Nobody was going to acknowledge it before the game, but Idaho State’s homecoming matchup with Southern Utah last Saturday was critical to the mental health and emotional well-being of the Bengals.
Sitting at 1-2 on the season coming in, and with Montana State, the No. 3-ranked team in the nation coming up, a loss to the Thunderbirds would have greased the downward-facing slide for the Bengals heading into the Big Sky Conference season.
And with two key starting linemen — center Alex Ramirez and left tackle Jorgen Miller — out for the season, the long-term prospects for the Bengal offense were not great.
“We needed this one,” ISU head coach Cody Hawkins said after the Bengals’ 38-28 win. “You know in the back of your mind just the amount of adversity we’ve had thrown at us during this stretch here. ... We had to find a way to get one of these three games. And starting off with Montana State in conference play, we know that’s going to be a physical match. We’re going four games in a stretch of five where you’re playing teams that just want to stand there and punch you in the mouth.”
That Saturday, at least, the Bengals punched back. Playing with two new starters and a position shift along the o-line, ISU did not allow a sack and ran for 272 yards − the most the Bengals have recorded since a 40-31 win at home against Cal Poly on October 15, 2022.
Defensively, the Bengals managed to stop the T-birds on four fourth-down conversion attempts, putting stops to promising drives that failed to yield points.
For one game, then, against a team that prides itself on being physical, the Bengals asserted themselves on both sides of the football.
Now comes the ultimate test — a Montana State team that defines itself as physical. The Bobcats average more than 330 yards a game rushing, and they feature some of the most impressive physical specimens in the Big Sky Conference. Defensive lineman Brody Grebe, offensive tackle Marcus Wehr and quarterback Tommy Mellott have all been singled out by various online sites as physical “freaks” because of their athletic ability.
Grebe, for instance, is a former all-state basketball player who ran for 31 touchdowns in high school, has a 40-inch vertical jump, bench presses 350 pounds and squats 560 pounds.
While the Bengals managed to “get off the field” when necessary against Southern Utah, stopping the run remains their biggest challenge defensively. ISU ranks 11th in the 12-team Big Sky Conference in rush defense, giving up 212 yards per game. The Bengals rank eighth in yards per carry yielded, at 4.85.
The win over Southern Utah was a product of ISU defensive coordinator Josh Runda pushing the right buttons at the right time to overload the defensive box, and get critical fourth-down stops when needed.
“We got off the field,” acknowledged Bengal safety Jayden Bell, who led the team with 10 tackles on Saturday. “Those were huge stops. That’s the difference between last week at North Dakota and this week. We didn’t get off the field on third and fourth downs at North Dakota and this week we did.”
Offensively, ISU demonstrated some physicality of its own. Keoua Kauhi set the pace early, slashing inside the tackles on his way to 70 yards on 10 carries, and then converted linebacker Dason Brooks came off the bench to break a couple of long runs, including a 75-yarder for a touchdown.
After struggling to react to North Dakota’s pass rush last week, and with new starters in place on the offensive line, Hawkins was determined to protect his quarterbacks this week.
“I love being the ‘Throwin’ Idahoans’, I think it’s a great identity,” said Hawkins. “But if you want to be a better football team, you have to be able to control games.”
Control as in run the football, kill clock, protect your quarterbacks and keep your defense off the field.
“I’m not going to lie, it feels good,” Bell said when asked how it felt to see his team run the football with conviction on Saturday. “Especially when we’re a 10-personnel team — we throw the ball a lot. Today, just seeing the offense run the ball, it felt good, and it also took time off the clock, so we’re not on the field so much. I just appreciated the offensive effort today.”
Heading into his second Big Sky Conference season as ISU head coach, Hawkins knows there is still much work to be done to lift this long-suffering program to the level of traditional power programs like Montana State. But his short-term goals are clear enough.
Offensively, he’d just like to keep the offensive linemen he has healthy. Last week was the first time this season the same o-line finished the game as started it. Sure you’d like to see your best players on the field, and not in recovery from knee surgery, but the Bengals have built enough depth that losing arguably their two best offensive linemen three games into the season hasn’t proven catastrophic. Now, Hawkins and Bengal fans need to keep their fingers crossed that this version of the Bengal o-line can stay healthy long-term.
Defensively, it’s still important for the Bengals to figure out a way to stop the run earlier in drives, and to create turnovers. ISU is last in the conference in turnover margin at minus-6, and the Bengals were fortunate to beat SUU without creating a single turnover in the game.
The Bengals have seen the emergence of defensive ends Cortland Horton and Logan George, who rank third and seventh, respectively, in the conference in sacks, and sixth and seventh in tackles for a loss. But they lack depth on the defensive front behind them. They haven’t been able to put the kind of athleticism on the field in the second and third levels of the defense to create turnovers.
So the building process continues. The big hope, quite frankly, is that ISU can at least hang with the Bobcats and get out of the game without any major injuries. The schedule gets a lot more manageable after that, with games against Cal Poly and Portland State immediately following.
“We’ve got to figure out the training and recovery components,” Hawkins said when asked what his priorities are going into conference play. “We’ve lost quite a few dudes. ... We’ve gotta look at our training. I like to get after it on Tuesday and Wednesday, but we’ve had a lot guys who have played a lot of football on our team. But I don’t know if this is the week to take our foot off the gas pedal. You’ve got Montana State that is going to be the toughest game we’ve had to this point.”
Brad Bugger has been observing athletics in southeastern Idaho for 45 years as a sports writer, broadcaster and fan. He can be reached at bpbugger@gmail.com.
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