Dakota loves its football, whether it’s cheering on Dakota on Friday nights, supporting the Spartans or Wolverines on Saturday, or watching the Lions on Sunday, it’s something that lots of people in the community all connect with. Unfortunately, last weekend was a dreadful weekend if you support the teams below:

Dakota Cougars:

Last Friday, Dakota played in the second round of the playoffs against Romeo, who they beat 34-28 earlier in the season. However, they were not able repeat the outcome this time, losing 15-14 on a touchdown on the last play of the game. Video evidence showed that the Romeo running back threw the ball into the endzone for a teammate to recover, which is illegal and the touchdown should have been called back, but unfortunately there are no reviews in high school football and the touchdown counted ending the cougars season. This was a heartbreaking loss to end the season especially with the potential we saw from the team throughout the season. While this was a tough loss to swallow the worst of the weekend was still to come.

Michigan State Spartans:

Saturday afternoon brought new hope as the Michigan State Spartans traveled to play Iowa after there impressive 27-24 win over Michigan. It was thought that the Spartans would build off of their first win under Mel Tucker, but instead was 49-7 drubbing. Michigan State came out flat on defense and looked lost on defense. State was dominated in the trenches rushing for just 59 yards on 32 attempts, while Iowa had 226 yards rushing on 41 attempts. Quarterback Rocky Lombardi, struggled mightily against the Iowa defense throwing 3 interceptions before being pulled in the fourth quarter. While it was a poor performance, Michigan State has an opportunity to bounce back against #10 Indiana on Saturday, who have been the surprise team of the Big Ten season thus far.

Michigan Wolverines:

Meanwhile, as Michigan State was being dominated by Iowa, at the same time Michigan was looking to bounce back from their embarrassing loss to Michigan State against #13 Indiana. Michigan had won 24 straight games against Indiana, and hadn’t lost to them since 1987. However, 2020 decided to strike again as Michigan was dominated by Indiana for the entire game losing 38-21. It was discovered during the Michigan State game that Michigan’s cornerbacks were a weakness, and Indiana took advantage throwing for 342 yards. Michigan was also unable to establish a run game which is a staple of Michigan’s offense. The Wolverines were held to an abysmal 13 yards rushing on 18 attempts. Michigan now sits at 1-2 on the year and their schedule doesn’t get any easier as they play #13 Wisconsin this weekend.

Detroit Lions: 

Finally, it’s Sunday afternoon and the Lions have an opportunity to pull out a win against the Vikings and salvage the weekend. Unfortunately, this was not the case as the Lions were dominated the entire game losing 34-20. Quarterback Matt Stafford missed practice all week because he was on the COVID list, and it showed. Stafford threw for just 211 yards and a touchdown while throwing 2 interceptions before backup Chase Daniel entered the game. As much as Stafford struggled, the run defense for the Lions was much worse. Vikings runningback Dalvin Cook ran for 206 yards on just 22 carries and had two touchdowns including a 70-yard touchdown run to seal the win in the fourth quarter. Lions have now lost two in a row bringing their record to 3-5, and while there is still lots of football to be played the Lions playoff chances seem to be slipping away.