armstrong’s return to coaching the position group.
Despite Montana State’s lauded offensive line recent history, former head coach Jeff Choate still put a huge priority on stacking the position group with talent. In 2019, the Bobcat offensive line featured Mitch Brott, a 50-game starter who broke Swaggert and Weidenaar’s school record in that category, plus Conner Wood, Taylor Tuiasosopo, Lewis Kidd and Zach Redd, all starters from their redshirt freshman years. All but Brott were Choate recruits.
Wood ended up transferring to Missouri last spring. Redd retired from football with a year of eligibility remaining, which would’ve been last fall. Tuiasosopo graduated after consecutive all-league campaigns as a physical offensive guard guard. Kidd is now on the active roster for the New Orleans Saints. And T.J. Session, who started when healthy last season, transferred to Cal in the off-season.
That’s all to say the talent along Montana State’s offensive front over the last handful of years has been surpassed by very few FCS programs, North Dakota State the first one that jumps to the top of mind. So, when second-year head coach Brent Vigen says he and his staff expect this year’s unit — a conglomeration of sophomores and freshmen that includes a converted defensive lineman and a 6-foot walk-on center — will be better than last year’s unit before the first game of the season, it gets your attention.
And now those offensive linemen are, in fact, getting the attention.
The Bobcat’ run game – despite seeing injuries steal their top three tailbacks in All-American Isaiah Ifanse, San Diego State transfer Keagun Williams, junior Lane Sumner and plus backup fullback Jaharie Martin for good measure – has, in fact, been better than last year’s run game in terms of yards per carry and yards per game.
Through three games MSU averages 6.6 yards per rush and 267.3 yards rushing per game. A year ago, those averages came in at 5.2 and 220.9 after a 15-game schedule.
“We’ve felt like this unit has a chance to be better and that’s the expectation,” Vigen said following the McNeese State game. “When is that point when we say, yes, we are better? I hope that’s a couple of games in. We are more athletic, I know that.”
Cut to MSU’s third and most recent game. Vigen continues to see the unit’s growth.
“Three games in, taking a big picture look, you look at it and I think our offensive line has played well,” Vigen said during his weekly press conference on Monday. “I think they’re maturing.”
In the units three games it has far exceeded its opponents per game averages. The Bobcats gained 6.1 yards a pop against McNeese, which is allowing 5.0 in its other two games. Morehead State has allowed 7.2 yards per rush, but MSU was good for 9.4 that day. Last Saturday against an Oregon State team that had allowed just 3.9 yards per carry against Boise State and Fresno State, the Bobcats were good for 5.3.
“It was our hope that at some point during the season, we would say that hey, we have a better offensive line than we previously did,” Vigen said. “And I don’t know if we can quite say that yet. But I think we’re getting there.”
Vigen and Armstrong have a raw, athletic group to work with. Not only does he have a solid core group with sophomore Justus Perkins (6-0, 280) at center; junior Cole Sain (6-4, 290) at right guard and sophomore J.T. Reed (6-3, 288) at left guard; sophomore Rush Reimer (6-5, 300) at left tackle and converted defensive lineman Marcus Wehr (6-2, 291) at right tackle – Vigen also has highly touted redshirt freshman Titan Fleischmann (6-4, 305) and Jacob Kettels (6-4-290) competing for time. Late in fall camp, Fleishman was the starting right tackle and Wehr was ahead of Sain at right guard.
“I think they’re playing with the right amount of confidence,” Vigen said. “I think they’re communicating, I think they’re still on edge knowing that there’s guys behind them that could be put in.”
One of the key cogs in MSU’s revamped line is Wehr, a sophomore out of Billings Central who’s already shown position versatility since flipping to defense. A year ago Wehr was a budding defensive lineman. But that all changed when Vigen came to Wehr after the national championship game. When Wehr went to Vigen’s office he was asked if he’d be interested in moving to the offensive line.
“I’m willing to do whatever to help this team win,” Wehr said. “I think it’s been a good transition for me so far from the spring to the fall. It’s been a grind and there has been some bumps in the road, but I’ve been getting better every day.”
“On offense, you have to be more condensed and more controlled with your motions,” Wehr said. “It’s not like d-line where you are just exploding out when you are reading and know what you are doing. You have to be aggressive on offense to a point.”
The Bobcats had to replace all but Perkins from last year’s starting unit. All but Sain are freshmen and sophomores.
“Every year, you graduate seniors and you have to replace them,” Wehr said. “We are a next man up mentality team and I think what we are doing this year. We just have to get our best five out there. We will have a lot of guys step up and we believe we will be great.
“I think (having for sophomores on the line) is good because we all got here around the same time and we all went through about the same things, grinding through morning practices and lifts. We know each other so well and we have good chemistry together.”
The fresh faces on the line this year have weathered more than meets the eye as they knocked helmets with the MSU defensive line last year as scout team players. A fact not lost Brody Grebe, who has had plenty of experience facing his teammates in practice.
“Some of these other guys on the offensive line had to go against current (Los Angeles Rams defensive end) Daniel (Hardy) and (All-Big Sky defensive end) Amandre (Williams) and (All- Big Sky defensive tackle) Chase (Benson),” Grebe, MSU’s preseason all-conference sophomore defensive end, said in August.
“There aren’t going to be guys in this league that they are going to have to go against every single week as good as the guys we have on our team and we go against them every day. We are just trying to make each other better.”
The Bobcats travel to Cheney, Wash. to take on the Eagles Saturday at 2:00 p.m. Mountain time.
