Griz, McNeese St. familiar foes
MONTANA WIDE RECEIVER Eric Allen maintains his balance Saturday after catching a long-bomb pass while running backwards and turning around into the end zone for a 54-yard touchdown catch against Montana State. The play with 7 minutes, 12 seconds left in the third quarter was the eventual game-winner in the Grizzlies’ 13-7 victory over the Bobcats. Allen, a 6-foot-3 junior transfer from Oklahoma State, leads the Griz with 653 receiving yards. He is one catch behind Ryan Bagley, who has 42 catches, for the team lead in receptions. Allen, Bagley and Craig Chambers each have four TD catches.…
The Daily Inter Lake
Here comes McNeese State.
The division of college football formally known as I-AA, which has been renamed the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision, starts its playoffs Saturday with No. 2 Montana hosting No. 22 McNeese State.
The game starts at 12:05 p.m.
The first-round playoff game will be the fourth postseason meeting between the two teams since 1994. Each time, the home team has won. The Cowboys have won two straight and no game has been decided by more than five points.
The last time the two faced, McNeese State beat the Griz, 24-20, in the 2002 quarterfinals. In 1997 MSU won, 19-14, in the first round. In 1994 the Grizzlies won the quarterfinal, 30-28.
The Grizzlies and Cowboys played each other in regular-season games in back-to-back years, in 1990 and '91. They split the meetings with the home team winning each time. So in the all-time series, McNeese State holds a 3-2 advantage.
The Cowboys hail from Lake Charles, La., and come from the Southland Conference with the likes of Texas State, Stephen F. Austin and Sam Houston State. They won the conference title and earned an automatic playoff berth with a 7-4 record.
But the bigger story of the Cowboys is how they started the season losing three of their first four games and four of their first five; then fired their coach and finished the season riding a five-game winning streak.
The Cowboys are a big-time running team, having run the ball 430 times compared to 240 passes. So 64 percent of the time, they run. They average 175.8 yards per game rushing at 4.5 yards per carry. Their quarterback is a redshirt freshman named Derrick Fourroux, who is second on the team in rushing with 474 yards and five touchdowns. Junior running back Jamie Leonard has 605 yards and five touchdowns at 5.9 yards per carry.
The Cowboys use their successful running attack to pass. They've only been sacked 13 times in 11 games. Fourroux has a couple of short speedsters as receivers and has completed 53.8 percent of 197 passes for 1,374 yards and 10 touchdowns and thrown seven interceptions. Junior Steven Whitehead, who is 5-foot-8, has 42 catches for 543 yards (12.9 yards per catch) with three touchdowns. Senior Carlese Franklin, who is 5-11, has 27 grabs for 412 yards (15.3 ypc) and leads the team with six touchdowns. Junior Quinten Lawrence, at 6-1, leads the team in yards per catch with 26 catches for 453 yards (17.4 ypc) and two touchdowns.
The MSU defense is known as a young unit that is led by Buck Buchanon Award candidate Bryan Smith. Smith (No. 93) is a 6-3, 217-pound junior defensive end with an eye-popping 22 tackles for losses, 12 1/2 sacks, 19 quarterback hurries, five passes broken up, four fumble recoveries and three forced fumbles.
But it's sophomore linebacker Allen Nelson (No. 41) who leads the team with 106 tackles.
As a team, the Cowboys are known for their athletism.
"We've talked to a few people from their conference and they all spoke highly of the athletic ability and their speed and their competitiveness," UM coach Bobby Hauck said.