Interesting that SEMO is going to be hosting despite being the lower ranked team because Illinois State's stadium is being used for high school state playoffs or something like that.

SEMO was the conference champ, but yeah, not seeded...getting to host.

It's a 4 hour drive from Normal to Cape Girardeau. Weather in the area is supposed to be pretty fair, low 40's is the afternoon high temp.

I watch the Illinois State offense...can't help but see similarities in style to UC Davis. Very aggressive, #2 WR Daniel Sobkowicz is an impressive player. Their QB #16 Tommy Rittenhouse makes plays, he can move around when he has to. RB #32 Wenkers Wright is long and has some good top end speed. RB #25 Matt Lawson has great burst and is a change of pace gasher.

Will post some SEMO tape a little later.

Illinois State
27.3 PPG
175.3 rushing yards per game
232.5 passing yards per game
ranked 27th in total offense
ranked 86th in total defense
-2 turnover margin

SEMO
30.8 PPG
98.2 rushing yards per game
301.7 passing yards per game
ranked 36th in total offense
ranked 36th in total defense
+2 turnover margin

Strength of Schedules (Simmons):
UC Davis - 24
Illinois State - 30
SEMO - 80

Interesting that Illinois State isn't particularly elite (top 10ish) in any singular metric, but still finished with a 9-3 record and the 12 seed.

They don't commit a lot penalties, that's a good statistic.

SEMO looks to have quite the passing attack.

So who should we root for?

I noticed that they put all of the top seeded Big Sky teams in the same side of the bracket. Guess they don't want the championship game to be an all Big Sky contest? No such reluctance to make it an all Missouri Valley game, though.

I'm not sure if there's a clear cut one we SHOULD be rooting for in this match up as I see it. SEMO is the stronger passing team and we've been susceptible defensively in that department over the last couple of weeks. They feature 3 really strong WRs, 2 of which are 6'5 and 6'7 respectively. We haven't faced that kind of size all season. That being said, Illinois State has had success playing a much more difficult schedule.

SEMO's passing attack is scary and those WR's are really tall targets.

Tough to know how we would deal with that size. Most of Big Sky has smaller shifty receivers. SEMO didn't really DOMINATE many games this year with a relatively weak SoS. They beat Northwestern State (0-12) 19-0 and Tennessee Tech (7-5) 34-3 as their largest margins of victory

I see Illinois State as the better overall team, but they want to run the ball more than SEMO and we've been fairly stout on the ground.

True but it's really Montana State and then a decent gap to us and Idaho then a slight drop to Montana. Whereas all the Dakotas are pretty even.

Should we root for SEMO? Obviously any team in the playoffs is good and can win, but Illinois State is better. If SEMO wins at home then maybe an edge for the Ags? EIther way, no looking past either team

My hope is that we win this game and anything after that is gravy (unless South Dakota loses and then I’d expect them to win 2 games). That’s not to say we can’t beat South Dakota but going there is going to be tough. Don’t want to get ahead of myself though. Win this game and go from there.

We're a long shot for a national championship but I'll bet the team believes they can do it. One game at a time though...

Dakotadome will be rocking. My question: If you were a road team from a warmer climate, would you rather play away at a dome where you'll probably get false starts or outside in a snowstorm / 10F but windshill of -15F?

If I were Illinois State, I'd be pissed about anything being schedules on my home field duirng the playoffs...they are literally kicking their own team off their own campus when due a home playoff game. It's ridiculous.

Do they have a forum somewhere? I'd love to see what their fanbase thinks of this. Of course, living just outside of the Palouse, I know Idaho fans are pissed.

Illinois State's Board is Here: https://www.redbirdfan.net/community/index.php?forums/football.40/

Put that "1% chance" graphic up in the locker room.

I'm liking SEMO's chances, as they are hosting.

These were the most active forums that I could find. The Illinois State forum looks fairly active. If someone can find a more active SEMO forum let me know. I don't know if @AggieFinn wants to pin these in his first post.

Illinois State Fan Forum

SEMO Fan Forum

I signed up at the Illinois State board, we'll see how long it takes Admin to do admissions.

Ha! I was waiting to see if it looks like they're gonna win before signing up

@CA Forever@AggieFinn thank you. It's always nice seeing the perspective of fans of teams we never play especially for FCS teams, which is a niche version of a niche branch of football (college vs NFL).

I'm signing up on the SEMO board as well

From a Redbird fan on their forum:
"SEMO has 6'7", 6'5" & 5'11" stud receivers all have 60 plus receptions even their 2nd tier receivers are 20 reception all WR are in double digits. That's depth and they rotate their WR's and utilize all of them. RB are committee of 5 all have average of 260 +/- 20yds for the season. Hopefully our LB/DL can get some pressure on QB to help our DB's on coverage still not sold 100 on defensive coverage on a good passing team."