Quarterback battle underway at Northern

Over the past few seasons, the Montana State University-Northern football team has struggled to win games, and part of that has been a lack of comsitency at quarterback.

Ever since Aaron Christensen has taken over as head coach for the Lights, Northern has struggled to find production at the position, and it has led to an offense that scored fewer points and gained fewer yards than any other team in the Frontier Conference over the past two seasons.

While Northern has boasted a solid running game over the years, all-everything running back Zach McKinley is gone, which will put even more pressure on the quarterback position and the passing game to pick up the slack.

The lack of an explosive passing attack contributed to an offense that averaged a Frontier low 9.6 points in 2015 and 16.6 in 2016. Jess Krahn took a majority of the snaps over the past two years as he started every game in 2015 and six games a year ago. Caleb McLaren also started six games for Northern a season ago. But McLaren graduated with one year of eligibility left, and Krahn has moved to tight end, which means no matter what happens, Northern will have a new starting quarterback when the Lights travel to Rocky Mountain College for their season opener in September.

“Right now, we have four different guys competing for the job,” Northern head coach Aaron Christensen said. “They are going to be competing for it from now until the opening game.”

The competition to be Northern’s next starting quarterback is still in its early stages as the Lights began spring drills just last week, but the player back with the most experience is Holden Maki, a junior who has 13 career pass attempts to his name. He has 99 career passing yards on eight completions and has thrown one touchdown pass.

Maki has been the backup for the past two seasons, but that doesn’t guarantee him anything as he will face challenges from junior college transfer Tommy Wilson out of the College of the Sequoias, as well as Dylan Cook, a redshirt freshman from Butte. However, his biggest challenge will come from Bryce Missey, who hails from Bethel, Washington, and was a former preferred walk-on at Washington State University.

“I was a redshirt at (Washington State), and coming out of high school coach Christensen was one of the few coaches to offer me,” Missey said.” We built a pretty good relationship, so when I decided to leave, I jumped at the opportunity to play for him.”

After Missey left Washington State around midway through the season, he signed with the Lights last winter and enrolled in order to compete in spring practice. And outside of his relationship with Christensen, Missey chose Northern because he saw a chance to compete and play right away.

“Coach and I had talked about having the opportunity to come in and compete right away and to prove myself and as a competitor and a player that's all you can ask for,” he said.

While Maki is the only guy on the roster with any game attempts playing for the Lights, Wilson brings a season of starting experience at the junior college level to the table. Last year, in nine games, Wilson attempted 257 passes and completed 57.4 percent of them. He threw for 1,809 yards, 14 touchdowns and nine interceptions, as well as averaging 201 yards passing and 32 rushing yards per game. He also scored eight rushing touchdowns.

Yet, Missey, who spent time with the Cougars last season, has the skill set as well. He may also have a leg up due to his experience working within a major college football program.

“Working with the staff at (Washington State) was an amazing experience,” Missy said. “Being around coaches that have been having success at such a high level makes you push yourself mentally. The athletes in the program are phenomenal and being around that type of talent every day only makes you better.”

Working mostly with the first team, Missey’s arm strength has been on full display in the first few days of spring practice. Yet, Wilson, Maki and Cook, who stands an impressive 6-7, have all had their moments, too, when they have gotten opportunities

“I think all four of us have played well, it's still pretty early we are only a few practices in,” Missey said. “For my own personal game, there are always a few bumps when you're picking up a new system, but I think it's going pretty well so far. I'm just excited to be here and to keep improving.”

Regardless of who is starting at quarterback for Northern, the hope, ultimately, is that all the competition will help each quarterback improve, which can strengthen the position as a whole.

“I think it’s going to be a good thing,” Christensen said. “We have a lot of competition, especially on the offensive side of the ball and the idea is that will push them all to get better.”

The Lights continue spring drills with practices Wednesday and Friday at 4 p.m. at the Northern practice fields. Northern's spring ball will last through the annual Spring Game, which will be held April 22.