Mercer football’s season ended in the second round of the FCS Playoffs on Saturday as the Bears were shut out 47-0 at home by the University of South Dakota. The loss capped a Southern Conference-winning season in which Mercer went 9-4 overall and advanced to the second round of the playoffs as the No. 6-ranked team in the FCS.
On Saturday, however, the Bears were soundly tamed by the Coyotes.
“We accomplished quite a bit, and there’s much to be proud of, but today was certainly not good,” Head Coach Mike Jacobs said after the game.
The lopsided score reflected both teams’ performances in the dreary weather: South Dakota recorded 550 yards of total offense to Mercer’s 277. When the Bears did have the ball, they struggled to move it downfield. The team averaged just 22.25 yards per drive in the game, including four drives that ended in an interception in the cold, rainy conditions.
"If I tell you anything other than they kicked our ass, it's an excuse," Jacobs said. "They dealt with the same thing we did, and we got beat today."
Quarterback Braden Atkinson’s ‘29 struggles came just days after the true freshman was awarded the Jerry Rice award for being the top freshman player in the FCS. Jacobs credited Atkinson’s performance to South Dakota’s consistent pressure in the pocket. While the quarterback did not get sacked in the game, he threw his first interception of the game as he tried to evade a large loss of yards on the second drive of the first quarter.
“We just didn’t execute well enough, and they executed really high-level on some of those things,” Jacobs said. “And we had a couple drops that led to a couple of those [interceptions].”
After Atkinson’s second pick of the day early in the second quarter, running backs coach Fred Jones dropped to a crouch on the sidelines, summing up the game for the Bears up to that point. Outside of his interceptions, Atkinson was uncharacteristically inaccurate. While his typically sure-handed receivers let the ball slip through their hands at times, Atkinson did no favors by throwing errant passes.
CJ Miller '27 was a rare bright spot on the offense, which was shut out at home for the first time in two seasons. Miller recorded his third highest total rushing yards this season with 105 yards on 18 carries. His play accounted for more than a third of the team's offensive output.
Conversely, the Coyotes, who will now play in their third straight quarterfinals game in the FCS Playoffs, scored on seven of their 12 drives in the game, including six touchdowns. South Dakota’s running back LJ Philips Jr. averaged 10 yards per carry and recorded two rushing touchdowns on 16 carries, including a 41-yard rush on the first drive that set up the Coyotes’ first touchdown.
Coming into the game, Jacobs said, he knew that Philips carried much of South Dakota’s load, and that the Bears tried to scheme for his impact. But the Southern Conference’s best rushing defense was gashed repeatedly on the ground on its way to giving up more than 300 yards to the Coyotes’ running back room.
Mercer’s secondary gave up two 60-yard touchdown receptions. Receiver Tysen Boze recorded the best game of his career with two catches that went for 108 yards. Five minutes into the third quarter, Boze caught a short pass in the flat and carried it 63 yards for a touchdown.
The outcome was somewhat unexpected. The Bears came into the game having won the SoCon, while the Coyotes, ranked No. 11, had dropped four games this season in the Missouri Valley Conference.
“I’m hurting,” Andrew Zock ‘28 said after the game. “It’s a team that we felt like we could definitely go in there and beat.”
Saturday’s loss may have been a number of Bears’ final game for Mercer. Zock is likely to be courted away from the SoCon while Atkinson may draw interest from larger programs who want a strong passer with starting experience and three years of eligibility left.
“I love it here, I feel like this staff has done a great job, it’s really no other people I would want to be around,” Zock said, adding that his aim now is to “just get another year under my belt.”
Gabriel Kopp '26 is double majoring in Journalism and Law and Public Policy at Mercer University. He has written for The Cluster since he started at Mercer, and currently works as Editor-in-Chief. When he isn't working on a Washington Post crossword, he enjoys going for runs around Macon and reading The New York Times or the AJC while sipping coffee.
