You can go to a year’s worth of football games in person, watch a bunch of games on television and still not see as many wacky occurrences as you saw in just one game in 2022 – the soggy Week 8 matchup between Montana State and Weber State.
That’s because long snappers rarely snap the ball through the end zone for safeties, let alone do it four times in one game as Weber State’ long snapper Grant Sands did last October 22. Sure, kickoff and punt returns for touchdowns happen, but not so much one of each in the first quarter alone as Abraham Williams and Hudson Schenck each found paydirt for Weber State. Long snappers get down field on punts, but it’s not every day you see one – MSU’s Tommy Sullivan in this case – recover a fumble.
Add in that Tommy Mellott threw his only career interception against a FCS team, the seven false starts by MSU, the six dropped passes by WSU and the blocked field goal by the Wildcats, and you’ve got a full year’s worth of madcap plays. Oh by the way, Mellott also set the Big Sky Conference record for rushing yards in a single game by a quarterback….and it was an afterthought because of all the other wild occurences.
It’s hard to say for certain that the wet conditions had much to do with the offbeat plays, but it had to be part of the equation.
It all added up to a 43-38 win for the Bobcats, but a frenetic comeback over the last 18 minutes by Weber almost upended that. WSU was up 24-9 at one point only to see MSU score 34 unanswered points to go up 43-24 in the fourth quarter. The Bobcats drove into Wildcat’ territory and looked ready to build an insurmountable lead. They opted to go for a first down on fourth-and-one from the Wildcat’ 14 only to see Lane Sumner stopped for no gain.
Two long touchdown drives ensued to cut it to the final margin and the Bobcats couldn’t run out the clock as WSU got one more shot. The Wildcats would convert on fourth-and-10 twice during the drive but the third time turned out to be the charm for MSU as the game all but ended on a dropped pass near the MSU 15-yard line by Ty McPherson with :31 to play.
Most of the mayhem occurred in the first half as Sands sent three snaps through the end zone. MSU took the ensuing kickoff and drove for touchdowns the first two times that happened. The third time the Wildcats forced MSU to punt only to see return man Hudson Schenck drop the ball and Sullivan recover. Shortly after MSU was in the end zone again and up 27-24 at halftime.
Prior to that, it was all Weber State as the Wildcats intercepted Mellott on the third play of the game. Mellott made a touchdown saving tackle and WSU settled for a field goal. Sands then sent a snap through the end zone and MSU got the ball and Mellott galloped for a 42-yard touchdown. That score was wiped away immediately when the nation’s top kick returner Abraham Williams went 100 yards for a touchdown, one of five KR touchdowns in the last season and a half for the fastest man in the Big Sky Conference.
MSU’s next drive stalled out in part due to two false starts and Schenck took the punt 91 yards down the MSU sidelines to put Weber State up 17-9. The Wildcats got a three and out and drove 70 yards easily to stake themselves to a 24-9 lead. The Bobcats looked to answer and when their drive went flat deep in Weber territory they saw Blake Glessner’s 39-yard field goal try get blocked by Maxwell Anderson, one of Weber’s top returners coming into this season.
With the Wildcats holding all the momentum, MSU got a three-and-out of its own and then Sands sent his second snap out of the end zone. The Bobcats took advantage of the typically good field position that kickoffs after safeties present – teams have to kick or punt from their own 20 instead of the 35 after safeties – and drove 59 yards to cut the lead to 24-18. Another three-and-out followed for Weber and just like clockwork Sands sent the ball out of the end zone and the score became 24-20. That led to the MSU punt and consequent fumble recovered by Sullivan. A play later Mellott found tight end Derryk Snell for a 15-yard touchdown.
Aside from one more Sands’ snapping safety, the second half wasn’t nearly as eventful until Weber State mounted its comeback bid. In all, the Wildcats covered a total of 161 yards on their two TD drives. They went from their own 10 to the MSU 22 – 68 yards – on the last drive. Once they hit the MSU 22, linebacker Callahan O’Reilly came up with a big sack to force WSU into a fourth-and-10 that McPherson couldn’t bring down.
The Wildcats would collect a walloping 229 yards on 35 plays on their last three possessions.
By the time the chaos calmed, the Bobcats had yet another win in a string of razor-thin victories during a season that saw MSU run the table in the Big Sky Conference. The loss likely cost Weber State a bye in the FCS playoffs and forced the Wildcats to come back to Bozeman a little more than a month later.
“Just even watching that game again (Sunday) you almost even forget the flow of that game and how crazy it was,” Montana State head coach Brent Vigen said. “We had some early success and then it was like a tidal wave and we were down a bunch of points in a hurry.
“What I do remember more than anything is hanging on for dear life at the end. I had forgot they cut it to five at the end….Crazy game. we made a bunch of plays, they did as well. It showed our resolve that day and then to come back in the playoff game and beat them, that was big.
“That’s the main takeaway from the games last year: this Weber team is going to keep after you. And I’d like to think that’s the way people think about us as well. I think it’s a really good matchup between two teams that have won a lot of football games in recent history.”
The game isn’t the only one in recent memory that went down to the wire between the two. The Bobcats also prevailed in Ogden in 2021 behind their stout defense and some clutch plays by former quarterback Matt McKay. McKay scored MSU’s lone touchdown early in the game on a fourth down play on the goal line, then sealed the win with first down run.
In last year’s playoffs, MSU dispatched the Wildcats in Bozeman in the second round. Similar to the Week 8 game, the Wildcats mounted a mad rally turning a 33-10 game into a 33-25 game with 4:42 to play only to see the Bobcats burn up the remaining time with a crushing drive made up of eight straight runs – seven by Chambers.
“What’s been proven the last couple of years that if you want to win our conference, you can’t lose a game,” Vigen said. “I don’t know if that’s going to be true again this year but that’s what starts again for us on Saturday.”
Montana State posted a 13-7 win in a completely slugfest the last time the Bobcats played Weber State in Ogden. No. 3 MSU and No. 9 Weber State kick off from renovated Stewart Stadium at 6 p.m. on Saturday night.
“That’s all most of us know is that one trip and looking back at history doesn’t do us much good,” Vigen said. “Places you’ve been to, there’s a familiarity with what the surroundings are all about. I know they’ve had some renovations this year and I know they have some crowds that could be a factor as well.
“You go on the road and try to keep things as simple as you can…I expect a great college atmosphere and we are playing a good team. That’s been the thing over the years: Weber has had some great teams.”
