well the Bearcats are looking to continue a 12year tradition of season opening wins against the tough Minnesota state Brett Kennedy has more here in the Press Box of Bearcat stadium in mville as the Northwest Missouri State football team hosted nsic power Minnesota state for week zero a tough matchup Northwest coming in with 12 straight season opening victories looking to make it 13 two top 25 teams as well Bearcats ranked 22nd and min inota State 13th Minnesota state jumped up first in this one quarterback Hayden eern gets lost in the scrum but breaks outside for a 6-y touchdown Scamper Mavericks went for two and got it 8 to nothing Minnesota state early but before defensive-minded Rich Wright knew it Minnesota state would strike again in the second quarter it's Eker again for the Mavericks this time right up the middle from 14 yds out he had three rushing touchdowns in the first half 15 to nothing now Northwest only had one deep Drive in the first half right before halftime inside the 15 yd line the Junior from Savannah High School Jaden Brady coughs up the football and the Mavericks recover costly turnover Minnesota state was up 22 to nothing at the break second half now down 29-2 junior quarterback Chris ranky starting his first meaningful game for the Bearcats the 43 yard bomb to Junior Andrew Bradley Northwest finally gets in the end zone 29 to9 at at that point the Bearcats and Blazers loving it in the student section Minnesota state driving in the fourth quarter eer is picked off though In The End Zone by senior trayon Jones for the Touchback huge takeaway by the Bearcat defense a few plays later runy scrambles to his right and somehow squeezes this pass in to Junior Luke Matthews and he weaves his way down the field breaking tackles for a marathon 880 yd touchdown extra point is no good 29- 15 at that point point the Bearcats band trying to cheer their team right back into it a little over a minute later Minnesota state has to punt but the punter drops the ball and Junior Shane Frederickson falls on it on Minnesota State's 13 yd line Bearcats smelling the comeback now very next play runy hits a bullseye Junior tank young is wide open in the back of the end zone and it's 2922 with almost 11 minutes left to play Northwest just down seven but Minnesota state would grind the clock down and Hayden eern would finish it off a 15 yard rushing touchdown his fourth of the night Minnesota state had 218 yards rushing as a team Northwest had ne17 Thursday night that was a huge factor in the Bearcats defeat as Northwest Falls 36 to 22 we're Northwest Missouri State and we're going to play good football teams and that's a good football team out there they they are a very good football team we knew that going in um at least I knew that going in and our staff knew that and so you know I've been around here long enough with Coach churma we've played you know abalene Chris and lost a football game we played Texas A&M Kingsville and lost a football game what it what really what really matters now is how we respond I think the second half showed us what we could do whenever we play how we should uh we got to get the Run game going a little bit better struggled in the Run game um but I think that teachers us we just got to start fast we can't dig ourselves a hole like that then being a ranked team um and from different conference it kind of get gives us a landmark to where we want to be at um especially us playing them first game of the season so I feel like um with that wakeup call we're going to do a lot of big things this year not a good way to start the season for the Bearcats now Northwest begins MIAA conference play the team will play next at Nebraska Carney on September 7th at 7 pm. reporting from mville Brett Kennedy KQ2 Sports