Teams have tried all season to run the ball against Whitworth, and if there was a team equipped to do it well, surely that was the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Stags.

Making their first playoff appearance, the Stags (7-3) are unranked but heralded as champion of the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. They are one of two playoff teams with three losses. That includes two to teams Whitworth already defeated this season.

Whitworth football coach Rod Sandberg got a call this week, he said, from officials at Claremont-Mudd-Scripps, the Pirates’ opponent Saturday. They were asking for heaters on the sidelines.

The Pirates (9-0) are preparing to host on Saturday the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Stags (7-3), a team they’ve never faced and the winner of the only Division III football conference besides the NWC that is entirely west of the Rocky Mountains.