From John Lock – Associate Sports Information Director, Southern Illinois University

OPENING STATEMENT

I’m excited that it is finally game week and we are finally here. It seems like it’s been a while, especially not being able to play the first week. We had to sit back and watch everyone play, really for two weekends. Our guys are ready to play. Really all of college football has had a five-week training camp. I feel like we’re in a good spot and we’re healthy. We’ve been able to give them some days off. I think last night was the most balanced I’ve seen them in a week or two. They have another day off today and we’ll hit our stride tomorrow for game week. We’re excited that it’s here. I’m really just excited to watch our team play. You go through spring football and summer and you recruit all of these guys, as a head coach it’s fun for game day to watch them go out there and play. I’m excited for Saturday for that.

An update on injuries, there’s no update on Roman Tatum from the beginning of the year. He’s battling and we’ll see where he’s at, but there is a realistic possibility that he’s out for the season. Landon Lenoir had surgery about four days ago. Right now it’s probably about 6-8 weeks with him and we’ll see where he’s at with how he progresses. I feel bad for Landon because he’s one of our top targets. He’s a young kid with a bright future, and he still is. He’ll keep battling for it when he comes back. Ernest Dye got injured a little over a week ago. He will probably be out for 2-3 weeks. We’re hoping to get him back pretty soon. Josh Podzielinski, another offensive lineman, went down with a hamstring about 10 days ago and will be probable for this game. He will be back in practice tomorrow and we will see where he’s at. He will be dressed for this game. We have some young kids that will get a chance to play and get some more reps.

With that said, I have a ton of respect for Mississippi Valley’s head coach. When you look as a young head coach and see a guy with 156 wins and I have four, he obviously knows what he’s doing. He’s won a ton of football games. They will keep getting better throughout the season. We all know what it’s like to go up to Fargo and play in that environment. It can get away from you pretty quickly. He’s not the only person that has went up there and struggled with a good football team.

We have to concentrate on us. We haven’t played a game yet and they have. They get to make some corrections and you see a lot of improvement from game one to game two. That’s what we’re expecting. They’ll come in here and play better than they did in week one. We have to control what we can control. We’re worried about what we do and how we play. They will have some talented football players and we’re expected to go out and play a good football game.

Who will start in Lenoir’s spot on Saturday?

We have guys go and start the game at wide receiver, but we don’t have starters really. We have six or seven guys that can play. At the beginning of the year, we thought it’s going to be tough to make the bus with this group. Landon is one of the we thought we’d be counting on. Darrell James has played a ton of football. Jimmy Jones is back. We have guys that will step in and play. We have some young guys who will progress. We’ll see if we’re going to put them out there at the beginning of the year or not. We have some depth at wide receiver. That’s one position that we felt like we could probably take an injury at because we have some talented depth.

Lenoir is a good blocker too. Do you feel like you lose something there?

That’s a collective with that group. We pride ourselves on being a blocking team. He’s come a long way, but he watched the group in front of him last year. It took him six or seven games to get on the field because that wasn’t his strong point. Connor (Iwema), Jimmy and Darrell are probably our top-three blockers. We’ll be good at that. We do that every single day here. You don’t get on the field unless you make that a point of emphasis and are able to block.

Who will start on the offensive line?

Right now, with those two injuries, Jacob Marnin will move over to guard and Jack White will start at center. Matt Chmielewski and Aaron Harris will play guard. You’ll probably see seven or eight guys play on the offensive line during week one and that’s a good thing. We have to build some depth. As soon as we get those guys back and we see where Podzielinski is at we can see about who is out there and the combinations we use, but we’re playing around with that still.

How have Withney Simon and Airan Reed looked in practice?

He’s a guy that hasn’t redshirted. He played as a true freshman. He always finds the ball. He’s played on special teams. Last year, he started the season as the number one. Then Airan Reedmoved into that position and Withney just kind of bounced around. All of this will come down to what kind of depth we have.

As for Airan Reed, he’s a top-level talent. He’s as athletic as anyone you’ll find when you’re recruiting a player. He came here as a safety and we moved him to outside linebacker. That’s how we play that position. You have to be able to play some man-to-man. You’re going to get caught in coverages playing cover one. He can rush the passer and we’ll use him in those situations as well. He has the ability to find the quarterback and get him down. He’s come a long way from where he was at. A lot of these guys were babies in this defense last year just trying to find their way and figure things out. Airan was one of those guys. His snap counts went way up at the end of last season and he was playing at a high level. Now, he’s had an offseason and you’d like to see him stay on the pace to get better. That’s what he’s done all summer. It’s just like the rest of our team. Now he has to go out there and do it.

The defense looks a lot better than they did this time last year. Is that because they have a year under their belt?

I think so. That’s with anything you do. I talked about that through training camp. The more you do anything the better you’re going to get at it. Experience is huge. The only way to get experience is to go out there, get thrown in the fire and learn from your mistakes. College football moves fast. Those guys have a lot of reps now. When you hear the same terminology over and over and over again and see different situations. By year two, the game slows down for you. Hopefully it does that for a lot of the defense. It’s not like you master it in year two either. We know that. The game is full of situations on how you adapt to things, whether it’s in practice or a game. That’s the thing I like with this team. Is the ability to adjust a stay together and figure it out together.

What excites you the most about the defense?

We’re athletic. We’re young and will be youngest defensive line in the country. There will be times when there are four freshmen out there together, redshirt freshmen and true freshmen. The other ones like Blake Parzych and Malik Haynes are second-year players, but they’re same age as those redshirt freshmen. Still they didn’t play a ton last year, but they’re a bit ahead. We’re mainly made up of first a second year players on the defensive line. There are some players that will be names that Saluki fans know for a long time around here. I’m excited to see them make some plays and have some fun on Saturday.

At linebacker, Cody Crider made some plays around here as a redshirt freshman. I think he was in the 60s in tackles. He’s as athletic of a linebacker as you’ll find. Kyron Watson is a leader on our team. He really brings the energy and our team feeds off of Kyron. Chase Allen just made the 53-man roster (for the Miami Dolphins). Kyron and Chase split reps last year at that positon. We have Kyron back, and Markese Jackson is a guy who is back that played starter reps. He can play multiple positions. We feel like we have five or six guys that can play at the linebacker position.

Is Jonathon Mixon still dealing with injuries?

No, Mixon has looked really good at practice the last few days. He was full go last night and moved really well. He will be a full participant all week. Unless there is a setback, he will be cleared and full go for Saturday.

What role does Mixon play with the running backs?

You’ll see him get series where he is our change of pace back. You want to see tailbacks get a rhythm and stack those carries because it’s a position where you have to get a feel and get hit qet lathered up to get going. That’s what the best ones do. It’s not like he’s going to get a certain number of carries. He closed out games for us last year. That’s what we’d like from him. You see games in the fourth quarter where you need a big bell cow to carry it home and Mixon can do that.

What is Daquan Isom’s role?

It’s big for us. He’s a guy who can score from anywhere on the field. He gives you an explosive back the field. He can catch out of the back field and take it the distance. I don’t know how many career catches he has, but he catches the ball well and he can be used in the screen game. I tell people all the time that physically he’s in the best shape he’s ever been in. When he was a freshman he carried the ball at under 170 pounds. He was 166 or 167 pounds. Now he’s in the 190s. He’s put on 20 to 25 pounds of muscle. He’s our strongest running back, even with Mixon. If you get him in the weight room, he’s an explosive kid. He’s not a huge back, but now that he’s in 190-pound range, hopefully he can carry the ball into the 20 carries a game range.

What do you know about Mississippi Valley’s quarterbacks? They play a few.

Yeah, the first guy, number three, I saw play in junior college. He got the start. It’s hard to judge a quarterback when they’re playing under pressure. Number one, you’re in the dome and you can’t hear. It’s hard to replicate that in training camp. So they’re going off a silent count and you can tell that the entire game. You can tell that by how they were snapping the ball. Not many people go in there and win, look successful and move the football in recent years. It wasn’t a great game to judge those quarterbacks. Especially going up there and playing against one of the best defensive lines in college football. They had a lot of heat on them. They didn’t have a lot of time to look down field. They’re college quarterbacks for a reason and that’s the way they we will prepare for them. The second two guys that came in could run the ball well. We look for them to have a package of that and we have to be ready for anything.

Defensively, they play a 4-4 sometimes with one free safety. How do you test that with your passing game?

Yeah, really nothing changes for us offensively this game or the next. We’re going to watch the film and have an answer for whatever they do. We went back and have watched very game they played last year, plus the NDSU game. They like to bring guys down in the box to stop the run. It’s just like anything, if they put too many guys in the box you have to be able to throw and if they back out you have to be able to run the ball. We can’t make things too complicated. If it’s not a good box to run and they have more guys in there than we can block, then we better start throwing. Hopefully we can hit them with a few throws to loosen them up so we can run the football.

What have you noticed about Sam Straub’s progression?

I think the confidence about him. We meet in the office and we sit down and talk. It’s not about how many completions he gets; he just has to win. I can see that in him. I think the confidence of him knowing that he doesn’t have to make a play. Sometimes the best play is throwing it into the third row and avoiding a sack. That’s what I’ve seen him be able to do now that he knows he’s the guy. No matter is we’re sitting here preaching that same thing to two or three guys, you still have the natural tendency to press a bit. I haven’t seen that in him. He’s just taking what the defense gives him. Coach Van Dam does a great job with the quarterbacks and them understanding the offense. We trust Sam, and I told him that in the game. He’s big in the game plans and on the sidelines on Saturday in knowing what he’s seeing out there. He knows our offense. I’m happy where Sam is at and I’m excited to see him go out there and play.

Jimmy Jones can be a factor on the field. What have you seen from him?

He is still getting healthy. That’s an injury that is tough to come back from. We limit his reps every day. He hasn’t been a full participant. He gets out there because he is a competitor. He’s snuck out there a few times when he’s not supposed to. He’s a difference maker when he is out there. He can run and speed kills in this came. He can run right by and he can make you miss when he gets the ball. He can do a little bit of everything. He’s always proven that when he’s been out there and been healthy. That’s hard to do when you go out and you’re playing, but we have to be smart with him throughout the week in practice. He’s gotten in the best shape. He will be out there on Saturday and have a package of plays. I’d like to see him continue to improve and by midseason have him back to Jimmy Jones form. You see him in practice now he’s still got that gear and can still run.