SEWARD, Neb. – A somewhat new-look squad picked up where it left off last season as the Concordia University, Nebraska Football team made rival Doane pay dearly for its mistakes. The opportunistic Bulldog defense forced four turnovers that led to 21 points and a lopsided 35-7 final score on a picture perfect Saturday (Sept. 6) night in Seward. A pregame flyover preceded three Carlos Collazo rushing touchdowns, a highlight-reel house call from Adam Van Cleave and near pick-six from Will Potratz.
Head Coach Patrick Daberkow’s program has won three straight and five of the last six in the series with the rival Tigers. Twenty-first ranked Concordia has started 1-0 after going 8-2 in 2024.
“I’m happy we got the win. It’s good to come out on top,” Daberkow said. “I think we have a lot of things we need to get better at. I probably sound like every coach in America right now. It’s week one. You just have to take care of the football and not shoot yourself in the foot with penalties. I think we did a subpar job of that in moments in this game. Some of the aggressive penalties I can live with. We’ll watch film and fix it.”
The early stages of the 70th all-time Concordia-Doane matchup on the gridiron provided a glimpse of what would become a theme. The Tigers coughed up the football (recovered by Drake Trent) on their opening possession, setting up an eight-yard Gideon Stark touchdown strike to Jonny Puelz three plays later. Just as Doane found a bit of traction in the third quarter, pulling within 21-7, the Bulldogs barked back.
Will Potratz snagged an interception of an overthrow, raced 38 yards to the one and teed things up for a short Carlos Collazo touchdown run. On the ensuing kickoff, Kannen Willis burst through a seam before losing the football, which was scooped up by Concordia kicker Peyton Atwood. Seven plays later, Collazo bulldozed his way over the goal line from one yard out for touchdown No. 3. That sequence capped the evening’s scoring.
From an offensive perspective, Van Cleave’s touchdown late in the first half stood out as the eye-popping effort of the night. On the play, Van Cleave caught a swing pass to the left, trucked a defender, found a gap in the middle of the field and then outran everybody for a 53-yard sprint to the end zone. The Columbus native finished with 13 grabs for 173 yards as he assumes the No. 1 receiver role.
In Stark’s first career start, the offense totaled 401 yards, including 278 through the air and 123 on the ground. The Magnolia, Texas, native Stark completed 24-of-43 passes and fired two touchdowns to go against two picks. Six different Bulldogs caught at least one pass (Max Bartels hauled in four catches for 48 yards). On the ground, Collazo racked up 95 yards on 28 bruising carries behind a revamped offensive line. The group did not allow a sack on Saturday.
Stark knows there is work to be done, but it was a solid week one showing for the offense. Said Stark, “We came out with the win. We have a lot to clean up, but the big guys up front kept me clean and the running backs clean. We moved the ball pretty well. We have a lot to clean up, and we’re looking forward to improving next week.”
Headlined by nose guard Carson Fehlhafer up front, the Concordia defense wreaked havoc in the Doane backfield. Fehlhafer came up with 1.5 sacks on an eight-sack night as a team. Terry Sebek led the way with three sacks while AJ Frazey and Daylon Henson added one apiece. At linebacker, Drake Trent (14 tackles) and Grant Huss (13 tackles) cleaned up Tiger ballcarriers. Huss and Deegan Barnes were also credited with a forced fumble apiece. In the secondary, Luke Penrod broke up five passes.
Doane (0-2, 0-2 GPAC) was limited to 252 total yards. The Tigers were also flagged for 12 penalties. Doane averaged only 2.8 yards per play against a stingy Concordia defense. Quarterback Sam Hartman led the visitors on a 12-play, 73-yard drive in the third quarter for their lone touchdown.
Said Potratz afterwards, “Defensively, it was a beautiful night. We’ve been putting this work in for three years. We have a veteran group on defense for sure. You have to give credit to the line … As a whole team, we’re here to play. We’re hungry. We’ve never been as hungry as we are this year. After last year, we’re on to new things.”
Added Daberkow, “Our defense does a really good job of checking everybody on their ball security. I was proud of the effort. There are going to be things that we’ll watch and think, oh my goodness, I can’t believe we left that out there. Any time you can beat a rival school in conference at home under the lights in front of a full stadium with 70-degree weather – I don’t think it gets better than that.”
Dating back to last season, the Bulldogs have won six consecutive games, marking the longest active win streak among GPAC programs. Concordia has won five straight against in-state rivals and has outscored Doane by a combined total of 135-43 over the past three meetings. With career win No. 41, Daberkow has pulled even with Vance Winter for the fourth most coaching victories in program history.
Another night game is on the docket for next Saturday (Sept. 13) when the Bulldogs will welcome Dakota Wesleyan (1-1, 0-1 GPAC) to town. Kickoff is set for 6 p.m. CT. The meeting that took place last season in Mitchell, S.D., resulted in a 42-7 Concordia victory. In Saturday’s action, the Tigers were blown out at No. 19 Dordt, 66-7.
| AVC from 53 yards out! @CUNEFootball leads Doane 21-0 late in the first half. pic.twitter.com/6mSD2Z4XHC
— Concordia Bulldogs (@cunebulldogs) September 7, 2025