PUEBLO, Colo. – Colorado State University Pueblo advanced one spot to No. 3 and No. 4 respectively in this week's latest AFCA Division II Coaches Poll, presented by GoRout Gridiron and D2Football.com Media polls that were released Monday morning.
In this season's 10th weekly national Division II football poll, the ThunderWolves, who are 9-0 overall and 7-0 in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference after picking up a 38-31 Halloween home win this past Saturday over Black Hills State, jumped up in both of the polls this week following Kutztown's 32-25 overtime loss this past Saturday to East Stroudsburg (Pa.). Kutztown was ranked No. 3 and No. 4 in the AFCA and D2Football.com polls last week.
The Pack received 676 points in this week's AFCA Coaches' Poll to sit 43 points behind No. 2 Harding (9-0), who received 719 points after earning a 48-10 win over Oklahoma Baptist this past Saturday and 13 points in front of No. 4 Minnesota State (9-0), who picked up a 44-9 win over Southwest Minnesota State this past Saturday. In the D2Football.com poll, the Pack remained one spot in front of Western Colorado (9-0 overall, 7-0 RMAC), who is ranked No. 5 in both the D2Football.com and AFCA polls. The Pack and Western Colorado will play each other in the ThunderBowl on Nov. 14 to close out the regular season.
CSU Pueblo and Western Colorado are the only two RMAC schools ranked in this week's latest national polls as Western Colorado is ranked No. 5 in both the AFCA and D2Football.com polls. Additionally, one RMAC school, Colorado School of Mines (6-2-1 overall, 6-1 RMAC) received 14 votes in this week's AFCA poll to be one of 14 teams receiving votes. One of the Pack's previous opponents this season, Central Missouri also received votes in this week's AFCA poll as the Mules earned nine votes this week.
Seven of the Top 25 teams ranked in this week's AFCA Coaches poll are from Super Region Four, including five teams from the region ranked inside the Top 10.
The top two teams remained the same in both the AFCA and D2Football.com polls as Ferris State (9-0) and Harding (9-0) are ranked No. 1 and No. 2 respectively in both polls. In addition to Ferris State and Harding, the AFCA has CSU Pueblo at No. 4 and Minnesota State at No. 5, while D2Football.com has Minnesota State at No. 3, CSU Pueblo at No. 4 and Western Colorado at No. 5.
CSU Pueblo will look to remain undefeated on the season as they return to action this coming Saturday, Nov. 7 as they travel to Rapid City, S.D. for a 2 p.m. RMAC contest against South Dakota Mines (5-4 overall, 3-4 RMAC). The Pack enters the game having won 18 straight regular season games dating to last season's 36-35 home setback to Fort Hays State, 32 consecutive conference games dating to the 2023 season, which is the longest active conference win streak in Division II football and 19 consecutive road games, which is also the longest active road win streak in Division II football.
