Kolpack: Bison put on a clinic by taking the audience out of the game – InForum

Normal, sick.

Head coach Brock Spack’s gameday traditions at Illinois State include having his players wear a dark power suit and tie when they come into the stadium, a kind of success attire before putting on the football pads. While the fans milled around the stadium doing what they do, the players were on the field going through their duties – in their formal attire.

North Dakota State had its own dressing room, which he brought to Hancock Stadium on Saturday afternoon. Doctor uniforms.

The Bison conducted training on how to get the home crowd out of a game.

It was like a surgical procedure on a celebratory homecoming day, a crowd seemingly energized to make a difference. However, the fans only opened their mouths to eat or drink.

The final score was 42-10 and it wasn’t all that close.

“To be honest, I didn’t really notice the crowd,” Bison defensive tackle Eli Mostaert said. “I think what really helped us was that we went at them pretty quickly, the crowd got loud right away and they calmed down because of the good start.”

How do you silence a crowd?

Don’t let the opposing team start a running game. Check. Make your own running game, like Marty Brown ran for 100 yards for the second straight year and the Bison ran .307 as a team. Check.

Own the time of possession; The Bison had the ball for nearly 39 minutes. Check. Have a clutch quarterback like Cam Miller on third down. Check.

The Bison were the clear winners in these categories.

The mostly red-clad crowd of 11,687 didn’t have much to cheer about, and perhaps NDSU’s first drive, which went 64 yards in 11 plays, set the tone. What really did it, according to Bison head coach Tim Polasek, was an 80-yard, 16-play beauty that lasted over 10 minutes.

“We had one of those classic rides,” he said. “It wasn’t like it was a homecoming for her today. I thought we neutralized the crowd a lot.”

Miller’s 11-yard touchdown pass to Mekhi Collins made it 14-0. On that play, Miller sat in the pocket at quarterback for what felt like an eternity before Collins broke free in the back of the end zone.

“I just needed to buy some time,” Miller said, “and he did a great job getting open.”

Miller completed 20 of 23 passes for 216 yards and three touchdowns. He completed passes to nine different receivers.

Alyssa Goelzer/The Forum

Miller’s only misstep came when he fumbled late in the first half and threatened NDSU to extend the lead to 14-7. The Bison were near midfield and a running Miller appeared to have gotten about 10 yards and was preparing to slide to the turf when an ISU defender launched the ball from behind.

The Redbirds rallied and the score remained 14-7 at halftime. Polasek (jokingly) asked a few reporters in his postgame press conference to question Miller after the game.

“Let’s beat him up there, let’s keep him humble because he’s playing almost perfect,” Polasek said.

Nearly perfect, NDSU went 10 of 13 on third-down conversions. At the start of the fourth quarter, the home fans began to empty the place. That wasn’t the case two weeks ago at East Tennessee State, when the Bison rebounded to win 38-35. The Buccaneers ran for 270 yards and their fans danced in the streets for about 58 minutes.

Illinois State’s longest play was a 43-yard pass that came against broken Bison coverage. The longest run of the day was eight yards by Wenkers Wright, who was one of the hottest defenders in the Missouri Valley Football Conference on day one.

After the first four non-conference games that were mostly quiet, the Bison defensive line came to life with five quarterback sacks. Mostaert had two of those to go, in addition to the three he had in the last NDSU game at Hancock Stadium two years ago.

“I think it was just better tackling,” he said. “Better coverage in the secondary and things like that increase our chances of getting to the QB, and we’ve implemented a lot.”

Jeff would like to dispel the idea that he was there when Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press, but he is now in his third decade of reporting for Forum Communications. The son of a reporter and an English teacher, and brother of a reporter, Jeff has worked at the Jamestown Sun, the Bismarck Tribune and, since 1990, the Forum, where he has covered North Dakota State athletics since 1995.
Jeff has covered all nine of NDSU’s Division I FCS national football titles and has written three books: “Horns Up,” “North Dakota Tough” and “Covid Kids.” He is the radio host of “The Golf Show with Jeff Kolpack” from April to August.