Transcript
Speaker: Welcome everybody in to warm weather fans the Sunbelt podcast. I'm your host as always Brian Stone joined this week. ah It is a two man weave. It is myself and Zeke Palermo. ah We are here to talk about Coastal Carolina and the South Alabama Jaguars. ah Matt is not with us. I don't know if if people listen to the Phil Steele interview. They'll recognize that Matt has been very down on South Alabama in the past couple weeks.
Speaker: And Phil kind of disagreed with his his stance on it, so Matt ah gracefully bowed out ah to avoid having to to answer for this. um But other than that, Zeke, how's it going for you? I'm doing well, Brian. um I got the weekend off when y 'all were talking to Phil Steele. I was in Dollywood with my dad, brother, and sister, which is just a a trashier version of Six Flags, I don't know. i'm ah I'm a little too young for the Dolly Parton hype. She's got a couple good songs, like Rocky Top is fine, but I i don't know if it really warrants a ah theme park. um but So I got the weekend off, now it's brian or Matt's turn in Brian. You'll get our next episode off, I suppose, if you really want it.
Speaker: ah I'll tell you this. um I am also too young for Dolly Parton's music. But what I do know is that she is a A1 human being. So at the very least, she's a humanitarian. So you could say that about her. Like she's she does all sorts of great stuff. So ah props to her. Shout out. We are a pro Dolly Parton podcast.
Speaker: Alright, so as I said at the top, we're here to talk about Coastal Carolina, the Chance of Clears, and South Alabama. Let's start off with Coastal here. ah So year two ah for Tim Beck.
Speaker: This is going to be an interesting season for him, I believe, and and Zeke, you may agree with me on this, but it is, we're finally past the, the Grayson McCall, the Jamie Chadwell years are are now in the rear view.
Speaker: this team, you know, was eight and five last year. And we talked about it all through the year when we did the podcast, it was strange that they seem to struggle when McCall played for them. But then when it was an Ethan Vasco, Jared guest week, all of a sudden, the team showed up to play. So and just to start off like broad strokes, I'm, I'm interested to see what kind of happens with this team, because
Speaker: It was strange to me that they played better without the, I mean what, the one or two, number one or two quarterback in the Sunbelt Conference. That was a weird situation that honestly, over the past two seasons, I feel like Coastal's experienced. um ah McCall's been injured. ah Fair bit missed pretty much half of last year. um Transfer to NC State will probably play one year before going to the NFL. um This was a disappointing team last year. um Coastal has been good in recent years. ah They went eight and five. I guess it's not. Let let me rephrase not disappointing when you consider the
Speaker: um You know, coaching change from Jamie Chadwell, Tim Beck, and again, losing one of the the the top quarterback. But it was disappointing as compared to recent Coastal seasons, a team that you feel like is always flirting with 10 wins, is always, ah you know, flirting with App State to be in the conference championship from the East. um So it was a step back. And Coastal, unlike some programs in the Sunbelt where there isn't a ton of
Speaker: uh pressure to get those 10 win seasons coastal is a school where you think they should be able to get 10 wins on a average season so um I don't know, I think this could be, we'll talk about it more position by position, but this team reminds me a lot of Georgia State in that it's a whole new team, ah offensively and defensively. um Tim Beck, a more experienced coach than Del McGee, but anyway, from a roster construction, anything I said about Georgia State two weeks ago or a week ago, two weeks ago, ah stands.
Speaker: So one of the things that I mentioned before we started recording here today was, and I'll go ahead and preface it by saying this. So Coastal returns six offensive starters, six defensive starters. But one of the things I said to UC before we started recording was, I probably recognize the names of three players in this roster. And I'll go ahead and list them right now. Like if that makes me a Coastal Carolina casual, a Triple C,
Speaker: fine with it. But the people's names when I was going through the roster looking that I recognize are Ethan Vasco, the I guess presumed backup quarterback. I thought he played fairly well in relief of McCall when he was injured last year. He had Braden Bennett who started five games and average four and a half yards a carry. It seems like now he's the backup as well at the running back spot. And then Matthew McDoom, who I felt like was a good corner solid piece on the back end for them last year. Um,
Speaker: And I was going through the Phil Steel magazine and I was trying to figure out why it felt like I didn't recognize any of the names, but they have six returning starters. And I found out they have 66 new players on this year's team. Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, think about like, how many players are on a college team. So that's got to be two thirds of the roster is new, in some form or fashion, either, either a guy that came over in the transfer portal, or, ah you know, incoming freshmen, or what have you. So that's the thing is, it's a lot of kind of unknown, you know, question marks at this point where you don't really know who the quarterback's going to be. And we'll get into this in literally like a second. But yeah at this point, you you're not 100 % sure on the quarterback. The coach had such a rocky up and down season last year, it was kind of hard to take anything away from that. They lost their best player, but they again, they got better later in the season, but they lost their best player. I don't really understand what to make of that. And
Speaker: the I'll save my last point when we start talking about the defense, but it is a ah big time sort of wait and see. And I guess that goes for both of the programs that we're talking about there. Yeah, I think obviously at quarterback without Grayson McCall is. The second biggest shift ah for you know in quarterback ability in the Sunbelt this year, just from one year to the next losing Grayson McCall and just having to downgrade to.
Speaker: Noah Cam or Ethan Vasco, whoever gets the job there. um Offensively, you're right. It's just an unexperienced group. It's a group that ah probably like has guys that showed flashes. Kendall Carr was a guy last year, the tight end, 23 catches last year. I think that like that number's just gonna have to go up.
Speaker: As you replace Sam Pinckney who went to the draft Jared Brown who I think transferred out ah almost 1800 yards between him. So this is a team that just like it's got guys. Noah Kim was started a game at Michigan State last year and did.
Speaker: fairly well ethan vasco when he played uh as you said in relief last season performed very well uh you've got guys jameson tucker only 20 catches but he was averaging 20 yards on those 20 catches uh kendo car like i said five touchdowns 23 catches these are guys that in ah played well in their, you know, less important roles. So offensively, if this team can fit, you know, if these guys can take the next step, I think Coastal is going to be hanging in a similar a place to where they were offensively last year, which was, you know, upper, upper definitely upper half, probably upper third of the Sunbelt.
Speaker: Um, but if that transition is not as smooth, they're going to struggle. I benefited this to, uh, your two leading rushers, although one of them being Vasco are returning Braden Bennett yardage wise. He's very efficient. You lose CJ Beasley, who had been there for a couple of years there and ah provided a big benefit out of the backfield in the past and run game. But like they've got guys that have played well, just in, you know, minimal roles.
Speaker: Yeah, so let's like let's get into the quarterback thing a little bit deeper. So number one, Noah Kim, I'm always a little weary of quarterbacks coming from Michigan State. um I just don't consider them a good program for binding or developing quarterback talent. And they really haven't done so since like Kirk Cousins went to the pros, I think like 12 years ago. um It's just been kind of a no matter who's they've been through, I think they're on their third coach in the last 12 years. And none of the coaches that have been there have been able to find, identify, develop
Speaker: you know make the most of anything from the quarterback spot so that gives me a little bit of pause uh i mean phil steel has him down here uh noah kim as having made five starts last year through for just 1260 yards nine touchdown six interceptions so not over the last two seasons rather sorry and That doesn't inspire a ton of confidence. But honestly, I kind of felt like Ethan Vasco should probably be the entrenched starter. He's had a year in the system. He kind of knows what's expected of him. He's younger.
Speaker: as a sophomore than Noah Kim is as a junior. he So he has that sort of extra year to develop. We talked about it. the The weapons on this offense aren't anybody that you can point to and say we have guaranteed production from anybody, really. I mean, if Braden Bennett runs away with the starting running back job, he's automatically the most experienced skill position player they have on offense. yeah And that's Not saying a lot. I mean, he's only played one season. um So. I mean, you know, he's got to identify some of these some of these receivers and and kindle car has to step up and maybe even be a number one target for whoever starts at quarterback ah because I'm looking at these other. um Receivers, it's like Jameson Tucker had 423 yards last year, which is fine.
Speaker: But also he goes from being a guy that only has to contribute, I think it says 21 .3 yards per game that he gave. So he's got a, he's the most entrenched receiver that they have on this roster, like literal receiver, not car who's a tight end, but that all of that just sort of leaves me with a, eh,
Speaker: like as far as trying to project this team. And I mean, we can talk about this once once we sort of start to wrap up and talk about schedule, but they're over under six and a half wins, which I feel like has been.
Speaker: the the most common over -under that I've seen this off -season. There's really not a lot of variety except the teams at the very bottom. Everybody seems like they're hovering around five and a half, six wins, six and a half yeah this season. and i mean think luke I think Louisiana is the only team I've felt good about taking the over so far and felt confident about it. I think, I don't want to speak for you or Matt, but I think the official warm weather fan stance on the Sunbelt this year is that it's It's going to be a ah regression and maybe the worst a state it's been in, I would say probably three or four years. Phil Steele in his book here has no akin as the presumed starter. I've seen no new Conway about it. I've seen no reports from camp um saying one way or the other. i I see no reason it wouldn't be Vasco, like you mentioned. And Vasco was brought in as a transfer last season.
Speaker: um before he got McCall. He was brought in from Kansas and that was while McCall was in the transfer portal because he was in the portal last and backed out. um Vasco was brought in to during that uncertainty to be McCall's replacement. ah He was already in their eyes good enough to replace him and then got to sit behind the guy for a year. It's going to be Vasco. It's just going to be a matter of like, is he the guy?
Speaker: ah I in my mind it just makes more sense for any the starter um Anyway, I I think it makes more sense to be the starter um But I I don't know I I could keep laboring the point that this is an inexperienced ah offense, but I i've done that enough already yeah um so ah another piece is the offensive line is kind of uh you know inexperienced as well um bill steel in the magazine says
Speaker: He feels OK about the left side of the line. um And part of that is because of left tackle Nip Del Grande, who is a or grand, ah who is a sophomore. He was fourth team Sunbelt, all Sunbelt last year. um And he's got Tyler Wagner, Jr. ah next to him. But other than that, I mean, it's.
Speaker: Zavon Lindsey started 13 games ah last year, which is, you know, good. um Donovan Manson at Right Guard got six starts. Zach Elam ah had eight starts, seven at center and one at Right Guard. So you don't even really have, outside of Del grand or del Grande, ah have a a guy who has an entire season, you know, in the books other than Basically, your two tackles, I think, are are experienced enough to make it work. It's just kind of is the interior of the line going to hold up? Is it going to hold up when you have even fewer weapons than you had last year? ah That's that remains to be seen, and that's going to be really interesting.
Speaker: um No, I mean, they just had a pretty solid offensive line. i just want to You know, so even if they remain relatively the same, they're they're in a good spot. Yeah, weirdly enough, they actually had a lot better season of keeping at least McCall and Vasco and Jared Guest all upright rather than they did in 2022. Last year only gave up 17 sacks. So that's a plus. ah They ran the ball effectively four point three yards per carry last season. So it it it It just remains to be seen like if you take if if you take the the offensive skill position players and sort of move them down a notch as far as what we can project is the offensive line going to make as much of a difference as we think it might with the with kind of the lack of impact skill position players that they have. um So let's skip over to the defense at this point. um One of the things
Speaker: that I find really interesting is how the defensive line is going to hold up ah for them. You return Will Whitson on the interior. He's your nose tackle. ah You know, nine starts had 42 tackles last year. But my big question, and this will have to play out before we kind of see it, is they had trouble generating s sacks at just 21 last season as a team.
Speaker: and they gave up 168 yards rushing per game last year, including 4 .7 yards per carry. So that has to improve or else teams are just going to be running the ball all day and taking the ball out of the offense's hands. So what do you kind of foresee for this defense? Do you think they could potentially take ah another step forward? I mean, they were good from a points per game perspective, but they didn't generate a lot of pressure and they couldn't stop the run.
Speaker: Right, ah I think defensively it I feel more confident that they will take a step than the offense will ah primarily because they return there like you're talking about the defensive line.
Speaker: Will Whitsim was the best defensive lineman of the group last year and he comes back admitted. He plays nose goal, so his like the ceiling of his impact is only so high. um But i I think anytime that you return like your best defensive players, um you're you're in a good position to succeed. um you know you You can hide guys defensively, I guess to say, if you bring back like your top 1 -2 -3, you can hide 4 -5 -6 more easily. um Obviously, that that does not hold statistically. They're top three leading tackle getters. um Do not return. They're leading interception getters. Do not return. um But i I think from a talent perspective, and again, the gap in production is not that great, um they're returning a more talented defense than they are offense.
Speaker: I think so too, when you factor in kind of where the returning production is because it at least feels like you have guys at the key defensive positions that are coming back that you can sort of say, you know, Hey, we've got a corner that we feel good about.
Speaker: We've got two, you know, one or two defensive linemen and and somebody else I wanted to, I wanted to kind of single out two other players too. So Braylon Ryan comes back from last year. He had 13 starts, but only had 26 tackles last year on the defensive line. that That needs to improve, especially for someone who has You know, just twice as many tackles as they have starts is not a great ratio, especially when your defense is giving up 168 rushing yards per game. The other, the other thing I wanted to single out too, they get Texas transfer Sawyer Gorham Welch.
Speaker: who is 64307 on the interior. ah Now, he's a transfer from UT. He did not play the last two years, so he hasn't recorded a stat, but he's at least kind of got the size that they need to see in order to kind of shut down some of these running lanes that they just were getting gashed by last year.
Speaker: um Then when you look at the, the linebacker in core, I think as a unit on the defensive side of the ball, the linebacker in core might be the more talented, you know, group because you get Shane Bruce, uh, who, who had 11 starts, 52 tackles and an interception last year. Um, you know, you get Wyatt Gideon, uh, who had 28 tackles and two and a half tackles for a loss as a true freshmen last year.
Speaker: um So you've got a little bit of experience there as well. ah I think Shane Bruce is going to be sort of a. steadying presence in the second level of the defense, um, while they kind of try to mix and match up front and try to figure out how to generate some more pressures. So how do you feel about the linebacker in court? Uh, like I said, I feel solid enough. Uh, Braylon Ryan, although, you know, he's edge guy, uh, Bruce and Gideon are are going to be fine enough. Yeah.
Speaker: for sure um so let's let's transition to the secondary as well uh so at nickel you have one powell uh who is a senior returning from last year um he had 10 starts eight at nickel two at regular outside boundary corner 55 tackles six pass defenses that's pretty solid uh and then i mentioned mcdoom kind of at the top of the show Or the top when we started talking about this 12 starts 26 tackles in past defenses Pretty good. And then Tobias Fletcher at the safety spot is also returning ah with 36 tackles. So I
Speaker: I don't think there was ever really a question that you were going to feel better about the secondary than you do about what's up front. I mean, the stats last year bear that out. They were pretty good against the pass and just defensively in the trenches, couldn't stop other teams that were running the football. So I think unless, you know, Gorham Welch or one of these guys that's supposed to be, you know,
Speaker: Whitson takes his game up a level unless one of these guys really takes another step It might be a little bit of more of the same on the defensive side Yeah, I think any time you lose your leading tackler and two leading interception getters those have and Clayton Isbell and kiosk Both left and you know anytime you lose those it's you know Similar to what i've won defensive line, you bring your best guy back. I fluke. Defensive back, you bring your best guy back, but they didn't. So it's it's really just going to be, can the two transfer safeties really ah fill that gap, especially? um you know we We feel good, but not great about the linebackers. So you need good safety play to pick up for that. um I don't know.
Speaker: finished start to look back on you know each position group it's just I feel okay I feel like there's potential everywhere at each position group to do exceptionally well and as I say this it sounds like a cop -out but you know I feel like there's but potential for this team to come together really well it's just a matter of if and I don't know and I don't know I got that out of Tim Beckler last year if I got that if so Well, I will say this as we sort of transition into talking about schedule and maybe win totals as well. If they had Grayson McCall and were just crushing it, and then the second he went down, they fell apart, I would feel a lot worse about the outlook of this team.
Speaker: But because they had that weird season where they played worse with that with him, and then kind of figured it out when he was gone, it makes me a little more hesitant to kind of say, oh, we can kind of just pencil this team in for like, six, seven wins, they won't really be a factor, etc, etc. I truly don't know what to expect because of the way that they ended last season, but also just the lack of production that you can project out. Like everything, like even little, like the little writeups Phil steals, like, I kind of think they're going to be the same points per game on offense. And it's like, all right. You know, they they're supposed to give up 25 points per game instead of 23 from last year. OK, so are they going to be the exact same team they were last year? Like, that's the tough thing to figure out.
Speaker: um So let's talk about the schedule a little bit. They have a pretty easy go of it, all things considered. ah So August 29th, they open at Jacksonville State on that Thursday. Jacksonville State showed a little bit of fight, or showed some fight in the games they played last year, so that's not gonna be a cakewalk for them, especially when you're breaking in you know a new quarterback or Vasco. you know we don't We don't really know where that stands at this point.
Speaker: William and Mary, they're in an FCS school. They're probably gonna win that game at home. They play at Temple. Temple usually does not have a good football team. I don't know what their outlook is, but that's just sort of their rep is like not good at football.
Speaker: And then they played Virginia to close out their first four games at home, actually. So they they actually get to play Virginia in the Brooks State in Brooks Stadium on the surf turf. So how do you feel kind of about that four pack of games to open up?
Speaker: I think Coastal could be feisty in these. ah you know you You really want a pencil in William, Mary, and Temple. You want a pencil to lose both in. I agree that Jacksonville State has been a an ankle biter, um or was an ankle biter, um last season.
Speaker: but i
Speaker: I feel bad saying this because this is like a gut call more so than a real defendable position. But I think Coastal is also itself going to be an ankle biter this year. um So yeah like against Jacksonville State, I want to give Coastal the edge um just because i I think they're going to be maybe better than what you're giving them credit for.
Speaker: Annoying to play I like I think is you know, we'll look up and down the schedule like Louisiana um At you know at home we we talked about we're high on Louisiana I I feel like coastal could make that a game ah app state ah Which is you know, probably the best team in the East this year I I think coastal can make that a game just I
Speaker: i well you ben I want to defend this, but it's just one of those gut calls. so here this might This is not even really a take. This is just something I'm throwing out there. I wouldn't be surprised after their first four games if they were three and one and their loss was to Jacksonville State.
Speaker: Like, I wouldn't be surprised. I wouldn't be surprised if they lost the Jacksonville State in a tight one to open the season and then beat William and Mary, which we expect beat Temple on the road and then upset, quote unquote, upset because Virginia's never been a good football team. I don't think since Matt Shaw has been there, ah they' they're just not good. and And we've seen Sunbelt teams beat them as well. So I wouldn't be surprised to see them three and one.
Speaker: or maybe even 4 -0 after this stretch. like I think this is a really good opening slate and you're gonna really find out kind of what Tim Beck and company have in this first this first four games, which is not something we have said about other teams because other teams in the conference will have just like two SEC schools in the first four. And you're like, well, I can't take anything away from playing ah you know Auburn and Clemson in your first four games. like Yes, you're gonna lose to those teams. We we expect that.
Speaker: um So they get a week off after the Virginia game. They come back October 5th. They play Old Dominion at home. That feels like a win, I guess, like Old Dominion is kind of in the same boat where you're just like, I don't really know who's going to make a play for you on offense, and we'll have to see how that all bears out. That could be actually a coin flip on it. I'm not 100 % at James Madison on a Thursday night, October 10th. We'll have to wait for the James Madison episode to make a call on that. I haven't really dove into their schedule yet. Louisiana at home.
Speaker: I will say this feel steel has this nice little tidbit that they haven't met since 2020, but the home team has lost all three previous meetings between these two schools. So if that keeps up, then Louisiana beats them on the turf. So then they get a break. They play at Troy.
Speaker: If anybody, if someone listened to the Phil Steele episode, he expects Troy to kind of take a step back this year. Obvious, but he he was the team that said he believed they would you know disappoint. But you have to kind of consider all the other things going into it as well. You play App State on a Thursday. App State, this Coastal App State game last year was the strangest game I'd ever seen. App State looked like they were cruising and then Their receiver gets stripped. The ball goes back the other direction. McCall takes them down. They kick a field goal as as time expires. They went and you're just like. that That was at the point in the season, we were like, is App State ever going to figure this out or are they just going to keep underachieving even though they have talent, you know? So and then you close out, you play at Marshall, Georgia Southern at home at Georgia State.
Speaker: Honestly, the more that I looked at it, and and I see the over -under on DraftKings as six and a half wins, I think I would just take the over kind of on principle of how easy the schedule was. yeah I don't really know what else I need to see.
Speaker: i Well, as we said, three and one through the first four feels very reasonable. you know Even if you don't beat Jax to eight, Uh, you know, you can still beat Virginia, even if you do, if you do beat Jack state, you can afford a loss to Virginia three and one feels very reasonable through that just four. And then you go to the back for Marshall Southern state, probably three be straight. Um, I'm realizing we could probably be keeping track of our week by week predictions because there's a chance I said Marshall but was going to beat Coastal. Um, but.
Speaker: ah Out of those three you got to win at least two of them So that's that's six wins right five wins right there. Now you just find one more um Phil Steele has it is 113 ease out of 121 in difficulties. That's what the eighth easiest schedule in the country Yeah, a coastal like I said um is in a position where Even if like seven or eight wins should be their bad years, at least is what the precedent that Fadwell kind of established.
Speaker: um But again, i I'm of the opinion that this could like Old Dominion feels like a win. All three of Old Dominion, James Madison, Louisiana, super winnable to me. um You know, and if you want to all, that's nine wins. I've very possible things I've pointed out there. um So I don't know. I like the over here because I think this is a team that can win eight, nine instead of six, seven.
Speaker: Yeah, I. I think I could project them as like a seven and five, eight and four type team. um Eight and four feels really good. Yeah, I don't think they beat App State. um I don't I no matter what you say, I don't think they beat Louisiana at home. Like I think Louisiana is just more talented than they are. and And there's more that you can point to. um And then I think they drop one of the Jacksonville State Virginia games, maybe even both. That might be your fourth loss there. um And then I could just see them losing like a random game in the back half. Like if they lost to
Speaker: I don't know, James Madison or they lost to Georgia Southern or Troy or whatever. Like I wouldn't be shocked by that either. Coastal is probably going to lose a game that you expect them to win and they're going to win a game that looked like it was it was all but over. Like that just seems to be kind of their emo, even going back to the Chadwell days. um So, yeah, I mean, I feel I feel pretty good about that. I think they're going to have a good I think they're going to have a good building block season.
Speaker: I wouldn't be surprised considering how the East looks this year to see them finish second in the East behind App. But as far as like contending for a Sunbelt title, probably not. i just don't I think App is pretty much loaded up and and like ready to make a run.
Speaker: um So with that, let's transition over to South Alabama and the the team that Matt did not want to talk about. ah So Phil Steele when he came on said that he had South Alabama as one that he expects to kind of rebound and take a step forward from where they were last year.
Speaker: Um, so kain womarck Kane Kane Womack, however you want to pronounce it goes and is now the defensive coordinator in Alabama. Uh, his former offensive coordinator now head coach Major Applewhite steps in and becomes the head coach. Uh, he was the head coach previously at Houston for two seasons, which did not go well. I mean, you know, it is what it is.
Speaker: ah Not a ton of returning production in a disappointing season last year, seven and six. And we we thought that they were going to to compete. We thought it was going to be 1A, 1B with Troy. And it just it wasn't that way at all. Troy ran away with the West. And honestly, it wasn't really all that close. So before we kind of dive into positions, do you think South Alabama has a chance to kind of maybe not make a run at the West, but become like they're building again towards something that kind of seemed like it got squandered last year. I think they're in a good spot. I think this year is going to be regression, but like as as you look at the the talent that they do return,
Speaker: um The a lot of the guys have one more year at at at least, um which it gives me the impression that this will be a regression year. um Or I guess continue last year's regression in the seven win range, um but the next season could be could jump into the 10. So I'm down on them this year, but over the. The you know foreseeable future. I feel I'm fairly high on South out.
Speaker: Right. um So Gio Lopez, ah who saw five games of action and one start last year was completed 67 % of his passes or touchdown to interception ratio. ah Most likely slots in it there as there's quarterback starter, he takes over for Carter Bradley, who, you know, just to be quite frank, like nobody really on this team played all that well last season. Like it was just one of those where when you come off a 10 in three season and I don't have the last year's magazine in front of me, but I'm pretty sure they returned like
Speaker: 19 or 20 of their 22 starters going into last year, and to just pull up and be seven and six. And we've talked about this, other than allowing sacks, I don't really understand what went wrong. Like they scored more points than they did offensively in 22. They allowed fewer points defensively than they did in 22 when they won 10 games. Maybe it was just like the an unlucky you know, break here and there and, you know, giving up sacks. And that was that was pretty much all she wrote. But it was just a strange year for them last year. um But Gio Lopez has seen a little bit of action. ah He's a lefty. So he that's that's interesting that they have a left handed quarterback because you don't see that very often.
Speaker: um Devin Voicen, I considered to be kind of the preemptive starter, you know, first and foremost at the receiver spot. um You know, he had 871 yards ah in 2022. And then he did not ah lay last year. So assuming that he doesn't have rust, I can kind of slot him in as the number one, at least that's something you can kind of hang your hat on. How do you feel about the weapons because they don't have Lidamian web anymore? Who was their leading rusher? They don't have called and Lacey who was their leading receiver. So and they do also return Jevon ivory.
Speaker: Um, who played sparingly last year, but how do you kind of feel about their set of weapons that they're kind of breaking in with Lopez? I think in the receiving game.
Speaker: they ought to be fine obviously calling lacy is a big miss um just i mean 91 catches is ridiculously difficult to replace uh but you return numbers two three four in the receiving receiving game and like you mentioned voicing comeback is huge he started uh the first two games of the season last year before he uh went down with injury missed the rest of the season but in 2022 he He had 870 yards on 64 catches. So yeah, obviously rust is a concern. I'm not certain where the injury was. I think I remember it being lower body, um you know, which obviously leads to some rust as a receiver. But it I feel confident that he. Isn't going to get exceptions like Lacey did, but he can get comfortably in the 7080 range.
Speaker: um Gio Lopez is a relief after the disappointing year Carter Bradley had because in 22 when the Jaguars were 10 -3 he set a ah South Owl single season passing record and then went into throwing 2600 yards ah with a 19 -7 touchdown interception ratio which like that's all right that's that's good I'm okay if my quarterback does that, but after you've set the school's single season passing record, leaves a ton to be desired. um This team has weapons. It's going to be, how quickly does Gio Lopez acclimate? Like I said, this team is good for seven or eight wins.
Speaker: um And it's just gonna be a matter of how quickly can Gio Lopez go. He played, um he actually took over as starter for a little bit from Carter Bradley last season, um but then lost the job, not because he wasn't playing well, because they wanted to preserve his red shirt. He was a true freshman last season. So he's the guy they like. um Just, you know, are you up to speed yet? Right.
Speaker: Um, so the offensive line, which we did mention did give up 31 sacks last year. That was a, an increase of five sacks from 2022. Uh, so I, I think that people had kind of pegged that as a, a weakness for them, uh, that they were able to run the ball with web pretty effectively. Um, and they I mean, they ran for 172 a game. So clearly running the ball wasn't a factor.
Speaker: But I think offensively from a past perspective, they weren't that efficient and I think the. The constant threat of potentially being sacked kind of got into Bradley's head after a point. So I think that was kind of the two main factors or the one main factors. Just they weren't a great prep past protecting unit. um So with that said, we moved on. We're moving on to the offensive line. Jordan Davis, a junior comes comes back after having started nine games last year.
Speaker: Um, played an 11, but he's there starting left tackle slotted in. You got read buys, who's a senior, uh, played 12 games last year, uh, at left guard. Now the rest of the line is where kind of the question remains. I think they've got a pretty good interior unit.
Speaker: But I think the tackles are sort of where they need to kind of figure it out. And they're kind of similar in that regard to Georgia Southern, where you can say, hey, the interior of this unit has some good pieces. But offensive line wise, it's still it might be a work in progress or it might be a a matter of, hey, we need to kind of figure this out sooner than later.
Speaker: um So we'll have to see if the offensive line takes a step forward ah from last year, because it was it was one of the main reasons offensively they just weren't able to get kind of things going. So ah did you have anything else on the offense before we transition over to defense? Not particularly. I'd love to chime in on the offensive line, but I'm having a sneeze attack over here. So you run into this defense. I'll be ready my next turn.
Speaker: All right, I feel for you. Uh, so another team that's got a prominent nose tackle coming back, uh, is South Alabama. YKV is Thomas, a junior 6 -2 -3 -0 -4 on the interior. Um, was 13 Sunbelt the last two years?
Speaker: So he should be there to kind of anchor that unit. Now, the other three guys that are slated to start on this four to five scheme, um they're a little bit of a question mark. So one of the things that South Alabama honestly did pretty well last year was getting to the quarterback and they played good defense all around.
Speaker: So, I mean, I think the problem is you you have two new defensive ends coming in, in Akil Washington and Jordan Norman. And then you have another defensive tackle in Maurice Strong.
Speaker: ah coming in to play next to Thomas. So I think the thing is, are they going to keep up the production from a sack perspective, from a being able to stop the run perspective? That's that's sort of what's up in the air at this stage on the defensive side, I think. I don't feel optimistic.
Speaker: that they will be able to keep up that static protection at all. um And primarily because the the edge rushers coming back are not experienced. They're they're not next man up. um they're They're guys that don't have a ton. Jordan Norman on one end, Akhil Washington on the other. ah Over the past four years, Washington only had seven sacks. Norman as a true freshman had a sack and a half, which, you know, as a true freshman ain't bad, but ah neither of these guys have experience as a team's premier pass rusher.
Speaker: Uh, and I, I'm of the belief that you can't just be, you know, step into that. You've got to, you know, rise rise up into that role. You, it's not like a wide receiver where in, uh, like in South Owls, uh, instance, I can just give voice in more, more volume. You can't just do that to a defensive lineman because if he's ineffective, he's ineffective. Um, so I worry about the, the.
Speaker: you know behind the line output from this group.
Speaker: The thing that concerns me the most and that we can kind of transition from units, I think is the linebacker spot. Considering number one, there's only two of them. And when you look at what's returning, you've got Gavin Forsha at inside linebacker. He's a junior, but he only had 11 tackles over the last two seasons. Um, and then you have Blaine Myrick, who's a sophomore.
Speaker: ah Didn't play in 2022 had seven tackles and 11 games last year. That's not That's not making the most of your playing time dude. You need to have more tackles than games played I'll say ah I'll say I do believe tackles are our volume stat and so You know, perhaps low tackle numbers. You don't know if that for sure guy played one snap in each of those 12 games Um, so I'm willing to be worried about the, the linebacker core, uh, because, uh, especially when you're only playing two, it's just, Hey man, do can you, can you fit a run? Um, and you know, I, I, so I'm willing to give them a bit more of the benefit of the doubt. Well, the thing that, I mean, I know you mentioned him, but the thing about Forsha to me is he has 11 tackles in two seasons.
Speaker: Like that that's not a one season, like, oops, I may have played a little bit. I mean, it's two seasons of work that he's like, I've got barely double digit tackles cracked. I'm not saying that he doesn't have the production. I just believe that it's maybe easier to make that production gap up than at N, for example.
Speaker: Well, ah I'll say this as well. um So Phil Steele has this um ah computer model that he uses to spit out kind of his projections for offensive points per game, defensive points per game, things like that. is His projection has them dropping from last year, they gave up 21 points per game on defense. This year he has them giving up, I think it was 26 .9. So I think the question is,
Speaker: If you take last year's team, and I know that they have very few returning starters, four on offense, three on defense, but if you took last year's team and you added another touchdown to the ah the opponent's score every week, thats that would be kind of tough to stomach because they were already kind of barely holding their head above water as it was. So we'll see if that plays out. That's just his projection. I'm not 100 % sure. And then when you get to the secondary,
Speaker: He got Ladarius Webb, um didn't really play last year and I mean played and appeared in four games, didn't notch any stats. ah The one that you've got to kind of perk up at is Jaden Voicen. I assume brother of Devin Voicen on the defensive side of the ball. Strong safety, first team Sunbelt last year. He's going to anchor this the back half of this defense because other than Ricky Fletcher, none of these guys really have logged significant time on the field out of the five DB slots other than Jaden Voicen and Ricky Fletcher. So I could see it still being a strength for them being able to kind of shut down the pass. But again, I think all my concerns with them are in the front seven. Do you do you kind of feel the same way?
Speaker: Yeah, I feel really something that you pointed out that I, as you were talking, I had to look up, you mentioned voicing likely brothers. We haven't checked that web, not related to a Damien web, at least as far as I can tell, which I thought was an interesting, good, you know, close enough names. Uh, yeah, I think, again, i'm I'm just going to continue my, uh, you know, my, you know, motif or whatever through each position group.
Speaker: ah offensive back you can't just fill a role if you're good you're good if you're bad you're bad um so seeing returning returning talent brings me optimism I suppose ah not returning the field corner I don't love I you know but you know I don't know why Fletcher can't move over to field and has to remain boundary but I don't know who really cares about that the the the secondary is going to be good. I think they're going to, ah you know, stay the pace of being a, again, top like, even the conference, the conference group.
Speaker: um So yeah, ah not much else to add there. So voice in as well, just want to add a little context to this. 71 tackles, seven pass breakups and four interceptions last season.
Speaker: Pretty impressive from the the strong safety spot, honestly. Uh, because usually, I mean, unless you're a run stopper, like you're going to be around the ball plenty, but not many teams are still playing one high safety where you're, you get to come down in the box and be like a thumper. Like that's just not really the way football's played anymore. So impressive on that front. Um,
Speaker: I kind of want to hand this off to you. I want you to kind of go through the schedule because I did it with the last with Coastal. They're over under for South Alabama is six and a half. So kind of take me through the schedule. I want to kind of flip roles for a second. Take me through the schedule and kind of see how you see it play out there. So they start with a huge but ah run of six games, which is ah Host North Texas at Ohio, not Ohio State. Host Northwestern at app at LSU at Arkansas State. That's the away games in that first stretch of six. That's going to be really tough. um Out of this group, Northwestern, you think you ought to win ah Ohio State. Oh, Northwestern State. Even easier. You think you ought to win that one. You got at Ohio, which another one I think you
Speaker: probably should win and same thing with north tech six so i think out of these first six south al comes out three and three with losses at app lsu and arkansas state which are you know two sub belt teams that were pretty high one where you guys are pretty high on uh then you go into the bite no well ah sorry i didn't know if you wanted to jump in there sorry then we go into the pi No, let me hear it. Yeah, I kind of I kind of see it going the same way. um I think they have I think they have a chance to be Arkansas State. um The only thing comes down to if Arkansas State can play a lick of defense, then they can make it tough.
Speaker: But from i mean we talked about it on the Arkansas State episode last week. like If they keep doing what they've been doing and giving up 33, 30 points per game every season, it it won't matter how good the defense is because they're going to lose more games than they win just based on the fact that other teams have the ball all the time and are just hanging out on the field while your offense is just watching.
Speaker: so yeah yeah one but three and three um yeah good Yeah, when we cut through these schedules, I like to think of it as kind of the average. like They're there' are years where these six games are four and two. Between North Texas, Ohio, and Arkansas State, like on average, you're going to be one of those. ah So that's how we get three and three there. You go into the buy, then you get Troy ULM Southern all at home, which Is a I suppose a pretty easy stretch of three Troy. We've not talked about ah Have we talked about Troy yet? No, because I won the call
Speaker: That's right. So we've not talked about Troy, but ULM and Southern we've talked about them. We know where they stand. We, I would say that's probably a two and one stretch there. We're looking at five wins now. And then you go at Louisiana at Southern Miss ah home versus Texas state. That is the hardest stretch.
Speaker: Well, barring the stretch of three games where you play LSU, um I think that's the hardest stretch of three games in this schedule. At Louisiana is a loss to me. At Southern Miss is a win to me. But then home versus Texas State is probably is definitely a loss to me. um So I think as we sum that up, we got seven wins here for South Al. There are years where they win eight here. There's years where they win six. I think seven just is the most likely.
Speaker: They've got a pretty like middle of the road Sunbelt draw is as I realize it. Yeah, I agree. I mean, you do play, you would, you know, you play the teams that we expect to kind of sit at the top of the conference at Louisiana, Texas state, Louisiana and Texas state. Things not surprising though, because they play in the West, you're going to have to play those two teams in order to.
Speaker: you know, be eligible for the West title. Now, they do have them listed as the 99th. What's the right way to say this? 99th easiest or 99th hardest? Because 99 artists. Okay, so that puts them in the bottom third as far as schedule difficulty. Now,
Speaker: I do think with I think they could use this certainly as a building season. And I would have loved to have had Matt on this episode because he kept he keeps alluding to these things he's hearing about with South Alabama in camp. And we have not heard what those things are. He just keeps being like, oh, it's not good. And I'm like, I need more detail than that. You can't just throw that out there. So especially when you're not going to show up on the episode. So.
Speaker: That might be the first thing we do next week when we get in. We immediately grill him and be like, you weren't on the episode. You got to tell us, like, what are you talking about? You can't you can't just say, man, it's it's a mess. OK, how I like what's going on again. I don't want to leak and maybe we run this by Matt before we talk. But it sounds like the guys just aren't meshing with major Apple. We haven't even talked about that, that they've got a new coach.
Speaker: um from what i I recall of Matt saying is the guys just aren't messing with him. Which is strange because he's been the offensive coordinator there like the last three years. Yeah. So now who knows maybe he's just better as a coordinator than a head coach. It it happens. I mean, there's there's a long, long list of football coaches who work better as coordinators than they do head coaches. I mean,
Speaker: you know, the the the list is endless. So maybe maybe that's just the thing because his his time coaching Houston post Tom Herman, Reed Dana Holgerson didn't go well either. And that team kind of fell off post Herman. So maybe he's just not cut out like personality wise to be a head coach or something. I mean, if I had to be scared that my head coach was going to steal my girlfriend, I would be worried as well.
Speaker: Check the Wikipedia. Yikes. um very Yeah, i've I've got a crazy I've got a crazy one of those to tell you once we get off the the air here. But. But yeah, so over under six and a half, I think I'm going to put them as an over. um Yeah, again, I played over notes. I'm not making notes of all the ones we take over and under. These are more just kind of throwing darts at the board and just trying to hit a number of different ones.
Speaker: um But I think their schedule is fairly easy. I think as long as you win the games, you're supposed to win. I mean, if the over six and a half, like you said, you could have three wins by September 19th and you you're only need four from there on out. So.
Speaker: We'll see. I mean, they're going to try to rebound from last year and kind of build toward the future with Gio Lopez kind of at the helm. But yeah if you got any final thoughts, ah feel free to send those over and then we you can plug socials and and we can get on out of here. nothing Nothing to really add here. um Just want to Express my condolences to the Sunbelt because again, this is just such a ah crappy year and I you know, this is a ah rant on its own but The really we had to have a down year the year NCAA comes out like I feel like the timing could not be worse. This is a incredible opportunity for You know folks to get invested in their G5 teams because they're starting rebuilds or whatever
Speaker: um So like what, you know, really? We couldn't wait one year. It's it's a bummer. I'm on Twitter at Zeke Palermo. Z -E -K -E -P -A -L -E -R -M -O. That's where you can find me. Brian, send us home.
Speaker: ah Feel free to email the show. ah We'd like to do a mailbag or at least answer a few questions if anybody has Sunbelt related questions for us. ah The email address is warmweatherfansatgmail .com. Feel free to send those over either via Twitter or via email. ah Follow the show on Twitter at warmweatherfans. You can follow me personally at WatchTheStone on X.
Speaker: We will be back next week to talk some more Sunbelt football, but this has been the latest edition of Warm Weather Fans.
