In a game chock full of playoff implications, the No. 6-ranked St. Thomas football team will take the long trek to the North Dakota-Minnesota border to face No. 14-ranked Concordia-Moorhead Saturday at Jake Christiansen Stadium.
The Tommies (7-0 overall, 5-0 MIAC) and Cobbers (7-1 overall, 5-1 MIAC) sit atop the MIAC standings, although coach Glenn Caruso said his team doesn’t need any extra motivations from conference positioning going into the game.
“The respect level that we already have for Concordia builds in the fact that this is an enormous game, has been every time we’ve played them and will always be as long as I’m the head coach,” Caruso said. “This is when you’re mind starts focusing on being a champion.”
The Tommies have dominated the opposition this year, outscoring opponents by a combined 325 points, in part because of a suffocating defense.
St. Thomas surrenders just 201 yards and 7.9 points per game this season and is led by some of the top defensive talent in the MIAC. Defensive lineman Anthony King-Foreman and linebacker Jesse Addo lead the conference with six sacks apiece. While Caruso heaped praise upon his stalwart pass rushers, he is quick to recognize the unsung heroes on his defense.
“(Defensive lineman Ryan Winter) does not get the credit for all the havoc that he creates,” Caruso said. “You have these guys on the edge that squeeze the pocket … it’s difficult to get the perfect matchup all the time. You’d almost have to be perfect in your protection calls to get two-on-ones where you need them.”
Defensive lineman Eric Sutton, tied for third in the conference with 4.5 sacks, said the defense succeeds because of contributions that don’t show up in the box score.
“We get the sacks, but a lot of times it’s a whole defensive unit effort,” Sutton said. “People have to take up blocks, and a lot of times, we just end up coming free.”
While St. Thomas’s defense has been historically good – the 2011 Tommies gave up 10.1 points per game, the lowest in Caruso’s tenure – Concordia hasn’t been a pushover itself.
The Cobbers lost defensive end Nate Adams, the 2013 Mike Stam Award winner as the conference’s outstanding lineman, to graduation, but the team still has plenty of talented holdovers. Linebackers Erik Bye and Levi Hintermeister lead a Cobber unit that relinquishes just 18 points per contest. Bye is second in the MIAC with 62 tackles, while Hintermeister is fifth with 58.
“Last year it was kind of led by their front, and now it’s led by their two inside linebackers,” Caruso said. “It’s probably just a little different shift of where their leadership might come from, but they’re still wildly productive.”
St. Thomas is coming off a 45-14 domination of Bethel last weekend that saw the Tommies exceed 230 rushing yards for the fifth straight game. Fullback Dominic Truoccolo said he sees similarities between the Cobber and Royal defenses.
“They’re hard-nosed and they’ll come at you,” Truoccolo said. “If we can match them physically up front, then we can dominate them.”
Unheralded on offense, Truoccolo helps pave the way for a Tommie rushing attack that is second in the conference with 238.3 yards per game. Not one to seek the limelight, the junior said he is content with taking on blockers so that St. Thomas’ talented tailbacks have room to run.
“I think it has to do a lot with the camaraderie between us,” Truoccolo said. “I may not get any awards in the press or anything, but my guys give me as much love as any paper would.”
The Tommies are second in the MIAC in rushing, but the Cobbers aren’t far behind. Concordia is third in the conference with almost 229 yards per game and runs a wing-based attack that Caruso said has been similar “for the last 30 years.”
Sutton said facing an option-based Cobber attack will be a tough challenge for the Tommies, albeit a necessary one.
“It’s a really hard-nosed game because you have to be really strict on your responsibilities,” Sutton said. “It’s good for us because last game we had some struggles tackling and wrapping up. I’m really looking forward to this week solidifying that.”
Much like the defense, the Cobber offense lost a bevy of production to graduation. Concordia lost its top four rushers from last season, including 3-time All-MIAC quarterback Griffin Neal.
“Whoever was going to have to fill (Neal’s) shoes was going to have a tall task,” Caruso said. “Griffin Neal threw the ball quite a bit. Now with a new quarterback, they have committed to being a running team.”
Filling those shoes against St. Thomas’ hellacious defense will likely be sophomore Michael Herzog. Thrust into the starting job after incumbent Alex Grove was injured in a Sept. 19 loss to St. John’s, Herzog has thrown just one interception and led Concordia to five straight victories.
Lost in the dominance of the defense, the St. Thomas offense has been efficient and productive since getting wide receiver Jack Gilliland back from injury two weeks ago. Gilliland’s return has allowed tight end Charlie Dowdle to shift inside and make the offense more complete, according to Caruso.
“Having Jack back allows us not to have to use Charlie as a wide receiver. If you look at this game last year, Charlie caught the game-winning touchdown from the wide receiver spot with about four minutes left,” Caruso said. “It’s nice to be able to leave Charlie in the middle because you have guys like (wide receiver Nick Waldvogel) and Jack taking those vertical routes.”
St. Thomas edged out Concordia 35-32 last year in a back-and-forth game in St. Paul. That win, in part, helped vault St. Thomas into the NCAA playoffs. Truoccolo and the Tommies hope to yield a similar fruit this Saturday.
“One of the core principles of our team is that it’s not about how we start, it’s about how we finish,” Truoccolo said. “That’s one of the key things that really pushed us to a different level this season.”
Tom Pitzen can be reached at pitz2014@stthomas.edu.