The formula has become as simple as it is improbable—become the head coach of North Dakota State and win the FCS national championship in your first year.
Bison head coach Tim Polasek became the third first-year head coach to win it all in his first year at the helm. Second-seeded North Dakota State (14–2) held off Montana State (15–1) in a 35–32 thriller to turn off the lights on a 15-year run for the championship game in Frisco, Texas.
Before Polasek, former Bison head coaches Matt Entz and Chris Klieman also capped their first seasons with championships at Toyota Stadium in Frisco during the 2014 and 2019 seasons, respectively. All three previously served as assistants during the Bison’s historic run that began in 2011 under head coach Craig Bohl.
Polasek, who coached on staff with four of the Bison’s 10 FCS title teams, credited the senior class. That’s a group that experienced a title drought, relatively speaking, as South Dakota State claimed the previous two FCS titles, which included a rare blowout of the Bison in the 2022 season.
That starts with senior quarterback Cam Miller, who started his career with the heavy burden of filling a wildly successful role at North Dakota State. Two quarterbacks before him—Carson Wentz and Trey Lance—went in the top three of the NFL Draft. Another, Easton Stick, led multiple national title runs as a full-time starter and set the FCS record for wins before he landed with the Los Angeles Chargers as a fifth-round pick.
Miller led the Bison to victory on Monday as he threw for 199 yards and two touchdowns with no interceptions plus 121 yards rushing and two scores. A Walter Payton Award finalist, Miller could land with an NFL team in April’s draft as a late-round pick.
“These guys mean the world to me,” Miller told reporters afterward. “They’re a big part of the reason why I stayed, and they believed in me when nobody else did.”
Seniors such as Miller and linebacker Nick Kubitz, who had nine tackles in the victory, simply eased the program’s fourth coaching transition amid a dynasty that began 14 years ago. An eight-time national title winner in lower divisions, North Dakota State moved up from Division II to the FCS in 2004 and became a dynasty again under Bohl, who left for Wyoming in 2014.
Klieman moved from defensive coordinator to head coach that year and extended the Bison’s three-year reign atop the FCS to five in 2015. He won one more with an unbeaten Bison team in 2018 before taking the head coaching job at Kansas State in 2019.
Entz, the defensive coordinator under Klieman, became head coach in 2019 and led the Herd to a second-straight perfect season. He then had to deal with COVID-19’s sidelining a 2020 squad littered with NFL draft prospects, but Entz led the Bison back to the podium in the 2021 season before the Jackrabbits became kings of the FCS for two straight years. Entz left for USC as the linebackers coach in 2024 but recently became the head coach of Fresno State.
North Dakota State’s opponent, Montana State, also benefited from the Bison dynasty coaching tree. Former Bison player and coaching assistant Brent Vigen brought the Bobcats back to power with three FCS title game appearances in four years.
Vigen coached under Bohl at the start of the Bison dynasty and joined him at Wyoming, where both had a hand in the rise of Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen. At Montana State, Vigen has enjoyed his own quarterback success in the development of Tommy Mellot, who won the Walter Payton award this season and could land a spot somewhere late in the NFL Draft.
How long the Bison dynasty will continue remains the question amid the shifting landscape of college football. For now, it’s back to work sooner rather than later for Polasek and his returning coaches and staff as the Bison seek to continue their dominance over the FCS in 2025 and a trip to Nashville for the championship game.
