Tarleton Preview

Here we go!  Here are some quick points to help prepare for the Texans.  

This is a good FCS team.

They are ranked #5 in the nation right now.

Last year, they were 12-2, 7-1 in conference play, won one game in the NCAA (beating North Dakota) before losing to Villanova by 5.  Also, they beat Army.  But, that was with a different set of guys.

Of the 63 players in the NSD class (that's correct) were, 37 are on defense, 23 on offense, and three for special teams. 

Of the 63, 54 are transfers and nine are high school signings. Of the transfers, 17 are joining Tarleton State from the FBS level, 10 are staying in the FCS, nine are from NCAA Division II and 16 are from the JUCO ranks.

Starting RG Terrence Saunders transferred from EMU.  They also have a transfer from Findlay (Desmond Brown). 

They are co-favorites in the UAC.

They have five players on the pre-season All-UAC team.

RB Tylan Hines, 184 yards and 2 TD on 25 carries in openers

DB Omar Emmons, DNP in opener and is not listed on the depth chart

OL Aidan Moe.  Starts at LT

P  Charlie Mullen--one punt for 40 yards in opener.  Averaged 39 YPP last year.

KR  DeAndre Buchannon.  Returned 2 for 76 last week, long of 45.  Transferred from West Georgia.

The QB is Kaden Anderson, a four year starter at Wyoming. Had a big game against Prairie View but was #118 in passing efficiency last year in FBS.

Marquis Willis had 6 catches for 109 yards and 2 TDS. He's a JUCO transfer.

They led the nation in FCS last year, with a turnover margin of +2 per game.  Whether that carries over remains to be seen.

Important:  they gave up 6.7 yards per carry in the opener.  The top back for PV had over 9 yards per carry. BG's offense needs to show up tomorrow and I like the BG's chances.

Getting to know the opponent: Tarleton State.

Tarleton State is in the Texas A&M system in Texas.  We don't have this in Ohio....in Texas they have six.  That includes the University of Texas system (Austin, Arlington, UTEP, Rio Grande...nine in all), the Texas State system, (seven schools, Texas State, Sam Houston State, Lamar), the Texas A&M system (including East Texas, Prairie View, Tarleton, Texas A&M Corpus-Christi, and seven others).

It was founded in 1877 by John Tarleton, a prominent local settler.  As seen below.

He also had a pet duck named Oscar P., who is buried next to him.

It became a university in 1973 and is located in Stephenville.  Die-hard football fans will be familiar with Stephenville, because it is the school where Art Briles won four state championships.   Other notable people include Jewel, Brock Holt, Kevin Kolb, three world champions in rodeo, and Jarrett Stidham.

Tarleton has been D1 since 2020, after 26 years in DII.  They are the Texas, but were once known as the Plowboys.  (Until 2019, their women's teams were the TexAnns.)  They have a 24,000 seat stadium and put 20+ in it three times a couple years ago.

They play in the UAC which is a football only partnership between ASUN and WAC.  Tthey won the UAC last year and beat North Dakota in the 2nd roiund of the NCAA tourney before losing in the quarters to Villanova. 

They were 12-2 last year and finished #6 in the FCS polls.

They are coached by Todd Whitten.  He has coached there for 16 years with a 151-87 record.  He went to SFA where he was a QB and was drafted in baseball and signed a UDFA with New England.  He played one game during the strike.

He is in the SFA hall-of-fame.  He has been coach of the year 7 times.

George Sick of Watching Baseball

Eddie talked first about QB. He said it was a tough decision.

Austin took it hard but has embraced the role.  My aside is that this is what you want.  You don't need a player who is happy to not win the job. One other thing...you OSU people are your starts.  OMG.  You're taking his ranking at a HS senior, have not seen him once since then and yet still carries "4-star" around his neck).

Jay got the job because of his stats, his big plays his command of the huddle and being a dual-threat QB.  And actually playing for two years.  Someone tried to say we might need Austin because he had played in some big venues, but Coach said he had played "a few snaps" and Jay had started for two years.

Tarleton is explosive.  They have great talent and great coaching.  Their WRs will challenge our backfield...will be critical to keep them in front of us.  Also, the old saw that your biggest improvement is between week 1 and week 2 works in their favor this week.

There were ominous words about the OL.  He said he expects them get better each week. They will be tested Saturday, and they are young and inexperienced.  "Growing pains."  

We haven't seen our OL play against someone else.  we will see how we match up front in first quarter or so.

Team is healthy-ish.  Nobody out for the year. 

The team also released the depth chart, which is below.  Of course, to your normal fans, they are mostly all strangers.

The big question mark is the o-line, which lost a lot.  At the end of last year, we had the following players with the following career snap counts returning

Sanchez moved to C, leaving Bolyn at G.  I think we expected Bolyn to go to C.  Alex Harris moved to the other G.  Thomas stayed at RT, and the LT is either Gabe Funk or Kraatz, meaning we got five of those six guys in one way or the other.   Funk is an App State transfer who played in one game there.  He was here in January.  Most of all, I think we expected Travis Robertson to start at T for BG...he's a FR who we stole back from UCLA and he is in third-spot at LT.  Note also that Theo Andall is on the depth chart after coming from the London version of the NFL Academy. 

QB we have talked about.  WR is guys who have yet to really excel at their position. TE is mostly for blocking....I expect us in 12 and 22 a lot.  The one proven position is RB.  Dendy was a stud last year and Amarchee has played himself onto "or" level with him.  Amarchee was highly recruited out of Michigan and having two backs will really help if the line can get them into space.

Defensively, I don't think there were many surprises and I think we will be decent.  Kostus was all-MAC at CMU.  Selah Brown is a Louisville transfer.   We are familiar with Myles Bradley and Dorian Pringle.  Sanders Ellis was highly productive for George at TN State, went to Purdue, wasn't used and now is at BG.  Was FCS all-american.  JoJo Johnson is returning All-MAC.  Andrews came to BG through HS (Erasmus in Brooklyn). EstoEsta also came to BG after HS as did Pascal.  Drey Braxton was highly productive at NC-Central. 

Special teams are also all new.  Kingston is the punter.  Coach says he needs to be consistent. Kenner was the holder last year. Return game has, well, returning players.

Well, that's that today.  Great to be back in the rhythm.  Looking forward to being at the Doyt on Saturday.  Based on predictions, nowhere for us to go but up.

White smoke, a QB emerges, and other news

 Here we go.  T minus 6 games to the start of the season.  Let's catch a few things up before game prep begins.

1. Pete Thamel has just reported that Jay Kastantin will be BG's starting QB Saturday against Tarleton State.  The battle was between Kastantin and Austin Novosad, who transferred over from Oregon and was a 4-star recruit out of HS in Texas.  I think the assumption was that Novosad would win the job, but you heard some not so good things and then the matchup continued and then today Kastantin won the job.

(Remember the time Shilz and Matt Johnson battled in camp, Schilz got the lost and last about two series?)

He represents a different model of QB than BG has traditionally gotten in the portal era, where the Falcons have taken P4 QBs who lost their jobs or never had one.  Kastantin was highly productive in DII at Assumption, and is moving up.

There is a lot to like here:

• Appeared in 22 career games over three seasons (2023-25) at NCAA DII Assumption
• Accumulated 3,658 career passing yards on 299-of-515 passing during his Assumption career
• Threw for 28 career touchdowns
• Also has rushed for 710 career yards and nine touchdowns
• In 2025 was named Most Valuable Player in the Northeast-10 Conference and first-team All NE10
• Completed 138 of 223 passes (61.9%) during the MVP season
• Led the conference in: Passing yards: 1,974; Passing touchdowns: 19; Passing yards per game: 219.3
• Added significant production on the ground:100 carries for 530 yards (5.3 yards per rush); 5 rushing touchdowns
• Recorded a 159.9 passing efficiency rating, ranking 18th in all of NCAA Division II

That rushing part is probably important and @thetalontribune feels might have been decisive. 

BG is looking to be run focused on offense.  I talked to one FB at the season ticket event who said he was ready to hit someone else's players in the A-gap.  If so, having a QB who can tuck it and run can be very effective.  In fact, it starts to look like the offense OU ran the last few years.

BG has 6 QBs in the QB room, so hopefully won't have the issues we had last year.

2.  Eddie George is selling bourbon. (Other versions has the NY removed from the hat).  He is working for the Ohio Liquor Authority.

3.  Scotty Miller was released by the Bears.  We'll see if he gets picked up, but either way he's a big success story for us.  Emerging from wreckage of the program's worst years, he caught 99 NFL passes and wears a Super Bowl Ring.

4.  So we all watched Tarleton State last night, where they were -21 over Prairie View A&M and won by 19.  They had some big horses on offense and scored 49 points.  They are #5 in the nation in FCS--that was the pre-season ranking.  As of today, FanDuel has BG at a 2.5 favorite.  ESPN makes it a 55% chance to win.

Not quite what you expect from your FCS game.  If BG does win, though, it's a decent W.  And important.  A loss and BG could easily open 0-5.

5.  Preview coming later.  I can just say this...being back at the Doyt makes me happy.  One way or the other.

MBB Schedule is Out

 

Well, here it is!  The men's basketball schedule is out.  On the surface, I think it is an improvement. As you know, my primary source of heartburn is the non-D1 games.  This year has only two, which is a reasonable number.  One is Cornerstone, which is Grand Rapids.  We beat Aquinas by 81 last year.

That was made possible by a critical scheduling change by the MAC--moving from 18 MAC games to 22.  Given the difficulty of scheduling non-conference games, this makes total sense and ensures competitive basketball inside MAC gyms.  Adding two MAC games to replace Bethany and Siena Heights is a win from my view.

This will create a new wrinkle in scheduling timing.  The Falcons will now play four MAC games before the new year, meaning that teams who are sorting it out (and that's most everyone in the NIL era) will have less time to do so.  But the same should be true for everyone. 

It's pretty impossible to tell how good anyone is going to be, including us, so it's hard to know if, for example, Niagara or Cleveland State are good pulls for home games or not.  But they are D1.

And putting the Falcons in Assembly Hall first time in 28 years will be a big day.

As in football, we seem to be moving into haves and have-nots in MBB.  Having said that, I'm 100% behind Todd Simon and his team. He's what we would want in a coach for this bizarre and dysfunctional era...we may never routinely be in the top 3 of the MAC again (unless the top teams in the MAC leave), but we can still put together a team and make a run and make the Big Dance.  Any year.  Every year.

Here Comes Football...

Football season is on the way....

It's a great time of year.

It's really difficult to tell anymore how good you are going to be.  We have so many new players on this year's roster.  

I will say this...any success this team has will be a pleasant surprise.  Bowl eligibility would be a miracle.  Much more likely, it's another season of people comparing Eddie George to Mike Jinks and a lot of bad vibes.

Consensus seems to have BG 9th or 10th in the conference.  We have an FCS team on our schedule, like everyone, but we have chosen to play the #4 team in FCS, and we open as home dogs in our FCS game.  The very possible scenario is that we lose our first five games before we play Sacramento State.  Being 1-4 would be a success.

What's going on?  First of all, we are investing in high school players, and that leaves this year's team very, very young.  CBS sports ranks BG as #135 out of #138 in terms of experience.  In the old world, this would be a re-building year.  Your hope is that you can retain these high school players long enough for them to contribute before they transfer,

So, could we be better next year or the year after.  It's possible.

The way I see it, I think our offense will be the problem.  I think the defense will be competitive.  The reports are that we are going to go to a very heavy run attack.  I have no problem with that.  (My favorite style of offensive football is the one where we win).  However, our offensive line is really young and unproven.  Even in 12 personnel, I worry about us being able to open up holes for a heavy run attack.

I'm worried about QB as well.  Austin Novosad was once thought to be a rising star.  And he might still be.  But Coach is saying right now that it's an open competition between Austin and DII standout Jay Kastantin.  Coach says one of them will step up and take the job, but to me, the fact that no one has is worrying.  Especially Novosad, who went from Oregon to battling at BG with a DII guy for a starting job.

With question marks on the line and at QB, it's hard to see the offense being consistently effective.  Austin Dendy is back at RB, so that's a strength.  At WR Isaiah Dawson was highly productive at Richmond, but the depth is unproven.

I don't think the defense will be bad.  We will be solid on the front 7 and the back end looks pretty decent.  I don't think it's carry the team good, but I do think we will compete on defense.

Season ticket event coming up on Monday.   

Odds and Ends

 So, a few little updates here and there for Falcon sports.

BG MBB will play Georgia State in the Sun Belt-MAC Challenge, which has been extended through 28-29.  This is a good thing for us...some of the coaches don't like the game being in the middle of the conference season, but if you look back, BG used to play non-conference games all the time during MAC play.  Georgia State will be tough to get a line on that early in the year...they fired their coach last year after going 10-22.  He has been replaced by Jon Cremins, former Vanderbilt assistant and nephew of Bobby Cremins.

There's an addition to the football roster.  His name is JayT Jackson, and he plays DB, a position always in need of numbers. He's from Columbus, Georgia.  He went to Garden City CC, where he played all 10 games in his one year there.  He had 22 tackles, including some impactful plays.  He went to Georgia State where he played in six games over two years, then to La. Tech where he played in 11 with 4 tackles total.

Welcome to the Falcons, JayT.

In the meantime, July first came and went, making it Sacramento State day for those who celebrate.

Here's a trivia question.  Obviously, Sacramento is in the state capital.  What founding member of the MAC was also located in a state capital?

So what do we know about them?

They are the Hornets. 

Their mascot is "Herky the Hornet" and has been for 70 years.  There's a lot of folklore about where the name came from.  The Hornet was selected over the elk, which was not considered aggressive enough.

They say "Stingers Up!!" giving us a 1:1 battle with the dumbest sayings in college sports.

They have 30,000+ students with a 94% acceptance rate.

Former students include:

• Tom Hanks (did not actually graduate).
• Lester Holt
• Joan Lunden
• This guy:

• Joseph DeAngelo, the Golden State Killer.
• Buck Martinez
• About 22 NFL players, plus Ricky Ray, CFL Hall-of-Famer.
• Ryan Coogler
• David Hodo, the construction worker in the Village People
• Bobby McFerrin (attended five universities)
• An adult film star, a Playmate of the month, and a girlfriend of H. Hefner.

Welcome to the MAC. Herky.