2025 Small College Football Season Preview: Concordia

The top football teams in the NAIA's GPAC conference typically call Iowa home, but last season Concordia University in Seward officially joined the ranks of the league's elite with the team's best season in more than two decades.

The latest stage of Concordia's evolution into one of the top teams in the GPAC came this past fall, where the Bulldogs defeated NAIA No. 2 Northwestern on the road, posted an 8-2 overall record, the team's best since 2001, and ended up just outside of the NAIA postseason picture.

"We know what our ceiling is, and we know that our ceiling can be even higher than what it was this last year," senior linebacker Grant Huss said. "I think it just puts confidence on every single person, whether they played last year or not, to know that we know what we’re capable of, we know that we are a playoff team...this is just who we are as Concordia."

"It shows us what we can do, and how we can build on that and be even better, how our ceiling can be even higher that what it is before," senior safety Daylon Henson echoed. "We feel like the grind’s the fun part. We’ve got to work for everything in this conference, so just taking it day by day, practice, every workout, everything one at a time has made us who we are today."

The Bulldogs return a lot of top talent on defense, anchored by Henson, a Associated Press First Team All-American last fall. But the offense will look quite a bit different this year under head coach Patrick Daberkow after the graduations of players like All-American receiver Austin Jablonski and All-Conference quarterback DJ McGarvie, both of whom set multiple program records at their positions. But after a few seasons on the sidelines, Concordia believes senior Gideon Stark is ready to assume the starting role behind center.

"The guys before us did a great job of just building the good culture for us, and we’re trying to step in and continue the culture, trust in our coaches, trust in players around us...just looking forward to play a game," said Stark, who backed up McGarvie the last couple of seasons, preparing for his turn at the helm of the offense. 

And the Bulldogs' two defensive leaders echoed the sentiments of their new starting quarterback, underscoring how important the concept of culture is to Concordia football.

"Since I’ve been here I’ve had great leaders show us the way, so I feel like if we just keep that cycle going, show the young guys how to lead, how to play at Concordia, I feel like we’ll be alright," Henson said. "[They showed us] how to lead, how to be who you are every single day, and not just fake an image of anything – just be who you are as a team and as a player."

"It all starts with the leaders of the group and the coaches, all them being on the same page, and them taking it into recruiting and where they recruit guys like us three. And then it goes down to us as players and being leaders as players, and being one united group and not being all cliquey, because that’s where you start to see the real problems within teams is you start to see the players who start to be more ‘I’ than ‘we,'" Huss outlined. "So I think it’s just been mind-blowing to see how amazing it’s been to have these coaches and players build one big program together. I think the culture is going to be set for years and years on, and I can’t wait to see how this program transforms in the future when I’m gone."

The Bulldogs cemented their status as a team to watch in the conference and beyond last season, but the well-trained and well-coached crew of players who spoke at Small College Media Day at Doane last month stressed that they can't present a sense of complacency along with their newfound contender status.

"We try not to forecast the season, we try to take it one day at a time and just get better each day and take each opponent on as they come and just see how we handle them – do the best we can," said Stark.

"That’s where you also start to see a lot of teams start to crumble is where they start to pinpoint certain games on their schedule like ‘Hey, we can beat them...’ ‘If we get to this game at this sort of record, we’ll be good for playoffs,'" said Huss. "There’s no easy teams that you can really put a guaranteed win on or a guaranteed loss on. Each day comes with different challenges, and you never know what might happen, injuries...you just have to keep level-headed and keep everything day by day."

The Bulldogs finished last season ranked No. 18 in the NAIA coaches poll, and they begin this season ranked 21st in the poll that was released at the start of this week. Concordia will kick off the 2025 at home in Seward next Saturday, September 6, against local rivals Doane.