UNIVERSITY CENTER, Mich. – Saginaw Valley State football started the 2026 season with a 48-24 win over McKendree in the Annual Red Feather Classic on Thursday night. The Cardinals offense was potent, compiling 557 yards of total offense in the dominant win.
Quarterback
Connor Wolf (Ada, Mich., ) had a great debut for SVSU completing 74% of his passes (14-19) for 308 yards and three touchdowns. Meijer Player of the Game,
Matt Vaughn (Stevensville, Mich.) had a great night in his debut as a tight end. Vaughn caught four passes for 102 yards and two touchdown receptions.
"We felt really good about our offense and the pieces that we had, but until we saw it live and in person in a game we didn't really know. We had a lot of good players really step up. I thought the running backs played great,
Matt Vaughn had a great day,
Connor Wolf, but it all started up front in the trenches. The offensive line played tremendously, and I couldn't be more thrilled with that group," said SVSU head coach
Michael Engle.
Devin Miles and
Obie Sanni (Aurora, Colo., Tennessee Tech) also had breakout debuts for Saginaw Valley State in the backfield. Miles led the ground attack with 113 yards on 18 carries and two touchdowns. Sanni had 13 rushes for 87 yards and two scores of his own.
Both teams moved the ball in their opening drives. The Cardinals received to start the game and drove the ball down the Bearcat 11 yard line before stalling. A bad snap on a 4
th-and-4 caused a loss on the play and SVSU turned the ball over on downs.
McKendree responded with a drive that moved inside the Cardinal 10-yard line, but an incomplete pass on a 4
th-and-3 kept the game scoreless through the first two drives of the game.
Saginaw Valley State broke the deadlock with a 15-play, 93 yard drive that chewed 7:15 off the clock.
An offside penalty on a 4
th-and-2 extended the drive, but a facemask call on the offense pushed the Cardinals back to the 46 with a 1
st-and-25.
Sanni scampered for 13 yards to negate most of the penalty yardage in a single play. Wolf then ran for another 12 yards to get the first down near the end of the first quarter.
Miles finished the drive with a nine-yard catch that put the ball on the two, and finished things off with a touchdown run to put the Cardinals up 7-0 with nearly a minute off the clock in the second quarter.
The lead extended to 14-0 after the SVSU defense forced a three-and-out on the next McKendree drive. Wolf completed a 52-yard bomb to
Braden Hill (Charlotte, Mich., Charlotte HS) on the first play of the drive to double the lead with 12:28 left before the half.
The Bearcats drove down to the SVSU 12-yard line and settled for a field goal to trim the lead to 11 points with 7:55 remaining on the clock.
Vaughn got his first touchdown on the next drive after catching a pass from Wolf at the McKendree 40 before running down the sideline to score and push the lead to 21-3 with just over four minutes left.
Vaughn had another big catch on the next drive with a 29-yard grab that put the ball in the red zone in the final 45 seconds of the half. Sanni then rushed for 14 yards in the next two plays to score, and extend the lead to 27-3 as the teams went into the locker room at the half.
The SVSU offense continued to roll in the second half with another scoring drive after the defense forced a three-and-out on McKendree's opening drive of the half. Wolf hit
JT Webber (Grand Blanc, Mich., Grand Blanc HS, ) with a 28-yard pass on the second play of the drive to move the ball inside the Bearcat 20-yard line. Vaughn would catch his second touchdown four plays later on a 4
th-and-2 with a seven-yard touchdown toss that widened the gap to 31 points (34-3) with 10:17 left in the third.
McKendree responded with its first touchdown of the game on the next drive after a 16-yard touchdown pass from Kendrick Lyons to Kendric Johnson cut the lead to 34-10.
Miles rushed for his second touchdown to cap a seven-play drive and push the lead to 41-10 with just under four to play in the third stanza.
The Bearcats continued to battle with a second touchdown drive in the quarter that kept the deficit at 24 points (41-17) as the game moved into the final quarter.
Wolf completed a pass to Webber for 31-yards that put the ball on the McKendree one-yard line, and Sanni finished things off with a touchdown run for the final score of the game for SVSU (48-17).
The Cardinals punted for the first time in the fourth quarter after a drive stalled just past midfield, and the Bearcats took advantage with their final touchdown drive of the game, as SVSU killed the remaining 3:01 to take the victory.
Miles and Sanni combined for 200 yards rushing and four touchdowns on the ground for the game. Wolf's 308 yards passing is the first 300-yard passing performance for the Cardinals since Mike O'Horo threw for 300 yards against Michigan Tech in 2023. Webber finished the game with 107 yards with four catches. Hill had two catches for 71 yards and a touchdown.
James McDonald (Warren, Mich., De La Salle HS, ) led the defense with seven tackles.
Jalen Edwards (Davison, Mich., Siena Heights) had a solid debut for SVSU with six stops, while
Junyoung Chung (Berrien Springs, Mich., ) recorded five.
Sean Hodges (Detroit, Mich., ),
Liam Kania (Rochester, Mich., ), and
Neven Neuman had a tackle for loss. Neuman recorded a sack.
Lucas Valencia and
Ty Robertson (Saginaw, Mich., ) each had a half sack in the game.
UP NEXT: The Cardinals remain at home to play Texas A&M-Kingsville on Saturday, September 5 at 6 p.m. ET.
