SWC75
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NAIA
SEMI-FINALS
Southern Oregon defeated Morningside 30-27 to return to the finals for the second straight year, (they won it all last season. High-scoring Morningside lost in the semi-finals for the third straight time. The Raiders scored the winner with 1:15 left and blocked a 40 yard field goal attempt on the last play to advance. Morningside scored 825 points this season, short of the record set by Division 3’s Mount union last year, (878). The Mustangs averaged 58.9 points per game while the Purple Raiders had scored 58.5 last year.
Marian, who lost to Southern Oregon in last year’s finals, 31-55 and to undefeated, #1 ranked St. Francis earlier this year, 42-45, came roaring back into the finals with a resounding 45-14 win over the previously unbeaten Cougars. The Knights blew it open with a 24 point second quarter and held Cougar running back Justin Green, who had gained 468 yards in the first two games of the playoff to 49 yards.
Summaries:
http://www.naia.org/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=27900&ATCLID=210563494
Championship game match-up:
SOUTHERN OREGON 11-2 (589-305) Lost to Carroll 20-26 and Montana Tech 17-21 Rank: #7 Post Season: 12-6 (1)
Vs.
MARIAN (Indiana) 10-3 (597-194) Lost to Robert Morris 21-30 and St. Francis 42-45. Rank: #6 Post Season: 13-3 (1)
The Championship game will be played at 6PM on Saturday December 19 on ESPN3
NCAA D3
THE SEMI-FINALS
I finally figured out what my password was and was able to watch these games on ESPN 3
MOUNT UNION 36 WISCONSIN-WHITEWATER 6
This one was on first. The Warhawks, (I call them the Tarantula Hawks because Mount Union, has historically been the tarantula of Division III but they’ve lost 5 times in a row to Whitewater.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarantula_hawk ) looked unintimidated by having to play the Purple Raiders in their own lair. The got a long pass play on their first day to set up a field goal, then found themselves trapped down near their goal line on the their second possession. They put on a long, grinding drive that led to another field goal. In their wins overt Mount Union, they had dominated the line of scrimmage with a huge line, (they have a 320 pound center), and it seemed like they would do the same thing here.
But they never scored again and the home rolled up 36 unanswered points in what must have been a hugely cathartic victory for them. The tarantula ate the tarantula hawk. They did it with a swarming defense that made up for a size deficit with numbers. Their own line was able to open up holes for 306 yards rushing, 214 by Logan Nemeth, who scored twice.
http://www.d3football.com/playoffs/2015/roundup-semifinal-1
ST THOMAS 38 LINFIELD 17
This game was not as close as the score indicated. St. Thomas had a 20 point first quarter and it looked as if the Wildcats had no answer for their running attack. They were playing catch-up the rest of the way but the Tommies never let them get close. Linfield is more of a passing team, so they had a puncher’s chance to come back but their regular quarterback, Sam Riddle was hurt and they used a back-ip who had performed well in the previous playoff games. The Tommies kept him on the run all the time and he threw two interceptions with no TD passes. Riddle came in trying to lead the team back and got them their 17 points but it was too little too late. The Wildcats passed for 290 yards but it couldn’t overcome the Tommies rushing for 398 yards, including 256 by Jordan Roberts, who scored three times.
"I certainly leave feeling this is the first time we've ever been beaten, in my opinion, in the playoffs," said Linfield coach Joe Smith. "We've lost games that have been close, that could have gone either way; today's is the first time that I've been at Linfield that we've gotten beaten in the playoffs, so hats off to them. They were phenomenal today."
The St. Thomas coach is an Ithaca College graduate who has had success wherever he’s coached. He’s built this program up from noting into a naitD3 power. You wonder if he might return to the Bombers at some point to bring them back to glory:
http://www.tommiesports.com/sports/fball/coaches/Glenn_Caruso
The Finals Match-Up:
ST. THOMAS (Minnesota) 14-0 (735-138) Rank: #3. Post-Season: 16-8
Vs.
MOUNT UNION (Ohio) 14-0 (751-105) Rank: #1. Post-Season: 88-14 (11)
So, if the tarantula hawk couldn’t slay the tarantula, who can? This is Mount Union’s 11th straight trip to the finals and their 19th in 23 years and they are going for their 12th national championship in that time. The last time they won it was 28-10 over St. Thomas in 2012. That game was more competitive that the score indicates. My summary from that year’s “Playoffs!” post:
“Mount Union jumped out on top with an opening drive of 82 yards in 7 plays, capped by Jake Simon’s one yard plunge. Then they went up 14-0 when a blocked punt was returned for a score. “Returned” is a relative term. The ball was bouncing among a sea of players for both teams and Mount Union’s Charles Dieuseul finally got a grip on it and dieselled his way into the end zone, bulling, (and being shoved), past several pairs of outstretched arms.
But then the momentum of the game changed. St. Thomas coach Glen Caruso decided to try to turn things around by blitzing on nearly every play. The Purple Raider running backs had to try to fight their way back to the line of scrimmage and quarterback Kevin Burke was on the run all the time. Mount Union uncharacteristically, kept punting the ball back to the opposition. You wondered if their defense might begin to tire. But their defense held- most of the time. St. Thomas did manage one score early in the second quarter on a 10 yard run by Dan Ferrazzo. The halftime score was 14-7 and Larry Kehres, interviewed as he left the field, credited St. Thomas’ pressure with turning the game around. “But we’ll make some adjustments”.
He did and the Purple Raiders dominated the second half. They didn’t roll up a huge score, as they often do. But they stopped the Tommies cold, holding them to 8 yards rushing in the last two quarters and chasing quarterback Matt O’Connell all over the field. They even stopped “Brenton Braddock”, who had 7 yards on 2 carries before being injured. After a field goal made it 14-10, the Purple Raiders put on two long, grinding drives to put the Tommies away, one of 81 yards in 12 plays and another of 87 yards in 14 plays. Burke passed 17 yards to Chris Denton for the first score and Simon had another 1 yard run for the clincher. Mount Union again dominated the yardage, 344-194, but the Tommies could take solace in the fact that the 28 points the Purple Raiders scored was their lowest output of the season.”
That St. Thomas team came into that game having outscored 14 teams by a combined 509-138. Mount Union’s margin over the same number of games was 764-124. This year the margins virtually identical: 735-138 vs. 751-105, (that’s 52.5-10 vs. 54-7.5). I think Caruso probably followed the Whitewater model by building up their program in the way Mount Union had done but with an emphasis on dominating the line of scrimmage. The taranitula may be facing another tarantula hawk. Can they beat two of them to win still another title?
The championship will be Friday, December 18th at 7PM on ESPNU
NCAA D2
SEMI-FINALS
SHEPHERD 34 GRAND VALLEY STATE 32
The Rams, who have never gotten this far, subdued perennial power Grand Valley, (winners of four national titles) by surviving two attempts at a tying two point conversion in a back and forth game that went from 14-3 to 14-17 to 34-19 to the final score. It even included a blocked extra point returned for two points and two pick sixes, one by each team.
http://collegefootball.ap.org/article/shepherd-beats-grand-valley-state-34-32-d-ii-semifinal
NORTHWEST MISSOURI STATE 38 WEST GEORGIA 23
In this one, the perennial power with the four national championships won. This one also had some back and forth to it at the bearcats led 24-6 at halftime but let the Wolves howl for a bit, making it 24-23 before putting the game away with two fourth quarter scores.
http://collegefootball.ap.org/article/nw-missouri-st-tops-w-georgia-goes-d-ii-championship
The Finals match-up:
SHEPHERD (West Virginia) 13-0 (517-230) Rank: #5 Post Season: 11-12
Vs.
NORTHWEST MISSOURI STATE 14-0 (587-184) Rank: #1 Post Season: 42-15 (4)
So, will pedigree win out or will we see a team win it’s first-ever championship for their school?
The Championship game will be on Saturday, December 19 at 4PM on ESPN2.
NCAA FCS
QUARTERFINALS
RICHMOND 39 ILLINOIS STATE 27
The Spiders came out firing deep- getting 369 yards passing on only 18 completions and built up a 32-14 lead. The Redbirds came storming back to make it 32-27 but Richmond scored a clinching TD on a 28 yard run by Jacob Green. It was Green’s 4th TD of the game, three on the ground, where he rushed for 137 yards.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855895
JACKSONVILLE STATE 58 CHARLESTON SOUTHERN 38
The Gamecock’s blew open a 13-10 halftime game by running all over the Blue Swarm’s second ranked defense. Troymaine Pope “rushed for 250 yards and three touchdowns on only 16 carries. His scores went for 76, 44 and 54”. His quarterback, Eli Jenkins “carried the ball 21 times for 195 yards and two touchdowns and completed 11 of 17 passes for 91 yards and a score”. These were the only teams in the tournament who were undefeated against FCS opposition.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855896
SAM HOUSTON STATE 48 COLGATE 21
These two teams had more losses than anybody else in the tournament. The Bearkats proved much better than the Red Raiders, jumping out to a 28-7 lead and never looking back. “Jeremiah Briscoe threw for 358 yards and 4 touchdowns. Corey Avery had 25 rushes for 197 yards and one touchdown -- a 1-yard score that started the scoring three minutes into the game. Yedidiah Louis caught nine passes for 119 yards and a touchdown, and Ladarius Brown caught five passes for 86 yards and two touchdowns for the Bearkats, which had 653 yards of offense and a school-record 37 first downs, compared to Colgate's 327 yards and 19 first downs.” 37 first downs!. Phew!
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855897
NORTH DAKOTA STATE 23 NORTHERN IOWA 13
It’s tough to beat the Bison in the Fargo Dome but if you want to select a team to do, you’d pick a team form their own conference that had played there many times before and was therefore less likely to be intimidates- and they weren’t. UNI, (not “You and I”), was up 10-7 at halftime when Bruce Anderson made one of the greatest, most determined kick-off returns you will ever see to give NDS (No Doubt State), a lead they never relinquished, thanks to great defense and- imagine that- great punting!
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855898
Semi-Final Match-ups
RICHMOND 10-3 (455-321) Lost 21-50 to Maryland, 25-30 to New Hampshire and 20-21 to Villanova. Post Season: 14-9-1 (1)
Vs. (8PM Friday ESPN2)
NORTH DAKOTA STATE 11-2 (454-213) Lost 35-38 to Montana and 21-24 to South Dakota . Post Season: 51-13 (12)
This time we have the spider going into the lair of the fearsome predator. But Richmond wasn’t supposed to win at Illinois State, either. And nobody can win 5 national titles in a row- can they? The Bison have looked like a national champion sometimes this season- and sometimes they haven’t.
SAM HOUSTON STATE 11-3 (606-359) Lost 45-59 to Texas Tech, 46-49 to Lamar and 10-27 to McNeese State. Post Season: 20-10-1 (1)
At (4PM Saturday, ESPNU)
JACKSONVILLE STATE 12-1 (512-252) Lost 20-27 to Auburn. Post Season: 22-14 (1)
Sam Houston State’s defense is suspect but their offense sure isn’t. Jacks State has been ranked #1 all year and would be 12-0 if they’d held on vs. Auburn. They led 20-13 until the War Eagles scored with 39 seconds left to force OT. It would have been another App State-Michigan type upset. The Gamecocoks haven’t been headed since. “Jacksonville State has won 11 straight since its only loss in overtime at Auburn. Gamecocks coach John Grass has a 22-3 record in two seasons -- the best two-year start by a coach in FCS history.”
The Championship game will be January 9, 2016 at Noon on ESPN2.
SEMI-FINALS
Southern Oregon defeated Morningside 30-27 to return to the finals for the second straight year, (they won it all last season. High-scoring Morningside lost in the semi-finals for the third straight time. The Raiders scored the winner with 1:15 left and blocked a 40 yard field goal attempt on the last play to advance. Morningside scored 825 points this season, short of the record set by Division 3’s Mount union last year, (878). The Mustangs averaged 58.9 points per game while the Purple Raiders had scored 58.5 last year.
Marian, who lost to Southern Oregon in last year’s finals, 31-55 and to undefeated, #1 ranked St. Francis earlier this year, 42-45, came roaring back into the finals with a resounding 45-14 win over the previously unbeaten Cougars. The Knights blew it open with a 24 point second quarter and held Cougar running back Justin Green, who had gained 468 yards in the first two games of the playoff to 49 yards.
Summaries:
http://www.naia.org/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=27900&ATCLID=210563494
Championship game match-up:
SOUTHERN OREGON 11-2 (589-305) Lost to Carroll 20-26 and Montana Tech 17-21 Rank: #7 Post Season: 12-6 (1)
Vs.
MARIAN (Indiana) 10-3 (597-194) Lost to Robert Morris 21-30 and St. Francis 42-45. Rank: #6 Post Season: 13-3 (1)
The Championship game will be played at 6PM on Saturday December 19 on ESPN3
NCAA D3
THE SEMI-FINALS
I finally figured out what my password was and was able to watch these games on ESPN 3
MOUNT UNION 36 WISCONSIN-WHITEWATER 6
This one was on first. The Warhawks, (I call them the Tarantula Hawks because Mount Union, has historically been the tarantula of Division III but they’ve lost 5 times in a row to Whitewater.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarantula_hawk ) looked unintimidated by having to play the Purple Raiders in their own lair. The got a long pass play on their first day to set up a field goal, then found themselves trapped down near their goal line on the their second possession. They put on a long, grinding drive that led to another field goal. In their wins overt Mount Union, they had dominated the line of scrimmage with a huge line, (they have a 320 pound center), and it seemed like they would do the same thing here.
But they never scored again and the home rolled up 36 unanswered points in what must have been a hugely cathartic victory for them. The tarantula ate the tarantula hawk. They did it with a swarming defense that made up for a size deficit with numbers. Their own line was able to open up holes for 306 yards rushing, 214 by Logan Nemeth, who scored twice.
http://www.d3football.com/playoffs/2015/roundup-semifinal-1
ST THOMAS 38 LINFIELD 17
This game was not as close as the score indicated. St. Thomas had a 20 point first quarter and it looked as if the Wildcats had no answer for their running attack. They were playing catch-up the rest of the way but the Tommies never let them get close. Linfield is more of a passing team, so they had a puncher’s chance to come back but their regular quarterback, Sam Riddle was hurt and they used a back-ip who had performed well in the previous playoff games. The Tommies kept him on the run all the time and he threw two interceptions with no TD passes. Riddle came in trying to lead the team back and got them their 17 points but it was too little too late. The Wildcats passed for 290 yards but it couldn’t overcome the Tommies rushing for 398 yards, including 256 by Jordan Roberts, who scored three times.
"I certainly leave feeling this is the first time we've ever been beaten, in my opinion, in the playoffs," said Linfield coach Joe Smith. "We've lost games that have been close, that could have gone either way; today's is the first time that I've been at Linfield that we've gotten beaten in the playoffs, so hats off to them. They were phenomenal today."
The St. Thomas coach is an Ithaca College graduate who has had success wherever he’s coached. He’s built this program up from noting into a naitD3 power. You wonder if he might return to the Bombers at some point to bring them back to glory:
http://www.tommiesports.com/sports/fball/coaches/Glenn_Caruso
The Finals Match-Up:
ST. THOMAS (Minnesota) 14-0 (735-138) Rank: #3. Post-Season: 16-8
Vs.
MOUNT UNION (Ohio) 14-0 (751-105) Rank: #1. Post-Season: 88-14 (11)
So, if the tarantula hawk couldn’t slay the tarantula, who can? This is Mount Union’s 11th straight trip to the finals and their 19th in 23 years and they are going for their 12th national championship in that time. The last time they won it was 28-10 over St. Thomas in 2012. That game was more competitive that the score indicates. My summary from that year’s “Playoffs!” post:
“Mount Union jumped out on top with an opening drive of 82 yards in 7 plays, capped by Jake Simon’s one yard plunge. Then they went up 14-0 when a blocked punt was returned for a score. “Returned” is a relative term. The ball was bouncing among a sea of players for both teams and Mount Union’s Charles Dieuseul finally got a grip on it and dieselled his way into the end zone, bulling, (and being shoved), past several pairs of outstretched arms.
But then the momentum of the game changed. St. Thomas coach Glen Caruso decided to try to turn things around by blitzing on nearly every play. The Purple Raider running backs had to try to fight their way back to the line of scrimmage and quarterback Kevin Burke was on the run all the time. Mount Union uncharacteristically, kept punting the ball back to the opposition. You wondered if their defense might begin to tire. But their defense held- most of the time. St. Thomas did manage one score early in the second quarter on a 10 yard run by Dan Ferrazzo. The halftime score was 14-7 and Larry Kehres, interviewed as he left the field, credited St. Thomas’ pressure with turning the game around. “But we’ll make some adjustments”.
He did and the Purple Raiders dominated the second half. They didn’t roll up a huge score, as they often do. But they stopped the Tommies cold, holding them to 8 yards rushing in the last two quarters and chasing quarterback Matt O’Connell all over the field. They even stopped “Brenton Braddock”, who had 7 yards on 2 carries before being injured. After a field goal made it 14-10, the Purple Raiders put on two long, grinding drives to put the Tommies away, one of 81 yards in 12 plays and another of 87 yards in 14 plays. Burke passed 17 yards to Chris Denton for the first score and Simon had another 1 yard run for the clincher. Mount Union again dominated the yardage, 344-194, but the Tommies could take solace in the fact that the 28 points the Purple Raiders scored was their lowest output of the season.”
That St. Thomas team came into that game having outscored 14 teams by a combined 509-138. Mount Union’s margin over the same number of games was 764-124. This year the margins virtually identical: 735-138 vs. 751-105, (that’s 52.5-10 vs. 54-7.5). I think Caruso probably followed the Whitewater model by building up their program in the way Mount Union had done but with an emphasis on dominating the line of scrimmage. The taranitula may be facing another tarantula hawk. Can they beat two of them to win still another title?
The championship will be Friday, December 18th at 7PM on ESPNU
NCAA D2
SEMI-FINALS
SHEPHERD 34 GRAND VALLEY STATE 32
The Rams, who have never gotten this far, subdued perennial power Grand Valley, (winners of four national titles) by surviving two attempts at a tying two point conversion in a back and forth game that went from 14-3 to 14-17 to 34-19 to the final score. It even included a blocked extra point returned for two points and two pick sixes, one by each team.
http://collegefootball.ap.org/article/shepherd-beats-grand-valley-state-34-32-d-ii-semifinal
NORTHWEST MISSOURI STATE 38 WEST GEORGIA 23
In this one, the perennial power with the four national championships won. This one also had some back and forth to it at the bearcats led 24-6 at halftime but let the Wolves howl for a bit, making it 24-23 before putting the game away with two fourth quarter scores.
http://collegefootball.ap.org/article/nw-missouri-st-tops-w-georgia-goes-d-ii-championship
The Finals match-up:
SHEPHERD (West Virginia) 13-0 (517-230) Rank: #5 Post Season: 11-12
Vs.
NORTHWEST MISSOURI STATE 14-0 (587-184) Rank: #1 Post Season: 42-15 (4)
So, will pedigree win out or will we see a team win it’s first-ever championship for their school?
The Championship game will be on Saturday, December 19 at 4PM on ESPN2.
NCAA FCS
QUARTERFINALS
RICHMOND 39 ILLINOIS STATE 27
The Spiders came out firing deep- getting 369 yards passing on only 18 completions and built up a 32-14 lead. The Redbirds came storming back to make it 32-27 but Richmond scored a clinching TD on a 28 yard run by Jacob Green. It was Green’s 4th TD of the game, three on the ground, where he rushed for 137 yards.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855895
JACKSONVILLE STATE 58 CHARLESTON SOUTHERN 38
The Gamecock’s blew open a 13-10 halftime game by running all over the Blue Swarm’s second ranked defense. Troymaine Pope “rushed for 250 yards and three touchdowns on only 16 carries. His scores went for 76, 44 and 54”. His quarterback, Eli Jenkins “carried the ball 21 times for 195 yards and two touchdowns and completed 11 of 17 passes for 91 yards and a score”. These were the only teams in the tournament who were undefeated against FCS opposition.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855896
SAM HOUSTON STATE 48 COLGATE 21
These two teams had more losses than anybody else in the tournament. The Bearkats proved much better than the Red Raiders, jumping out to a 28-7 lead and never looking back. “Jeremiah Briscoe threw for 358 yards and 4 touchdowns. Corey Avery had 25 rushes for 197 yards and one touchdown -- a 1-yard score that started the scoring three minutes into the game. Yedidiah Louis caught nine passes for 119 yards and a touchdown, and Ladarius Brown caught five passes for 86 yards and two touchdowns for the Bearkats, which had 653 yards of offense and a school-record 37 first downs, compared to Colgate's 327 yards and 19 first downs.” 37 first downs!. Phew!
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855897
NORTH DAKOTA STATE 23 NORTHERN IOWA 13
It’s tough to beat the Bison in the Fargo Dome but if you want to select a team to do, you’d pick a team form their own conference that had played there many times before and was therefore less likely to be intimidates- and they weren’t. UNI, (not “You and I”), was up 10-7 at halftime when Bruce Anderson made one of the greatest, most determined kick-off returns you will ever see to give NDS (No Doubt State), a lead they never relinquished, thanks to great defense and- imagine that- great punting!
http://espn.go.com/college-football/recap?gameId=400855898
Semi-Final Match-ups
RICHMOND 10-3 (455-321) Lost 21-50 to Maryland, 25-30 to New Hampshire and 20-21 to Villanova. Post Season: 14-9-1 (1)
Vs. (8PM Friday ESPN2)
NORTH DAKOTA STATE 11-2 (454-213) Lost 35-38 to Montana and 21-24 to South Dakota . Post Season: 51-13 (12)
This time we have the spider going into the lair of the fearsome predator. But Richmond wasn’t supposed to win at Illinois State, either. And nobody can win 5 national titles in a row- can they? The Bison have looked like a national champion sometimes this season- and sometimes they haven’t.
SAM HOUSTON STATE 11-3 (606-359) Lost 45-59 to Texas Tech, 46-49 to Lamar and 10-27 to McNeese State. Post Season: 20-10-1 (1)
At (4PM Saturday, ESPNU)
JACKSONVILLE STATE 12-1 (512-252) Lost 20-27 to Auburn. Post Season: 22-14 (1)
Sam Houston State’s defense is suspect but their offense sure isn’t. Jacks State has been ranked #1 all year and would be 12-0 if they’d held on vs. Auburn. They led 20-13 until the War Eagles scored with 39 seconds left to force OT. It would have been another App State-Michigan type upset. The Gamecocoks haven’t been headed since. “Jacksonville State has won 11 straight since its only loss in overtime at Auburn. Gamecocks coach John Grass has a 22-3 record in two seasons -- the best two-year start by a coach in FCS history.”
The Championship game will be January 9, 2016 at Noon on ESPN2.
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