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By PAUL DELANEY
Contributor 

Eagles go Bison hunting in Fargo

Eastern meets North Dakota State in opening round of playoffs

 

Last updated 4/22/2021 at 10:18am



CHENEY — The foe in Eastern Washington’s round one of the Football Championship Subdivision’s spring season tournament is quite familiar.

Having to gather together all the gear for a road playoff game in the Fargodome on Saturday, April 24 against the North Dakota State Bison? Maybe only head coach Aaron Best has memories of the last time the Eagles played away from Roos Field in postseason?

Not including championship games in 2010 and 2018, Eastern’s last 17 games in the playoffs have come in Cheney. The Eagles have won 13 of them. Eastern’s last road game in the playoffs was Nov. 28, 2009, in Nacogdoches, Texas, in a 44-33 loss to Stephen F. Austin, back when Best was an offensive line coach.

The first-round game features a pair of runners-up in their leagues. No. 9 Eastern finished 5-1 and with a five-game winning streak to earn an at-large berth out of the Big Sky Conference. The No. 2 Bison are 6-2 and also received an at-large entry after losing to Missouri Valley Conference champion South Dakota State 27-17 April 17 at the Fargodome.

With a rare number of losses – 2 in the COVID-shortened 2021 spring season — it was suggested to Best at an April 18 press conference that the Bison might be considered “vulnerable.”

“This game of football is not played on paper,” Best answered. “And so, your definition of vulnerability — or anybody else’s — would be ‘Oh, they’ve lost multiple games in a six game seven game setting; that doesn’t necessarily equate to vulnerability.’”

Eastern is best known for its volatile offense, but the unsung story for the Eagles might just be defense. “We’ve played great times, we’ve played not as great at times,” Best said. “But consistency has won the day on defense and it’s not been with consistent players.”

But NDSU has won nine of the past 10 FSC national titles with James Madison interrupting the Bison appearances in 2016.

Eastern is 1-3 all-time versus the Bison, losing 34-24 the last time they met on Jan. 5, 2019, in Frisco, Texas, for the FCS title for the 2018 season. The two teams met in regular season games in 2016 and 2017, with EWU falling 50-44 in overtime in the Fargodome in the first meeting, then losing the following season 40-13 in Cheney.

The first meeting between the schools came in 2010 with the Eagles beating the Bison 38-31 is a sometimes near blinding snowstorm — in overtime — in the FCS quarterfinals at Roos Field.

Should there be some benefit COVID-19 brings Saturday it will be that only 25% of the stadium’s nearly 19,000 seats will be filled, drastically cutting the noise level.

“If we can stay consistent that’s always gonna’ give us a chance, but you know as well as I do defense wins championships and offense sells tickets and if we can have a little bit of both we’ve got a chance,” Best said.

Paul Delaney is a retired former Free Press Publishing reporter and can be reached at pauldelaney53@comcast.net.

 

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