The Central Washington football team will return home Friday to Ellensburg, the eighth and final day of a 4,300-mile marathon road trip covering a half-dozen states and including two football games.

The Wildcats will travel with smiles on their faces after knocking off defending national champion Minnesota Duluth 13-10 on Thursday in a nationally televised game before 5,389 fans at Malosky Stadium, the second-largest home crowd in UMD football history.

The Wildcats' win snaps UMD's NCAA-best 17-game winning streak, but perhaps even more than that, it sends a message back home to Washington that NCAA Division II football is worth playing, according to Central Washington kicker Garrett Rolsma.

Western Washington, Central Washington's rival, dropped football this year, making Central the only Division II football team in the state and one of the few remaining west of the Rocky Mountains.

"This is it. This is why we made the trip. This was the game we've been coming for," said Rolsma, who kicked the winning 24-yard field goal with 4:13 to play. "We're on the map. We're trying to show the people back in Washington they have a team they can root for and rally around."

UMD (1-1), which had starting quarterback Jon Lynch knocked out on the opening series of the game with an arm injury, didn't go down without a fierce fight as true freshman Chase Vogler took over at quarterback. The Bulldogs had two late scoring opportunities, but with little time and only one time out, they got away from their trademark running game.

"Every team deals with adversity, but we didn't deal with it well (Thursday)," said UMD senior cornerback Brandon Wood. "But we'll be back. We're not going to let this ruin our season. We'll be back."

UMD sophomore kicker David Nadeau's desperation 48-yard field goal attempt was blocked to end the game. Nadeau also had a 23-yard attempt blocked with 5.7 seconds remaining in the third quarter that would have given UMD a 13-10 lead.

The Bulldogs also committed an uncharacteristic 10 penalties for 99 yards.

"It was a tough game," Wood said. "We made too many mistakes and against a good team like that, you can't make those mistakes. We killed ourselves.

"Nothing about this feels good."

Isaac Odim finished with 25 carries for 120 yards and a touchdown to lead UMD, his 11th 100-yard rushing game in 17 career games as a Bulldog. The yardage wasn't easy, however, as Central Washington (2-0) loaded the line of scrimmage.

While Wood was dejected, UMD coach Bob Nielson tried to put a positive spin on the hard-fought loss.

"I don't usually say much to the team after a game, but what I said to the team after this one was that nothing we've set for a goal has been taken away from us," Nielson said. "We just have to go back to work and be a better football team."