Questions remain for Samford at QB
Of all the teams North Dakota State has squared off with over in their storied history, one team the Bison have yet to face on the gridiron is the Samford Bulldogs. That will all change on Friday night when the sixth-seeded champions of the Southern Conference will head from Homewood, Ala. to Fargo, N.D. for a quarterfinal matchup. The Bison are coming off a 49-26 defeat over the Montana Grizzlies in the second round where they rushed for 453 yards. The Bison will have an opportunity to dominate the run game again against a Samford team that is ranked 84th in the FCS in run defense.
Against Montana, Kobe Johnson and TaMerik Williams led the way for the Bison as they combined for 307 of the 453 rushing yards in the win. The Bison were able to reach that mark without Senior Bowl invite Hunter Luepke. Luepke, who injured his shoulder against Southern Illinois, will miss the rest of the season and will need surgery to repair the injury. Although Luepke is now officially out, the Bison can still be confident in the rest of their running back room, particularly Johnson and Williams, as they utilize many ball carriers throughout the season.
“Kobe and (TaMerik) are super talented guys,” wide receiver Braylon Henderson affirmed. “We finally got to let them loose and see what they can do. They’re amazing backs and if you give them one lane they can keep going and go the distance.”
As for Samford, they possess an abundance of talent on the offensive side of the football. The Bulldogs, who are averaging 34.8 points per game, are led under center by quarterback Michael Hiers. Hiers has thrown for 3,317 yards on the season and 35 touchdowns while being intercepted only three times. However, the nation’s most accurate passer (76.8%) is listed as a game-time decision for Friday night. After sustaining a wrist injury in an overtime win over Mercer, Hiers played just a handful of snaps in last week’s win before being relieved.
Filling in for Hiers last week was Quincy Crittendon, who fit into Samford’s high-tempo offense quite nicely. The freshman completed 65% of his passes for 314 yards and four touchdowns along with 94 rushing yards and a score. No matter who is under center for the Bulldogs, the Bison will be challenged with stopping running backs Jay Stanton and Jaylan Thomas along with receivers Chandler Smith and Kendall Watson, who have each eclipsed 900 receiving yards on the season.
“I don’t know the extent of the injury of the starter,” Bison Head Coach Matt Entz stated. “He’s a tremendous quarterback. He’s got a burst, he’s got some juice to him, and we’re going have to do a really good job.”
The Samford offense that plays at a lightning-fast tempo will be another added element for the Bison defense. Along with the difficulty of getting calls in and substituting, making sure everyone is on the same page is another area of concern heading into Friday’s game.
“All eleven guys on the field need to be on the same page from a communication standpoint,” Entz clarified. “The people that I worry about the most are going to be the opponent side corner and safety because they’re the farthest ones away from the signals and that they’re not missing something or not seeing a call getting sent in. All of a sudden we have 10 of 11 playing one call and we have one person playing something else.”
Another challenge for the Bison defense is to maintain the energy to keep rushing the passer effectively. The Bison are coming off a game against Montana where they recorded a season-high six sacks. Leading the way was junior Dylan Hendricks, who recorded his first career sack last Saturday.
“It’s huge for me to finally feel comfortable in the role that I’m in on the team,” Hendricks said. “Do anything that can help this team move forward and eventually just win the game.”
Hendricks is now in his fourth season with the Bison, but it wasn’t until October 8 of this season that he finally was able to get on the field. After overcoming a ton of injuries and unfortunate events, Hendricks made his debut against Indiana State two months ago and has since recorded 10 tackles on the season. Half of those tackles came against Montana this past week.
“For him to start seeing the success and just the sheer enjoyment,” Entz said of Hendricks. “When he had that sack on Saturday, the thing I’m showing our team is everyone on the sideline and how excited they got for #95’s success but it’s good to see and it’s at the right time of the year for us.”
As Hendricks and the rest of the team prepare for Samford, they’ll have one less day to do so. In all eight home quarterfinal games the Herd has played since 2013, each of them has been an 11 AM kickoff on Saturday morning. However, this time around the Bison were scheduled to play on Friday night, something not foreign to the program. The Bison most recently played on Friday night last season in the 20-14 semifinal victory over James Madison.
“The schedule is a little bit different,” Henderson said of playing a day earlier. “A lot of us have been here, we’re all veterans so we’ve played on Friday nights before. We’re going to be ready.”
The quarterfinal matchup between the Bison and Bulldogs will kick off from the Fargodome at 6:00 p.m. on Friday, December 9. The game will be televised on ESPN2 and on the radio you can listen to Rob Hipp on the play-by-play and Bison legend Phil Hansen on the commentary at Bison1660-AM or 107.9 The Fox.