Photo by Samantha Davis: Southwest Minnesota State wide receiver (84) reaches out to attempt to make a catch during a Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference football game against Sioux Falls on Oct. 12 at Mattke Field in Marshall. Auten set a career high with 92 receiving yards on Saturday in the Mustangs’ 55-23 loss to Northern State in Aberdeen, S.D.

ABERDEEN, S.D. — New season highs of 28 first downs and 162 rushing yards weren’t enough for the Southwest Minnesota State University football team to pull out a road win over Northern State on Saturday. The Wolves built up a 32-point first-half lead and coasted to a 55-23 win over the Mustangs, handing SMSU its fifth consecutive loss.

While both the Mustangs and Northern State play in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference, the game was considered a non-conference game officially.

Brock Bagozzi connected with Carter Campbell for a 29-yard touchdown in the first two minutes of the game to give the Wolves a lead that they never relinquished. Bagozzi finished the game completing 11 of his 13 pass attempts for 143 yards and three touchdowns, while Campbell caught three passes for a team-leading 48 yards in the game.

Jacob Honstetter headed SMSU’s season-best rushing attack with 15 carries for 67 yards, trailing only his three carries for 70 yards against Duluth on Oct. 4. Macloud Crowton also toted the ball 15 times for 47 yards while Tariq Parker logged seven carries for 53 yards.

Ryan Kronbach scored SMSU’s lone rushing touchdown with 20 seconds left in the first half, punching it in from two yards out to trim Northern State’s lead to 48-23 four minutes into the fourth quarter.

SMSU opened with an eight-play, 46-yard drive, capped by a 36-yard Mason Carver field goal to make it 7-3. Northern State responded by scoring the next 27 points, building a 34-3 lead by the middle of the second quarter.

Tryg Auten set a new career high with 92 receiving yards on seven catches, including a 14-yard touchdown in the second quarter that ended Northern State’s 27-point run, trimming the deficit to 34-10. Later, Auten caught a nine-yard pass with 20 seconds left in the first half for SMSU’s second touchdown, cutting the deficit to 41-16 as halftime approached. Crowton completed 19 of 36 attempts for 200 yards, two touchdowns and three interceptions.

On its scoring run, Northern State found the end zone on a 35-yard pass from Bagozzi to Stubbe, a 22-yard pass from Daniel Britt to Gavin Giesler, a 35-yard punt return from Blake Clay to close the first quarter at 27-3, and a 10-yard pass from Zach Jorgensen to Zach Kraft early in the second quarter.

Britt completed nine of his 13 attempts for 99 yards in the game, while the touchdown was Zach Jorgensen’s lone pass attempt. Maxamillion Thomson also attempted one pass for Northern State, but it was intercepted by SaMaury Alexander with four minutes left in the game.

In between Auten’s pair of touchdowns, Bagozzi completed an eight-yard touchdown to Cooper Eisenbeisz.

Josiah Hedensten led the game with 13 total tackles for SMSU, 11 of which were solo tackles. He became the eighth Mustang to reach 300 career tackles in the process. His 307 career tackles rank sixth in program history.

Wyatt Block carried the ball eight times for 117 yards while Britt finished with seven carries for 84 yards for the Wolves, propelling Northern State to 274 yards on the ground with an average of 8.1 yards per attempt to SMSU’s 4.1.

Stubbe ran in a five-yard touchdown for Northern State to close out the third quarter while Kimani Quade ran in an eight-yard touchdown halfway through the fourth quarter.​

Jake Adams logged eight solo and 13 total tackles for Northern State, including a combined half-sack with Logan Cooper. Cooper also logged a half-sack and an interception for Northern State.

Cordae Jones and Antonio Moore got to Crowton for a sack each in the game while Andrew Ewald and Kyle Thomas each came down with an interception.

SMSU falls to 1-6 overall with the loss and 1-5 in conference play with the loss, and looks to get back on track when it hosts Augustana on Saturday at Mattke Field at 1 p.m. for its penultimate home game.