By THOMAS GRANT JR., T&D Senior Sports Writer
Monday was business as usual for the South Carolina State football coaching staff.
The desk of head coach Oliver "Buddy" Pough was stacked with videotapes from Saturday’s 20-7 victory over Winston-Salem State. In the adjacent offices, assistant coaches were at work studying film and reviewing plays from the previous contest.
The only thing not taking place was any type of game plan preparation. For the first time in over a month, the Bulldogs do not have an immediate opponent to strategize for this week as the team’s next game is not scheduled until Oct. 6 at Norfolk State.
Having seen his injured list grow to unfathomable lengths the past three games, Pough more than welcomes the bye week to regroup as a staff and evaluate the team’s progress.
"We’ll go back and actually study -- self-scout -- and figure out what we’ve done," he said. "Get a feel for what we’ve been for four weeks as a football team. It’s also an opportunity for us to plan for the rest of the year. We’ll spend the first part of the week just working on things that will help us overall for the rest of our schedule and then, towards the back part of the week, then we’ll start preparing for Norfolk."
Given the Bulldogs’ brutal early-season schedule which included two games against Football Bowl Subdivision opponents Air Force and the University of South Carolina, Pough said the team is "fortunate" to be 2-2 overall, 1-0 in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference. While disappointed with the offense’s inconsistency and the high number of infractions the Bulldogs have committed this season Pough is ecstatic about the play of his defense which leads the MEAC in sacks (15) and is third in points allowed per game.
"We’ve had way more penalties this year than we had before," he said. "That’s a sore thumb of sorts that I’m embarrassed about a little bit. I’d like to think that we would be more consistent on offense. Defensively, we had a struggle or two adjustment wise against the (FBS) teams. I thought we played extremely well against Bethune-Cookman and Winston-Salem State, defensively. I’m hoping that will be a sign of things to come as we get to the rest of our season. Hopefully, our defense is going to continue to be somewhat dominant."
SCSU’s defense has accomplished this despite the absence due to injury of key players like BANDIT Marshall McFadden (elbow), linebacker David Erby (ACL, out for the season) and defensive linemen Steven Jacobs and Sterling Blunt (ankle sprains). The offensive line has been equally hit hard by the injury bug starting with the offensive line where tackle Nygel Pearson has missed all four games with a broken hand, center Raymond "Duck" Harrison played through a hand injury last Saturday and Devon Dawson suffered with the flu.
Both quarterback Cleveland McCoy and running back Will Ford also played with nagging injuries, but finished with season-high numbers.
On both sides of the football, the Bulldogs have received contributions from unlikely parties like defensive back Rafael Bush of Williston-Elko, defensive linemen Jayson Ayers and Sam Chester and offensive linemen Josh Harrison and Johnny Culbreath.
On Monday, Culbreath was named MEAC Rookie of the Week after posting four knockdown blocks, five domination blocks and allowed no sacks in assisting the SCSU offense with amassing 493 total yards.
"We’d like for it to be somewhat of a distraction ... a little bit of a confidence builder for us in the fact that we can go out and play these guys knowing that when we put another group in, we don’t have much of a drop off," Pough said. "As teams see us, I would hope that they would feel a little bit uncomfortable with the fact that we can continuously roll those guys and we’ve got really high level play at all times."
The various lineup changes have produced one negative when it comes to a lack of continuity on the offensive line. This has been especially troublesome on field goal attempts where Stephen Grantham has had four kicks blocked this season, two Pough blamed on an offensive lineman missing a block in his zone.
After giving his players some down time, Pough plans to address those areas of concern on offense and special teams as well as counting on his athletic training staff to keep his team close to full strength by Oct. 6.
"Our athletic trainer is really going to earn their keep this week," Pough said. "That staff’s going to earn their keep because we’ve got so many guys that are beat up."
Monday was business as usual for the South Carolina State football coaching staff.
The desk of head coach Oliver "Buddy" Pough was stacked with videotapes from Saturday’s 20-7 victory over Winston-Salem State. In the adjacent offices, assistant coaches were at work studying film and reviewing plays from the previous contest.
The only thing not taking place was any type of game plan preparation. For the first time in over a month, the Bulldogs do not have an immediate opponent to strategize for this week as the team’s next game is not scheduled until Oct. 6 at Norfolk State.
Having seen his injured list grow to unfathomable lengths the past three games, Pough more than welcomes the bye week to regroup as a staff and evaluate the team’s progress.
"We’ll go back and actually study -- self-scout -- and figure out what we’ve done," he said. "Get a feel for what we’ve been for four weeks as a football team. It’s also an opportunity for us to plan for the rest of the year. We’ll spend the first part of the week just working on things that will help us overall for the rest of our schedule and then, towards the back part of the week, then we’ll start preparing for Norfolk."
Given the Bulldogs’ brutal early-season schedule which included two games against Football Bowl Subdivision opponents Air Force and the University of South Carolina, Pough said the team is "fortunate" to be 2-2 overall, 1-0 in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference. While disappointed with the offense’s inconsistency and the high number of infractions the Bulldogs have committed this season Pough is ecstatic about the play of his defense which leads the MEAC in sacks (15) and is third in points allowed per game.
"We’ve had way more penalties this year than we had before," he said. "That’s a sore thumb of sorts that I’m embarrassed about a little bit. I’d like to think that we would be more consistent on offense. Defensively, we had a struggle or two adjustment wise against the (FBS) teams. I thought we played extremely well against Bethune-Cookman and Winston-Salem State, defensively. I’m hoping that will be a sign of things to come as we get to the rest of our season. Hopefully, our defense is going to continue to be somewhat dominant."
SCSU’s defense has accomplished this despite the absence due to injury of key players like BANDIT Marshall McFadden (elbow), linebacker David Erby (ACL, out for the season) and defensive linemen Steven Jacobs and Sterling Blunt (ankle sprains). The offensive line has been equally hit hard by the injury bug starting with the offensive line where tackle Nygel Pearson has missed all four games with a broken hand, center Raymond "Duck" Harrison played through a hand injury last Saturday and Devon Dawson suffered with the flu.
Both quarterback Cleveland McCoy and running back Will Ford also played with nagging injuries, but finished with season-high numbers.
On both sides of the football, the Bulldogs have received contributions from unlikely parties like defensive back Rafael Bush of Williston-Elko, defensive linemen Jayson Ayers and Sam Chester and offensive linemen Josh Harrison and Johnny Culbreath.
On Monday, Culbreath was named MEAC Rookie of the Week after posting four knockdown blocks, five domination blocks and allowed no sacks in assisting the SCSU offense with amassing 493 total yards.
"We’d like for it to be somewhat of a distraction ... a little bit of a confidence builder for us in the fact that we can go out and play these guys knowing that when we put another group in, we don’t have much of a drop off," Pough said. "As teams see us, I would hope that they would feel a little bit uncomfortable with the fact that we can continuously roll those guys and we’ve got really high level play at all times."
The various lineup changes have produced one negative when it comes to a lack of continuity on the offensive line. This has been especially troublesome on field goal attempts where Stephen Grantham has had four kicks blocked this season, two Pough blamed on an offensive lineman missing a block in his zone.
After giving his players some down time, Pough plans to address those areas of concern on offense and special teams as well as counting on his athletic training staff to keep his team close to full strength by Oct. 6.
"Our athletic trainer is really going to earn their keep this week," Pough said. "That staff’s going to earn their keep because we’ve got so many guys that are beat up."
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