North Dakota State hasn’t played a snap in a full season of FBS football yet, but one analyst has a clear picture of where the Bison will fit.
ESPN Las Vegas’ Steve Cofield called NDSU “a better program” than recent College Football Playoff team James Madison. NDSU enters the FBS with 10 FCS national championships after years of speculation, and JMU, a former FCS rival of the Bison, reached the CFP before being thumped by Oregon.
“I think there’s massive curiosity,” Colfield told the Fargo Forum’s Jeff Kolpack. “I mean, we saw James Madison bump up from FCS and do well in FBS, and frankly, North Dakota State is a better program so I think there’s a curiosity of, are they going to do the same thing? How good are they going to be in year one?”
That’s the biggest question as NDSU joins the Mountain West Conference, a league that hopes to find a new torchbearer with Boise State off to the Pac-12. Boise State made the first CFP in the 2024 season and earned a bye as No. 4 seed.
As for Cofield calling the Bison better than JMU, the Bison have a 4-1 record all-time against the Dukes, including two FCS title games. JMU moved up in 2022 and dominated the Sun Belt Conference from the get-go, and the Dukes slipped into the CFP because of the ACC’s conundrum with a 5-3 Duke squad upsetting Virginia in the championship game.
Bison May Have Postseason Wait
How soon NDSU will get to confirm Colfield’s position is another question since the NCAA has a two-year postseason ban for teams moving up divisions. The Bison are set to appeal the decision for a waiver this year, but it’s possible that NDSU will only play in a bowl game if there aren’t enough bowl-eligible teams.
Of the remaining Mountain West teams, UNLV went 10-4, and New Mexico and Hawaii went 9-4 in 2025. Hawaii is considered a dark horse for the CFP by ESPN, but getting a playoff bid will likely be harder this fall after two Group of Six teams got blown out — Tulane and JMU.
In the meantime, NDSU looks poised to help the Mountain West brand, which lost longtime powerhouse Boise State to the Pac-12. Additional losses of Fresno State, San Diego State, Utah State, and Colorado State to the Pac-12 also hurt the Mountain West.
NDSU dominating the FCS led many NFL players and two top-three picks at quarterback along the way. College GameDay visited Fargo twice during the five-year title run, and the Bison appeared a third time when visiting South Dakota State in 2019.
How Will the Bison Travel in 2026?
Bison fans are known to travel, especially for the 11 FCS championship games in Frisco, Texas, in addition to the FBS opponents NDSU faced on the road. That’s a quality Cofield says people in the Mountain West are interested to see.
“The other curiosity is how many people are going to make the trip?” Cofield said regarding UNLV in particular. “What’s going to be the trip to go to for North Dakota State fans with all these road games?”
NDSU visits Honolulu, Colorado Springs, Las Vegas, and Albuquerque, New Mexico, during conference play this year.
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