Welcome to Championship Week! This week culminates the end of the Division II and Division III football seasons. On Friday night Division III will invade Salem, VA for their eighth straight time. In Division II it was Cinderella story Wayne State advancing over Winston-Salem State to Florence, AL to take on Pittsburgh State who demolished Delta State 49-23. While Division III’s National Championship will have a familiar feel to it, Division II’s will be completely new.
Despite looking weaker at times (and despite my own faulty predictions) both Mount Union and Wisconsin-Whitewater will face off for the eighth consecutive year in the Stagg Bowl. On Saturday Mount Union came back from 13-14 half time deficit to win 28-21 in a back and forth games that Mount Union’s offense finally start clicking. 9 hours to the northwest Wisconsin-Whitewater dominated a St. Thomas team to the tune of 20-0. That display of offensive ability along with a strong defensive statement from Wisconsin-Whitewater has made me rethink my thoughts about their ability coming into these playoffs. An interesting change this year will be that both teams appear to be relatively healthy. Last year both teams were down to their backup QB’s in the Stagg Bowl, and it almost appeared it would happen again as Mount Union had both their starter and top back-up QB go down in the quarterfinals. However Mount Union starting QB Matt Piloto came back in the semis to play the entire game so that concern is no longer around. We will have a full blown preview later in the week for this Friday’s Stagg Bowl!
While I would of loved to see a chance for Winston-Salem to faceoff with Wayne State in the championship game it wasn’t the way the bracket worked out and instead they faced off in the semi-finals. In what was a hard fought battle between the two as Wayne State came out on top 21-14. In the end it was Wayne State’s defense that held the Rams in check as star RB Nic Cooper was held to only68 yards on the ground and Kadarron Smith was forced to throw more than he would of liked in the loss. Pittsburgh State overcame five turnovers in their game to beat Delta State. Delta State got down early in the 1st Half and could never recover. It was 14-13 late in the 2nd Quarter before Pittsburgh State scored three more times to make 35-13 at the half. Pittsburgh State knows it will have to shore up its mental lapses from the semi-finals if it wants to beat the hottest team in the entire country right now. A big difference here is that Pittsburgh State has been here before just seven years ago they were in Shoals for a National Championship game. While this current roster has yet to be there they are well aware of their universities proud tradition having already won a National Championship in 1991. Wayne State on the other hand has never been to Florence for the title game and will be seeking their universities first ever football National Championship.
While Division II and Division III wrap up their playoffs, the FCS is getting ready for its final week before they take a short hiatus before their National Championship. Quarterfinals weekend started off strong as powerhouse Montana dominated Northern Iowa on national TV last Friday night. That set the stage for what we thought was going to be an epic in-state re-match if Montana State could beat Sam Houston State but it wasn’t meant to be as Sam Houston State proved its metal in its first real test this year housing the bobcats 49-13. Sam Houston will take on Montana next week in one of the two semi-finals.
On the other side of the bracket both contests were rather lopsided as Georgia Southern finally put away Maine in the 2nd half with a 35-23 victory and North Dakota State dismantled Lehigh 24-0. NDSU v. Georgia Southern in the other semi-final has all the makings of one of those classic games that we tend to see every year. Georgia Southern v. NDSU has the 2:30pm kickoff on ESPNU on Saturday while Montana v. SHSU has the primetime Friday night game at 8pm on ESPN. Both games should offer football fans the best the playoffs have to offer.
I will be back later this week to preview both Championship games and the FCS Semifinals so be sure to check back. Here is this weekend’s programming:
Friday 12/16-Stagg Bowl Mount Union v. Wisconsin Whitewater-7:00PM ESPN2
Friday 12/16-FCS Semifinal-Montana v. Sam Houston State-8:00PM ESPN
Saturday 12/17-Division II National Championship-Wayne State v. Pittsburgh State-11am ESPN2
Saturday 12/17-FCS Semifinal-Georgia Southern v. NDSU-2:30PM ESPNU
