Biesiot: Blue Hawks have to work on ‘everything’

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Two days had passed and Dickinson State head football coach Hank Biesiot still felt the same about his team’s season-opening loss to Rocky Mountain College.

“It looks like we’ve got everything to work on,” Biesiot said. “At the same time, you’ve got to keep it in perspective.”

Biesiot said Monday that the Blue Hawk coaching staff has gleaned some encouraging moments from a demoralizing 38-3 defeat at the hands of the unheralded Battlin’ Bears last Saturday in Billings, Mont.

“It’s hard to find a lot of positives in a game like that, but there were some,” Biesiot said.

The most glaring trouble spot was the Blue Hawks’ passing game, where junior Dave Velasquez struggled mightily in his first career start.

Velasquez and redshirt freshman Matt Harkless were a combined 9 of 31 for 62 yards with three passes completed for no or little gain. Velasquez was 7 of 25 for 51 yards and an interception.

“Offensively, we have to develop some consistency,” Biesiot said. “We were able to run the ball some, but we have to develop some more consistency in passing, which we think we can do.”

The best thing to come out of the DSU’s offense against Rocky was the performance of senior transfer Jordan Scott at running back.

Scott had 147 yards on 21 carries, an average of 7 yards, but much of that came in the second half when Rocky had the game all but wrapped up.

Biesiot said he wants the Blue Hawks to find better balance between the run and pass when they go to Moorhead, Minn., to take on Concordia College at noon Saturday.

“We’ve got to get settled down a little bit in there,” Biesiot said. “You’ve got to have balance between the two.”

Despite the score, Biesiot said, coaches weren’t completely disappointed with the effort or performance of the team’s defense, which returned only two full-time starters.

“We probably played the field a little better than we were anticipating,” Biesiot said.

However, DSU’s young and mostly untested secondary gave up 251 yards passing and three touchdowns to Rocky freshman quarterback Bryce Baker, playing out of a spread offense.

Rocky’s quick-strike offense and DSU’s inability to move the ball downfield — the Blue Hawks had no first downs in the first quarter — contributed to game getting out of hand early and the Bears racking up a 31-3 halftime lead.

“We still have to improve our tackling,” Biesiot said.

DSU gets two more chances to prove itself worthy of the No. 7 preseason ranking in the NAIA coaches’ poll.

The next poll doesn’t come out until Sept. 12, after the Blue Hawks have played Concordia and hosted Valley City State in their home and Dakota Athletic Conference opener, which is at 1:30 p.m. Sept. 10 at the Badlands Activities Center.

Had there been a ranking this week, historically speaking, a loss like Saturday’s would have likely dropped the Blue Hawks out of the top 20 or out of the poll entirely.

A poll, however, is the furthest thing from Biesiot’s mind at this point.

He just wants to get DSU in the win column.

“We’ve said it 100 times: you’re never as good as you think after a win and, after a loss, you’re probably not as bad as you think either,” Biesiot said.

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