GAME 6 – No. 13 SOU (4-1, 1-1) vs. Rocky Mountain (1-4, 0-3)
1 p.m. Saturday | Ashland, Oregon | Raider Stadium
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ASHLAND – The most daunting stretch of the season is over, but the Frontier Conference title race is only beginning to heat up as No. 13-ranked Southern Oregon returns home to face Rocky Mountain (Mont.) on Homecoming weekend.

SOU (4-1 overall, 1-1 FC) and the Battlin' Bears (1-4, 0-3) are set for a 1 p.m. kickoff Saturday at Raider Stadium. The Raiders, after knocking off back-to-back top-10 opponents, took their first loss last week at then-No. 16 Montana Tech, 42-35. The result left Carroll (Mont.) as the only unbeaten team left in Frontier play, and the Saints have yet to face any of the conference's four nationally-ranked squads.

The next three-week stretch for the Raiders contrasts sharply with the one they just completed. The opponents on the docket are 2-11 combined, having secured their only wins against each other. The Bears enter the week losers of three straight, though they played both Carroll and Eastern Oregon within three points and were within striking distance throughout most of last week's 49-31 loss at College of Idaho.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: The Raiders are 10-4 all-time against Rocky, with records of 7-4 in Frontier matchups and 5-1 at home. They scored a 23-5 victory last year in Billings – the start of a 5-1 stretch to end the season – while allowing the Bears to get into the red zone just three times on 13 possessions and limiting them to 288 total yards. SOU accumulated 280 rushing yards on that day, and the Bears' run-game issues have persisted into this season. They're averaging fewer yards on the ground (112.2/game, 3.2/carry) than any team in the conference and are surrendering 160 per game. The Raiders give up just 96.6 and generate more offensively (206.2) than any Frontier team.

NAIA TOP 25: The Raiders went from unranked to No. 7 in the span of a month, making a bigger jump than any team in the country two weeks in a row, but fell six spots on Monday to No. 13. Their loss to Montana Tech gave the Orediggers a four-spot bump to No. 12. The Frontier is the only conference in the NAIA with four top-15 squads, the others being No. 7 Montana Western and No. 15 College of Idaho. The shuffling is likely to continue after Montana Tech visits Montana Western on Saturday.

YATES WATCH: Gunner Yates kept up a historic pace last week with 19 rushes for 139 yards and three touchdowns to go with six catches for 78 yards and a TD. It was the sophomore's second four-touchdown game of the season, his fourth straight game with over 100 rushing yards and his fifth straight with multiple rushing TDs. Yates is up to 14 rushing TDs on the season, the second-highest total in the NAIA; the SOU record, established by Dusty McGrorty in 2001 and matched in '03, is 22. He is up to 15 total TDs, and that record, also held by McGrorty, is 25. The SOU single-season mark for rushing yards is 1,713, established by Yates' father, Griff, in 1997. Gunner is sitting on 773 with six regular-season games (and a possible postseason) to go, and he is averaging 28.2 more rushing yards per game (153.4) than any player in the country.

QUICK HITS:

• Senior quarterback Blake Asciutto posted his third 300-yard game in four outings last week. He didn't hit that number once last season. The 29-of-39 performance was also his fourth in a row without an interception, giving him 10 TDs and one interception on the season and 16 TDs compared to two picks during a seven-game stretch that dates back to 2023. Asciutto ranks second in the Frontier and 15th in the NAIA with 254.4 passing yards per game. His 68.9% completion rate is No. 1 nationally among quarterbacks throwing for more than 250 yards.
• The Raiders started 4-0 for the eighth time in history and had won nine of their last 10 games going back to 2023 prior to last week's loss. Since joining the Frontier in 2012, they've had three different 9-1 stretches. They've enjoyed seven such stretches in the history of the team, which dates back to 1927.
• Before last week, the Raiders had held 10 consecutive opponents under 30 points. The defense wasn't done any favors at Montana Tech: SOU surrendered a game-opening kickoff return for a touchdown and fumbled twice in its own territory, paving the way for Tech TDs both times. The Raiders are still giving up the second-fewest points (21.6) and yards (291.2) per game in the Frontier, and they have the fourth-most takeaways (8).
• Last week marked the second time this season that the SOU's offensive line didn't allow Asciutto to be sacked. The Raiders have given up six total sacks.
• Jordan Faifai is one of five players in the conference with multiple interceptions. The sophomore collected the third of his career at Tech.
• Last week Yates and Jeremiah Faulstick became the sixth and seventh different Raiders to collect reception touchdowns. Sawyer Cleveland leads the team in receptions (25), reception yardage (354) and reception TDs (3).

MORE ON ROCKY:

• The Raiders will face another dual-threat quarterback this week in Graedyn Buell. The senior is averaging 226.2 passing yards per game on 59.0% accuracy with nine TDs and five interceptions, and he leads the Bears in rushing at 60.4 yards per game and three touchdowns. (No other Bear has a rushing TD.) Buell passed for 373 yards last week at C of I. Hit top receiver, Joseph Dwyer, averages 65.6 reception yards, has four TDs and was an All-FC second-team selection a year ago.
• The Bears got their only win in a 27-12 nonconference game against MSU-Northern. But they gave up a game-winning field goal with 1:35 left at Carroll and had a potential game-winning drive stopped five yards short of the end zone a week later against Eastern Oregon, throwing an interception on 1st-and-goal. They were picked sixth in the Frontier preseason poll and are only three years removed from a conference co-championship.
• Their defense is headlined by a pair of All-FC performers: defensive back Kaysan Barnett leads the team in tackles (33) with 4 ½ for losses, and lineman John Aragon leads the Frontier in tackles for losses (8) and the team in sacks (3). As a unit, they're allowing 6.1 yards per play and 377.8 per game. They've generated five takeaways and the second-most sacks (14) in the circuit.

HOME HISTORY: SOU owns a 113-70 all-time record at Raider Stadium, where the team has won four in a row dating back to last year. The Raiders are 38-17 as the designated home team in Frontier play and are 26-4 in Frontier home games against unranked opponents. No unranked opponent has won in Ashland since 2022.
 
THE FRONTIER FILES: The Raiders made their Frontier debut in 2012 and have gone 68-42 in conference play since, giving them a higher winning percentage (.618) than any other FC team in that span. They've won two titles, in 2012 and '17, and finished among the top-two in six of 11 seasons. Last year's Raiders tied for fourth place at 5-3, their first winning record since 2018. Frontier teams have combined for 19 NAIA playoff wins since SOU joined, and the Raiders have accounted for 10 of those.