VERMILLION, S.D.—South Dakota football will still kick off its 2021 slate at home against Western Illinois on Friday, Feb. 19, and will meet South Dakota State in Brookings at the end of the year, but the middle parts of the schedule have changed as the Missouri Valley Football Conference announced a remodeled schedule Thursday.
The changes were made following Indiana State’s announcement that it will opt out of the 2020-21 season. The new schedule maintains an eight-game slate for the remaining 10 members with no byes. Instead, the final week of the regular season – April 17 – will be reserved as a possible make-up date should there be cancellations.
A road trip to Youngstown State replaces the road trip to Indiana State listed on the prior schedule. South Dakota’s other seven opponents with home and away designations remain unchanged, although the order of when the Coyotes will meet those teams has. USD will host Western Illinois, Missouri State (March 13), North Dakota State (March 27) and Northern Iowa (Fri., April 2). The Coyotes will travel to Illinois State (Feb. 27), North Dakota (Thurs., March 4), Youngstown State (March 20) and SDSU (April 10).
The season opener against Western Illinois will be the first MVFC game of the season and will be the conference game of the week. It will be broadcast by MVFC TV and featured on ESPN3. MidcoSN will broadcast the Coyotes’ three other home games. MidcoSN will also broadcast USD road games at North Dakota and South Dakota State.
The full slate is below:
Date Opponent Location Time
Feb. 19 (Fri.) Western Illinois Vermillion 6 p.m.
Feb. 27 at Illinois State Normal, Ill. Noon
March 4 (Thurs.) at North Dakota Grand Forks, N.D. 5 p.m.
March 13 Missouri State Vermillion 1 p.m.
March 20 at Youngstown State Youngstown, Ohio Noon (ET)
March 27 North Dakota State Vermillion 1 p.m.
April 2 (Fri.) Northern Iowa Vermillion 6 p.m.
April 10 at South Dakota State Brookings, S.D. TBA
