Coming into the season we all knew that UND was facing a tough schedule. With that said there were several games that were viewed as ‘must wins’. Sam Houston State at home on Potato Bowl was one of them.
The Hawks didn’t play a complete game but they played a good one and left the Alerus Center with a 27-23 win over the 24th ranked Bearkats. The win moves UND to 2-1 on the season as they head into their much-needed bye week.
The Rundown
The UND defense won this game. The game plan that DC Eric Schmidt put together was effective for the majority of the game, minus some nice adjustments in the 2nd quarter by the Bearkats, which forced Schmidt to consequently adjust to those changes.
UND came into the game knowing that SHSU had a ton of playmakers at their disposal. WR Nathan Stewart is an All-American, WR Dee Bowens is a dynamic, quick player who can beat you on any play. Plus, their RB stable was deep and talented. Stewart only caught 4 passes for 11 yards on Saturday – once again, an outstanding effort defensively for UND.
Schmidt opted to go to a “bracket” look with three down lineman and four linebackers back in coverage “bracketing” the inside receivers. This funneled the slot receivers into the Hawks ILB’s and narrowed the windows. The Bearkats never seemed to figure out how to attack that look in the passing game – going 17-36 for only 118 yards and 3 INT’s.
What SHSU did then was starting running QB Eric Schmid on QB powers and sweeps, while also mixing in the running backs on zone stuff. This began to take hold in the 2nd quarter leading to their 14 unanswered points and a 14-14 tie at half.
Sam Houston ran an astounding 86 plays for only 280 yards of offense. Like I said, the defense won this game. They looked much livelier than they did the week prior and it showed.
The Bearkats were only 5-19 on third down. UND ended the game +2 in turnover margin (3 INT’s & 1 FR vs 1 INT & 1 FR).
Senior OLB Jade Lawrence had two interceptions implementing the bracket game plan I explained earlier. The first INT was a backside hole drop by Lawrence where QB Ty Brock never saw him as Brock tried to hit the crosser from the other side of the field.
OLB Jaxson Turner was very active off the edge again in pressure situations, notching two sacks and nine tackles overall.
CB C.J. Siegel may be playing the best of all the DB’s right now. Very quick, very active and isn’t giving up much over there at all.
Speaking of DB’s, Hayden Galvin filled in for Lenny Nelson and played very well, IMO. He made some sure tackles in space and kept everything in front of him, limiting any big plays.
CB Evan Holm was held out again this week.
The swing gate play that SHSU ran on that last 4th down was so moronic. They had been moving the ball on the ground the entire drive and now on 4th and 2 you go to the swinging gate? Personally, I think they outcoached themselves in fear of what UND was going to draw up to stop their call (like they did last year). The Hawks aligned themselves perfectly and didn’t send too many guys out to the gate – meaning they had the Bearkats outnumbered over the ball. The result was ILB Noah Larson lining up off the edge, actually, and coming in unblocked to hit Schmid. Here is the play:
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The man of the hour was true freshman QB Tommy Schuster. Backup QB Andrew Zimmerman went down in the first quarter with an bad ankle injury. This led to a panic on the sidelines as they needed to find out who can go in the game because senior starter Nate Ketteringham was supposedly the emergency QB in case of injury. Well, that wasn’t the case and in came Schuster.
Schuster got the Hawks through the half and OC Danny Freund then made some adjustments to what the plan was with Schuster at the helm. The result was the Hawks came out and marched right down the field going 63 yards in 3 plays with the first two being long passes to WR Noah Wanzek (9 catches for 109 yards), capped off by a short James Johannesson TD run. The faith Freund showed in Schuster by throwing immediately was telling.
I asked Freund after the game how much of the playbook he used with Schuster in the game – his response: “the entire thing”. Was a bit floored by that answer but apparently Schuster understands the entire offense after only a couple months on campus and the coaches felt good about running whatever they wanted to.
Clips of the Schuster to Travis Toivonen TD pass and Schuster showing his scrambling ability:
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The UND offense only had 281 yards of offense on the day but that is probably not a huge surprise.
The running game struggled mightily on Saturday. They gained 91 yards on 30 carries but 56 of those came on Brock Boltmann’s long QB run. Some of this had to do with the way SHSU runs their defense. They manned up on the outside the entire game and stacked the box. This meant it was imperative that Schuster hit some long passes vs the press man coverage.
Pass protection was, once again, very solid and gave Schuster time to work and survey the field. The Bearkats only had one sack on the day.
Watching the tall UND WR’s work against the aggressive, lengthy Bearkat DB’s was pretty fun. The McCollum twins are good players and went at Wanzek, Toivonen and Garett Maag all game.
Was good to see RB Cam McKinney come alive in the passing game – he caught 3 passes for 31 yards. McKinney is the quickest, most dynamic player UND has and if the running game is struggling they need to get creative in distributing the ball to him.
The UND kickoff team is starting to show the same passion and desire that UND fans are used to seeing from this unit. Back in the day it was an honor to be on the kickoff team. It was nine guys (minus kicker and safety) flying down the field like crazy men, all wanting to be the one who made the tackle. On one kickoff in the second half it was Kadon Kauppinen who was that guy – Kaupinnen beat his blocker and obliterated the returner, bring the UND faithful to their feet.
Cade Peterson didn’t have his best day only averaging 34 yards/punt. He never quite got the hang time or distance that we saw in the Drake game earlier this season. They need Peterson to get it rolling again because field position is vital for this team.
Bubba Schweigert’s decision to take the safety when backed up was a very good one. It was 27-21 at the time so SHSU needs a TD to win the game if you punt it and they need a TD to win the game if you take the safety and kick from the 20. This gave UND the ability to setup their coverage team via a kickoff look and took away the ability of SHSU to block the punt in the end zone, which HC K.C. Keeler admitted after the game they were going to try and do.
The Hawks are right where they needed to be heading into their bye week. They head out to the Inferno on Sept 28th to take on the powerful Eastern Washington Eagles on the red turf. That will be a big one, obviously, and luckily for the Schweigert he has a full two weeks to let his team heal up and prepare for Eric Barriere and that high-flying offense.
Photo courtesy of Eric Burton.