For the first time since Oct. 14, 2023, the Idaho Vandals have lost a football game in the P1FCU Kibbie Dome. After defeating Northern Colorado 55-35 the last time these two teams met for a Vandal homecoming game, the Bears bested Idaho 49-33.
Time and time again, the Vandal defense failed to get stops, which led to the end of a nine-game home win streak in the regular season. This was just the fourth homecoming loss for an Idaho team in the past 11 seasons.
Though Idaho did a good job of slowing down opposing offenses at certain points earlier in the season, they have struggled in the last two games. Everything went the Bears’ way offensively as they racked up 482 yards and seven touchdowns.
Brayden Munroe caught five passes for 151 yards and a touchdown. Carver Cheeks caught nine passes for 120 yards. Northern Colorado was much better in clutch situations, converting on eight third-down conversions, while Idaho went four for 12.
The Vandals had several opportunities to come back, but Northern Colorado had so many explosive plays that Idaho wasn’t able to crawl back into the game. Head coach Thomas Ford Jr. noted in the postgame press conference that the team’s primary focus moving forward is not getting beat vertically.
“If we continue to allow them to consistently get vertical in the pass game, it’s going to be impossible to stay off the field,” Ford said. “We’ve got to do a much better job playing the football in the air. Ultimately our demise on defense today was just not being able to stop the vertical processing.”
The short-handed Idaho offense did as much as they could to stay within reach of the Bears, but the defense wasn’t able to do them any favors. Idaho had 440 yards of offense, led by an 81-yard, two-touchdown performance on the ground for dual-threat backup quarterback Rocco Koch.
“Rocco is a winner,” Ford said. “He’s very driven. He wants to help this football team in any way he can, and he provides a lot in terms of his legs. I could see his role continue to expand.”
With Joshua Wood missing the game due to an MCL injury, Jack Wagner made his first start of the season at quarterback. Wagner was 6-2 as a starter in 2024 and he performed well in his season debut, completing 21 of his 33 pass attempts for 237 yards and a touchdown.
Elisha Cummings made his return to the Vandals’ offense and played well, tallying 114 yards from scrimmage and scoring a touchdown.
“We were nowhere near our best today. We did not do a great job in a number of ways. This is a pretty painful one. We did not execute at a high enough level to win this football game,” Ford said. “Whenever you’re playing anybody in this league, you have to play your best and we’re nowhere near that.”
Liam Bradford can be reached at [email protected].