Every figure in this column covers nine games for each team, through the end of October, unless I say otherwise.

The Montana book has us by 26.5 with a total of 61.5, no national book has bothered to post a number, and no computer has us by more than the book does.

Montana wins every row, both sides of the ball. That is what should happen against a 2-7 team.

Zero on the roster, zero on the staff. #22 DaMari Washington, whose bio names his father: Bobby Washington. The bylaws handled this once, in Davis, a player named Robert whose father was a Bobby, and ranked him below a coach. A player not named Robert whose father is a Bobby ranks below that, and the siren chirped once, like a smoke detector asking for a battery. Level zero, one generation removed.

Their defensive captain is #6 Jaxton Helmstetler. #34 Brogan De'Asis, pronounced like oasis, and he has been one for quarterbacks: 461 snaps, zero sacks. #90 Herbert Ware, defensive tackle. Hardware. #80 Eddie Vega, a defensive tackle who was promised a route tree. #5 Marcellous Ryan, a 155-pound corner whose bio says his nickname is Yellow. #56 Caine Elroy, offensive line, no Abel on the roster, which tracks. #12 Deryk Farmer, a safety. #20 Derrick Blanche Jr., a running back. Their centers are #68 Semisi Latu and #69 Kapeliele Hausia, and whichever one snaps it, Riley Corcoran is going to say "the center." #13 Jackson Presley hasn’t played: ladies and gentlemen, Elvis has not entered the building. #19 Bo Gionet holds, #51 Cash Larsson is the backup snapper, and #37 Joshua Hossmann Lees kicks, so we are one tweaked hamstring from a field goal unit of Bo, Cash and a man with three names.

#13 Jackson Presley, quarterback, Kalispell Glacier, who won the Class AA title last fall and has not taken a snap for the Vikings. The staff is where the count picks up. Jared Gallatin, their special teams coordinator, is from Polson and played at Rocky Mountain College. Alex Kastens, the line coach, played at Carroll and started coaching there. Kiante Goudeau coaches their corners, and he came from Montana State. #82 Tyson Hunt, a tight end, came by way of Rocky Mountain College in Billings. The reverse count is one: #2 Terahiti Wolfe played eleven games for us last year and transferred out, and they have him off the two-deep. Week 10 census: one Montanan on the roster, one former Griz on the bench, and more Montana on their headsets than in their huddle.

The run game they want to reestablish moved 13 yards against Idaho

Twenty-three carries for 13 rushing yards against Idaho last Saturday. Take the sacks out and it is 42 yards on 19 carries, the charitable version. The week before, at Idaho State, 56 rush yards. Their own notes count it for me: they are 2-2 when they rush for a hundred yards and winless when they don't. The notes do not say how they plan to get there. Their runs get stuffed for no gain on 24.0 percent of their carries, against an FCS median of 18.4.

#24 Delon Thompson is the run game, and PFN says almost nobody in FCS carries a bigger share of it. He averages 4.8 a carry. Inside the tackles that falls to 3.1, and to the right it climbs to 8.3, so the back is fine and the middle of that line is not.

Chris Fisk, after Idaho: "I've made my living and my career coaching that group. We're in it right now." His group gave up four sacks that night. #77 Trevor Newkirk, the right tackle, is among the most-beaten pass blockers in FCS, and he lasted 20 snaps against Idaho. Tyler King played for Fisk at Central Washington last year and had 13 sacks doing it. Saturday he rushes from our edge at Fisk's line. Yeah, they are bad.

Loville and the tight end are the passing game, and first down is where the drive dies

The two-deep says #14 Tyrese Smith, #5 Gabe Downing started last week, and it doesn't really matter: Smith runs it on third-and-short, Downing throws from the gun, and both are looking for the same man. #3 Terence Loville draws more than a quarter of their targets. Ten of their completions of 20 yards or longer are his. #10 Tanner Beaman, the tight end, is next, about a fifth of the throws. The third option is #6 Cru Newman, who gets thrown to plenty and averages 4.5 yards a target.

They throw on first down more often than they run. The first-down throw nets 5.4 yards and half of them gain nothing or lose ground, so second-and-long is where Portland State lives. Six of their nine games were over before the fourth quarter started. More than a third of their snaps this year came after the game was decided.

General Baer is in shadow command, and third-and-short is free

Colonel Mustard and the Mustardettes, the yellow-hat staff Eric Sanders runs, set a school record in Cheney with 11 sacks. Kent Baer is on this staff as an analyst. He ran this defense from 2018 through 2022, and what we watched on Halloween was his scheme. Colonel Mustard isn't the colonel anymore. General Baer has assumed shadow command of the game plan.

With the backups' snaps cut, our defense allows success on 45.1 percent of plays for the year, and most FCS defenses beat that. Eastern got seven points under its own average, our best afternoon by that measure since Drake.

Where we have been soft is the first-down pass, which succeeds against us 56.7 percent of the time, and the third-and-short run, which converts 85.2 percent of the time. Portland State's first-down throw fails more often than it works against everybody, and when they get to third-and-short they have been throwing it: 27 times for 1.2 net yards a throw. Blitzing that costs nothing, so send them. Tyler King has 8.5 sacks, the most in the Big Sky.

Colonel Mustard's cheat sheet, as approved by General Baer

They give up a chunk play every eighth snap, and they did last year too

Portland State gives up an explosive play on one snap in eight, which almost no FCS defense does more often. Last year's rate was within a tenth of this year's. That's just who they are. They've been bad a while. They give up 42.7 points a game. Even when they get an opponent behind schedule they do not get off the field: 37.8 percent success allowed on passing downs, the 97th percentile.

First down is where I want the ball in the air. Their first-down pass defense is the softest down they have, and our first-down pass is the best down we have. Montana stays on schedule on standard downs more often than anyone in FCS, 59.0 percent of the time. Throw it on first down and don't wait for third-and-long to find Davis. Ah Yat's first throw Saturday is the 1,000th of his career. I'd like that one to go deep.

Their pass rush is one true freshman

Portland State has 13 sacks in nine games and had none against Idaho. #94 Avery Ducsik, a true freshman defensive end, has six of them. He is the one Viking to find before every snap. Our line has four men graded in the top ten at their position. They have allowed nine sacks all year. Slide the protection to Ducsik and the Ah Yacht club will have a banner day.

The corners are a true freshman and a JC transfer, and their best one is off the two-deep

#5 Marcellous Ryan is a true freshman starting at corner, and quarterbacks have thrown at him 39 times. Five of those went for touchdowns and three of them he caught himself. #13 Lamarr Stephens, the JC transfer on the other side, has been thrown at 21 times and hasn't forced an incompletion yet. #2 Terahiti Wolfe played for us last year, and by PFN's charting he is their best cover man, and he is off the two-deep.

Take sevens, because the goal line is the one place they hold

Opponents have run 80 goal-to-go snaps against them and succeeded on fewer than half, which for this defense is a stand. Thirty-five of 46 red-zone trips against them ended in touchdowns anyway. Eli Gillman is three touchdowns from tying Cooper Kupp's Big Sky career record. Score from the fringe when it's there, and when it isn't, hand it to Eli.

Coach Pease's cheat sheet

Their kicker never tries a long one, and ours hasn't tried a medium one

Hossmann Lees makes nearly everything they ask him to try, and they don't ask him to try long ones. The kick that beat Weber State as the clock hit zero came from inside the stretch of field where Jo Silver hasn't attempted one all year. Silver's makes come from long range or from close, with nothing in between. #8 Zui Shelton has taken a kickoff 95 yards for a touchdown this year. Newman took a punt 78 for another. Kick it through the end zone.

Portland State has four doubled surnames, Bailey, Herrera, Thompson and Washington, eight men, and not a brother among them, the most Index-shaped nothing I have run across. The one brother who matters starts at quarterback for Cal. Seven babies have been born to their coaches since June 2025, five of them firsts, so two came home to a sibling already in the house, and the bylaws book those as pending, roster-eligible around 2044. Week 10 Brother Index: Portland State 0 confirmed, 0 suspected, 1 in Berkeley, 2 pending; Griz 4 confirmed and 3 suspected, with the Beaner twins. Advantage Griz, through 2043 at least.

Avery, six sacks is the most by any freshman in the country, by your own school's count, and the depth chart still prints you second team. Tyler King got the same coaching from the same man at Central Washington, left, and has 8.5 in maroon with games to play. Portland State wrote that they could build a program around you. Come join one already built.

Their notes have Montana allowing 283.6 passing yards a game, which they count as 120th in FCS. Downing has thrown no interceptions against an FCS defense this year. They take the ball away, 16 takeaways in nine games. A defense that cannot stop anybody can still hand its offense a short field.

They are bad, and they have been bad a while. The run game they want to establish went 0.6 a carry against Idaho. Last year in Portland we scored 63 on them and picked them off five times. Six straight in the series, by an average of 29.

Portland State comes out running on the first drive, because they said they would, and Thompson gets three yards twice before somebody is throwing on third-and-long into a defense that just set a school record for getting there. Loville gets his, one long one, because he is good and our first-down pass defense is still what it is. Eli gets to the goal line early and ties Kupp's number in the third quarter. I'm not predicting a sack count. I just want the same scheme we ran in Cheney, the aggressive one, and if General Baer has to keep running it from the shadows, fine.

Good Guys 50, Vikings 17.

Go Griz.