SDSU lost to NDSU 13-9 in what was the second-lowest-scoring game in the Dakota Marker rivalry’s history, dating back to 2004.
In the second half, SDSU led 9-7 after Chase Mason’s 66-yard touchdown and a Hunter Dustman field goal at the end of the second quarter. However, with less than two minutes remaining, Cam Miller secured the win for NDSU with a 20-yard touchdown pass to Raja Nelson.
“I believe we’d make one more play and Cam begged for the ball at the end. I thought it was a critical decision not to just run it out but to take a shot there on second down. It was a good gamble, but I think it was the right move,” NDSU head coach Tim Polasek said.
The two top FCS teams had an even series split before this game, with SDSU winning the last five matchups. Despite outgaining NDSU in total yards—including 103 more rushing yards—SDSU struggled due to 10 costly penalties.
“Feel like we were running the ball well, we were passing well. Just again, the penalties killed us, in those certain situations like on the last drive we got a holding called back and that backed us up 10 yards, false start penalty. Just being able to overcome those little penalties will help us, but we shouldn’t be making them the first place,” SDSU quarterback Mark Gronowski said.
This year’s Dakota Marker had a sold out crowd of nearly 19,000 rocking the Fargodome.
“You can tell this community is in to everything Bison and we’re blessed to have that same type of fan base that appreciates us and we’re excited to be back at home. Hopefully we can create this type of volume and noise at Dana J. next week,” coach Rogers said.
SDSU now turns its focus to the State-U matchup this Saturday, hosting South Dakota with kick-off set for 6:30 P.M.
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