Twenty-eight teams begin competition Thursday in the football state tournament semifinals. The winners advance to next week’s Prep Bowl. All games are played at U.S. Bank Stadium.

Follow live scoring of each game on Strib Varsity.

Thursday’s schedule:

Class 4A: 10: 30 a.m. Orono 15, Marshall 14, OT

Nine-Player: 1 p.m. Fertile-Beltrami vs. Hills-Beaver Creek; 4 p.m. Hillcrest Lutheran Academy vs. Kittson County Central

Class 6A: 7 p.m. Edina vs. Minnetonka

Prep Bowl Matchups:

Friday, Nov. 21

Class 1A: 10 a.m.

Class 4A: 1 p.m. Orono vs. Kasson-Mantorville or Grand Rapids.

Class 2A: 4 p.m.

Class 6A: 7 p.m.

Saturday, Nov. 22

Nine-Player: 10 a.m.

Class 3A: 1 p.m.

Class 5A: 4 p.m.

Study the state tournament brackets here. All games are streamed live on NSPN.

Extra reading: Strib Varsity writers predict state semifinal football results; Lakeville South’s Ben Burk sees gains from coaching rollercoaster

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1Q: Hills-Beaver Creek 8, Fertile-Betrami 6

Creed Tollefson scored on an 85-yard touchdown to Fertile-Beltrami on the board. Two-point conversion failed.

1Q: Hills-Beaver Creek 8, Fertile-Betrami 0

Hills-Beaver Creek strikes first on the opening drive, with a short pass from quarterback Jamin Metzger to Brodie Metzger, who dashed up the right sideline for a 45-yard passing touchdown. Two-point conversion is good to get the Patriots off to a rolling start with nine minutes still to go in the first quarter.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

Pregame: Fertile-Beltrami vs. Hills-Beaver Creek

Our first Nine-Player semifinal has defending state champion Fertile-Beltrami (8-3) looking to fend off Hills-Beaver Creek (11-0) in a rematch of last year’s Prep Bowl. The Falcons have reached the state tournament the last four seasons, including a runner-up finish in 2021 and their 20-8 Prep Bowl win last year. South Dakota commit and Mr. Football finalist Micah Bush is all over the field for the Patriots, which are vying for their first state title since 1990.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

Final: Orono 15, Marshall 14, OT

Orono won on a two-point conversion, a pass from Griffin Mauer floated over the shoulder of sophomore Lincoln Stinar in the corner of the endzone.

Orono won the toss and elected to defend first. Marshall senior Andrew Stelter rushed for 6 yards, then a 4-yard touchdown to put the Tigers up, but Orono answered shortly after. Mauer had to scramble to the right sideline and heave a pass to senior Simon Vinton. A spiked ball celebration was called for unsportsmanlike conduct, moving the extra point back to the 35-yard line. Orono decided to go for the two-point conversion instead, which booked the program’s first trip to the Prep Bowl.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

End 4Q: Marshall 7, Orono 7

It didn’t take long for a state semifinal to head to overtime this year. One game, in fact.

Orono kept this one tied and avoided fourth-quarter chaos with a solid defensive stand after a short 12-yard punt out of their own end zone took a massive Marshall bounce and set up the Tigers on the 26-yard line. But the Spartans have held firm, stiffening up again against the Marshall run game late.

Marshall nearly found another break in the final minute, as Levi Maeyaert floated a deep pass to Ethan Boeck for a tip-toe sideline catch that was close enough to launch the Tigers players into celebration, but was ruled out of bounds.

Orono had to escape another dicey situation and not let the Marshall defense win on what would have been, essentially, a walk-off safety as Tigers punter Milo Swenson dropped a punt to the Orono 1-yard line with 57 seconds to play.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

4Q: Orono 7, Marshall 7

You could hear a pin drop in U.S. Bank Stadium, only a few hushed, nervous voices rising up from the lower bowl, as the officials took a timeout to measure whether Marshall’s rushing attempt on 4th-and-1 on Orono’s 18-yard line was good with eight minutes to play. It was short, leading to the Orono defense running to the Spartans sideline in celebration. Junior linebacker Lucas LaBelle, who leads the Spartans in tackles, was credited with the crucial stop.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

3Q: Marshall 7, Orono 7

This Marshall rushing corps is too good to stay quiet the whole night. Senior running back Andrew Stelter heated up on Marshall’s first drive of the second half, which ate up most of the third quarter. He had six carries for 42 yards — more than he had all first half — including the drive’s finale, a 6-yard rushing touchdown, his 21st of the season.

After entering the red zone off an Orono pass interference call, Marshall had to convert a 4th-and-4 on the 13-yard line to keep the drive alive. A 5-yard pass from Levi Maeyaert to receiver Rocco Rignell did the job.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

3Q: Orono 7, Marshall 0

It looked as if Marshall’s defense might hold Orono to a deep three-and-out to start the half, but Orono quarterback Griffin Mauer connected with receiver Bennett Halverson for a 14-yard slant pass on 3rd-and-9, giving the Spartans the first down. But on the next set of downs, an Orono false start turned a 4th-and-short that the Spartans were going for near midfield into a punt.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

3Q: Orono 7, Marshall 0

We’ve got the second half underway, with Orono receiving. The Spartans are two quarters away from its first Prep Bowl.

Trailing is a situation the Tigers have rarely faced during its undefeated season. They’ll look to get more out of its usually-strong ground game in the second half.

The winner of this game will face the team to come out of tomorrow’s semifinal between Kasson-Mantorville and Grand Rapids. Neither of those teams have won a Prep Bowl either, meaning we’ll have a first-time champion in Class 4A this year.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

Halftime: Orono 7, Marshall 0

Just like their regular-season meeting, this one has been defensive-dominant. Neither team has taken a snap in the red zone, the only score coming on a 31-yard passing touchdown from Orono quarterback Griffin Mauer, tipped into the hands of receiver Bennett Halverson.

Marshall’s been held to just 66 yards offensively by a speedy Spartans defense. Orono’s success in the air has made the difference on the other side of the ball. Two big gains from Mauer make up most of his 86 passing yards (10-for-13), which are already more than what Marshall averaged giving up this season (59.8). Yet, Marshall’s defense has sacked him three times, including to pull the wheels off Orono’s final drive of the half. The Spartans get the ball to start the third quarter.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

2Q: Orono 7, Marshall 0

With Marshall on the Orono 40-yard line, Spartans linebacker Grant Eslinger forced a fumble that popped out and into the arms of junior linebacker Max Spronk, setting up Orono back in shallow Tigers’ territory.

But a 9-yard sack by Marshall senior JR Vierstraete, the Tigers’ all-time leader in the category and a Southwest Minnesota State commit, set up a deep third down that the Spartans weren’t able to convert. Orono went for it on 4th-and-21 on the Tigers’ 33 and gave up another sack, this time to sophomore Braedyn Van Meveren, giving Marshall solid field position with three minutes left in the half.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

2Q: Orono 7, Marshall 0

Orono junior receiver Bennett Halverson needs to clip his second-quarter touchdown and save that highlight somewhere special. At the 31-yard line, quarterback Griffin Mauer rolled right and launched a pass to the doorstep of the Marshall endzone. The ball dropped just a step behind Halverson and his defender, junior defensive back Carter Manthei, who tipped the ball. Halverson, stumbling forward, managed to snag the ball out of the air and fall into the endzone for his seventh receiving touchdown of the year.

Mauer, who is now up to 15 passing touchdowns this year, kicks the Spartans’ extra points too.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

End of 1Q: Marshall 0, Orono 0

It’s not all too surprising, based on a 13-12 regular season score in this same matchup, to see this semifinal scoreless at the end of the first quarter. Orono’s defense has been able to mostly stifle Marshall’s run-heavy offense — five players have posted 250-plus yards this season. Marshall has 41 yards on the ground so far.

Orono quarterback Griffin Mauer helped the Spartans end the quarter with possession. Deep in the Spartans’ own territory on 3rd-and-13, he got Orono out of a pinch by finding senior Adrian Licursi up the middle for a 30-yard pass.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer

Pregame: Orono vs. Marshall, Class 4A

As Edina head coach Jason Potts hollered after the Hornets booked their trip to the Class 6A semifinals last week, “The Bank is open!”… U.S. Bank Stadium, that is.

We’ve got three days of state football semifinals lined up, kicking off with Marshall (11-0) facing Orono (8-3) in Class 4A.

Both of these teams reached the state tournament last year, and Orono (8-3) has made the tournament quarterfinals three of the last five seasons. Neither program has reached a championship game before, though that will change for one of them today.

These teams have already met this season, with the Tigers beating the Orono Spartans 13-12 on Oct. 3. Marshall’s defense has been stellar all season long, conceding more than 10 points just twice and never more than 14.

But after Marshall beat Totino-Grace 22-9 in the quarterfinals last week, Tigers senior linebacker and leading rusher Andrew Stetler said that Orono was the toughest defensive assignment Marshall faced all season.

Orono, led in both passing and rushing yards by senior quarterback Griffin Mauer and averaging over 30 points a game, has the solid defense and balanced offense to test the Tigers.

— Cassidy Hettesheimer