Published: September 05, 2008 12:47 pm         

ECU to host Kingsville Saturday

Ada — The 2008 East Central University football schedule is only one game old, but it’s already crunch time for third-year coach Kurt Nichols and his team.

When the 2008 East Central University football schedule was released, Nichols knew the Tigers would be heavy underdogs in three of their first six games — at Division I-AA power Sam Houston State on the road in last Thursday’s opener (which the Rhett Bomar-led Bearkats won, 58-14), at home next Saturday versus a Tarleton State club that manhandled ECU the past two years, and on the road Oct. 4 against an Abilene Christian squad ranked in the Division II top 10 and picked to be the overall Lone Star Conference champion in preseason polls.

So if ECU is going to have any chance to post a winning record for the first time since 2004, Saturday’s home showdown (6 p.m. kickoff) with another LSC South rival, Texas A&M-Kingsville, becomes critical.

Three of the Tigers’ first five games are at Norris Field, then the schedule turns against Nichols’ club during the second half of the season. After Northeastern visits on Sept. 27 for an afternoon (2 p.m.) contest, ECU has just one home date the rest of the season (Oct. 25 against Southwestern), so winnable home games can’t be wasted.

And if the past two meetings between the Tigers and Javelinas mean anything, Saturday is one of those winnable home games. ECU lost to TAmUK in triple overtime at home in 2006, then last season the Tigers went to Kingsville and won for the first time since joining the LSC more than a decade ago.

“Kingsville plays hard, and they had a tough opener like we did (losing 40-13 at North Dakota),” Nichols said. “I think Sam Houston is going to prove to be one of the top 1-AA teams. Let’s face it, you don’t judge Tennessee-Chattanooga by what they did against OU (in a 57-2 loss Saturday). You judge them by how they do against teams in their own conference.

“(The Javelinas) aren’t a bad football team — they played a 1-AA team and got beat, and they played more consistently through four quarters than we did,” he said. “This game is just the first step. We should be able to compete with Kingsville as well as anybody on our schedule. That’s the standard that you judge it by.”

Although the home opener is a crossover contest for ECU, the game will have added significance for the Javelinas because it will count on their conference record. Northeastern is the first division rival for the Tigers who, after road games against Abilene and Southern Nazarene, will close the season with four straight LSC North Division contests — three of them on the road.

Nichols went into last week’s game hoping to keep mistakes to a minimum and keep things competitive; the Tigers turned ball over six times, however, including three times in a first half that ended with SHSU up 52-0. ECU receivers dropped a number of passes, and Nichols’ rebuilt defense gave up 474 yards, with Bomar (who threw for four touchdowns) and the first-team offense rolling up most of that total in the first two quarters before turning things over to the reserves in the second half.

“Defensively, we had some people on the field I had some questions about, and their performance answered those questions,” Nichols said. “We’ll probably change some things this week.”

The biggest change could simply be a return to the norm for the ECU defense. After a 4-3 scheme had been the staple for the Tigers for years, Nichols installed a 3-4 defense this spring but said he plans to use four down linemen the majority of the time Saturday.

“Our defensive line did a better job than our outside linebackers,” Nichols said, singling out senior Brandon Hopstein, junior nose guard Darnell Barnes and redshirt freshman Maurice Lanclos for their line play against the Bearkats. “(SHSU) did pretty much what they wanted to on offense. We let them have some big plays and got rattled, but they’re a very good football team.

“We’ve got to play better defense, and we will,” he added. “It was a good learning experience for us. I had a bunch of guys who hadn’t played a lot of football games, and it told us a lot about them.”

Although TAMUK’s offense has traditionally started with the running game, Nichols said he expects the Javelinas to throw the ball quite a bit Saturday.

“Kingsville is more of a pass-oriented team this year,” he said. “Last they, they ran the ball more. They’re more wide open this year.”

If the ECU defense doesn’t play better this week, Saturday’s game could turn into a shootout. Despite the blowout loss last week, the ECU offense moved the ball pretty well all night, and junior quarterback Marcus Johnson was named LSC North Offensive Player of the Week after completing 31-of-53 passes for 296 yards and two touchdowns against the Bearkats.

“We went 70 yards and didn’t score on our first drive,” Nichols recalled. “That was kind of disappointing, but we moved the ball all night against their 1s and 2s. Marcus tried to force some things (he threw two interceptions and also lost a fumble), but we also dropped eight or nine balls and fumbled (four) times. Probably the biggest thing that hurt us was that we had negative plays inside the (Sam Houston) 15, and I’ll take the blame for some of that.”

Another bright spot in the ECU offense was the performance of tailbacks Charles Huffman and Collin Avery. A junior coming off his second major knee surgery in three years, Huffman gained 51 yards on just seven carries, while Avery — a true freshman who was one of the stars of preseason camp — had 28 yards on six trips. The ECU running game (which ranked last in the LSC over the past two seasons) should get an additional boost this week with the return of University of Missouri transfer Alex Woodley, who was No. 1 on the depth chart at tailback but missed the opener with a minor injury.

“We had almost 400 yards of offense (ECU finished with 374, including 297 in the second half), and we ran the ball pretty well,” Nichols said. “We missed some key blocks, but Collin didn’t do bad for a freshman. There’s a battle right now for the top three positions (on the depth chart at tailback). That’s a good situation to be in.”

Nichols said if the Tigers are going to even their record this week — and keep alive realistic hopes for a winning season — they will have to eliminate mistakes and be more consistent on both sides of the ball.

“I don’t want to beat myself defensively — I want to play more base defense and bend more and not break,” he said. “I want to be more basic on defense, and I don’t want to try to win the game defensively.

“I think we’ve proved we can move the ball against anybody we play,” Nichols added. “We needed to move the ball, score when we have a chance and play sound defensively.”

     

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