Tough Road Contest at No. 11 South Dakota State Awaits No. 2 ISU

SETTING THE SCENE
Date: Nov. 7, 2015
Location: Brookings, S.D.
Kickoff: 2:05 p.m. CT
Stadium: Coughlin-Alumni Stadium
Stadium Capacity: 15,000
Series: ILS leads 3-2
Watch: ESPN3

THE GAME
As the calendar turns to November, the journey for No. 3 Illinois State (7-1, 5-0 MVFC) to win a conference title for the second-straight season get extremely tough with a road contest at No. 11 South Dakota State (6-2, 3-2 MVFC) on Saturday. The game will be streamed live on ESPN3, and is set for 2:05 p.m. kickoff.

THE SERIES
This will be the sixth meeting in the series between Illinois State and South Dakota State, which began in 2008.  The Jackrabbits won the first two games in the series in 2008-09 in convincing fashion, but the Redbirds have fought back to win the last three games, including a 45-10 win at Hancock Stadium in 2014.  ISU is 1-1 in games played at Coughlin-Alumni Stadium, including a 24-14 win on Sept. 18, 2010, the last time the Redbirds traveled to Brookings, S.D.

THE COACHES
Illinois State: Brock Spack (Purdue, 1983) is in his seventh season as the head coach at Illinois State (53-27). Spack led the Redbirds to their first Missouri Valley Football Conference title in 15 years in 2014, and set the school record for wins with 13 while being named a finalist for the Eddie Robinson Award.
South Dakota State: John Stiegelmeier (SDSU, 1979) has posted a 126-88 record in 19 seasons as the head coach at his alma mater. With Stiegelmeier at the helm, the Jackrabbits have reached the FCS playoffs four times (2009, 2012, 2013, 2014), and have won first-round contests the last three seasons.

PLAYER TO WATCH
All-American running back Marshaun Coprich continued his remarkable stretch of consistently strong performances last week against No. 21 Indiana State. Coprich rushed for 165 yards and scored on a 44-yard touchdown run to help the Redbirds to the victory. It marked his seventh-straight 100-plus yard rushing performance and put him over 1,000 yards for the second-straight season making him the third player in ISU history to do that.

THE @REDBIRDFB PROGRAM

• Five FCS playoff appearances (1998, 1999, 2006, 2012, 2014)
• Four-time FCS quarterfinalists (1999, 2006, 2012, 2014)
• Two-time FCS semifinalists (1999, 2014)
• The team is 34-6 at home under Spack's guidance
• ISU's current 17-game home winning streak is the longest in the FCS
• The team tied a program-record cumulative GPA of 2.94 in the Spring 2015 semester

THIS WEEK'S OPPONENT

• South Dakota State University is located in Brookings, S.D., and has an enrollment of 12,557 students. The Jackrabbits are members of the Missouri Valley Football Conference and play their home games at Coughlin-Alumni Stadium (15,000).
• The Jackrabbits finished the 2014 season with an 9-5 overall record and a 5-3 mark in MVFC play, which tied them for third place in the league standings.  The Jacks were one of five Valley Football teams selected for the FCS playoffs.
• SDSU won their first-round playoff game at No. 17 Montana State (47-40), before having to travel to No. 2 North Dakota State in the second round and suffering a 27-24 defeat at the hands of the eventual national champions.  
• South Dakota State returns 47 lettermen and 15 starters from last year's team, including nine of the defense and six on the offense, with a glaring loss at running back with the graduation for three-time 2,000-yard rusher Zach Zenner.
• The Jackrabbits opened the season with a win over FBS foe Kansas by a score of 41-38 and were 3-0 heading into MVFC action.  However, SDSU had to open the season with No. 2 North Dakota State and suffered a 28-7 defeat, but have gone 3-1 since that time.
• The SDSU offense is led by the 2014 MVFC Freshman of the Year Jake Wieneke, who recorded 73 catches for 1,404 yards and 16 touchdowns last season.  Through eight games this season, Wieneke has 47 grabs for 942 yards with eight touchdowns.

THE LAST TIME THEY MET (OCT. 4, 2014)
Marshaun Coprich rushed for 174 yards and set a career best with four touchdowns, as No. 22-ranked Illinois State rolled to a 45-10 victory over No. 9 South Dakota State (3-2, 0-1 MVFC) on Homecoming at Hancock Stadium. Coprich scored three touchdowns in the first quarter to stake the Redbirds to an early 21-0 lead and a 95-yard kickoff return for a touchdown by Tevin Allen just before halftime blew the game wide open.

IN RARE COMPANY
Senior All-American running back Marshaun Coprich holds nearly every career and single-season rushing record in Illinois State history, but his performance against No. 21 Indiana State (Oct. 31) put him in rare company once again.  With 165 yards rushing against the Sycamores, Coprich moved over 1,000 yards on the season with 1,150 and over 1,000 yards for the second-straight year.  Only Toby Davis (1991-92) and Willie Watts (2000-01) had previously achieved that feat and the trio are the only three in school history to post multiple 1,000-yard seasons at all, with Coprich the only to rush for over 2,000 yards.

REDBIRD ROAD WARRIORS
As good as the Redbirds have been at home over the past two seasons, with 17-straight home wins (longest in the FCS), they have been equally as tough on the road especially in Missouri Valley Football Conference play.  The Redbirds have won five of their last six MVFC road contests overall and will have to continue that strong play on the road with two-straight road games to start the month of November.  The Redbirds travel to face nationally-ranked South Dakota State Saturday, looking to stay atop the league standings and get closer to clinching a second-straight league title.  Overall, the Redbirds are 8-2 in road contests over the past two seasons, while compiling an overall record of 20-3 in that time.

ROBERSON RUNNING TO THE END ZONE
With over 1,000 yards rushing in 2014, Redbird quarterback Tre Roberson proved he could be dangerous running the ball as well as throwing it.  Over the past two games, Roberson has taken advantage of his elusiveness with the football and scored a pair of touchdowns on the ground each in wins against No. 20 Western Illinois (Oct. 24) and No. 21 Indiana State (Oct. 31).  Roberson scored the first touchdown of the game for the Redbirds against the Sycamores and ran in the game-winner from five yards out to secure the win for Illinois State.  He has now posted four games with multiple rushing touchdowns over the past two seasons and upped his rushing touchdown total to six, more than half of his rushing touchdown total of 11 from 2014.

ISU EXTENDS HOME WIN STREAK
In 2013, a newly-renovated Hancock Stadium was opened to the public and the Redbirds treated the fans in attendance to a 31-17 win over Abilene Christian. Little did those in attendance realize that win would be the first of many for the Redbirds, who increased their home winning streak to 17 games in a row with a 27-24 win over No. 21 Indiana State (Oct. 31). Illinois State's streak at Hancock Stadium is the longest in FCS football and is the third-longest home win streak in MVFC history, trailing NDSU (26) and UNI (25). Harvard has the next longest streak at 11 games, followed by Bethune-Cookman (10) and Jacksonville (9).

TO BE THE BEST, YOU HAVE TO BEAT THE BEST
It is an impressive feat for any team to be 5-0 in the toughest conference in FCS football, but to have four wins over Top-25 ranked teams during that stretch makes what the Redbirds have done to this point extremely impressive.  Only 11 teams in the FCS have two or more wins against Top-25 teams, and more than half of those teams are in the MVFC.  The Redbirds have the best record among those teams at 4-0, with another ranked team in No. 11 South Dakota State awaiting ISU this week.  Overall, the Redbirds have the 11th toughest schedule, ranked on cumulative opposition, with their opponents posting a 36-24 combined records to this point.

QUICK-STRIKE REDBIRDS
The Redbirds started the game against No. 20 Western Illinois (Oct. 24) with a quick, two-play scoring drive to take an early lead and kept that up for the rest of the contest, scoring four different times against Leathernecks in three plays or less. Tre Roberson's 65-yard run capped the first drive in the first quarter and a 65-yard pass from Roberson to Anthony Warrum capped off a three-play, 77-yard drive in the third quarter. On ISU's next drive, Marshaun Coprich ripped off a 19-yard touchdown run to put an end to a three-play drive and he later added an 83-yard scoring run to put an end to the scoring and cap off a three-play, 92-yard drive late in the fourth quarter.