Jul. 20—GRAND FORKS — The preseason Missouri Valley Football Conference poll comes out Monday to kick off the league’s media day in Sioux Falls.
The Fighting Hawks could be pegged anywhere from fourth to seventh, most likely.
With preseason polls basically a reflection of the previous season’s final standings, the poll will reveal nearly nothing about the question on UND football fans’ minds: How are the 2025 Fighting Hawks going to fare?
If the MVFC media has no idea where to peg UND, you can’t blame them.
Who would know? Nobody really knows what’s in store in 2025.
New UND coach Eric Schmidt has galvanized the fan base and alumni in his short time as head coach after returning to his alma mater and taking over for Bubba Schweigert in the offseason.
Equipped with experience at the FBS level with stops at Washington, Fresno State and San Diego State, Schmidt has modernized the building blocks of the program and parlayed a new weight room, new coaching offices and a new locker room into recruiting victories in the Midwest unlike any time in UND’s Division I history. UND has beaten out the other Division I Dakota schools on a regular basis with the 2026 recruiting class — a claim UND rarely could boast in the last 20 years.
But these high school recruiting victories will impact the course of the 2029 UND football season more than the 2025 Fighting Hawks.
The course of the 2025 UND football season is going to come down to in-house development, transfer portal recruiting and whether a coaching change and culture shift are sparks seen on the field in less than a year.
Although Schmidt is changing UND’s defensive alignment for the first time in decades, the Fighting Hawks’ biggest 2025 mystery is on offense at the most important position in football.
UND’s starting quarterback job is completely up in the air, despite returning 2024 starter Simon Romfo.
This spring, an arm injury kept Romfo on the sidelines for the entirety of spring ball to further complicate what may be a four-man race still.
Looming over the uncertainty is the addition of San Diego State transfer Javance Tupou’ata-Johnson, who will be in the mix at quarterback. The dual threat transfer portal addition didn’t make the smoothest transition during spring ball. His play left in-house options Jerry Kaminski and Jack Sulik with realistic shots at the starting job entering the summer.
Part of Tupou’ata-Johnson’s disconnect with the wide receivers was felt across the entire passing game as the program moves on from wide receiver Bo Belquist, who dominated targets and production the last few years.
Perhaps UND’s most experienced wide receiver Nate DeMontagnac missed most of spring ball with an injury. The most productive wide receiver during spring ball was Four Winds product Deng Deng, who played in four games last season in his redshirt year.
Deng leading production may be promising for his development, but it also highlights UND’s lack of experience and production at the position.
If there is a reason to buy stock in the 2025 Hawks, it’s because of the offensive line. Seth Anderson, Trace Thaden, Liam Becher, Ben Buxa, Caleb Olson and Carter Gorder bring back an experienced group that was solid in 2024 despite, for some, playing ahead of schedule due to transfer portal exits in the roster ahead of them on the depth chart.
This line should create space for two proven running backs in Gaven Ziebarth and Sawyer Siedl. If Ziebarth is the power and Siedl the speed in this combination, UND attempted to patch up the missing component from 2024 of Isaiah Smith, who was a senior last season and provided the speed-power combination the program attempted to fill with transfer Xavier Leigh of FCS Sacred Heart.
Leigh’s impact is a complete unknown as he was added after spring ball.
Defensively, there are even more questions than the offense.
The defensive line, already a thin position group in a 3-4 scheme, received a ton of offseason recruiting attention amid a change to a four-linemen setup.
Sacramento State’s Tyler Henry was added after spring ball, but the position group remains UND’s biggest concern.
Despite dropping from four linebackers to two in the new scheme, UND also found itself short at linebacker after graduating Wyatt Pedigo, Kason Kelley and Josh Navratil, while also moving one of its top prospects in linebacker Lance Rucker to edge rusher.
Fall camp will be the first opportunity for UND fans to see if the addition of Michael Devereux of Old Dominion can help Malachi McNeal hold down the linebacker position.
At defensive back, UND brought in junior college transfer Idrique Carmichael after spring ball to battle with pre-spring ball additions of Bennett Walker (San Diego State) and Zach Lewis (Northern Arizona).
UND safety Tyler Erkman will return at fall camp after using all of spring ball to recover from injury.
When UND comes together for fall camp at the end of the month, the 2025 will begin to take a shape — a path nearly impossible to imagine at the onset.
Will a new quarterback emerge? Will the defense adjust to the new system? Will Eric Schmidt’s vision and energy be evident in the roster immediately?
The questions go on and on. The answers are hard to come by in mid-July.