ASU-Western Illinois notes
Odds and ends heading into Appalachian State’s game against Western Illinois in the second round of the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision playoffs:
ASU is the No. 1 seed in the FCS playoffs for the third time. The Mountaineers were the top seed in 1987, when they made it to the semifinals and lost to Marshall, and in 2006, when they won a national title.
The Mountaineers are in the playoffs for the sixth straight year. That’s the second-longest streak in the field behind New Hampshire’s seven straight appearances.
What’s a Leatherneck? Western Illinois University is located in Macomb, Ill., and has an enrollment of 13,331. The school adopted the Marine Corps’ nickname, “The Fighting Leathernecks” in 1927 when coach Ray “Rock” Hanson, a Marine hero, received permission from the military. A bulldog is the team’s mascot.
There are few ties between the programs, although both Coach Jerry Moore of ASU and Mark Hendrickson of Western Illinois were once assistant coaches under Hayden Fry.
The programs will meet for the first time. ASU center Brett Irvin said that his team doesn’t know much about the Leathernecks, but that it cuts both ways.
“The good thing about it is that they really don’t know what to expect from us,” Irvin said. “It’s better than going against a team that has already played you and has the advantage of adjusting what they do the second time around.”
Dominique McDuffie, a free safety for the Mountaineers, said: “Going against an opponent you’ve never played is kind of exciting. It’s another chance to show what you can do, and another chance to see how good you really are.”
Western Illinois was 1-10 last season, and was picked to finish eighth this season in the Missouri Valley Conference’s preseason poll.
“We’ve had the biggest turnaround in school history and gotten our team in the playoffs and had a big first-round win (over Coastal Carolina),” quarterback Matt Barr of the Leathernecks said. “Now to go and play probably the most known and most successful Division I FCS teams in Appalachian State, to go play at their place in the second round, is really all you can ask for as a college football player.”
Barr, a 6-2, 210-pound senior, ranks third in the FCS with 3,312 passing yards and has thrown for 26 touchdowns.
“He throws the ball well,” Coach Jerry Moore of ASU said. “He’s an experienced player, has been in big ballgames. He moves the ball around. They’ve got several guys who can catch the ball but two of them are more dominant than the others, but he scatters the ball around to the tight ends and backs just enough to make you really have to respect those other receivers.”
Barr’s top target is senior Lito Senatus, who has 1,120 yards and 13 touchdowns receiving.
Bobby Bozzo, a defensive tackle for ASU, said of the Leatherneck’s offense: “Their offensive line is taller and leaner than some we play against. They run a kind of zone that we haven’t seen a lot. A lot of the teams we play have moved away from that normal zone scheme, but that’s kind of what we run and we go against the best zone team in FCS every spring and every camp. I feel like that’s our strong point.”
The Mountaineers will be facing a predominately passing offense, something they haven’t seen an overabundance of this season.
“They like to sling it around,” McDuffie. “No team is easy, especially in the playoffs, but if everybody will focus on their assignments, pay attention to what they’re doing and wrap up and make tackles we should be fine.”
The Mountaineers will be without starting cornerback Ed Gainey, who will have to serve a one-game suspension after being ejected for fighting in the final regular-season game against Florida.
Demetrius McCray, a sophomore who got his first start against Florida, when cornerback Troy Sanders was shifted to strong safety to fill in for injured Mark LeGree, is expected to start in Gainey’s spot. Sanders will return to cornerback, with LeGree expected back at strong safety.
Saturday’s game will be broadcast on MASN and available on ESPN’s GamePlan pay-per-view package as well as online on ESPN3.
The winner will between ASU and Western Illinois will face the winner of Saturday’s Villanova-Stephen F. Austin game in the quarterfinals. If ASU wins, the game will be in Boone either next Friday night or Saturday, Dec. 11.