As the College Football Playoff race heads into the final week of the regular season shrouded in uncertainty, the Football Championship Subdivision begins its postseason with the sport’s closest thing to a certainty.
The release of the FCS Playoffs bracket on Sunday is a prelude to the inevitable as North Dakota State begins its pursuit of an 11th national championship since 2011. Bison coach Tim Polasek opened his press conference following a 62-7 blowout of St. Thomas on Saturday saying, “This thing goes through Fargo,” and it’s true in the most literal and figurative ways.
North Dakota State will host all the way to Nashville, the new home city of the FCS National Championship Game. This is the first time in its decade-and-a-half domination of the subdivision that North Dakota State could hoist the championship somewhere other than Frisco, Texas, and that’s the least of all that has changed in college football since 2011.
The Bison claimed their first NCAA Div. I national championship against a Sam Houston State program led by Willie Fritz. Since that January 2012 matchup, Fritz has been head coach at Georgia Southern, Tulane and now Houston, making him head coach of as many programs in that time as the number of different head coaches to win championships at North Dakota State.
Polasek became the fourth with last season’s title, joining Craig Bohl, Chris Klieman and Matt Entz.
As for Sam Houston State, the Bearkats dropped the State and left the subdivision altogether.
Two of the three programs to interrupt North Dakota State’s monopolization of the national championship moved up. Sam Houston won the COVID-shortened spring 2021, shortly before making the jump to the FBS. The Bearkats regressed with the departure of KC Keeler, plummeting to the bottom of a Conference USA rife with recent FCS movers.
James Madison, winner of the 2016 season’s title, was the closest thing North Dakota State had to a foil outside of Missouri Valley Football Conference rival South Dakota State. The Dukes ended the Bison’s original dynastic run of five straight championships with a stunning win at the Fargodome in 2016.
James Madison took the Trey Lance-quarterbacked Bison of 2019 to the wire in a classic that put current Indiana coach Curt Cignetti in the national spotlight for the first time. Cignetti now has the Hoosiers all-but assured a second straight College Football Playoff appearance, while James Madison is jockeying for a spot in the 12-team field at 10-1.
The College Football Playoff existed only as an oft-debated concept among fans and pundits at the beginning of North Dakota State’s run. While rumblings about an FBS tournament predate even the Bowl Championship Series, it wasn’t until after the 2012 installment of the BCS Championship Game that momentum for a playoff really gained steam.
College players profiting off of their name, image and likeness felt about as likely in 2011 as…well, about as likely as a program winning 10 national championships in 13 years.
North Dakota State has been so good for so long, marveling at its continued success feels almost passe. Sustained excellence in sports becomes boring in a way, which explains LeBron James having only four NBA Most Valuable Player awards.
Likewise, the novelty of North Dakota State football’s inevitability gave way at some point to cynicism. As inevitable as the annual Bison run to a national championship is discussion of if North Dakota State should move to FBS.
There’s been a flurry of former FCS programs jumping in the last 14 years, with this year’s additions of Delaware and Missouri State making 12 and 13 newcomers to FBS (not counting Charlotte, which launched at the FBS level):
- Appalachian State
- Georgia Southern
- Georgia State
- Jacksonville State
- James Madison
- Kennesaw State
- Liberty
- Old Dominion
- Sam Houston
- Texas State
- UTSA
With the Mountain West Conference losing members to a resurrected Pac-12, this year’s round of NDSU-to-FBS banter may feel more realistic than ever before.
However, that shouldn’t overshadow appreciation for just how incredible this program’s run has been. Before Entz left for the linebackers coaching position at USC, North Dakota State showed more vulnerability than at any time since 2011.
South Dakota State winning back-to-back national championships suggested the balance of power shifted elsewhere in the MVFC. But as South Dakota State squeaks into the Playoffs in 2025, falling to 8-4 after Jimmy Rogers’ departure for Washington State, it underscores the difficulty in winning after regime changes.
North Dakota State doing so successfully from Bohl to Klieman to Entz is the ultimate outlier. That it’s extended to a fourth head coach’s tenure seems incomprehensible.
Even more unfathomable is that after 14 years, the 2025 bunch may be the most impressive the Bison have ever been. That isn’t to call the 2025 team North Dakota State’s best ever; others have had more talent, including NFL-drafted quarterbacks in Lance, Carson Wentz and Easton Stick.
Other North Dakota State teams have been more dominant up-and-down the schedule, avoiding close calls like the one-possession wins over Youngstown State and North Dakota earlier this month.
Still, they head into the FCS Playoffs 12-0, marking the program’s first perfect regular season since 2019.
They are scoring 42.2 points per game and holding opponents to 11.7 points per game. Three Bison have rushed for between 487 and 950 yards, 10 have picked off passes and eight have two or more sacks.
It’s a group reminiscent in makeup and results to the 2011 bunch that started this unprecedented run. And with as much as college football has changed in that time, the certainty of North Dakota State remains special 10 championships later.
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