BOBCATS BY THE NUMBERS: 32 Days Before Kickoff!
7/30/2019 8:02:00 AM | Football
Tom Kostrba's Bobcat career was brief, but he boosted MSU to a big win in 1976
July 30: In addition to a quick look at players wearing the jersey number corresponding to the number of days remaining until Montana State's season opener at Texas Tech on August 31, Bobcats by the Numbers brings you another tidbit or two aligning with that number.
#32
Jory Choate, LB: With a redshirt season, and more importantly an off-season and summer in Alex Willcox's strength and conditioning program, Jory Choate appears ready to compete for playing time. He begins fall camp fourth on the depth chart at the Will linebacker position, but his increased physicality and innate savvy gives him the opportunity to play his way onto the field early in his career, particularly on kick teams.
32 – Rushes by Tom Kostrba in a playoff win vs. North Dakota State in 1976
Montana State had beaten North Dakota State earlier in the 1976 season, but the Bobcats' trip to Fargo for the 1976 NCAA Division II Playoffs shaped up as no easy task. For one thing, the Bison and MSU had met every season since 1970, with NDSU winning four of those seven meetings. For another, the brutal cold and icy field conditions served as an equalizer. But the Bobcats earned the right to play – and eventually win – the 1976 National Championship Game by playing a vintage Sonny Holland game. The Cats rushed 72 times for 174, with Kostrba plowing for 106 of them.
Chronology: Menton Place (1931), Charles Herstrom (1937), George Wallis (1940), Bill Zupan (1941), John Heine (1946-47), Morry Sivertson (1948-49), Dick Newman (1953), Don Edwards (1956), Guy Troisi (1957), Dick Cope (1958), Barton Furry (1959), Bucky May (1960-61), Dave Miller (1963-64), John Cunneen (1965-66), Hans Pidino (1968-69), Roger Crow (1970), Doug Vickery (1971), Mike Vidmar (1974), Bob Burkhart (1972-73, '75), Mike McLeod (1976-79), Heath Hunter (2010-13), Sam Plucker (2015), J. McCarthy (2016-17), Jory Choate (2018-)
Other #32 Notes: The Buzzetti name in Bobcat annals is more identified with the hardwood than the gridiron. Ed Buzzetti was a brilliant basketball player, a member of the famed Wonder Team which has since become known far and wide as the Golden Bobcats. In fact, he was believed to be the final surviving Golden Bobcat upon his passing in 2005. Ed's brother Ray (featured here because of the year '32 rather than his jersey number) followed him to Montana State from Hardin (the family moved there from Fromberg) and made a mark in both football and basketball. On the hardwood he was called "the greatest guard in the Rocky Mountains" by one publication, and the Montanan said called him "a ball rustler of the highest order, sinking phenomenal shots, dribbling, twisting, turning and pivoting," but he also starred for Montana State in football. Ray helped spearhead one of the finest moments in the school's pre-World War II era in a 1932 upset of the Grizzlies, scoring an early touchdown to pull the Bobcats back into the game then sealing the win with a 21-yard fourth-quarter touchdown run… There are players in Bobcat football history whose presence outlast their career by decades – Sonny Holland, Dennis Erickson, Don Hass, Steve Kracher, Ron Ueland, Joe Bignell. In 1969 the Billings Gazette conducted a poll which named Montana State's all-time football team. Only a small handful of years after the advent of two-platoon football, one player was selected for the 11 positions that lined up on each side of the ball. Hass, Holland, Erickson… most of that team was probably obvious then, and could be picked today nearly on auto pilot by serious Bobcat fans. A couple of "pass-catching immortals from the 1920's," Max Worthington and Val Glynn, cracked the lineup, but as did a bunch of Bobcat Hall of Famers. Included in that group was a three-year starter at fullback – a position that has existed only occasionally at MSU in the last three decades – named Dave Miller. He was called a "hard, determined runner" who "provides (the) Bobcats with clutch short-yardage punch" by the school's brilliant Sports Information Director and Bobcat Hall of Famer Ken Nicholson, and he used the battering ram mentality to gain 1,217 yards in a three-year career shortened by a knee injury during his sophomore season. Bobcat coach Jim Sweeney considered Miller the best linebacker he'd coached to that point, and he drew equally effusive praise as a bruising blocker. Dave Miller was an All-Big Sky fullback in 1964, and you can bet he was a key cog in that season's Big Sky Conference Championship.
#32
Jory Choate, LB: With a redshirt season, and more importantly an off-season and summer in Alex Willcox's strength and conditioning program, Jory Choate appears ready to compete for playing time. He begins fall camp fourth on the depth chart at the Will linebacker position, but his increased physicality and innate savvy gives him the opportunity to play his way onto the field early in his career, particularly on kick teams.
32 – Rushes by Tom Kostrba in a playoff win vs. North Dakota State in 1976
Montana State had beaten North Dakota State earlier in the 1976 season, but the Bobcats' trip to Fargo for the 1976 NCAA Division II Playoffs shaped up as no easy task. For one thing, the Bison and MSU had met every season since 1970, with NDSU winning four of those seven meetings. For another, the brutal cold and icy field conditions served as an equalizer. But the Bobcats earned the right to play – and eventually win – the 1976 National Championship Game by playing a vintage Sonny Holland game. The Cats rushed 72 times for 174, with Kostrba plowing for 106 of them.
Chronology: Menton Place (1931), Charles Herstrom (1937), George Wallis (1940), Bill Zupan (1941), John Heine (1946-47), Morry Sivertson (1948-49), Dick Newman (1953), Don Edwards (1956), Guy Troisi (1957), Dick Cope (1958), Barton Furry (1959), Bucky May (1960-61), Dave Miller (1963-64), John Cunneen (1965-66), Hans Pidino (1968-69), Roger Crow (1970), Doug Vickery (1971), Mike Vidmar (1974), Bob Burkhart (1972-73, '75), Mike McLeod (1976-79), Heath Hunter (2010-13), Sam Plucker (2015), J. McCarthy (2016-17), Jory Choate (2018-)
Other #32 Notes: The Buzzetti name in Bobcat annals is more identified with the hardwood than the gridiron. Ed Buzzetti was a brilliant basketball player, a member of the famed Wonder Team which has since become known far and wide as the Golden Bobcats. In fact, he was believed to be the final surviving Golden Bobcat upon his passing in 2005. Ed's brother Ray (featured here because of the year '32 rather than his jersey number) followed him to Montana State from Hardin (the family moved there from Fromberg) and made a mark in both football and basketball. On the hardwood he was called "the greatest guard in the Rocky Mountains" by one publication, and the Montanan said called him "a ball rustler of the highest order, sinking phenomenal shots, dribbling, twisting, turning and pivoting," but he also starred for Montana State in football. Ray helped spearhead one of the finest moments in the school's pre-World War II era in a 1932 upset of the Grizzlies, scoring an early touchdown to pull the Bobcats back into the game then sealing the win with a 21-yard fourth-quarter touchdown run… There are players in Bobcat football history whose presence outlast their career by decades – Sonny Holland, Dennis Erickson, Don Hass, Steve Kracher, Ron Ueland, Joe Bignell. In 1969 the Billings Gazette conducted a poll which named Montana State's all-time football team. Only a small handful of years after the advent of two-platoon football, one player was selected for the 11 positions that lined up on each side of the ball. Hass, Holland, Erickson… most of that team was probably obvious then, and could be picked today nearly on auto pilot by serious Bobcat fans. A couple of "pass-catching immortals from the 1920's," Max Worthington and Val Glynn, cracked the lineup, but as did a bunch of Bobcat Hall of Famers. Included in that group was a three-year starter at fullback – a position that has existed only occasionally at MSU in the last three decades – named Dave Miller. He was called a "hard, determined runner" who "provides (the) Bobcats with clutch short-yardage punch" by the school's brilliant Sports Information Director and Bobcat Hall of Famer Ken Nicholson, and he used the battering ram mentality to gain 1,217 yards in a three-year career shortened by a knee injury during his sophomore season. Bobcat coach Jim Sweeney considered Miller the best linebacker he'd coached to that point, and he drew equally effusive praise as a bruising blocker. Dave Miller was an All-Big Sky fullback in 1964, and you can bet he was a key cog in that season's Big Sky Conference Championship.
Players Mentioned
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