BOZEMAN, Mont. (Nov. 4, 2023) – The Northern Arizona University football team lost on the road No. 6/8 Montana State today by a score of 45-21 at Bobcat Stadium in Bozeman, Mont.
After the loss, NAU drops to 3-6 overall and 3-3 in Big Sky Conference play, while the Bobcats improve to 7-2 and 5-1.
The Bobcats scored on their first four drives, all of which were in the first half, and put up 343 rushing yards and 458 total yards of offense in the victory. The Lumberjacks were held to 100 rushing yards and 154 passing yards for 254 yards of offense.
Angel Flores earned his first career start, the third quarterback to start for the Lumberjacks this season, and completed his first six pass attempts. He ended the day 12-for-18 for 97 yards with an interception and added 21 rushing yards on 16 carries.
Daniel Britt also made his second appearance of the season and threw his first career touchdown pass to
Coleman Owen, cementing Owen into NAU's all-time top-ten for receiving touchdowns with 16. With 23 seconds left, Britt found Xander Warner for 43 yards and the touchdown, the first of Warner's career, to show no quit.
"We didn't execute like we needed to execute, and we made too many mistakes. They're a really good football team and we needed to do a better job up front on both offense and defense. We didn't tackle like we needed to tackle, and we just didn't do a good job executing the game plan like we needed to do," said head coach
Chris Ball. "You can't make many mistakes against this team because they'll take advantage of it. They're a really, really, good football team. We'll take a look at the tape and make some corrections; we have two more games and can end up 5-3 in this conference."
Montana State scored on two consecutive drives to open the game, first stringing together a 12-play, 75-yard opening drive that ticked 7:36 off the clock and resulted in a nine-yard rushing touchdown for an early 7-0 lead. The second score came on a four-yard rushing touchdown and MSU led 14-0 after the first quarter after putting up 135 rushing yards.
The Lumberjacks got on the board midway through the second quarter when Flores rushed five yards for the score. The drive lasted 7:04 and including 13 plays for 75 yards. During the drive, the Lumberjacks converted on third down twice and fourth down once.
The Bobcats responded with their third rushing touchdown of the half on the next drive, making it three-straight drives with a score to pull ahead 21-7. Before the half was over, the Lumberjacks turned the ball over on downs and Montana State tacked on seven more points following a 20-yard receiving touchdown.
At the break, Montana State led 28-7.
MSU found the endzone once in the third quarter, scoring a one-yard rushing touchdown and converted a 42-yard field goal attempt to take a 38-7 lead into the fourth.
Northern Arizona's offense received a spark when Britt entered the game in the fourth quarter. After he rushed for 31 yards to set up first-and-ten on the MSU 12-yard line, he found Owen for 12 yards and the score to make it a 35-14 game after
Szymon Gawlick's extra point attempt was good.
On the next drive, the Bobcats found the endzone once again on a 45-yard rushing touchdown to push the lead out to 45-14.
The Lumberjacks refused to quit and Britt found Warner for 43 yards and the score, but the comeback attempt was too late and NAU fell 45-21.
Tommy Ellis led the team with a career-high 10 tackles, the first double-digit tackle performance of his career, and
Malachi Williams finished with eight.
Hendrix Johnson was NAU's leading receiver along with Warner, hauling in 43 yards on four catches. Johnson needs just five more catches to break NAU's all-time receptions record. Owen finished with 40 yards on six catches.
Northern Arizona returns to action next Saturday, Nov. 11, to host Northern Colorado at 1 p.m. Mountain Standard time for Senior Day.
