DILLON — Both Montana Western and Montana Tech football teams will be searching for postseason redemption this Saturday.
After receiving first-round byes, the No. 4 Bulldogs and No. 7 Orediggers will host NAIA Football Championship Series second-round games a year after Tech fell to Dickinson State in the first round and Western was defeated by the College of Idaho in the second round.
This year, the Blue Hawks — who are set to return to the Frontier Conference in 2025 — will travel to Dillon to face the Bulldogs. No. 14 DSU (10-1 overall, 8-0 in the North Star Athletic Association) held off Kansas Wesleyan 27-20 in the opening round.
"You don't want history to repeat itself," said Western head coach Ryan Nourse, who was tabbed as the Frontier Conference's coach of the year. "You look back, regardless of if it was good or not so good and then you make the appropriate changes.
"But this has been a very focused team this year, a pretty darn mature team for its youth. I credit that to our seniors and leaders just being able to stay the course, doing the things that need to be done that have led to success before."
Meanwhile, Tech is set to host No. 11 Northwestern College (Iowa), a member of the Great Plains Athletic Conference. Northwestern blew past Briar Cliff (Iowa) 71-7 in the first round.
Both the Bulldogs (9-1 overall, 7-1 Frontier) and Orediggers (9-2, 6-2) head into Saturday's second-round games on win streaks and with unblemished records at home. Western has reeled off six straight wins and Tech five.
Both teams will look to keep those perfect home records intact as they look to punch tickets to the quarterfinals.
"One of our big things is to protect home field this year," said Tech senior quarterback Blake Thelen. "We've been pretty mediocre at home the past couple of years. This year, we take care of home field and we'll get where we want to go."
If both the Orediggers and Bulldogs prevail in their second round games, it would set the stage for a probable quarterfinal rematch between the Orediggers and Bulldogs.
