SAVANNAH, Georgia -- There were two things very evident as the Savannah State University football team played its first limited intra-squad scrimmage at Savannah's Memorial Stadium early Saturday morning. The first thing noticeable was the enthusiasm from coaches and players, and the second could be summed up in the words of Tiger's head coach Earnest Wilson, III, …"We're big."The Tigers entertained family, friends and community onlookers with the offense being led by quarterbacks' senior Ker-Sean Wilson and freshman David Handler. Between them, they ran over 100 plays on natural grass, rather than the artificial turf at Ted Wright Stadium, their home field.
Handler, a 6-5 player from Culver City, California, took most of the "reps", while Wilson took the rest. Only two of the SSU quarterbacks participated in the game, along with a full crew of NCAA officials, who at game's conclusion went over the new rules for the 2015 season.
"We're moving forward and need a lot of repetitions for all of the young players that will be playing Division I football for the first time," said Wilson. "We have over 40 freshmen, 29 sophomores and only seven seniors on the team this year. We have a lot of teaching to do," Wilson added.
The Tigers play a 10-game schedule with two of the teams being Bowl Championship Series (BCS) teams with the rest being from the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) of which the Tigers are members.
"We don't want to be a team from Savannah that lies down and dies," said Wilson. "We're selling this program as a team that has gone from mostly 5-10 players to a lot of guys standing 6-4 or 6-5."
Handler is a tall rangy thrower with precise accuracy. He had a good day throwing as he tossed four touchdowns to various players. When asked if he (Wilson) had decided on a starter, Wilson said there was no timeline in his decision on who would open the season at that position.
The Tigers head into this season wearing t-shirts under their uniform with a simple phrase stating that to be successful, "Refuse To Be Overshadowed."
Junior running back Richard Williams seems to be the leading candidate at his position for the offense. The second-year back transferred to SSU from the University of Iowa last year via Memphis, Tennessee, where he was one of the best running backs coming out of high school in the nation.
On defense, Coach Anthony Pierce, the linebackers coach was animated with the success of his players as they kept the running backs in check. Defensive back coach Cordell Taylor stayed in the ear of the defensive backs, who consistently broke off the completion route of the offensive receivers. Defensive coordinator Mike Wallace stayed focused on the overall effort of the entire defense and seemed content with the progress of the defense, thus far.
SSU opens the season on September 5 at Colorado State University on the road in Fort Collins, Colorado. Their second BCS game will be two weeks later when they travel to Akron, Ohio to take on the University of Akron on September 19 in Ohio. Their first MEAC conference game will be the following week in Daytona Beach with Bethune-Cookman being the opponent. The first home game is October 3 against Florida A&M University.
COURTESY SAVANNAH STATE UNIVERSITY SPORTS INFORMATION
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