The fourth-ranked Grizzlies, who grinded out a 21-16 win over talented Northern Arizona last Saturday, were relegated to ho-hum status outside of greater Missoula by both Montana State's upset loss at Northern Colorado, and Portland State's 73-68 loss to Weber State.
The Vikings' loss didn't raise as many eyebrows as the fact that they scored 68 points. With a true freshman quarterback. In regulation.
But it's hard to imagine a repeat of the Shootout at PGE Park. For one thing, Montana is allowing the fewest points in the Division I Football Champion Subdivision, 11.2 per game.
For another, even PSU offensive coordinator Mouse Davis can't cook up 68 points every week. Can he? Given that the Vikings average an FCS-best 361 passing yards a game, something has to give.
The depth chart out of Portland State shows freshman Drew Hubel as the probable starter at QB. He entered the Weber State game with one touchdown pass and left with 10, catching injured starter Brian White in the process.
That it wasn't in the process of winning galls the Vikings, who are 2-6, including a 2-3 record in the Big Sky Conference.
“The biggest issue is we lost,” said PSU receiver Tremayne Kirkland. “To score 68 points and lose, it's kind of typical of what's been going on this season.
“It's kind of bad, though,” he added. “Because we just woke Montana up. Scoring 68, I know their coaches put that up on the bulletin board. We definitely know that Montana's bringing their best defense, after what we did last week.”
The Grizzlies fell to No. 4 in the Sports Network's Top 25 despite what was probably their most impressive victory of the season.
They seized command against the speedy Lumberjacks with two 80-yard drives in the third quarter, though they lost some of it when they turned the ball over on downs near midfield in the fourth.
Yet after NAU scored, the Griz - with senior running back Lex Hilliard playing the leading role - had possibly their best drive, running the final 4:42 off the clock.
“Rob (Phenicie) made some great play calls in that drive,” UM coach Bobby Hauck said. “That was a pretty broad-based run game. We had ‘Iso,' we had power, we had sweep, we ran bootleg and ran for it and ran bootleg and threw it.”
Right tackle Brent Russum felt the Jacks ran out of steam at the end, while the Griz O-line, which has seen he and fellow tackle Cody Balogh playing guard at times this season, settled in.
“I don't know if they were in it mentally or they just didn't have the men to rotate through, but we were definitely chugging along,” said Russum. “We're healthy. We've got Colin Dow back at center, and Balogh and I aren't playing guard.”
Instead it was J.D. Quinn and Terran Hillesland at the guards.
“We were playing our original positions that we started the year with. We're just a solid group up front and just kept going and going. And Lex kept running harder and harder.”
Russum and Hilliard shared NAU player of the game honors from the Griz coaching staff. Clark and linebacker Tyler Joyce shared the defensive honors, and redshirt freshman receiver Chase Reynolds - with a tackle and forced a fumble - was honored for his special teams play.
Speaking of the NAU game, a computer/inputting error incorrectly credited Lumberjack receiver Alex Watson with a 75-yard reception against the Griz Saturday. Efforts to correct the error for Sunday's Missoulian fell short, so here are some official stats from NAU: Quarterback Lance Kriesien ended up with 204 passing yards on 18-for-34 passing, and Watson had 11 catches for 107 yards.
The Lumberjacks still out-gained the Griz 422-414.
QUICK KICKS: The NAU statbook also had UM's Karl Pitcher recovering one of NAU's two fumbles, though fellow defensive end Kroy Biermann actually recovered both. Š Biermann's 31 career sacks leave him just 3.5 behind leader Tim Bush (34.5 from 2000-03). Biermann's 42 tackles for loss rank him fourth on the UM career list. Š Montana linebacker Alex Hawthorne played against NAU, recording one tackle. Š Saturday's forecast calls for a high of 51 degrees with only a slight chance of rain. Š Hubel won national offensive player of the week honors from both sportsnetwork.com and collegesportingnews.com. ... Montana moved up one spot to No. 11 in the Gridiron Power Index (GPI), a hybrid ranking of the FCS. The Grizzlies moved ahead of both James Madison and Yale, which dropped down, but Richmond jumped up to No. 9 after beating JMU.
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