This is the third part in a series as we count down to the Thursday night opener at Bowling Green
LOOKING AHEAD: UAB, at home Sept. 19
It’s good to see this series return for a two-year deal that has Troy playing at UAB in 2010. Hopefully it’ll continue past that. Unfortunately for Troy, UAB has dominated the past two games in the series (2005 and 2006) before ex-UAB coach and A.D. Watson Brown got his wish and got out of the series. It’s back on, but Troy would have loved to play UAB the past two seasons, when the Blazers were dreadful. UAB isn’t expected to be much of anything this year, but it’ll be a tougher game. READ THIS report from the NY Times Quad Blog if you want the real, in-depth scouting report, but the offense returns everyone and the defense, which was pretty bad last year, lost its top players. I covered one of senior QB Joe Webb‘s games at Wenonah (actually in Ensley’s Fair Park) back in 2004 when I was a Birmingham News intern, and knew he’d be a good one. The tall, rangy right-hander has had a good career and could contend for all-conference honors in Conference USA. He is interception-prone, though. Running back Rashad Slaughter and wideout Frantrell Forest are other top weapons. Former Troy running back Justin Brooks, who was a walk-on and played a little in 2006, is in the mix for playing time in the UAB backfield. The top returning defensive player is senior cornerback Brandon Carlisle, and some recruits will be counted on to fill spots on the UAB defense.
What would I say? This isn’t the same UAB team that had its way with Troy a few years back. Troy should control the game and win by double digits.
Read about the Blazers: The Birmingham News‘ Steve Irvine does the best job of covering UAB. Read his blog HERE. Their main UAB page is HERE. Also, check out the UAB athletics official site.
LOOKING BACK: Ohio State 28, Troy 10
It was a beautiful morning in Columbus, Ohio, and a great atmosphere. They really know how to do it up in Big 10 country, at least up there, but it’s a big time program with a lot of money. But it wasn’t a good day for the Trojans, though they held their own, trailing just 14-10 heading into the fourth quarter. All of OSU’s touchdowns came on short fields, two of which were aided by turnovers. I would like to see this year’s Troy team go play last year’s OSU team—especially with the experience on this team. The worst part of the day came when senior defensive end Kenny Mainor tore his ACL, ending his college career. The best part of the day was when Jerrel Jernigan made a bunch of overrated Big 10 defenders look stupid (see video below).
The AHSAA Regionals have been moved from Troy to South Alabama. More to it is in this report from the Press-Register in Mobile.
It’s a hot topic around here. I’ve talked to a lot of high school coaches who aren’t happy with the decision.
This quote from AHSAA executive director Steve Savarese, “No matter where we have it, there will be a travel issue. Now, we make travel an issue for southeast Alabama.“ sounds like a big cop-out to me, something that caters to the bigger cities of Mobile and Montgomery and brushing aside the Wiregrass.
Two years ago, a regional was moved from Mobile to Montgomery’s Acadome on the Alabama State campus. All you’ve seen in the past two years in Montgomery are problems - first reports of teams/players having money stolen from lockers, and last year’s infamous brawl.
I also talked to Troy basketball coach Don Maestri, who hated to see it leave because of what it did for the visiting schools and their fans and students. This contract runs through 2012. By then, Troy’s arena should be finished. Maestri said he was hoping for it to be done for the 2011-2012 season.
“I don’t think that’s out of the question,“ Maestri said. “Everybody’s pushing for it to get done on the fast track, as long as it’s done right and first-class.“
Posted by Drew Champlin on 06/24 at 02:44 PM
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Bowling Green officials announced kickoff times for 2009 home games. As you know, Troy opens the 2009 season at Bowling Green on Thursday, Sept. 3.
HERE is the release. For those who don’t want to click the link, the game kicks off at 6 p.m. CST (7 p.m. EST - which is the time zone BG is in), and, as of right now, there’s no television.
HERE is the Mid-American Conference’s TV schedule announcement.
***Threw the italics in when a BGSU spokesperson e-mailed me back and said he hadn’t heard anything about it being on TV, but you never know. Currently, ESPN2 does not have a game listed for that Thursday night. The only thing I can think is that ESPN2 will be running a 2-hour Fantasy NFL special, or a World Series of Poker rerun. You think I’m joking, but…
Posted by Drew Champlin on 06/24 at 12:11 PM
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Rivals.com has their season prediction of Troy in the Rivals Top 120. It’s a good read, though it lists 10 teams today so that link isn’t just Troy. The only things that were a little off were that left tackle James Brown is a sophomore, not a junior, and Eugene Kinlaw will likely be the starter at DT instead of Rashad Roussell, so that would make 9 seniors on defense instead of 10. Other than that, you can tell that the rivals.com guys did their research.
Wow, 9 seniors. 10 if Roussell’s the starter. I’ll post some 2010 names and you tell me if you think it’s rebuilding or reloading.
The class listed by their name is what they would be in 2010, not this year
DE-Mario Addison (Sr.)
DT-Eugene Kinlaw (Sr.)
DT-James Searcy (So.) or Emanuel Dudley (Sr.)
DE-Jonathan Massaqoui (Jr.) or R.J. Roberts (Jr.)
LB-Donnell Golden (Jr.)
LB-Xavier Lamb (Jr.)
LB-Kanorris Davis (Jr.) or Daniel Sheffield (Sr.)
CB-Bryan Willis (So.)
CB-Barry Valcin (Jr.) or KeJuan Phillips (Jr.)
S-Willard Ross (Sr.)
S-Caleb Massey (So.) or Bryant McKissic (Sr.)
Other names to be thrown on there include DE Antonio Harper (So.), LB Jacoby Thomas (So.), LB Johnny Thompson (RFr. or So.), and DBs Bradley Wallace and Sergio Perez (both will be either RFr. or So.), and likely a couple of JUCO transfers.
And that’s your lesson in the future of Troy football, since it’s June 22 and it feels like the start of the season is so far away.
Posted by Drew Champlin on 06/22 at 11:32 AM
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The offensive signee that might have the most fanfare is running back Greg Pratt of Naples, Fla. Pratt, who is 5-foot-8, was rated as one of Troy’s best signees in the 2009 class because of his speed and athletic ability.
Offensive coordinator Neal Brown said that showing what junior playmaker Jerrel Jernigan can do in this offense was a big selling point for Pratt, who had more than 1,600 yards of total offense and 20 touchdowns his senior year.
“Anytime we’re recruiting a guy with great speed and someone that’s electric with the ball, we’re always going to show them what we do,“ Brown said. “Greg Pratt is a great example. He’s a kid that now Jerrel’s going to be a junior so you’ve got two years of separation and if Greg redshirts, then we’ve got three.
“We can look at him and say here’s what we did with Jerrel and here’s the road we’re going with you. He can run like Jerrel and he’s fast. I don’t know if he’s as good as Jerrel right now, but he did some great things in high school. He can really make people miss. We definitely use that. We want speed and want guys that can make people miss.“
It’s a little different in that Jernigan has never been a running back at Troy, just a wide receiver, and Pratt’s position will be at running back to start out. But don’t be surprised if Pratt eventually learns to play in the slot.
“He’s going to play running back, but we want to use him the same way we use Jerrel. We’ll get him some screens and get him to make people miss,“ Brown said.
Pratt will be among several newcomers who are slated to arrive this week for the start of the second summer session.
Posted by Drew Champlin on 06/21 at 09:15 AM
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