BROOKINGS — The punt was short, and Tucker Large played back, waiting for the bounce, shouting at his South Dakota State teammates to avoid the ball. But when it hit the ground it bounced once, twice, and then took what shortstops call a Sunday Hop, right into Large’s hands at the 21-yard line.
“Once the ball went up, and it got the bounce that it got I was like, here he goes, he’s got a look,” Jackrabbit coach Jimmy Rogers would say later.
Large dodged to the left to avoid the first tackler, then found a burst of speed to run past three Albany Great Dane defenders. Someone got a hand on his jersey, but Large shrugged it off as he crossed midfield. He juked right to avoid another, then made a sharp cut back to his left to make one more Great Dane miss, and from there he was gone.
The 79-yard punt return touchdown was one of the most exciting plays in a season chock full of them, and it was undoubtedly the exclamation point on the top-ranked, top-seeded Jackrabbits 59-0 stomping of 5th-seeded Albany in the FCS playoff semifinals in front of 12,265 Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium fans.
“I was debating midway if I should take it,” said Large, who also had a key interception in the first quarter to snuff out an Albany drive. “But it kind of just bounced right to me. I saw the long snapper in front of me and I thought I could make him miss and then I just followed some blocks and went down the sideline and ended up scoring.”
Scenes from the FCS national semifinals between the South Dakota State Jackrabbits and UAlbany Great Danes on Friday, Dec. 15, 2023, at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium in Brookings.
Landon Dierks / Mitchell Republic
That made the score 28-0. The Jacks had already been dominating the game, but Albany coach Greg Gattuso said they were still holding out hope of getting back in the game. Large’s punt return ended any realistic hopes of a comeback, and whipped a loud and raucous crowd into even more of a frenzy than they were already enjoying.
“That was huge,” quarterback Mark Gronowski said of Large’s touchdown. “This kid is just a playmaker. He had that interception on a big third down, too. I mean we were just out there having fun and that was the nail in the coffin. We just kept it rolling from there.”
The win sends SDSU (14-0) to Frisco, Texas for the FCS national title game, Jan. 7, where they’ll look to repeat as champions. It was the Jackrabbits’ 28th win in a row. Was it the biggest blowout in FCS semifinals history? That information wasn’t immediately available after the game, but it’s hard to imagine a more complete and dominating performance than the one SDSU just laid on the Great Danes. The Jacks outscored their three playoff opponents 123-12.
“It was a good old fashioned whipping, all the way around,” Gattuso said. “They’re a good football team. A great football team. One of the best I’ve seen.”
Scenes from the FCS national semifinals between the South Dakota State Jackrabbits and UAlbany Great Danes on Friday, Dec. 15, 2023, at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium in Brookings.
Landon Dierks / Mitchell Republic
Rogers often says his team is ‘never going to be perfect’, and when asked if this one was close to that he sheepishly pointed out the Jacks had a 50-yard field goal blocked in the first half. But that was the closest thing you’d get to a complaint on this night. SDSU was tremendous. Albany came in hot, having pulled an impressive road upset at Idaho last week to reach their first ever semifinal. They led the nation in sacks and rushing defense coming in. A lot was made of that, including by SDSU coaches in an effort to motivate their own players, particularly their offensive line. It worked. The Great Danes had zero sacks. The Jacks rushed for 220 yards, averaging 6.9 yards per carry.
“Their D-ends were really good so we had a protection to chip ’em,” Rogers said, referring to a call for a running back or tight end to help slow down edge rushers. “And at times I don’t know if it was needed. Our guys took it real personal how much we talked about how good their D-line was, and they executed it.”
The Jacks went 11 plays in 74 yards on the game’s opening drive, taking a 7-0 lead on a Gronowski third-down strike to Zach Heins, then got it right back when Large snagged a pass over the middle, the first of three SDSU interceptions.
That turned into Isaiah Davis’ first rushing touchdown of the night to make it 14-0, and his second made it 21-0. Then came Large’s big punt return. Gronowski then fired 36 yards to Jadon Janke to make it 35-0 at the half.
Albany got the ball first to start the second and almost immediately, Isaiah Stalbird forced a fumble that Jason Freeman recovered and ran back 34 yards to make it 42-0. It never let up.
Scenes from the FCS national semifinals between the South Dakota State Jackrabbits and UAlbany Great Danes on Friday, Dec. 15, 2023, at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium in Brookings.
Landon Dierks / Mitchell Republic
Gronowski threw for 265 yards and three scores while rushing for 50 yards. Davis had 107 yards on 15 carries. Janke had six catches for 151 yards, Heins had two touchdown catches and late in the game Chase Mason found Griffin Wilde for a 71-yard touchdown.
That came after Rogers pulled the starters, a little later than usual. The seniors wanted to go out with a score, to save one last drive together in what was their final game at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium.
SDSU’s John O’Brian (78), Isaiah Davis (22) and Jaxon Janke (10) jog off the field after a touchdown in their FCS semifinal win over Albany on Friday, Dec. 15, 2023 at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium in Brookings.
Jenn Kenyon/Sioux Falls Live
“It was emotional,” Heins said. “We knew going into the fourth quarter (the game was in hand) so we were really able to soak in that moment, soak in the crowd and soak in the last time ever playing at that stadium.”
Rogers’ voice cracked a couple times afterwards when he was asked about the seniors going out the way they did. There was a palpable energy in the stadium before kickoff that never went away all night, and the coach and his players said the motivation to do something special on this field, one more time, was what drove them to produce one of the most complete performance ever seen by a Jackrabbit football team.
“These seniors were motivated to play in their final game at Dana J. and all of them shined out,” Gronowski said. “When that energy started and the fans started coming in the building you could feel it coming. We were all super confident and the fans were bringing energy. That was one of the loudest crowds we’ve had at Dana J. Man, that was fun.”
Matt Zimmer is a Sioux Falls native and longtime sports writer. He graduated from Washington High School where he played football, legion baseball and developed his lifelong love of the Minnesota Twins and Vikings. After graduating from St. Cloud State University, he returned to Sioux Falls, and began a long career in amateur baseball and sports reporting. Email Matt at [email protected].
2023-12-16 06:45:00
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