By Manie Robinson, SoConSports.com
This is the only time during the season when Western Carolina and Wofford are not bothered by being at the bottom of the Southern Conference football standings.
And Chattanooga and The Citadel understand their position at the top is merely nominal. No one has kicked off yet, so, the nine SoCon teams are simply listed in alphabetical order.
Yet, SoCon coaches expect the standings to shuffle often this season, because the margin in talent between first and ninth may be tighter than the space between C and W.
“There’s not a dominant team in this league. The worst team in the league can beat the best team in the league on the right Saturday,” ETSU coach George Quarles said. “That’s what makes it hard, but that’s what makes it great, too.”
Since 2016, no team has won the SoCon championship outright in consecutive seasons. Wofford claimed sole ownership of the SoCon title in 2017 and 2019, but it shared the championship with Furman and ETSU in 2018.
“Over the last four years, you’ve had four different champions. So, how much difference is there? You’ve got to do something to separate yourself,” Mercer coach Drew Cronic said. “You find a way to make one more play.”
Last season, 10 SoCon games were decided by eight or fewer points. Samford, Furman, Mercer and Chattanooga finished first through third, respectively (the Bears and Mocs tied for third), in the standings. Games among those four teams were decided by an average of 9.7 points.
“Every Saturday, we go out there, it doesn’t matter what a team’s record is we’re playing in the league, we’re going to get their best shot,” said Chattanooga coach Rusty Wright, whose team suffered its three conference losses last season by a total of 18 points.
Race For The Top
Furman, Mercer and Chattanooga welcome back at least 15 offensive and defensive starters. Samford returns six offensive starters, including preseason offensive player of the year Michael Hiers at quarterback.
Hiers earned SoCon offensive player of the year honors last season after amassing 3,544 passing yards and 36 touchdowns. Samford completed only the third undefeated run through the SoCon since 2010. That perfect record was preserved with a seven-point victory against Furman.
Samford and Furman represented the SoCon with NCAA Division I Football Championship playoff wins last year. Samford notched 11 victories, reaching the 10-win mark for the first time since 1991. Furman logged its first 10-win season since 2005.
None of those victories will carry over into 2023, but Furman coach Clay Hendrix acknowledged that sustained success can elevate expectations.
“I think we’ve been, for a couple of years, a team that has expected to play well, which gives you a chance to win,” Hendrix said. “I think now we’re a team that expects to win. That’s a mindset. I think that’s the biggest thing that has changed.”
Furman and Samford shared the top spot in the preseason SoCon coaches poll. They also share a simple objective— to focus on maximizing their potential rather than obsessing over the outcomes.
“We’re not trying to repeat as the conference champions. This team is totally different than last year,” Samford coach Chris Hatcher said. “I used the term ‘ultimate.’ It means the best achievable of its kind. When you talk about our culture, that’s what we want to be. We want to be the best team we can be.
“That may be the conference champions, or we may not win a game. But we want to be the best team we can be. To me, that’s what our culture’s all about.”
Behind Furman and Samford, the coaches poll projected Mercer and Chattanooga to finish third and fourth, respectively.
Third season a charm for Western Carolina football?
The preseason SoCon polls can be enticing, intriguing, entertaining … but also inaccurate. Since 2018, the preseason favorite has won the conference title only once. In two of those seasons, the eventual champion was picked sixth in the preseason coaches poll, including Samford last year.
No coach expressed more confidence about vaulting in the standings than Western Carolina coach Kerwin Bell, whose team is projected fifth in the preseason poll.
Bell hopes, once again, the third season is the charm. In 2018, his third season as head coach at Valdosta State, Bell led the Blazers to a NCAA Division II national championship. He also won a conference championship in 2009, his third season as the head coach at Jacksonville University.
Bell is entering his third season with Western Carolina, and he believes the Catamounts are primed to repeat that three-year pattern.
“We’ve talked about it the whole off-season – we’re getting on a ship and there’s only one destination. That’s a championship. If you’re getting on this ship to go somewhere else, then get off.”
WCU coach Kerwin Bell
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Bell’s confidence has more to do with what he has observed in his Catamounts, rather than what he experienced at previous stops. At the midpoint of last season, Western Carolina dropped a 49-6 drubbing at Mercer. The Catamounts responded by winning three of their final five games, including a three-point win at ETSU and a three-point season-finale victory against Chattanooga.
“What has me so excited is that, the last three games, I saw that championship DNA,” Bell said. “It’s ‘Championship or Bust.’ We believe in that. I’m not just saying that because I’m trying to rally a football team. I truly believe we’re at this stage in our development right now with the talent level we have.
“If we put our mind to it and be a tough football team and continue to grow in this area, then we can accomplish whatever we want.”
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Coaches may not share Bell’s bravado, but, at least at this point in the season, they all share some level of optimism. According to Quarles, the unpredictability of the league fortifies that.
“It provides hope. We all need some hope,” said Quarles, whose team was projected sixth in the preseason poll. “You’ve got to be determined and believe in yourself, but it also is great to have some realistic hope, which you have in this league.
“That’s not to say at all that it’s easy. We know it’s not going to be easy, but…you just want to be able to go out there and compete and max out your ability, and I really believe the scoreboard will kind of take care of itself.”
Looking to climb off the bottom
That hope extends to the three teams in the bottom of the preseason poll, Wofford, The Citadel and VMI, whose coaches are approaching their first full season.
Shawn Watson led Wofford as interim head coach through the final six games of last season. He was officially hired as head coach in December. Maurice Drayton will open his third coaching stint at his alma mater, The Citadel, but the first as head coach. Danny Rocco will open his first season at VMI after winning conference titles at each of his previous head coaching stops at Liberty, Richmond and Delaware.
Watson, Drayton and Rocco expressed no delusions about the renovations in front of them. But they were encouraged about the foundation they found at their respective sites. Each believe that their players have accepted their new blueprints.
“There isn’t always a total buy-in with new coaching staffs,” Drayton said. “So far, from what I’ve been able to see with our young men, there’s a total buy-in right now. It may not correlate into wins and losses in year one, but it’s the right start.”
“When I stood in front of the team in December,” Rocco recalled, “I had just took the job. I was speaking to a group of guys that were uninspired, defeated and deflated. You could see it in their body language. You could see it in their eyes.
“They’d gone through a hard season. They lost their coach. They had guys jumping in the (transfer) portal. The team I stand in front of today is a different team. A lot of it just is that ownership, that energy, that enthusiasm, and with that comes confidence. So, I think those are the building blocks.”
From top to bottom, whether sustaining or rebuilding, no team in the SoCon will be overlooked or underestimated.
“Very rarely, do we get a game where somebody doesn’t play their best,” Wright said. “That’s fine. That’s the way it should be.”
“It doesn’t matter if you’re first in the standings or you’re last in the standings. Everybody has a chance to win every week,” Wofford offensive standout Kyle Pennix said. “That margin is really, really small. Every week you’ve got to be prepared and ready to go, because there’s no telling what the outcome of the game will be.”
Because the margin in talent is small, the margin for error is even smaller.
“We’re going to play good people. The league is what it is,” Wright said. “But we have to be more consistent to get over the next step. We’ve got good enough players, but it’s being in the right gaps when it’s time to make a play. It’s taking the handoff the right way and hitting the hole the right way. It’s staying on a block a second longer.”
“You feel bad about the losses you could’ve won when things kind of fell apart, when you didn’t stay focused, when you didn’t meet the standard, the expectation that we’ve set for ourselves,” said ETSU tight end Noah West. “When you lose focus, the little things are really the first things that fall apart.
“When the alarm clock goes off and you make the decision to get out of bed, are you going to attack the day? Are you going to get the most out of it that you can? That’s the expectation that we’re trying to set. You can’t waste a day, because you don’t have very many days left to waste.”
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