September brought both ups and downs for the Montana State Bobcat football team. Fort Louis was the Cats first home game, played under the lights at Bobcat Stadium on September 3. After a rocky start the Cats came back to capitalize with an extraordinary second half of football, the Bobcats came out on top with a 45-14 win.

After two weeks of rest the Bobcats found themselves in Cheney Washington facing the University of Eastern Washington Eagles. A rocky start would be an under exaggeration to describe the Bobcats performance at the start of this game. This would be a non conference game for the Cats, but the outcome would leave the winner with bragging rights in the FCS and the Big Sky. Some questionable calls on the coaching staffs behalf left the Bobcats fighting from behind 21 points at the end of the first quarter, with the score 28-7 Eastern Washington.

The Bobcats did prove one thing in the game, that they are a second half team. Coming out in the second half, the Bobcats offense dominated for most of the second half. Biting and scratching their way back into the game, it was not enough to catch Eastern Washington’s lead. The Bobcats yielded a total of 763 offensive yards, you just don’t see that kind of offensive yardage in FCS football very often. Combined with Eastern Washington’s 656 total offense this was an offensive showdown for the record books, Bobcats falling to Eastern Washington 55-50. This is going to make an interesting matchup if the Bobcats and Eastern Washington meet in the playoffs in December.

After the unbearable beating by Eastern Washington the Bobcats returned home September 26 for the homecoming matchup against Cal Poly. The Bobcats needed to make a mark in the Big Sky Conference with a good showing against Cal Poly. Dakota Prukop and the Bobcat offense came out with all pistons firing, chalking up 21 points in the first 10 minutes of the game. That was just the start, the Cats had a commanding lead at halftime 31-21.

Coach Ash was incredibly proud of the Bobcat defense only allowing 7 points in the second half. He contributed the defense success to going back to the basics. “We just simplify things for the defense and it seemed to work well, very proud of my defense.”

#90 Taylor Sheridan defensive end said, “We had no specific play for the defense, we were to just go out and do our assignments.”

The defense had a major part in the 45-28 victory over Cal Poly. This victory placed Montana State as one of the power house teams to watch out for in the FCS this year.

The Bobcats will travel to Northern Arizona to play the Lumberjacks October 3, then return home October 10 to take on Sacramento State at Bobcat Stadium, game time 5:05pm. Games can be seen on ROOT Sports, or listen on Bobcat radio network, or tune into real game highlights at Bozeman Magazine Facebook page or Jacks kidcatchat on Facebook.