You can criticize Sacramento State’s playoff results, but you can’t criticize how entertaining the Hornets are to watch in the FCS postseason.
On Saturday in Grand Forks, North Dakota, Sac State added a win to its brief history of playoff appearances in customary shootout fashion, earning first-year head coach Andy Thompson his first postseason win in the process.
Troy Taylor led Sacramento State to 23 wins in 24 Big Sky Conference games, earning Big Sky Coach of the Year honors three years in a row after leading Sac to its first three league titles, ever. But Taylor went 1-3 in the FCS Playoffs before bolting to Stanford. Those results included falling just short in a 24-19 loss to South Dakota State in the 2021 playoffs; a 38-31 win over Richmond in the second round of the 2022 playoffs; and a 66-63 loss to Incarnate Word in last year’s quarterfinals that proved to be Taylor’s last game at the helm for the Hornets.
Sac State started this season in the Top 10 of the polls and stayed there for most of the season before falling back late thanks to losses to Montana State, Montana and UC Davis over the last five weeks of the season. Ultimately, a 30-23 win over Taylor and Stanford in Week 3 got the Hornets into the 24-team tournament.
After winning a 42-35 thriller at the University of North Dakota on Saturday, Thompson now has as many playoff wins as Taylor did leading the Hornets. And Thompson ensures that the Big Sky has four teams in the final 16 of the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs.
Kaiden Bennett threw for 207 yards and rushed for 126 more in leading Sac to the second postseason win in school history. The Hornets move on to play South Dakota, the No. 3 seed in the 24-team tournament. The ‘Yotes went 9-2 this season, with a 14-10 victory over UND on November 11.
“Kaiden Bennett was outstanding,” Thompson said. “We did a great job of blocking in the run game and we made a bunch of plays on the perimeter.
“Great job by our offensive staff. This is a tough place to come to and win. They have great tradition. They are a heckuva football team and we are really happy to be walking out of here with a win.”
Saturday at the Alerus Center, the Hornets jolted out to a 14-7 lead as Bennett engineered touchdown drives on each of Sac State’s first two possession. The lead swelled to 28-14 by halftime as Coleman Kuntz scored a pair of short rushing touchdowns for the visitors. Gaven Ziebarth rushed in both of UND’s first half touchdowns.
But North Dakota used a smothering defensive effort in the third quarter to even the score at 28. On the opening drive of the second half, the hosts turned a 39-yard kick return by Red Wilson and a fourth down conversion in the red zone into a Bo Belquist seven-yard touchdown reception. The Fighting Hawks forced a stop, then capped a drive with a short Quincy Vaughn touchdown run to tie the game at 28.
Ziebarth rushed for 96 yards and Isaiah Smith added 81 as UND rolled up 221 yards and scored four times on the ground. But Sac got enough stops to find a way to move on.
“I don’t think I did a good enough job of getting the guys ready to go. One time, I brought seven guys within five yards of the line of scrimmage and they still did a good job of blocking it,” Thompson said. “They are a very good run team. I was proud that our defense made some stops at the end. They kept fighting.
“Playoff football, win and you advance. Period.”
Bennett threw for 40 yards and ripped off a 17-yard run to get the Hornets within four yards of the end zone with the score tied at 35. He then scampered in from four yards out, his second rushing touchdown of the afternoon, for the final margin.
Brock Mather and Darian Pollard each notched sacks of Tommy Schuster to force a UND punt, and the Hornets ran out the final 2:41 of the clock.
Sac State is now 8-4. The four losses: at Idaho in Moscow the first week of conference play (36-27), to Montana State (42-30 on October 21) in Sacramento, at Montana (34-7 on November 4), and at UC Davis (31-21) in the final week of the regular season.
South Dakota’s two losses include a 35-10 loss at Missouri to open the season and a 37-3 loss to No. 1 South Dakota State on October 28 in Vermillion.
“I’m proud,” Thompson said. “They are a resilient group, man. All year, they have been resilient. We haven’t lost two games in a row all year. We have had some injuries. But they just keep fighting. They are going to do the same thing next week. We are excited to come back to the Midwest next week. We get to play a good football team.
“I’m just glad I get to coach these guys another week and we want to keep it rolling.”
