Griz hold off SDSU

MISSOULA - The Montana Grizzly offense prefers to move the ball through the air.

But don’t tell that to its shortest player.

Junior halfback John Nguyen, who’s listed at 5-foot-7 inches tall, carried the ball five times in the final series of the Grizzlies’ first-round FCS playoff game against visiting South Dakota State on Saturday.

Those handful of totes equated to 34 yards of offense, melted the clock and Montana staved off a furious second-half comeback to notch a 24-17 victory before 14,575 spectators on a frigid, breath-seeing afternoon at Washington-Grizzly Stadium.

The cat-quick, dynamic-in-the-open-field running back surpassed the century mark for the third consecutive game, galloping for 107 yards on 18 carries.

“It’s really fun to have the ball in my hands,” Nguyen said. “I’m grateful that coach Stitt has faith in me, for me to hold on to the ball and really kind of end the game on my hands. It’s a great feeling.”

Montana has never lost to South Dakota State, improving its record vs. the Jackrabbits to 8-0 all-time.

The Grizzlies (8-4) will get a rematch with four-time defending national champion North Dakota State next Saturday in Fargo. Montana defeated the Bison 38-35 in late August on a dramatic last-second rush to pay dirt by Joey Counts.

Against the Jackrabbits on Saturday, wide receivers Ben Roberts and Josh Horner both had career days.

Roberts, the former Washington State baseball player, a godsend in his first and only season in Missoula, caught eight balls for 133 yards, including a crucial 62-yard grab down the sideline in the fourth quarter that got Montana out from under its own end zone and chopped precious seconds off the clock.

“There was no doubt in our minds that we could come back,” South Dakota State tight end Cam Jones said. “… I wish we just had a little bit more time, just a little bit more time. Give credit to our defense, they stuck it to them in the second half. They really kept us in that game. Clock just hit triple zeroes too soon.”

Horner, meanwhile, the former C.M. Russell High star, hauled in a career-best in catches (6) and yards (80) and helped jumpstart an offense in the first half that saw its first three possessions result in three-and-outs.

“All week long we kind of thought we could take advantage of … their defense a little bit,” said Horner, the former All-State quarterback under head coach Jack Johnson. “Early on, we were able to do that, just running crossing routes over the middle. We kind of thought they were a little susceptible there and we were able to take advantage of that.”

The Grizzlies, which have now won four straight games, remarkable considering where this team was several weeks ago, dominated the Jackrabbits in the first half, amounting 293 yards of offense to South Dakota State’s 111 as the home team raced out to a 24-0 lead at intermission.

Quarterback Brady Gustafson, in his third game back from a broken leg that kept him out six games, threw for 295 yards and two TDs, including a four-yard in-route to Jamaal Jones and a fade to Ellis Henderson for 26 yards.

“Well, we played really well in the first half,” Montana head coach Bob Stitt said. “I was excited to get 24 points on that defense. That’s a tough thing to do. That’s a good football team, offensively and defensively, and for our guys to go out and score that many points and shut them out in the first half was tremendous.”

The Montana defense was just that.

Prolific pass rusher Tyrone Holmes registered two sacks and three tackles for loss on the day as Montana’s defensive front proved too talented, bottling up true freshman quarterback Taryn Christion, who filled in for starting QB Zach Lujan because of injury.

Holmes, the first-team Big Sky selection, moved into a tie for second all-time in UM history in both sacks and tackles for loss. The 32.5 sacks and 48.5 TFL are both tied with former great Tim Bush.

“It feels pretty good,” he said of the accomplishment. “It’d feel better if I had a national championship with it. So hopefully we can keep rolling.”

The Jackrabbits (8-4) did not go away easily and, in this series, it wouldn’t make much sense if they did.

The two teams met back in 2009, and the Grizzlies scored the final 40 points in a 61-48 victory at Washington-Grizzly Stadium, so South Dakota State head coach John Stiegelmeier was hoping for some payback.

“I just wanted so badly to be on the other end of a comeback out there,” he said, “but credit to coach Stitt, their quarterback is a really good player. I’m really proud of our team to have come back the way we did. But we did fall short. It hurts.”

The running lanes that were closed in the first half for Christion suddenly opened in the second, and the Grizzlies’ offense stalled, amounting just 15 yards on their first 15 plays from scrimmage. The first five drives resulted in three and outs.

Stitt took some of the blame for the offense’s inability to move the ball after halftime and some of its conservativeness, but added that they needed to shorten the game when it was clear the offense wasn’t clicking.

“Proud of our players,” Stitt said. “I’m really excited because I get to work another week and we get these seniors to stay around and see their faces (Sunday) in the team meeting and the 2015 team is still together and alive and kicking.”

Christion passed for 154 of his 230 yards in the final 30 minutes of play as the Jackrabbit offense found life.

Midway through the fourth quarter, Christion threw one up for grabs to All-American wide receiver Jake Wieneke – who was held in-check for the most part, even though he did catch six balls for 128 yards – down the sideline for 44 yards.

“Coming out of the second half,” Christion said, “we just were more energetic than we were in the first. We were able to settle down a little bit, kind of got used to the noise and then we were finally able to get things going.”

Four plays later, the Jackrabbits faced a fourth-and-8 from the Grizzly 34-yard line. But the UM defense was drawn offside, which made it a much more manageable fourth-and-3. The Grizzlies had 12 penalties for 129 yards.

The true freshman quarterback then hit Wieneke for eight yards, and four plays later, on a fourth-and-19, Christion lofted a perfect pass to tight end Dallas Goedert in the end zone for a 30-yard strike. 24-17 with 4:44 left.

South Dakota State never got a chance to tie the game, however. Montana ran the final 10 plays of the game as the Jackrabbits helplessly burned their final three timeouts.

“Our O-line just decided they wanted to win the ballgame and John (Nguyen) did a great job of running with it,” Stitt said. “… It was a great drive, a great drive. You need those to win big ballgames. That’s the number 12 team in the country. That’s just not another team. That’s a good football team we beat out there.”

And it will be another good, maybe great football team it will face next Saturday. North Dakota State, ranked second in one poll and third in the other, is 9-2 on the season.

“As long as we are still playing,” Stitt said. “I told our guys in the locker room we don’t care who lines up, we just have to go in and keep our head down and beat those guys. You don’t care whose jersey it is, what color it is, you just go play football. We’ve had our backs against the wall for a long time and nobody expected us to be sitting here right now talking about what we are talking about right now.”

Holmes, a senior, is excited for the opportunity.

“I mean, it’s huge,” he said. “They’re a really good team. We’ve already played them once this year and it’s hard to beat a team twice, so we are going to have to get geared up and have a good game plan and go in there and try to get a win.”