After loss to New Mexico Coyotes face first home game

Four hundred and twenty eight yards. That’s how many yards South Dakota gave up on the ground to New Mexico during last Thursday’s 21-48 loss and Coyote head coach Bob Nielson’s biggest disappointment after his first game as USD’s head coach.

“Obviously the biggest disappointment was defensively. Giving up 428 yards rushing, give New Mexico credit they’re a good rushing football team, they’re going to get a lot of rushing yards against everybody they play,” Nielson said. “We gave it up too easily to them and we can’t give up yardage in the big chunks like we did and have a chance to win.”

New Mexico’s triple option offense seemed to overwhelm the Coyotes at times, and the defense wasn’t able to match the fast-paced scheme.

“We had a hard time matching their speed to begin with, and when you don’t tackle well and you don’t get off blocks on the perimeter option football teams make big plays, and that’s what they were able to do,” Nielson said.

One of the Coyotes who was able to make tackles was senior linebacker Jet Moreland. He led the team with 12 total tackles. As the team prepares for Weber State, they will face a different threat than New Mexico’s ground attack.

“Different game plan, they’re not a similar offense to the triple option, (they’re) pretty balanced in the run and pass game,” Moreland said. “Coaches have developed a solid game plan so if we stick to our main points it should turn out fairly decent.”

As one of the seniors on the defense, Moreland knows it’s now his time to be a leader for the entire unit.

“Every team looks to their seniors to be leaders from a players perspective — coaches can only lead in so many ways,” Moreland said. “A lot of the guys look up to seniors on the field and off the field so I’m just trying to help my team out.”

While South Dakota tries to take some positives from the New Mexico loss, one is apparent, junior quarterback Chris Streveler. The Minnesota transfer lit it up for the Coyotes early. He totaled 117 yards through the air on 10 of 13 passing for one touchdown. This in addition to a team high 131 rushing yards for two touchdowns. 

Nielson said he went with Streveler as the starter for the opener because of his ability to run and make plays.

“We felt it was going to be a situation where we were going to have to utilize some quarterback run early in the game to potentially be consistent moving the football, make some big plays and that’s really Chris’ forte,” Nielson said.

Because of his performance on Thursday, Nielson will be giving Streveler the start for the next game. 

“Chris will start the game this week. I felt Ryan (Saeger) played well when he came in, the interception that he gave up was really a great play by their best defensive football player,” Nielson said. “I feel confident in the ability for him to go in and give us a little change of pace at quarterback as well.”

The Coyotes rushing attempts will be heavily contested by Weber State’s Big Sky leading rush defense. The Wildcats typically don’t let much get through their front line.

“They were the leading rush defense in the Big Sky last year,” Nielson said. “That’s because you’re physical in the defense front seven, which they definitely are. They’re an offensive team that’s balanced, that has experience.”

The Coyotes take on Weber State on Saturday at 2 p.m. After going 6-5 last season, the Wildcats also lost their opener last weekend, as they fell 6-45 to Utah State. Interestingly, they also gave up exactly 428 rushing yards.

For Nielson, this will be his first time coaching the Coyotes in the DakotaDome in front of a home crowd. He said he’s excited to see what a game day in Vermillion is like.

“I’m excited to experience home environment here,” Nielson said. “I think we’ve got some excited fans and our goal this week from a team perspective is to be a much better team than we were last week against New Mexico and obviously improve in some of the areas that we weren’t as sound as we needed to be.”