DES MOINES, IA - Grand View's historic run came to an end Saturday at Duke Williams Stadium, as Benedictine College snapped the Vikings' 73-game regular season winning streak, the longest active streak in college football, with a 21-17 win.
This was Grand View's first regular season loss since November 3, 2018, also to Benedictine, and the program's first loss of any kind, regular season or postseason, since falling to the College of Idaho in the NAIA Football Championship Series Quarterfinals on December 2, 2023. The top-ranked Vikings led for the better part of three quarters before a special teams turnover flipped the game in the fourth, and they could not answer down the stretch.
The Vikings streak stretched across nine seasons and touched every corner of Grand View's rise into an NAIA powerhouse. Since that November 2018 loss, the Vikings won back-to-back national championships in 2024 and 2025, going a combined 28-0 across those two seasons, the first time in program history Grand View won consecutive titles. The 2025 title also opened a remarkable run for head coach
E.J. Peterson, who won a national championship in his very first season at the helm and carried a 17-game winning streak to begin his head coaching career, 14-0 in 2025 followed by three more wins to open 2026. Those championships gave the program three NAIA titles in all, joining a 2013 team. Along the way, the Vikings also won the Heart of America Athletic North Conference championship in 8-straight seasons.
Grand View opened the game with a 12-play, 66-yard drive that ate up nearly seven minutes of clock, with
Casey Rooney completing passes to four different receivers and
Dalten Van Pelt grinding out yards on the ground. The drive stalled in the red zone, but
Cory Wood connected on a 29-yard field goal to make it 3-0. Benedictine had two chances to answer in the period, both ending in missed field goals, a 51-yard attempt that fell short and a 41-yard try that sailed wide left, the second coming after a
Simeon Reichenbach sack helped force the miss. Grand View led 3-0 after one quarter.
Benedictine finally broke through early in the second quarter, needing 12 plays and 74 yards to cap a drive with a short touchdown run, taking a 7-3 lead. Grand View answered right back, going 66 yards in 10 plays and capping the drive with a 5-yard touchdown pass from
Casey Rooney to
Triston Williams, retaking the lead at 10-7 with 2:22 left in the half. Benedictine drove into Grand View territory on the ensuing possession but could not convert, burning two timeouts before punting with under 30 seconds to play, and Grand View ran out the clock to take a 10-7 lead into the locker room.
Benedictine's opening drive of the second half stalled at the Grand View 30 on a turnover on downs, and the Vikings capitalized. An 8-play, 70-yard drive was capped by a 30-yard touchdown run from
Dalten Van Pelt, Grand View's longest offensive play of the day, pushing the lead to 17-7, its largest of the game. Benedictine answered with an 11-play, 75-yard drive of its own, scoring on another short touchdown run with 36 seconds left in the quarter to cut the lead to 17-14 heading into the fourth.
Grand View's first drive of the fourth quarter ended in a sack and a punt from deep in its own territory, and Benedictine's ensuing possession stalled too, with the Vikings sacking the quarterback twice more to pin the drive back near midfield. But on the punt that followed, the Vikings fumbled the return at their own 1-yard line, and Benedictine recovered it in the end zone for a touchdown, taking a 21-17 lead with 8:59 to play. Grand View answered with a promising drive of its own, a 34-yard run from
Dalten Van Pelt setting up a first down at the Benedictine 16, but three straight incompletions and short gains pushed the chains no further, and
Cory Wood's 32-yard field goal attempt sailed wide right on fourth down. Grand View got the ball back one more time but was stopped on fourth and 1 at its own 44, and Benedictine ran out the final two minutes to close out the 21-17 win.
NOTES
- Benedictine College snapped Grand View's 73-game regular season winning streak, the longest active streak in college football, and handed the Vikings their first regular season loss since a November 3, 2018 defeat, also to Benedictine
- It was Grand View's first loss of any kind, regular season or postseason, since falling to the College of Idaho in the NAIA Football Championship Series Quarterfinals on December 2, 2023
- The streak encompassed both of Grand View's back-to-back national championship seasons in 2024 and 2025, a combined 28-0 run, along with 8-straight Heart of America North Conference Titles.
UP NEXT
Grand View hits the road next Saturday, September 26th, to face MidAmerica Nazarene University in Olathe, KS.
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