BUTTE — Montana Tech's 27-24 home football win over the College of Idaho back on Sept. 27 did two things for the Orediggers.
One, it gave them a sense of redemption after falling to the Yotes in overtime back in 2024.
Two, it lifted Tech's record to 5-0, the first time in the over century-long history of the program that the Orediggers have won their first five games.
Tech followed up that unprecedented fifth win with a 49-21 rout of Dakota State to open Frontier Conference East play with a victory while pushing its record to 6-0. Oh, and the Orediggers have yet to trail an opponent at any point this season.
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Now ranked at No. 7 — with four top-25 victories this season — the Orediggers are now the only unbeaten team in the Frontier. For head coach Kyle Samson, his team has been reaping the rewards of the effort they've been putting in each game week.
"It's fun to have success but to be honest it's days like today, a Wednesday practice, where the kids look forward to coming to practice," said Samson. "The guys are enjoying the work that it takes to be successful on Saturday and I think that's when you know you have a special team."
A key component to Tech's success this season has been the play of sophomore quarterback Jarrett Wilson. The first-year starter has piled up 12 touchdown passes against just one interception while adding 251 yards and a score on the ground. He also hauled in a 5-yard touchdown catch from receiver Levi Torgerson during the win against Dakota State.
Wilson said having veterans around him like Torgerson helped him quickly find his footing as the Orediggers' signal caller.
"As a young quarterback I think it's important to have the seniors and leadership we have on this team to kind of help and build my confidence," said Wilson. "I'm extremely confident in all the players that surround me on offense."
Five games are left on Tech's Frontier East slate and while the obvious goal is to win out — and earn its first Frontier title since 2016 — the Orediggers will do so on a game-by-game, week-by-week basis.
"This league's too good to look past the next opponent," said Samson. "We definitely have team goals of what we want to accomplish. We want to be Frontier Conference champs but we have a long ways to go."
Said Torgerson: "We want to keep going. (Being) 6-0 is awesome, but at the end of the year you want to be undefeated, so we want to keep it going, obviously want to keep this momentum going."
