SPOKANE, Wash. – Two teams looking to bounce back from opening game disappointments meet this week when the Whitworth Pirates visit the Redlands Bulldogs for a non-conference football game on Saturday night in Redlands, California. The game will kick off at 7:00 pm and fans can watch on FloCollege or listen to the call through WhitworthPirates.com.
Whitworth (0-1) is coming off a 51-17 loss to Eastern Oregon in the season opener last Saturday in the Pine Bowl. Redlands (0-1) had a week off after opening the 2026 season with a 27-0 loss at George Fox on September 5th.
The Pirates: Whitworth's offense had trouble establishing consistency and the defense was slowed by a physical Mountaineer offense as Eastern defeated the Pirates 51-17 on Saturday in the Pine Bowl. EOU outgained Whitworth562-277 and had a 32-17 advantage in first downs.
Logan Lacio completed 12 of 27 passes for 133 yards with one interception and one touchdown. Carter Steinwand played one series before leaving with injury. Jimmy Hughes finished up at QB and completed 8 of 10 passes for 60 yards. Deacon Deitz caught six passes for 85 yards, while Jheremie Cacpal caught three for 46 yards, including a 29-yard catch and run for the Pirates' first touchdown. EOU limited the ground game to 79 yards. Grant Spillman came in late and finished with 34 yards on four carries, including a 19-yard touchdown run.
Drew Cody led the defense with 12 tackles and a fumble recovery. Hayden Throneberry made nine stops and forced the fumble that Cody recovered. Maddox Suitonu made six tackles and intercepted a Hail Mary attempt on the final play of the first half.
Iden Bone made his first field goal attempt of the season from 22 yards away in the second quarter. He just missed a 55-yard attempt near the end of the first half that would have been a career-high. Matthew Herzog punted five times for an average of 37.4 yards. Jake Gaffaney had three touchbacks on his four kickoffs.
West Coast Crossover: Saturday's game is part of a crossover weekend between the Northwest Conference and the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. In addition to Saturday's game between Whitworth and Redlands in California, La Verne visits Willamette, Lewis & Clark battles Pomona-Pitzer, George Fox goes to Claremont-Mudd-Scripps, Puget Sound is at Cal Lutheran and Linfield plays at Chapman. With Whitter resuming its football program and Azusa Pacific joining the SCIAC, the leagues will return to eight members each in 2027. Until then, PLU travels to Trinity (Texas) and Pacific (Ore.) heads to Wis.-Stevens Point this week. Last season the NWC went 3-3 against the SCIAC on the crossover weekend, including Redlands' 34-17 win at Whitworth.
Team Captains: The Pirate team captains in 2026 are QB Logan Lacio and center Caleb Cabrera from the offense and CB Omari Williams and LB Drew Cody from the defense. A special forces captain will be selected on a week-by-week basis. Last week's special forces captain was senior RB Cole Northington.
Defensive Stopper: Junior LB Drew Cody has picked up where he left off in 2025. He led the team in tackles with 12 in the first game of the 2026 season.
Last Fall Cody led the NWC in total tackles (106), tackles per game (9.6) and solo tackles per game (5.4). He also had 7.0 tackles for losses of 23 yards. He was named first team All-NWC.
A "Bone" to Pick: Whitworth place kicker Iden Bone is a D3football.com preseason All-American in 2026. For good reason. In 2025 he finished the season as the league's leading scorer in overall points (82) and points per game (7.5). He made 16 of 19 field goal attempts and all 34 of his extra points. Bone ranked second in NCAA Div. III in field goals per game and top ten in field goal percentage (.842). He set the school record for most field goals made in a season, breaking the previous record of 15 set in 2015.
Home-Sweet-Home: Including the exhibition game date against the Utah Islanders, six of the ten games on the schedule are in the Whitworth Pine Bowl this season. It is the first time since 2021 and only the second time in the last decade. The Pirates are 50-13 at home since Rod Sandberg became head coach in 2014.
Looking Back at 2025: Whitworth bounced back from a 1-2 record against non-conference opponents to run through Northwest Conference action 7-0. The conference title came during what might have been considered a rebuilding season when the team was only returning a pair of starters each on offense and defense from 2024. Whitworth fell to Chapman 18-16 in the NCAA playoffs when a two-point conversion attempt with no time left failed to tie the game.
Leading the Evergreen State: Since Rod Sandberg took over as head coach in 2014, Whitworth has the best winning percentage of any football playing university in Washington State. Heading into 2026, the Pirates are 92-27 since 2014, a winning percentage of .773.
Above Water: The Pirates' all-time record in football now stands at 436-424-18. In 2024 Whitworth moved above the .500 mark in all-time won-loss record for the first time since the Bucs were 32-31-2 before the start of the 1929 season.
Whitworth won its 100th game in 1959, during Heritage Gallery member Sam Adams' second season. The 200th victory came in 1981 under Bruce Grambo and the 300th win came in 2006 when John Tully led the Pirates to an 11-1 finish. Whitworth won for the 400th time in school history on October 16, 2021 vs. PLU. It took 55 years to get the 100th win, 22 more to get to 200 and 25 to get to 300. It took Whitworth only 15 years to get to 400.
In 1997 Whitworth's record in football was 248-337-18, 89 games under .500. Since that point Whitworth is 187-84.
Power of 12: With the win over PLU on November 1, 2025, Whitworth clinched its 12th consecutive winning season under head coach Rod Sandberg. That extended the longest streak of winning campaigns in school history. The previous long streak of seven was set between 1959 and 1965.
Watch on FlowCollege: Like the rest of the Northwest Conference, Whitworth's home athletic events will be steamed through FloCollege in 2025-26. Fans can sign up to watch Pirate sports on the FloCollege portal. Registration is $120 for an annual subscription or $20 per month. Those who register with a .edu email address get a significant discount.
Inland Northwest Athletics Hall of Fame inductee Bud Nameck, familiar in Spokane as the KXLY channel 4 sports director for over 20 years and the longtime host of the KXLY 920am Morning News, is in his 11th season as the voice of the Pirates in 2025. He was the voice of Washington State University men's basketball for 22 years and spent that same amount of time on the Cougar football broadcasts – the final three on play by play. He is a longtime resident of the Inland Northwest who began his career as the Sports Information Director and radio voice of Gonzaga University basketball and baseball in the 1980s.
Listen to Road Games: Fans can tune in online to listen to Pirate ROAD games for free at WhitworthPirates.com. Bud Nameck will provide play by play when Whitworth is away from the Pine Bowl.
The Head Coach: Now in his 13th season, Rod Sandberg has entrenched himself in the Whitworth and NCAA record books as the Pirates' head football coach. Sandberg has guided the Pirates to an 92-27 record over that span, including five appearances in the NCAA Division III playoffs (2015, 2018, 2023, 2024 and 2025). He is in second place in total victories in school history and no Pirate coach reached 50 victories as quickly as Sandberg. Sandberg's winning percentage of .773 is the best among Whitworth coaches with at least five seasons and currently ranks among the top 15 active coaches in all of Division III. He coached the Pirates to the fourth unbeaten regular season in school history (9-0) in 2018 and then duplicated that accomplishment in 2023. In 2023 and 2024 Whitworth had the first-ever back-to-back ten-win seasons in school history, and the Pirates have made three straight NCAA playoff appearances. The Bucs' 15-game winning streak, counting the final five games of 2017 and the first ten of 2018, is the second-longest in school history. Whitworth was 6-4 in 2014, Sandberg's first season, the best first-year record for a Pirate football coach since Rod Enos led the team to a 6-3 mark in 1965.
Sandberg spent 19 seasons on the defensive staff at Wheaton College (Ill.), including the last 11 as defensive coordinator. Wheaton made the NCAA Division III playoffs five times during Sandberg's tenure as defensive coordinator. The team never lost a first round playoff game and reached the Division III semifinals in 2008 and quarterfinals in 2003. Sandberg's 2007 and 2013 squads led the Collegiate Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin, regarded as one of the strongest football leagues at the Division III level, in scoring defense. The Thunder were second in the league in scoring defense five other times.
The Bulldogs: Redlands is coming off a 6-4 record in 2025, the Bulldogs' best mark since 2021. Redlands finished 4-4 in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletics Conference. The Bulldogs opened the 2026 season with a 27-0 loss at Northwest Conference member George Fox on September 5th.
Head coach Jim Good is in his sixth season guiding Redlands and his 17th year on staff after serving a long stint as Associate Head Coach. He is 26-24 through his first five years.
Senior QB Tobey Schmidt was a second team All-SCIAC honoree last season when he completed 62% of his passes for 1043 yards with eight touchdowns and four interceptions in eight games. Sophomore running back Mark Mitchell was the SCIAC Newcomer of the Year in 2025, rushing for 527 yards. Senior DB Enrique Ybanez was a first team All-SCIAC selection last fall. He made 31 tackles, intercepted four passes and broke up eight others.
The Bulldogs struggled to get going offensively at George Fox in a 27-0 loss on September 5th. The Bruins finished with a 434-225 edge in total offense and a 21-13 advantage in first downs. Schmidt completed 10 of 26 passes for 105 yards with one interception. Mitchell ran for 42 yards on 12 carries. Ybanez had a good day with nine tackles, a forced fumble and a pass breakup.
Last Meeting: Whitworth led 17-13 heading into the fourth quarter, but visiting Redlands scored 21 unanswered points – including a defensive touchdown – to pull away for a 34-17 win in the Pine Bowl.
The Pirate offense never got untracked, finishing with 207 total yards. Luis Salgado ran for 98 net yards on 17 carries (5.8 yards per carry) and scored two touchdowns. Logan Lacio completed 14 of 34 passes for 121 yards with one interception. That interception was returned 20 yards for a touchdown in the fourth quarter, giving the Bulldogs a 27-17 lead with 4:14 to play. Tight end Nate Peterson caught five passes for 30 yards.
The Pirate defense caused four fumbles and recovered two, but Redlands was able to pick up 120 of its 407 yards in the fourth quarter. Drew Cody made seven tackles and recovered a fumble. Hunter Leteer had the other fumble recovery and finished with six tackles.
Iden Bone made his only field goal attempt, from 39 yards in the third quarter. Matthew Herzog had his best games as a Pirate punter, averaging 46.2 yards per punt (eight punts), including a long of 58. Three of his kicks ended inside the 20-yard line.
The Series: Redlands leads the series 7-3 and has won six straight games. Prior to last season the teams had not met since 2011. The Bulldogs have won three of five games played at Ted Runner Stadium in Redlands, California. Redlands won 20-7 at home in the first-ever meeting in 2000. The 2001 game was cancelled after the events of Sept. 11th. Whitworth won three in a row from 2004 through 2006. The Pirates' largest margin of victory was 28-3 in 2006. Redlands' largest win was 38-7 in 2008.
Coming up next: Whitworth will have a bye week on September 26th before opening the Northwest Conference schedule at home against Pacific (Ore.) on October 3rd.
