BROOKINGS — The Missouri Valley Football Conference media days took place via Zoom on Tuesday and Wednesday as all 10 head coaches and the conference commissioner took questions from the media.

South Dakota State will open fall practice next week and will kick off the season on Aug. 31 at Oklahoma State. Here are my five biggest takeaways from the two-day conference media day event.

Chasing a three-peat

SDSU is looking to become the third school in FCS history to three-peat as national champions this season and the Jackrabbits will have some new faces leading the way.

After returning almost every starter last season, SDSU will replace seven starters on each side of the ball. It was almost a forgone conclusion last season that the Jacks would be crowned back-to-back champions as they only won two games by less than 10 points.

SDSU head coach Jimmy Rogers said replacing that many starters is exciting because you get to see the development of guys come to fruition as they replace the talent from last year’s team. He added that his team is also excited for a big challenge to start the season playing at Oklahoma State.

“I think it’s exciting because it challenges you to develop the best scheme and plan and develop players and people. That’s what we got into this for. If I could just get every five-star kid and roll out the ball and beat everybody by 50, what fun is that? … It’s exciting to me, but it’s exciting for the players. We’re really excited to go to Oklahoma State. If we’re going to say that we’re one of the best teams in the country, what an opportunity to try and compete for that,” Rogers said.

Rogers added that he doesn’t think his team will look at this season as they need to prove something because all of the guys on the roster head into each practice with something to prove.

“I block out the outside noise as much as the players,” Rogers said. “If you were to ask me if we have a prove-it approach, I’d tell you that last year we had a prove-it approach because they had to prove it in practice, because if they weren’t better than what we have we’d play the other player.

“… I think when you join the program and you have success, you have to be around a bunch of people that have a prove-it-type mindset every day and that’s what we’re trying to develop. It’s not always easy to have that mindset when you start to [ listen to outside noise], but that’s our approach. Trying to eliminate as much complacency in the program as possible.”

Breakout players

SDSU will be replacing seven starters on the offensive side of the ball and that means there will be opportunities for players to step up that haven’t seen the field as much over the past few seasons.

Rogers touched on some of those players in his media availability on Wednesday.

“Talking about the offensive side of the ball, [wide receiver] Graham Goering is a guy that got some run last year, but was always kind of behind the Janke’s,” Rogers said. “One of the biggest playmakers and big play guys is Angel Johnson at running back. I felt like every time he touched the ball last year he’d break a 60-yard run.

“And then Kentrell Prejean is a slot wide receiver for us who’s from Louisiana and a redshirt freshman. He’s very talented and is very similar to Cade Johnson’s skillset, who was with us a couple years back.”

The group with the least amount of experience is the tight ends. Rogers said that sophomores David Alpers and Brody Gormley and redshirt freshman Davin Stoffell will get the most reps at the position and all three are very talented.

“Although they’re inexperienced, our tight end group is one of our deepest positions. I think we have three players that have the caliber to play at the next level. They just need to get experience and have reps,” Rogers said.

Can USD sustain success?

South Dakota had its best season at the FCS level last year. The Coyotes went 10-3 overall and 7-1 in the MVFC and made it to the quarterfinals of the FCS Playoffs. Now the question is can it be repeated? USD head coach Bob Nielson said competing for a national championship is the next step for his program.

“Consistency is something that you want. We talk about having a program that year in and year out is going to compete for a national title and this year gives us an opportunity to do that again. The one thing I will say is, last year there were a lot of great things, but when we walked off the field after that playoff game that we lost against North Dakota State, there wasn’t any satisfaction in our locker room and that’s been the attitude that this group has had throughout the offseason,” Nielson said.

Getting to the quarterfinals has put the Coyotes in the conversation with North Dakota State and SDSU, but the next step is to beat those teams and get to the top of the mountain. Nielson said his program is heading in the right trajectory with facility enhancements and investments from the school to help get them there.

“Without question, that’s our goal. To get to the top. We’ve got great support here and a perfect example is we have brand new turf going down in the dome this week. It’s another significant investment in terms of a facility standpoint. … There’s nothing that is keeping us from being a championship football team and that’s a big thing to say when you’re in our league,” Nielson said.

New leader in Fargo

Tim Polasek was named the 32nd head coach of North Dakota State back in December and it’s a bit of a homecoming for him as he has coached in Fargo for 10 seasons before.

Polasek began his NDSU coaching career in 2006 as a graduate assistant under Craig Bohl and spent the next six seasons as the running backs coach and the running backs/tight ends/full backs coach. He then spent one season at Northern Illinois before returning to Fargo in 2014 to be the offensive coordinator/running backs coach under Chris Kleiman for the next three seasons.

Polasek replaces Matt Entz who had a 60-11 record at NDSU but was criticized for losing the last five games against South Dakota State and winning one national championship in five seasons.

Polasek said during his conference media day availability on Tuesday that he feels like the Bison are not far off from returning to national championship glory and thinks Entz left his roster in good shape.

“I’ve been looking and searching [to find], where are we off, if we’re off at all, and we just have to make a few more plays in critical moments,” Polasek said. “We have to be a little more cleaner in big moments and big games. We have to eliminate some bad football at times.”

“But Matt won a lot of big games over the years, including a national title. We came up short one time and lost in a semifinal on a two-point play. … Matt Entz is a really good coach who left this program in really good hands. There’s some really good players at the top of our roster with the 27 seniors.”

State of the MVFC

Missouri Valley Football Conference commissioner Patty Viverito closed her opening statement on Tuesday’s media availability with the announcement that she would be retiring after this year. Viverito has been the commissioner of the conference for the last 40 years and in the next nine months a committee that’s comprised of presidents and athletic directors will decide who is the next commissioner.

When asked what was going to be the most important task for her over the next 12 months, she talked about figuring out scholarship numbers for teams in the conference.

“I think managing the national landscape is top of mind for all of us,” Viverito said. “One area where I think we’ll have to make some decisions in the near term, and it isn’t going to be speculative two or three years down the road, is roster management. We’re going to have to make some decisions with how we manage that at the FCS.

“We have to do it in a way that’s independent as conferences because I don’t think they’re going to be NCAA rules because it gets us into trouble with antitrust. I would expect we’re going to have some interesting and tough decisions to make as far as scholarship numbers and roster limits.”

The MVFC will drop back down to 10 teams after this season as Missouri State will be moving up to the FBS and joining Conference-USA. The MVFC was at 12 teams last season before Western Illinois moved all its sports to the Ohio Valley Conference.

The conference was at 10 teams for eight years before North Dakota joined in 2020. Viverito said she likes the 10-team model because it’s the closest to a round robin conference schedule as every team plays eight conference games. She added that there likely will not be any expansion in the coming years.

“I think when you look at the [college football] landscape, the opportunities in the short term for FCS realignment are pretty minimal. I think we are committed to being the best, strongest FCS conference in the Midwest. I don’t think we want to be far from our time zone. So, I think we’ll be thoughtful and diligent, but we’re 10 [teams] today, we’ll be 10 tomorrow and we’ll be 10 for the foreseeable future,” Viverito said.