Undefeated Bobcats rolling with ranked Idaho squad coming to town 

Bobcats to host Vandals on national TV Saturday evening 

By Colter Nuanez SKYLINE SPORTS 

BOZEMAN—Ty Okada’s face said it all as Montana State University football exited the frozen tundra of Dana J. Dykehouse Stadium in Brookings, South Dakota on a frigid December day in 2022.  

In head coach Brent Vigen’s first season at the helm, Montana State made an unforgettable if not unlikely run all the way to the 2021 Football Championship Subdivision national championship game. In 2022, MSU proved the surge was no fluke, going undefeated against FCS opponents, including posting an undefeated record in Big Sky Conference play to earn its first league title in 10 years.  

But when that 2022 campaign came to an abrupt and startling end in a 39-18 loss to No. 1 South Dakota State University in the semifinals of the FCS playoffs, the collective mentality of the program shifted.  

“Today, we saw the standard,” said Okada, the captain of the 2022 Bobcats who now plays for the Seattle Seahawks. “South Dakota State is the standard. We know what it takes to win the Big Sky. Now we have to figure out how to grow as a program to compete on that level.” 

Last offseason, Montana State’s rallying cry across the program centered upon using SDSU as a measuring stick and the barometer of a national champion. That’s an apt bar considering the Jackrabbits have now won 29 games in a row, including back-to-back FCS national titles.  

But on Sept. 9, 2023, when MSU lost 20-16 in the final seconds of its Week 2 game at South Dakota State, it seemed to alter the narrative yet again. Montana State was literally a Clevan Thomas toe drag away from slaying the Goliath of the FCS. And it seemed to be a presumption that the two schools would meet for the third year in a row in the postseason.  

Instead, internal turmoil and a kicking calamity tanked the end of the regular season for the Bobcats. MSU lost at University of Idaho a week after the Vandals had lost to their mutually hated rivals, University of Montana. Then for the second time in Vigen’s short tenure as head coach, Montana State was on the wrong end of a meltdown in Missoula. The Grizzlies did whatever they wanted in a 37-7 win that punctuated UM’s first Big Sky title season since 2009 and made sure the Bobcats limped into the playoffs.  

Still, Montana State had yet another opportunity to topple an FCS juggernaut and avenge the heartbreaks of playoff past. When North Dakota State University blocked an extra point in overtime to walk out of Bobcat Stadium with a 35-34 playoff victory, Montana State’s nightmare stretch run to 2023 had an exclamation point.  

That’s all to say that the way Montana State is approaching this season—preaching a “go 1-0 each day” mantra—is much more than a coaching cliché. It’s a rallying cry that Montana State had taken to heart.  

Last season, it seemed like the path to earning a rematch with SDSU was blurred while the projection of a rematch was presumed. This season, Montana State has taken each day as it’s come. Thus far in 2024, the Bobcats have looked like the most dominant team in the Big Sky Conference and perhaps the most complete team in the FCS.  

We’ve talked about it a lot this year: Don’t let your perception dictate your performance,” Vigen said. “You can get caught up in this wave from looking at film or watching scores and looking at stats and come up with a perception of this team isn’t this or that.  

“We have to expect every single team’s best, period.” 

Montana State enters its primetime “Big Sky After Dark” showdown this weekend with an unbeaten record that has been even more impressive if you take a closer look at MSU’s 6-0 start. On Saturday, the Bobcats get a shot at revenge against an upstart Idaho team that is led by former MSU offensive line coach Jason Eck, a charismatic and brash head coach who has the Vandals swashbuckling again after years of lying dormant, either toiling in the FBS ranks or struggling to find footing after returning to the Big Sky Conference in 2018.  

Saturday’s kickoff is scheduled for 8:15 p.m. and the game will be broadcast on ESPN2 nationally from Bozeman.  

MSU has earned six consecutive victories, including its first win over a Football Bowl Subdivision team in nearly 20 years, thanks to a bulldozing run game that has been better than ever despite all sorts of adversity. The Bobcat defense also looks like the best unit on that side of the ball since Okada and Troy Andersen—last week’s NFL Defensive Player of the Week for the Atlanta Falcons—exhausted their eligibility.  

On offense, MSU is averaging 299 rushing yards per game despite mitigating senior quarterback Tommy Mellott’s carries in the run game and having to work behind an ever-evolving offensive line.  

During fall camp, senior All-American center Justus Perkins suffered a high ankle sprain that caused a full reshuffle of the offensive line. Senior Cole Sain, who missed all of 2023 with a neck injury, shifted from right guard to center. Senior Marcus Wehr, the top NFL prospect in the Big Sky Conference, shifted from right tackle to right guard where he’s been even better than his All-American form a year ago.  

Senior JT Reed broke his hand during fall camp and sophomore Burke Mastel got banged up, meaning MSU had to move All-American left tackle Conner Moore to left guard. Sophomore Titan Fleishmann has started all six games at right tackle while redshirt freshman Cedric Jefferson has been a stalwart thus far at left tackle. Reed and Mastel are back while Perkins is expected back this week or next.  

In the backfield, sophomore Scottre Humphrey has blossomed into a starter and freshman Adam Jones might be the Big Sky’s best rookie ball carrier. They’ve carried the bulk of the load with Julius Davis, a former Wisconsin transfer, on the shelf thus far. Humphrey is the Big Sky’s leading rusher by averaging 111 yards per game. He has scored eight touchdowns and is averaging a robust 7.3 yards per carry. Jones, a former three-sport standout at Missoula Sentinel High School who had an offer to pitch at University of Utah before choosing MSU, is averaging nearly 75 yards per contest and 6.6 yards per carry. He has scored five total touchdowns, including a 93-yard rip that helped MSU rally for a 35-31 Aug. 24 win at FBS University of New Mexico.  

Defensively, the dismissal of defensive coordinator Willie Mack Garza and the appointment of Bobby Daly as the defensive play caller has made a world of difference. The headlining unit for the Bobcat defense—MSU plays eight different defensive linemen, three linebackers and six or seven defensive backs in its primary rotation—has been stout, giving up a total of 52 points in six games.  

Skeptics would point to the fact that Montana State’s six wins have come over completely overmatched opponents. New Mexico, Utah Tech, Maine, Mercyhurst, Idaho State and Northern Colorado have a combined record of 9-26 so far this season.  

That strength of schedule takes a huge spike this week as MSU plays an Idaho team that has been in and out of the Top 10 in the FCS rankings so far this season. Idaho is 4-2 with a win at FBS University of Wyoming and coming off a 23-17 win over No. 24 Northern Arizona University.  

“We’re in a position where there’s a fair chance we’re going to get everyone’s best shot,” Vigen said. “I’m pleased with our trajectory, but I feel like we have a ways to go yet. We haven’t ultimately accomplished what we want to accomplish but I think what we have in front of us this year is a team—if we can find a way to get better each week, if we can find a way to by-and-large show up with the same mindset and effort—we’re going to give ourselves a chance to win and be there in the fourth quarter. That’s what you need to be about.” 

Colter Nuanez is the co-founder and managing editor for Skyline Sports, a multimedia online news-gathering outlet founded in 2014. You can find his work at skylinesportsmt.com and you can reach him at Colter.Nuanez@gmail.com