FORT COLLINS — After spending the first two weeks of conference play as front-runners, Colorado State finally had an obstacle to overcome.

An 11-point deficit. At home. In front of a sellout crowd of 36,765 on homecoming Saturday night at CSU Stadium. With less than 20 minutes remaining on the clock as a 25-point favorite over Nevada.

And as much as the fanbase had come to believe this team was different, that the Rams were going to blow their way through the Mountain West, maybe they were right and wrong at the same time.

CSU was good as a front-runner last year, not so good when adversity hit.

This team is different then. It can play from behind, which it did in rallying for a 44-42 victory.

“That’s what I told the guys in the locker room. I said it would have been easy to fold, but that’s not what we’re made of,” CSU head coach Mike Bobo said. “I had zero doubt the whole game, that we were going to find a way to win because of the look in their eye on the sideline.”

It wasn’t pretty. The Rams didn’t cover the spread, but they covered their butts, remaining perfect in conference play at 3-0, 5-2 overall. Nevada fell to 1-6, 1-2.

They had to survive a defensive that allowed 428 passing yards and four touchdown passes by Nevada quarterback Ty Gangi, as well as 35-yard field goal attempt with 5:33 remaining that clanged off the right upright.

The Rams did it by remembering Michael Gallup is an all-conference receiver, who after an electric start to the game became almost an afterthought for nearly a quarter before he broke loose again, finishing with 13 catches for 263 yards, the last a 17-yard touchdown catch to put the Rams in front for good.

They did it because Dalyn Dawkins eclipsed the 100-yard mark for a third consecutive game, including a 59-yard touchdown run that cut the lead to four in the fourth. Then, with CSU all set to run the 4-minute offense, he blew that plan out of the water with runs of 33 and 19 yards on back-to-back plays, giving him a career-best 195 yards.

And when Nevada had one last shot, linebacker Josh Watson broke a double team and hit Gangi’s arm as he was trying to throw, resulting in a harmless attempt.

The defense was hardly happy, and Bobo isn’t a fan of allowing 42 points, but he was glad it came down to the unit and they rose up.

“That’s a huge difference. We learned how to keep playing through adversity,’ cornerback Kevin Nutt Jr. said. “That fighter’s mentality that we developed through the whole season, that’s what we showed the crowd tonight is the fighter’s mentality and not quitting, because we play all four quarters. Even when things were going bad, we continued to play and we knew we could win the game.”

The Rams stormed out of the gates as they had been, jumping out to a 14-0 lead on a pair of Stevens-to-Gallup scoring tosses. But Nevada caught up every time CSU took another lead, until finally the Wolf Pack broke in front and built a margin.

The Pack broke away with big plays, with three touchdowns covering 55 yards or more. The Rams also had big plays, and it was Dawkins’ 59-yard sprint that jumped started the offense as the third quarter was coming to a close.

“My line, they did a good job up front, and the receivers did a good job blocking down field,” he said. “I just made sure I found the right holes and hit ‘em and finished my runs.”

On the next drive, the Rams covered 74 yards in 11 plays, capped by Gallup’s third touchdown catch as Stevens threw for 384 yards and four scores (the other to Dalton Fackrell) as the Rams piled up 606 yards of total offense.

The Rams had a chance to extend the lead after Nevada’s missed kick, but Wyatt Bryan, who hit from 51-yards earlier, missed an attempt from 30 wide right with 2:13 remaining on the clock.

In one play, Nevada went from its 20 to near midfield. A play later, the Wolf Pack was at the CSU 33. But that’s where it ended.

The Pack could get no further, and facing fourth-and-11 from the CSU 34, a defense that had given up 565 yards got the final stop as Watson made his move.

“We just kept saying the offense is out there scoring points. We’ve got to take pressure off the offense,” Watson said. “The whole defense bought into that and started stopping them in the fourth quarter. It was kind of crazy how that all happened. We just kept faith and we kept fighting.”

Nevada didn’t score in the fourth, and that’s why Colorado State avoided what Clemson and Washington State could not.

Bobo loves football, and he watches it all the time. He knew how wild of a start the weekend was off to, and as he stepped to the podium, he warned that he may be out of breath, that he nearly had a heart attack.

When he left, he said he was glad he could just breathe.

His Rams are different this season. He’s sure of it now.

“You saw it all across the country, there were a lot of upsets this weekend,” he said. “But not Colorado State. We won.”

Mike Brohard: 970-635-3633, mbrohard@reporter-herald.com or twitter.com/mbrohard