Round 3 games on 12/10-11/21: (For what it's worth, Sagarin predicted winning margin shown) 3-1/17-3
For fans of FCS football, this is a huge weekend of potentially great games. Hope the Bears are getting to watch these and study what the top teams look like.
Friday: Montana (Big Sky, 10-2) @ James Madison (4) (CAA, 11-1) - 6pm, ESPN2
Dukes win 28-6. Play either ETSU at home in semi-finals next week or hit the road to North Dakota State. JMU piled up 492 yards offense vs Bobcats who could only manage 302. JMU looked like a team ready to move up to FBS. Montana lost at least 5 players during the game.....their QB and top WR went out early which crimped their offense and they lost 3 players on one punt return when two tacklers missed the runner and collided and on the same play another tackler hit the runner while on the ground n was called for targeting. JMU scored like 5 plays later to seal the win.
Saturday: East Tennessee State (Southern, 11-1) @ North Dakota State (20) (MVFC, 11-1) - 11am, ESPN
Bisons wins 27-3. NDSU had the most conservative game plan I have seen in a long time.....defense, dominate LOS and run the ball. Awfully good o-line....missing 3 starters including center but looked like never a beat missed. I suspect our o-line compares in size to them but NDSU is really good blocking and moving on sweeps, screens and the like plus double teams inside. Just pounded ETSU for three quarters then pounded them some more in Q4. NDSU had 401 in total offense with 278 rush.....ETSU could only manage 165 total with 66 rush. I can see where ETSU could be tough against a normal good FCS defense. Now Bisons get to host JMU next week. This game will be a FBS caliber game at CUSA or Sunbelt level or better.
Surprisingly, the attendance looked way off....usually the Fargo Dome is packed. Dome holds 19,000 and box score shows attendance at only 11,800.....maybe deer hunting and another team playing in-state....
South Dakota State (10) (MVFC, 10-3) @ Villanova (CAA, 10-2) - 1pm, ESPN+
Jackrabbits win in Philly by 35-21. Very strong road win. Wildcats scored with less than a minute to go in first half on a 55-yard bomb to take 21-14 lead at break. That is the last they would score. SDSU piled up 418 yards of offense, including 266 rushing, while Nova gained a respectable 378 with 271 through the air. Opposite offense approaches...run gain wins again. A couple oddities in the game.....SDSU's leading rusher ran for 119 while Nova's top receiver also tallied 119. Also, both placekickers had first name of "Cole" and both punters had a longest punt of 46. Nova had two fumbles losing one and Rabbits had none...each team threw one interception. SDSU had about 8 more minutes of possession time. Nova only had 5 2nd half possessions with one punt from their 31, the next with a 10-yard punt from their 39, then a turnover on downs, then two drives deeper into SDSU territory that ended with an INT and a lost fumble.
Montana State (Big Sky, 10-2) @ Sam Houston State (7) (AQ7, 11-0) - 7:30pm, ESPN+
Bobcats win 42-19. Bobcats with a stifling defense and a productive offensive show helped by a couple of INTs jumped out to a 28-0 lead midway in Q2 and had held Sam to 3 yards rush and about 40 passing. SHS finally pulled off a long 14-play 75-yard drive to score at 1:28 in half to narrow half time lead to 28-6 (2pt conversion failed). Kats held MSU and got the ball back with about 30 seconds on the clock but could get beyond the MSU 40. Bobcats total offense in H1 was 166, 101 rush, and Kats was 146, 93 rushing. Sam scored on an QB Eric Schmid 1-yard run. MSU scored first on a 75-yard drive, then a 1 play 31 yd drive with a TD pass after an INT, then a 10-play 55-yard drive and finally a 3-play 3-yard drive after another INT returned 28 yards to the Sam 3.
H2 started with early long 60-70 TD passes by each team then settled into a defensive struggle with short drives and 3 and outs. Sam then hit another 60+ yard pass on the first play after a MSU punt. Bobcats then stopped the Kats on a 3rd and 4th down sacks in MSU territory and promptly ran for a 41 yd final TD before holding Kats one final time. Total offense 359 for MSU, 190 rush, and 433 for SHS, 354 pass (about 290 in H2!). Kats WR Idi Adeyi had only about 30-40 receiving at half but ended up with 187 on 7 recepts and two TDs.
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