Sports
FCS national championship preview: Illinois State, Montana State starving for title
Illinois State came within 37 seconds of a national title in 2014 but couldn’t keep North Dakota State out of the end zone. After getting thumped by NDSU in the 2021 title game, Montana State returned last season and tried everything it could to erase an early deficit against the mighty Bison. The Bobcats came up three points short.
Both ISU’s and MSU’s ambitions have been held back by the Goliath of FCS, but thanks to an all-timer of an upset, one will win the 2025 national title. Brock Spack’s ISU Redbirds knocked out a particularly strong NDSU squad in the round of 16, erasing a late 14-point deficit and nailing a well-timed 2-point conversion. And with the bracket busted, the Redbirds kept rolling: They pulled off two more road upsets — they’re the first team to win four road games in a single playoff run — and rode a rapidly improving defense to a spot in their first title game since the 2014 heartbreaker.
Montana State, meanwhile, is in its third title game in five seasons. With a mix of new blood and stalwarts from last year’s oh-so-close squad, the Bobcats have won 13 straight, and they outclassed rival Montana in the semifinals. They’ve waited more than 40 years for a follow-up to their 1984 national title, and they came achingly close to the mountaintop last season. Now all they have to do is beat a team of destiny.
On Monday night in Nashville (7:30 ET, ESPN), two teams yearning to take advantage of the best title chance they might ever have will square off. Here’s everything you need to know about a fascinating FCS finale.
How they got here
No. 2 Montana State Bobcats
Record: 13-2
SP+ rankings: third overall, fourth on offense, ninth on defense
First-team all-conference selections: RG Titan Fleischmann (6-foot-4, 300 pounds, Jr.), NT Paul Brott (6-3, 300, Sr.), edge Kenneth Eiden IV (6-1, 250, Sr.), SS Caden Dowler (6-0, 205, Sr., Big Sky Defensive Player of the Year)
Key regular-season results: lost to No. 2 South Dakota State 30-24, def. No. 10 Northern Arizona 34-10, def. No. 9 UC Davis 38-17, def. No. 2 Montana 31-28
Playoff run: def. Yale 21-13, def. No. 7 Stephen F. Austin 44-28, def. No. 3 Montana 48-23
Including a Week 1 blasting by Oregon, Montana State averaged a pretty mortal 23.8 points over the first four games of the season. As always, the run game was strong from the start — the Bobcats have gained at least 189 yards on the ground against every FCS opponent and have topped 225 yards 10 times — but new quarterback Justin Lamson, a Stanford transfer, averaged just 4.3 yards per pass attempt (including sacks) against Oregon and South Dakota State, and he had only three touchdown passes in the first four games.
Over his past 11 games, however, Lamson has thrown for 2,157 yards (13.4 per completion) with a 21-to-1 TD-to-INT ratio. Complement a dynamite run game with an error-free and occasionally explosive passing game, and you’re going to be awfully hard to stop. MSU has averaged 43.3 points per game in these 11 contests and has allowed just 13.9 per game in its past 13. The Bobcats found fifth gear, and they’ve stayed there, really having to sweat against only Montana in the regular-season finale and Yale in their first playoff game.
Record: 12-4
SP+ rankings: 10th overall, 11th on offense, 28th on defense
First-team all-conference selections: WR Daniel Sobkowicz (6-3, 205, Sr.), LT Jake Pope (6-7, 300, Sr.), LB Tye Niekamp (6-3, 240, Jr., Missouri Valley Defensive Player of the Year), CB Shadwel Nkuba II (6-1, 190, Sr.)
Key regular-season results: lost to No. 1 North Dakota State 33-16, lost to No. 25 Youngstown State 40-35, def. No. 21 South Dakota 21-13, def. No. 15 South Dakota State 35-21, lost to No. 24 Southern Illinois 37-7
Playoff run: def. No. 16 Southeastern Louisiana 21-3, def. No. 1 North Dakota State 29-28, def. No. 8 UC Davis 42-31, def. No. 12 Villanova 30-14
Brock Spack has brought incredible reliability to ISU; in 17 seasons in Normal, his Redbirds have won at least six games 14 times and at least 10 five times. ISU had won three FCS playoff games in its history before he arrived in 2009 — and has won 12 since. But that 2014 title game run was starting to seem pretty far in the rearview mirror. The Redbirds hadn’t made it past the quarterfinals since then, and they had reached the playoffs only once in the 2020s.
Illinois State won four in a row late in the regular season to all but clinch a playoff spot, and the offense provided plenty of sterling moments. But even with star linebacker Tye Niekamp, the defense didn’t really look the part, and a humbling 37-7 loss to Southern Illinois in the regular-season finale gave no indication of what was to come. The Redbirds were only 21st in SP+ heading into the playoffs, and they’ve been projected underdogs in every game they’ve played.
They’ve redefined “peaking late,” however. They’ve overachieved against SP+ projections by 7.2 points per game on offense and by 14.1 on defense, and after four immaculate road wins, here they are.
Can ISU keep the magic formula going?
Based on pregame SP+ projections, ISU had a 0.3% chance of winning its four playoff games — and that doesn’t even begin to crack the degree of difficulty involved in beating North Dakota State while throwing five interceptions. But just about everyone in the Redbirds’ lineup has come through when required. Quarterback Tommy Rittenhouse indeed threw five picks in Fargo, but he also has thrown eight touchdown passes in the past three games. Seven of those went to Daniel Sobkowicz, who has 29 catches for 403 yards in four playoff games, scored twice against NDSU and went for 150 yards against UC Davis. (Sobkowicz also threw a TD pass to Rittenhouse against Southeastern Louisiana.) Lead back Victor Dawson, meanwhile, has 517 rushing yards (5.3 per carry) in the playoffs after producing 734 (4.8) in 12 regular-season games.
The defense ranked 56th in SP+ when the playoffs began but has transformed into something pretty remarkable. Southeastern Louisiana averaged 33.3 points per game in the regular season but finished with more interceptions thrown (four) than points scored against the Redbirds. NDSU gained 78 yards on its first snap, a long catch-and-run from Bryce Lance, but gained just 101 additional yards. UC Davis, with one of the best offenses in the country, scored 10 points in the first four minutes and 14 in the final three, but scored just once in seven drives in between as ISU was seizing control with a 35-7 run. Villanova turned three early trips into ISU territory into just six points and trailed by 24 when it finally got moving again late.
Niekamp has been as reliable as ever in the playoffs, but so many others have contributed when needed, from tackles Garret Steffen and Jake Anderson (6.5 TFLs and five sacks) to corners Shadwel Nkuba II and Cam Wilson (one INT, seven breakups, a TFL, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery) to safety CJ Richard Jr. (two picks, a breakup and a fumble recovery). This has been a 2007 or 2011 New York Giants type of run, with an occasionally error-prone QB coming up big in critical moments and an increasingly confident and disruptive defense taking over for growing swaths of time.
If you can hold NDSU to less than 200 yards, you can do it to pretty much anyone, but obviously it will be an enormous challenge pinning down a Montana State offense that has scored at least 31 points in 11 of its past 13 games. One wouldn’t figure the odds of success here are high, but if there’s one thing we’ve learned, it’s that the Redbirds don’t care much about the odds.
So MSU will close the deal this time … right?
Last year’s title game loss felt like such a missed opportunity for Montana State. NDSU hadn’t been at its absolute best in 2024, and Brent Vigen’s Bobcats had an unbeaten and particularly brilliant squad led by All-Americans (and soon-to-be departees) such as quarterback Tommy Mellott — the Walter Payton Award winner and a sixth-round NFL draft pick — plus fullback/tight end Rohan Jones, offensive linemen Marcus Wehr and Conner Moore, and defensive end Brody Grebe. They were going to get hit by attrition, and NDSU really wasn’t. It was time for them to break through, but a poor start in the title game prevented it.
Even if the losses were to Oregon and South Dakota State, an 0-2 start in 2025, combined with NDSU’s immediate brilliance, reinforced the idea that MSU’s time had passed. But you never know what will happen if you just keep trying to improve. Justin Lamson found his rhythm after the slow start, and when it was time for the Bobcats to shift into a new gear, they did so.
Going back to the end of the regular season, they have played five straight games against playoff teams — including four against quarterfinalists and top-eight seeds (Montana twice, Stephen F. Austin and UC Davis) — and have won those five games by an average of two touchdowns. Lamson has completed 72% of his passes and thrown for 886 yards, with 334 non-sack rushing yards plus 12 combined TDs, in these five games, and running backs Adam Jones (the dual threat) and Julius Davis (the workhorse) have combined for 856 rushing yards, 120 receiving yards and 9 touchdowns. Slot receiver Taco Dowler hasn’t always had much to do, but he caught a game-turning 87-yard touchdown pass in the semifinals, and wideouts Dane Steel and Chris Long have come through as well.
Against a strong group of offenses in this five-game run — among others, Montana is second in offensive SP+, and UC Davis is eighth — MSU’s defense has allowed 21.8 points per game and 5.1 yards per play (not dominant, but well below these opponents’ season averages) and has pounced beautifully on mistakes: The Bobcats have made 18 sacks and forced 11 turnovers, scoring on three of them. Safety Caden Dowler reeled in pick-sixes in each of the last two regular-season games, and linebacker Bryce Grebe‘s 40-yard pick-six finished off the semifinal blowout.
Caden Dowler might be the biggest story of the game: He’s the best safety in FCS — and maybe the best player on either of these rosters — and he has made 6 picks with 4 breakups, 6.5 TFLs and 2 forced fumbles this season. But he left the semifinal win with an injured arm, and although Vigen expressed optimism about his availability, it’s a race against time, and he might not be 100 percent even if he plays.
Projecting the title game
DraftKings projection: Montana State 33.5, Illinois State 23.0 (MSU -10.5, over/under 56.5 points)
SP+ projection: Montana State 33.2, Illinois State 24.8
Per SP+, Montana State has about a 70% chance of winning this one, which means we can almost think of this as having three equally likely outcomes: a tight ISU win, a reasonably tight MSU win and a comfortable MSU win. If ISU can control the ball with Dawson, and if Rittenhouse avoids picks, the Redbirds could score enough to give themselves a chance. But the Redbirds’ margin for error isn’t great, as they’ll also have to continue overachieving drastically on defense against a peaking MSU attack.
It’s hard to bet against Spack’s Redbirds considering the odds they’ve defied just to get to this point. But it’s also pretty easy to see this as Montana State’s moment. The Bobcats just keep inching closer and closer, and thanks to ISU, the typical final boss isn’t waiting in the final. If you squint just right, both of these teams have a “team of destiny” vibe. Only one will lift the trophy, however.
Nine freshmen, led by Duke’s Cameron Boozer and BYU’s AJ Dybantsa, headline the men’s Wooden Award midseason top 25 watchlist released Wednesday.
Boozer leads the nation in scoring at 23.3 points per game, with Dybantsa just behind him at 23.1 per game. Boozer has been arguably the most consistent player in college basketball since the start of the season, scoring at least 14 points in every game and tallying seven double-doubles to lead Duke to a 14-1 start. The 6-foot-9 forward is also averaging 9.7 rebounds and 4.2 assists.
Dybantsa, meanwhile, recently put together one of the most impressive stretches ever by a freshman. In the month of December, he averaged 27.8 points, 8.0 rebounds, 5.7 assists and 2.3 steals, shooting nearly 66% from the field.
North Carolina’s Caleb Wilson isn’t far behind the two stars, averaging 19.3 points and 10.9 rebounds with 10 double-doubles in his first 15 games.
The midseason list also included two talented freshmen with lingering injury issues. Kansas’ Darryn Peterson has played in only six games this season because of a hamstring injury, although he has started the Jayhawks’ past two games and had 32 points in 32 minutes Tuesday against TCU. Louisville’s Mikel Brown Jr. has sat out five games in a row because of a lower-back injury.
Those five freshmen made up the top five in ESPN’s latest 2026 NBA draft big board.
There also are a number of college veterans poised to make a second-half run at the award. Purdue’s Braden Smith entered the season as the favorite thanks to his status as an All-American last season and the top player on the AP’s preseason No. 1 team. He leads the nation in assists, averaging 9.6 entering the week, setting the Big Ten career record earlier this month. Should he maintain that average, Smith would be on pace to set the all-time Division I career assists record (1,076) held by Bobby Hurley.
Iowa State’s Joshua Jefferson and Michigan’s Yaxel Lendeborg have emerged as legitimate contenders for the award after an outstanding first two months of the season. Jefferson is the anchor for a 14-0 Cyclones team, averaging 17.5 points, 7.3 rebounds and 5.4 assists. Lendeborg, a former UAB transfer, leads the No. 2 Wolverines in scoring (14.7) and is second in rebounding (7.0) and assists (3.4).
Players not on Wednesday’s watchlist are still eligible for the late-season list and the final ballot whose voting determines the winner.
Wooden Award Midseason Top 25
listed in alphabetical order
Darius Acuff Jr., Arkansas
Nate Ament, Tennessee
Cameron Boozer, Duke
Jaden Bradley, Arizona
Mikel Brown Jr., Louisville
Tucker DeVries, Indiana
AJ Dybantsa, BYU
Kingston Flemings, Houston
P.J. Haggerty, Kansas State
Thomas Haugh, Florida
Graham Ike, Gonzaga
Joshua Jefferson, Iowa State
Alex Karaban, UConn
Trey Kaufman-Renn, Purdue
Yaxel Lendeborg, Michigan
Tamin Lipsey, Iowa State
Koa Peat, Arizona
Darryn Peterson, Kansas
Labaron Philon Jr., Alabama
Emanuel Sharp, Houston
Braden Smith, Purdue
Bennett Stirtz, Iowa
Bruce Thornton, Ohio State
JT Toppin, Texas Tech
Caleb Wilson, North Carolina
For ages, certainly as long as we have been in the College Football Playoff age, people have politely asked and desperately pleaded, when were some new bloods finally going to replace the blue bloods on college football’s biggest postseason stage?
Well, folks, the age of new is officially the age of now.
The promise of the four-team CFP versus the two-team Bowl Championship Series title game was to create more room for more teams to challenge the same old establishment. One year ago, the impetus behind the playoff’s further expansion to a dozen teams was to widen that door even further and perhaps interject a little March Madness into college football.
It’s working. At least for now, it is. And fittingly, it’s a basketball school that is leading the movement.
For the first time since the CFP debuted at the end of the 2014 season, the playoff’s final four lineup does not include Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State or Clemson. And over those first 11 editions, any team that did manage to break the big four’s big box déjà vu blockade to earn a spot in the semis or final … well, they weren’t exactly George Mason ’06 or Loyola Chicago ’18.
Notre Dame made it to the title game one year ago, following Michigan‘s 2023 run to the championship. But no one is going to mistake the Irish and Wolverines for UMBC and VCU. The closest we came to a true CFP Cinderella run was TCU in 2022, when the Horned Frogs crashed the big ball in Los Angeles, only to have Georgia take away their glass slipper and beat them over their horned heads with it 65-7.
However, this year’s fortuitous foursome — with Ole Miss facing Miami on Thursday night and Indiana taking on Oregon on Friday — is guaranteed to bring us a new-age champion, no matter who winds up standing atop the stage at Hard Rock Stadium on Jan. 19. And it won’t merely be the boldest new-blood dash of the CFP era, but also of nearly the entire BCS era that began in 1998. Or, honestly, even the Bowl Alliance, the Bowl Coalition or the plain old Bowl era that reaches back more than a century.
No matter your age, you know that Indiana has never had a football golden age until now. No offense to Coach Corso and the 1979 Holiday Bowl champs or Vaughn Dunbar and the 1991 Copper Bowl victors or even Antwaan Randle-El and Anthony Thompson, but that’s really as good as it ever got. The good people of Bloomington were content to let the Irish be the state’s football school with occasional loan-outs to Purdue, while everyone waited for hoops season to finally tip off.
IU has fielded football teams since 1887, but the Hoosiers hadn’t posted double-digit wins in a season until the past two years and hadn’t won an outright Big Ten title since 1945, nor had they won a Big Ten championship game or a Rose Bowl until these past six weeks. Should they win it all, someone needs to let the kids of the 1954 Milan High Indians and Jimmy Chitwood’s Hickory Huskers know that they are no longer the greatest underdog story in “Hoosiers” history.
If you are of a certain age, then you remember when Oregon was really bad at football. As in, most of the 20th century. From 1893 through 1993, the Ducks made exactly three Rose Bowl trips, two of those prior to 1920. They did win seven conference championships, but six of those were shared with other teams; their only outright title came in the four-game Oregon Intercollegiate Football Association campaign of 1895. When they made it to the 1992 Poulan Weed Eater Independence Bowl, it was a very big deal … and they lost that game to Wake Forest.
But the revolutionary football evolution that followed, fueled by Oregon grad Phil Knight and the little shoe company he started on the Eugene campus back in the day, was every bit the equivalent to what Indiana is doing now. They turned around a battleship in a bathtub. But even the dapper dayglo Ducks we’ve known since then — from Joey Harrington’s towering likeness in Times Square and Marcus Mariota’s Heisman win of 2014 to Chip Kelly, Earth’s funniest mascot and those bazillion uniform combinations — Oregon has yet to win a national title, despite two appearances in the BCS/CFP finals, the last coming a decade ago with Mariota behind center.
If you are of the Gen X age, then you knew the unstoppable machine that was The U. But your kids and grandkids have never seen the Miami Hurricanes on college football’s biggest stage. Unless you’ve shown them the Canes dynasty 30 for 30 films on the ESPN App or you’ve made them watch standard definition footage of Ed Reed, Jeremy Shockey & Co. winning the 2001 BCS title (shoutout to Larry Coker), then they only know Miami football as the embodiment of #goacc.
So many preseason predictions of “The U is back!” have ended with Sebastian the Ibis flat on his back in the Everglades mud. Miami’s biggest postseason victory since it beat Nebraska on that January night in Pasadena — so far back the Canes were still a member of the Big East — was, what? The 2016 Russell Athletic Bowl?
And speaking of ages, unless you were an Ole Miss student during the Space Age, you’ve never seen the Rebels fitted for a real championship ring. Fact: There are few, if any, Saturday college football experiences as glorious as strolling The Grove, red Solo cup in hand. The best food served by the most beautiful people beneath tents taken straight out of home decorating magazines beneath magnolia trees taken straight out of Southern Living magazine. We all know about Archie and Eli Manning, about Deuce McAllister and Jaxson Dart.
But also a fact: When you enter Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, you are struck first by how well everyone is dressed. Then you realize how naked that stadium’s walls are when it comes to addressing the program’s championship seasons. The 2003 SEC West Co-Division champions? The 1963 SEC champions? The ’62 national champions, a title bestowed upon the Rebels by the Litkenhous Difference by Score Ratings system (we’re not making that up!) while USC was dubbed the champ by the major polls? The Rebels’ last natty was their third in four years, but it was won so long ago that Johnny Vaught, the name that adorns their stadium, was still coach, and JFK was in the White House.
The point of this four-part, four-team history lesson is not to harp on those programs’ longtime struggles to insert themselves into college football’s most exclusive room, or return to that room after a generational absence, or to finally be able to take care of business once they do get in there.
Reliving the statistical pain of this year’s playoff survivors is to give us all the proper perspective on what it will mean for the one squad that manages to emerge from this quirky quartet to finally hoist the big gold trophy. Also, to fully recognize the realization of a much-demanded postseason team transfusion.
Y’all have been asking for it. Well, now we’ve got it. The new age of new CFP blood has arrived. Enjoy it now, folks, because 156 years of college football history tells us the blue bloods never stay out of power for long. Then again, that same history would have tried to tell us that this quadrumvirate was never going to happen in the first place. And that’s why, as the semifinal kickoffs loom, it feels like it could be, yes, one for the ages.
ISLAMABAD: Ali Tareen has decided not to take part in the Pakistan Super League’s upcoming franchise auction, opting out as the tournament moves toward a major expansion with eight teams and 10 qualified bidders set to participate in the process.
Tareen shared his decision on the X, reflecting on his journey with the Multan Sultans and his deep connection to South Punjab.
“After careful consideration, my family and I have decided not to participate in today’s PSL franchise auction,” Tareen wrote.
He emphasised that his involvement with the Multan Sultans was about more than just owning a cricket team.
“Our time with Multan Sultans was never just about owning a cricket team. It was about South Punjab. About giving a voice to a region that had been overlooked for too long. That’s what drove everything we built,” he said.
Looking ahead, Tareen indicated that any potential return to the PSL would remain tied to his passion for South Punjab.
“If I come back to PSL, it has to be for the same reason. South Punjab is where my heart is. It is home. This year, I’ll be in the stands, cheering for the players and celebrating with the fans. And when the Multan team is being sold, we’ll be ready,” he stated.
He concluded by wishing luck to prospective team owners at the auction.
“Wishing all the bidders the best. May the most outspoken owner win,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) announced that it will take temporary control of the Multan Sultans franchise for the 11th edition of the PSL, scheduled to be held between March and May.
PCB Chairman Mohsin Naqvi confirmed during a media conference that the board would operate the franchise for one season before initiating the auction process following PSL 11.
“Multan Sultans will be operated by the PCB this year. Once the PSL concludes, we will carry out the auction process and put the franchise up for sale. However, for this season, the board will run the Sultans,” Naqvi said.
He added that an interim management structure would be implemented soon.
“For this purpose, we will appoint an acting head within the next eight to ten days who will oversee the team. A professional cricketer will be brought in to manage Multan Sultans for this season,” he said.
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