BROOKINGS South Dakota State will return from its bye week on Saturday and the Jackrabbits will take on Division I newcomer Mercyhurst at 2 p.m. at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium.
The Jacks are off to a 3-0 start after beating Sacramento State, Montana State and Drake. SDSU head coach Dan Jackson said his team used the bye week to get better individually.
It was a really productive week, Jackson said. The players had one area of their game specifically that they needed to work on. I thought our coaches did a good job of giving them a plan to accomplish that. Maybe my favorite part of last week was, which we saved towards the end of practice, the players went and individually worked on their specific thing, and then we had some of the older players work with the younger players.
That was cool to see because the player-led program was in full effect. Were really excited about this week because now its an opportunity to show what weve improved on.
Mercyhurst
Mercyhurst is a private Catholic university in Erie, Pennsylvania. It has an enrollment of 2,759 students and was founded in 1926.
The Lakers are in their second season in the FCS. They went 4-7 last season and are off to a 1-3 start so far this year.
Mercyhurst competed as a Division III Independent from 1981-92 and then was a Division II Independent from 1993-97. The Lakers then played in three different Division II conferences up until 2024 when they moved to the Northeast Conference and became a full-time Division I member.
The Lakers made the Division II Playoffs just one time in 2010. They had a bye in the first round and then won in the second round before falling in the quarterfinals.
Mercyhurst is led by Ryan Riemedio, who became the head coach in 2022 and is 4-18 so far in his tenure. He was an assistant for the Lakers for 10 seasons before becoming the head coach.
The Lakers opened the season with a 24-15 loss at Youngstown State. They then beat New Haven, who is in its first season of Division I play, 48-14 at home. Mercyhurst then hit the road and lost 49-28 to Sacramento State and 17-0 to Montana State.
Jackson compared Mercyhurst to how SDSU was when it first moved to Division I. The Lakers are a program that did not see a lot of success in Division II, but Jackson has seen in the film that there is potential for the Mercyhurst program.
Weve seen this story before, Jackson said. I dont think in the early 2000s that everybody knew that [SDSU] would become a powerhouse at the Division I level. [Mercyhurst] has moved up, and the thing that I see first and foremost is that theyre a really well coached group. What I mean by that is that theyre sound in all areas.
I think their coach has a really good feel for his team and has put together a formula for them to control the ball, for them to be aggressive on fourth down, for them to steal possessions in special teams and not allow any explosive plays on defense. Its pretty clear that they want to keep the game close and then see if they can make enough plays to win it.
Jackson added that its been nice to prepare for an opponent that has had common opponents with them so far.
This is really the first opponent weve played [this year] that we have significant and usable film, Jackson said. Weve been formulating game plans in these first [three] games that we knew we could have success on or had some base rules, but it certainly helps to have more of an understanding of your opponent.
For us to have more film in general helps, but to also have some common opponents helps. We know Youngstown States offense pretty well and being able to take some similarities of what those schools do, with Montana State and Sac State, you have a better feel for the opponent and what they want to accomplish or how they want to defend you.
Explosive plays
After SDSUs 38-21 win over Drake on Sept. 13, Jackson talked about the lack of explosive plays in the Jackrabbit offense so far this season. The Jacks have yet to have a play of over 50 yards so far this season.
Jackson noted that SDSU hit on a couple big plays against the Bulldogs as Chase Mason connected with Graham Goering for a 43-yard pass and Corey Blair Jr. had a 42-yard run. He still wants to see more big plays and thinks they will come as the SDSU offense continues to come together.
We have to get our [helmets] in the right place on the offensive line at times, Jackson said. Our running backs need to stay true to their reads and stay front side or understand when he should cut back. Big plays can come from either. Sometimes we need to let it rip when we have one-on-one situations. We have really good wide receivers and we need to set some of those up, which we did with [Goering] on a post route versus Drake, which was exciting to see.
Its also about confidence. When we came into the season, offense, defense, special teams, we were confident and we believed in what we could do, but theres also the human element of things being new. I think through the first three weeks weve done what we needed to do to win games, but we know exactly what we need to get better at and I expect all phases to make a jump.
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