North Dakota State has been the toast of the Mountain West Conference with a big debut win over Jacksonville State on Saturday.
Bison head coach Tim Polasek doesn’t want his team to get comfortable after a 33-7 win over the Gamecocks. He doesn’t see Fordham as an FCS team to overlook in Week 1, and he is even more concerned that his Bison squad doesn’t get ahead of themselves with first place in the Mountain West.
Polasek, who once served on Wyoming‘s coaching staff, knows the league Mountain West all too well. He doesn’t see contenders Hawaii or UNLV losing season openers in Week Zero as a clear runway for the Bison to the Mountain West throne.
“First of all, I don’t know what the point is to talking about where somebody’s going to be 12 weeks from now in today’s college football,” Polasek told reporters on Tuesday. “What do we know about any team? Who’s on their roster? How tight and how much chemistry do they have? How many games have they played together?”
Polasek doesn’t believe the Bison can lock up the Mountain West anytime soon, regardless of how thoroughly the team dominates Fordham and gears up for a big conference opener with Air Force on Sept. 12. He expects the conference race to go the distance.
“In the three years I was in the league, the conference race wasn’t really determined until about Week 9 or 10, and I think there were some swings and back and forth,” Polasek said.
Penalties a Concern For Bison
As much as NDSU looked dominant on Saturday against JSU, penalties plagued the Bison with 13 for 94 yards.
The bottom line is that those penalties took away more opportunities for our offense and the offensive kids to go have fun, and so we have to get all of that cleaned up,” Polasek said.
NDSU will get a good chance to work the kinks out on Saturday against the Rams, and the Bison could get playing time for backups, which is critical for roster development. It helps ensure the Bison will have quality depth when needed down the road, and that had been commonplace during the FCS dynasty when backups played large chunks of second-half blowouts over the years.
Bison Focused on 1-0
Polasek only needs to go back to one of his predecessors whom he coached under to drive home what’s expected after a big win such as the JSU game.
“Chris Klieman … taught us, all of us young coaches, a lot,” Polasek said about the former Bison head coach. “He took over for coach [Craig] Bohl, who won three in a row, and he acknowledged it immediately … staying humble and hungry.”
“Let’s identify this 1-0 mentality because 1-0, if you have that mindset at least that gives you a chance to sustain success,” Polasek added. “Because in today’s game, it’s harder than ever.”
NDSU dominated the FCS with that process amid 10 titles in 15 years. The Bison have the most wins in all of Division I football, FCS and FBS, since 2004. Polasek emphasized it’s the preparation versus the talent that got them this far.
“The Bison are not good enough to just show up, and we’re 1-1 in our last two games,” Polasek said in reference to last season’s FCS playoff loss. “So we don’t have to look that far to figure that out.”
NDSU Coach Sounds Off on Challenges Ahead