Sioux City, Iowa — The 2020 football season is here as Northwestern and Morningside meet up in a top 10 match-up Saturday night in Sioux City, Iowa. Kickoff at Elwood Olson stadium is set for 7pm.
Northwestern finished the 2019 season ranked 10th in the NAIA with a 9-2 record and begins this season either fifth or sixth in the preseason rankings. Morningside won its second straight national championship to cap a 2019 season with an unbeaten 14-0 record and is ranked first in all of the preseason polls.
This will be the 29th match-up in the rivalry with Morningside; Northwestern trails the all-time series 10-18 and has dropped six straight to the Mustangs. The Raiders last win was a 38-28 win on Korver Field in 2013.
Matt McCarty owns a 31-13 record in his four seasons as the head of the Raiders football program. He has guided the Raiders to three consecutive playoff appearances and his teams have been ranked in the NAIA’s top 15 for 29 straight weeks and in the top 20 for 33 consecutive polls. McCarty was also the defensive coordinator for 11 years (2005-15) and played for Northwestern from 2000-03, earning All-American honors in 2003.
Steve Ryan is now in his 20th season as head coach and has guided the Mustangs to a 184-36 record for an 83.6 winning percentage in 19 seasons for the most football coaching victories and the highest victory rate in Morningside history. Ryan has led the Mustangs to 16 consecutive post-season appearances in the NAIA National Championship Series, where the team has advanced to at least the semifinals seven times in the last nine years. He has led the Mustangs to 10 Great Plains Athletic Conference (GPAC) championships, including their current run of nine consecutive league titles.
The two-time defending national champion Mustangs have won 29 straight games dating back to a semifinal loss to the University of Saint Francis (Ind.) in the 2017 national semifinals. They have gone unbeaten the last two seasons (15-0-2018; 14-0-2019) and have won 43 straight GPAC games. They have not lost a conference match-up since the final regular season game in 2014 (vs Doane).
Morningside unofficially returns 12 starters (7 offense, 4 defense, 1 special teams) from a 2019 team that defeated Marian (Ind.) 40-38 in the title game.
The Raiders have qualified for the NAIA Football Championship series three straight and six of the last eight seasons. They finished second in the GPAC with an 8-1 record, 9-2 overall, losing to 9th-ranked Saint Xavier (Ill.) 25-20 in the first round.
McCarty returns 16 starters (7 offense, 6 defense, 3 special teams) from the 2019 squad, including seven players who earned all-conference accolades.
