Idaho State at Montana State coverage leading up to the game

ISU football notebook: An ‘embarrassment’ Cal Poly isn’t ranked

Idaho State prepares for the elements at Montana State

5 QUESTIONS FOR THE BOBCATS
Idaho State plays at No. 13 Montana State on Saturday.

Statistically, it looks like an even matchup. Both teams have high-scoring offenses and each team’s defenses have had their good and bad moments throughout the season.

Of course, the matchup on the field is only part of the attraction. Idaho State head coach Mike Kramer is returning to the school where he coached for seven years before being fired.

In preparation for the game, Colter Nuanez, the senior writer and co-founder of Bobcat Beat (bobcatnation.com), was kind enough to answer five questions about the Montana State football team.

Question 1. Mike Kramer is returning to Montana State. It's been nearly a decade since he last coached the Bobcats. How will MSU fans receive Kramer? How is he viewed now seven years later?

Mike Kramer is quite possibly the most polarizing figure in the state of Montana. On one side, Kramer laid the foundation for what Montana State is now — a perennial Big Sky Conference contender with an expanded stadium and one of the most passionate fan bases in all the FCS. On the other hand, many resent Kramer for bringing in what was painted as illegitimate thugs and ruining the idyllic image of a sleepy mountain town.

Kramer wears his heart on his sleeve and shoots from the hip. He is a swashbuckler at times and his teams play with emotion. Many Montanans miss that. He’s also as good at getting a fan base involved as any coach I’ve been around. People miss that. A great many fans appreciate how Kramer resurrected the Montana State program and many of Kramer’s former players — Kane Ioane, Travis Lulay, Jeff Bolton, Brent Swaggert, ISU defensive coordinator Roger Cooper — are remembered with the reverence of legends.

When Kramer was fired, the program was a mess internally. Never mind the vast turmoil caused by the much-chronicled crime spree that included student-athletes using scholarship money to buy and sell cocaine. Never mind the murder of Jason Wright in which former football player John Lebrum and former basketball player Brandon Miller were convicted. The Academic Progress Rating was way down and NCAA sanctions were coming. Kramer’s defensive line coach Joe O’Brien was arrested for selling meth. All of it culminated in Kramer’s firing.

Because Rob Ash has cleaned up the program and righted the ship in virtually every aspect — MSU now has a glowing APR and does nearly 1,000 hours of community service in and around Bozeman each season — most would never want to go back to the Kramer days.

Question 2. With a combined 3,211 yards and 30 touchdowns, sophomore Dakota Prukop has really exploded onto the scene this season. What has made him so dynamic?

First, I must say that I don’t think there’s anyone associated with Montana State or the Big Sky Conference that thought the Bobcats would replace DeNarius McGhee so seamlessly. Not only was McGhee a two-time Big Sky MVP and one of 14 players in college football history to throw for more than 10,000 yards and rush for more than 1,000, but he also was an icon, the face of the program on and off the field. He was the most famous athlete in the state of Montana for four years running and arguably the face of the entire university, not just the athletic department.

Prukop is as good an athlete as there is in the Big Sky Conference. He’s one of the two or three fastest players on the Bobcats, all positions included. I would put my money on him having the best pure speed of any quarterback in the league including Cal Poly’s Chris Brown. He was recruited as a safety by several Big XII schools including Texas Tech. But Montana State was the only school that offered him a scholarship as a quarterback.

MSU pitted Prukop in a battle with junior Jake Bleskin for the right to backup McGhee for all of 2013. Bleskin won the backup job and started two games last season in McGhee’s absence. In spring drills and fall camp earlier this year, the battle raged on and Ash would always make sure to say Bleskin had the slight edge.

Now that we are three months into the season, it’s clear the coaches knew Prukop was their guy all along. But they drummed up the battle to keep Prukop motivated.

To answer your question, the things that make Prukop so dynamic are his athleticism and his ability to make decisions quickly. MSU is running the triple option out of the spread, meaning on most plays, Prukop has the chance to give to a running back, keep the ball himself, pitch it to the outside or find a receiver downfield. It’s resulted in oodles of big plays for the Bobcats, particularly on option throws.

“The most remarkable thing is his ability to read plays as they are going on,” Ash told me earlier this year. “I mean that both in terms of the run with all the options — I mean, there’s plays where he could have the ball, the running back could have the ball, he could pitch it to another guy or he can throw a pass, all could be possible when the ball is snapped and he gets it right almost all the time. That’s the most remarkable thing that he’s doing is that it all happens after the snap.”

If and when Prukop makes the correct read, it renders him literally unstoppable. In recent weeks, teams have done their best to take away anything over the top and they’ve also began to spy Prukop. The result has been lower point totals, but MSU has still rushed for more than 300 yards in three of its last four games and Prukop has gone over 100 two weeks in a row and five times this season. He’s as good a dual threat as there is in college football and a superior athlete for the FCS level.

Question 3. There have been times this season when Montana State's offense has looked unstoppable (averaging 53 points during one six-game stretch). But MSU hasn't topped 29 points in its last three games. What's going on?

As mentioned in the previous post, teams have been playing two-deep high safeties in an effort to take away the option in the triple option game, which is the big play over the top. Against Sacramento State and UC Davis, those plays were there to be had all night. Weber State and Cal Poly both eliminated that portion of the game while also dialing up exotic blitzes from the secondary and out of zone defenses to put pressure on Prukop.

Against Portland State, MSU was without senior running back Shawn Johnson and freshman running back Justin Paige, its two fastest offensive weapons. Johnson averages nearly 10 yards per touch and has scored eight touchdowns — four rushing, four receiving. Paige is a legit sub-4.4 40 guy who is averaging 32 yards per catch as a true freshman. PSU in turn loaded the box to stop the run and played man press on the outside. Without its burners, MSU couldn’t take the top off the defense, but the ‘Cats still rushed for 329 yards.

Another factor in not breaking into the 30s after scoring 136 points in a two-game jaunt through California has been the mistakes of MSU. Against Weber, Prukop and center Joel Horn failed to recognize the corner crack blitz before the snap on two different occasions, causing WSU sacks in the red-zone. MSU attempted field goals both times and missed them both. They also turned the ball over twice against Weber and got tricked on two fake punts that extended Wildcat drives.

Against Cal Poly, several holding penalties negated drives and the Mustangs simply played keep away from the ‘Cats. Late in the game, Prukop threw an interception on a fourth down play inside the red-zone when the Cats needed two yards for a first down. There was still 61 seconds left on the clock.

Against PSU, MSU got stopped on fourth down in the red zone one time and had another drive thwarted by two offensive pass interference calls.

Against Davis, the Cats scored on 11 of 12 offensive possessions because they made no mistakes. If they don’t shoot themselves in the foot, they would have been in the 30s or 40s scoring-wise against WSU and PSU.

Question 4. Montana State has faded in years past during the months of November and December. Do you get the sense the fan base is confident going into Saturday, or are there some nerves since Idaho State has won its last five games?

Oh, nerves abound from the Montana State faithful. Montana State’s defense has been the worst Bobcat unit this century, at least statistically, for a program with a proud, proud defensive tradition. MSU’s defensive scheme is predicated on having playmakers at the Bandit defensive end spot and the Will linebacker spot. Alex Singleton is exactly the playmaker you want at Will and he’s proven to be a star this season with 70 solo tackles, best in the FCS. But Odin Coe has not been able to mount the production of his predecessors at Bandit end. He’s got six sacks, a far cry from the 15 Brad Daly had last year in winning the Buck Buchanan Award or the 12.5 Caleb Schreibeis had in winning the Buck in 2012.

The fan base has been up in arms by the perceived offensive cold streak after they were spoiled with the ridiculous rip through California last month. Many think the coaches are being too conservative and handcuffing the offense when in reality, it’s more a matter of mistakes by MSU and adjustments by MSU’s opponents.

The fan base certainly knows Kramer, Don Bailey and Roger Cooper will come here with something to prove. The last time ISU came to Bozeman, the Bobcats thrashed the Bengals. An emotional Kramer said he felt his team quit on him during the post-game press conference. Everyone around here remembers that and knows that even if there’s no revenge on the minds of the players from either side, a few of the ISU coaches will certainly prepare with a vengeance.

With the loss of McGhee, Kirk and Daly among others from a group that won three straight Big Sky titles, a lot of folks around here thought this would be a rebuilding year. Now that it’s clear that it’s not and two wins could mean another Big Sky ring, people are very weary of this game. Like I said, Montana State’s offense has been a surprising bright spot this season, but the defense has struggled even against the likes of UC Davis and Sac State, two of the lesser teams in the league. North Dakota, Weber State and Portland State all went over their averages for total yards per game against MSU, so a team like ISU that is averaging 550 yards and 40 points per game presents a HUGE challenge for a unit that’s struggled to find any modicum of consistency this year.

Question 5. The projected high for Bozeman is 11 degrees on Saturday. How much is that going to diminish the crowd?

I think this is a game that has been marked on everyone’s calendar since the beginning of the season so I’m not sure it will have much affect. That said, last week there were only 16,667 fans there, almost 3,000 less than MSU’s season average coming into the Portland State game. Still, I think it will be a sellout or close to it and as long as it’s a good game heading into the fourth quarter, most of the seats will stay full.

Colter Nuanez is a freelance journalist living in Bozeman, Mont. He’s covered the Bobcats since 2011. He’s the co-founder and senior writer of Bobcat Beat (bobcatnation.com), a newspaper-style website that covers all Montana State sports. He can be reached at BobcatBeat56@gmail.com and followed on Twitter @Bobcat_Beat.