GREELEY, Colo. - The University of Northern Colorado football team was limited by both the South Dakota State defense and the blistering cold and snowy conditions at Nottingham Field on Senior Day as the Bears fell 14-7 in their season finale on Saturday afternoon.

UNC (2-9, 2-3 Great West) was limited to only 59 net yards until their last possession of the game. On that possession, junior quarterback Nick Hager completed three straight passes to senior All-American Vincent Jackson for 50 total yards to put the Bears into scoring territory. A Hager to Jamar Farbes pass put Northern Colorado in the red zone and Hager then found Jackson on an 18-yard touchdown pass to cut the SDSU (6-5, 2-3) lead to 14-7 with 1:17 left.

With no timeouts left, that set up an onsides kick attempt for UNC that appeared to be successful at first as junior Reed Doughty recovered the Justin Zaitz kick. But the officials ruled the ball did not travel 10 yards, awarded possession to the Jacks and then SDSU ran out the clock to end the game.

The Jackrabbits rolled up 275 yards of total offense on the afternoon and struck first when Dusty Snyders caught an eight-yard touchdown pass from Brad Nelson with 47 seconds left in the first quarter.

SDSU went ahead 14-0 on a two-yard touchdown run by Anthony Watson at the 5:20 mark of the second quarter.

The Walter Payton Award candidate Jackson, who had only two catches for 13 yards before the final drive, finished the game with six receptions for 81 yards and the touchdown. He ended the season with 80 catches, setting the UNC single-season record. For his magnificent career, he ended up with 177 catches for 3,548 yards, 37 touchdowns and 5,810 all-purpose yards.

Hager finished the afternoon 11-25 for 121 yards in relief of starter Tony Christensen who was 2-8 for 13 yards and was sacked four times due to limited mobility from a lingering injury.

SDSU's Watson led all rushers, gaining 93 yards on the ground while Nelson passed for 195 yards on 15-31 passes. He was picked off twice. SDSU punter Neal Bainbridge may have well been the player of the game, punting eight times for 359 total yards (a 44.9 average), including a long of 67 yards.

Defensively, Charlie Barrett was credited with 13 tackles while Doughty, Thomas Smith and Ryan Palmer each had nine. SDSU's Chris Coauette had 11 tackles, 1.5 sacks and two interceptions.

The win for the Jacks was the first in Greeley since the 1992 season; the win snapped a five-game losing streak at Nottingham Field.

The snowy and cold conditions kept the crowd small for the final home game of the 2004 season. The temperature at kickoff was only 30 degrees.