2008 Woodie Awards
No simple task
The 4-5 Redbird football squad will face the No. 1 FCS team in the country on the road tomorrow.
Alice Riddle
Issue date: 11/2/07 Section: Sports
In spite of these obstacles, Redbird Head Coach Denver Johnson said his team is looking forward to the challenge ahead of them, agreeing with Mordis in that they are not prepared to go in without a fight.
"We're excited and anxious to go up to Fargo," Johnson said.
"It'll certainly be a great challenge for us."
"Even though we're disappointed with our standing right now, that we're out of the conference race and the playoff picture and all that kind of stuff is no longer a factor, we still have two opportunities to compete and to represent ourselves and to still make something positive happen for us here at the end of our season," Johnson said.
"We'll prepare well and hopefully go up and patch together a team that can be competitive against North Dakota State."
Similar to Western Illinois' Herb Donaldson, the Bison boast a strong running back in Roehl.
Johnson said the team must take their experiences from playing Donaldson and apply them to this week's challenge against the North Dakota State run game.
"They're committed to running the ball, and they're big and physical. We can't get reached out of our gaps. Like we said last week, we've got to tackle well. We can't count on one guy to make tackles; we've got to get it defended, and then get in pursuit there, get other defenders around it," Johnson said.
"We're going to have to do the things we did well more consistently than last week."
Kickoff on Saturday is set for 4:07 p.m. in the Fargodome.
"We're excited and anxious to go up to Fargo," Johnson said.
"It'll certainly be a great challenge for us."
"Even though we're disappointed with our standing right now, that we're out of the conference race and the playoff picture and all that kind of stuff is no longer a factor, we still have two opportunities to compete and to represent ourselves and to still make something positive happen for us here at the end of our season," Johnson said.
"We'll prepare well and hopefully go up and patch together a team that can be competitive against North Dakota State."
Similar to Western Illinois' Herb Donaldson, the Bison boast a strong running back in Roehl.
Johnson said the team must take their experiences from playing Donaldson and apply them to this week's challenge against the North Dakota State run game.
"They're committed to running the ball, and they're big and physical. We can't get reached out of our gaps. Like we said last week, we've got to tackle well. We can't count on one guy to make tackles; we've got to get it defended, and then get in pursuit there, get other defenders around it," Johnson said.
"We're going to have to do the things we did well more consistently than last week."
Kickoff on Saturday is set for 4:07 p.m. in the Fargodome.
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