Northwestern College football coach Orv Otten hopes the strength of the Great Plains Conference is an advantage as the Raiders get set for this weekend’s N-A-I-A playoff game at Missouri Valley. Nearly half of the teams still alive are members of the G-P-A-C.
Otten says it’s a very strong conference week in and week out and there are still three teams from the conference in the playoffs. Otten says some of the teams that didn’t finish at the top of the conference had comparable scores to playoff teams when playing some of the opponents.
Northwestern opened the playoffs with a 17-10 victory over Black Hills State and Otten says playing on the road offers some different challenges. He says you have to deal with the travel and different housing accommodations. Otten say you’re palsying on a different surface and away from your fans, but he says they didn’t lose a game on the road this year.
Northwestern is sixth ranked and 11-1 on the season. Missouri Valley is 12-0 and ranked fifth nationally.