 |
| |
|
 |
 |
||
 |
 |
||
 |
|||
EVENTS
CENTERS
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE
|
 |
Ball State Cardinals (2000: 5-6) The following team preview is provided by Blue Ribbon. For the nation's most comprehensive look at this and all Division I-A teams, be sure to order the 2001 Blue Ribbon College Football Yearbook, on sale now at 1-800-775-2518.
Coach and programWhich is more unlikely? A head coach keeping his job after a 21-game losing streak? Or that same coach surviving the streak and running off five wins in the last seven games of the 2000 season?Things had gone nowhere but downhill for Ball State and head coach Bill Lynch after a MAC crown in 1996. After a mediocre ’97, things slapped bottom in ’98 as the recruiting gap between Ball and the league’s other top teams got too wide. The Cards lost the last six that fall, every game in ’99, and suffered a brutal 0-4 beginning in 2000 to the likes of Kansas State and Florida. There was no sign of immediate progress and the vultures seemed to be circling in Muncie. The 43-14 home loss in game four to Northern Illinois was the final straw. The next week, Lynch turned the team over to a redshirt freshman quarterback, Talmadge Hill (5-11, 198), and lightning struck at rival Miami. The more-mobile Hill replaced junior Brian Conn (6-2, 211), and led Ball State to a 15-10 win over the RedHawks. That week at Yager Stadium, the Cards found their quarterback of the future in Hill, and the porous Miami defense gave confidence to a pair of running backs who would combine for more than 1,500 yards in 2000. Ball State went on to score 29 or more points in four of its next six games, all wins. And except for predictable losses to Toledo and Western Michigan, the Cards were competitive the rest of the way. This year, the Cardinals have a taste of success behind them, the first for anyone on the roster. And virtually everyone returns or upgrades on both sides of the ball. Is it enough to pass any of the prohibitive top three in the West yet? The schedule is substantially easier, as the two “collect-a-check” games are against less-than-top-10 competition (at Auburn and Kentucky), and the other games against I-AA laggard Southern Illinois and at Connecticut should both be wins. But the games at Western and Northern are where the rubber meets the road. A win in either gets them marginally into the West race. Matching last season’s win total is possible, but improving on it much would be difficult.
OffenseHill added a new dimension to the Ball State offense and took virtually every snap the rest of the way after taking over at Miami. In just under seven games, Hill threw for 1,455 yards and 13 touchdowns, on a completion percentage better than 61 percent. He did throw 12 interceptions.“Talmadge had an outstanding season,” Lynch said. “He was an integral factor in us winning football games. He is a very gifted student-athlete who has worked extremely hard to put himself in position to help lead our team.” In their third year of the conversion to a more spread-out passing offense, the Cardinals finally found the running backs who could succeed in the single-back set last season. Fifth-year senior Anthony Jones (5-10, 192) ran for 515 yards, but Lynch was looking for a guy with a better burst once he hit that hole. The elusive Marcus Merriweather (6-1, 215) went for 1,004 yards and eight touchdowns on the year, with 257 of those yards in a dominant 600-yard offensive performance versus Central Michigan. Last year’s leading pass-catcher was junior Sean Schembra (5-10, 186), who came down with 40 grabs for 484 yards. Schembra is not going to stretch the field, but is the possession guy that so many of the MAC’s spread offense teams seek out.
Defense and special teamsThe numbers on defense from 2000 aren’t very positive in most columns. But if you subtract the embarrassing results of the first four weeks, things look a little better for the longer term. Forget about the 183 points allowed in the first month and the picture shifts considerably.Senior Mark Zackery (6-0, 283) does return in the middle, with 42 stops and three sacks last fall. Sophomore Greg Pagnard (6-2, 276) and redshirt freshman Jerome Tilmon (6-3, 245) will do battle for the new starting spot alongside Zackery. Pagnard saw action in eight games last fall. Inside, Ball has two of the league’s best linebackers. Senior Shaka Johnson (6-0, 230) was to be the only bright spot on last year’s defense, before the season turned around. Johnson led the squad in tackles as a junior, but dropped to 73 last year when freshman Lorenzo Scott (6-2, 195) sprouted up beside him to make 96 stops and a pair of interceptions. Junior Jade Winchell (5-10, 196) is an absolute vacuum cleaner at free safety and has two years of starting experience behind him. Winchell was the third-leading tackler last fall with 72. Sophomore Reggie Hodges (6-1, 225) had plenty of chances to punt last fall, especially in September. In 64 punts, Hodges stopped only one inside the opponent’s 20-yard line and averaged 36 yards per kick. This facet of the game must improve to get the young offense some better field position throughout a game.
Bottom lineThere are a lot of seniors here, and if this group is truly peaking, they’ve picked the wrong year to do it. In the “old’’ MAC, this would be a team competitive at the top of the league, which could sneak into a high finish as in ’96. This year, the Cards would have to be better than Toledo and Northern and Western. That’s a tall order.Anything more than about six wins would represent a huge step forward. Kentucky is a winnable game. Mid-season games against Miami and at Eastern Michigan will determine whether this team stays near .500 or falls back some. |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
