(12-09-2011 11:57 PM)CrushMI Wrote: I was impressed by the UNT backup RB. Should be a good one.
James Hamilton is a senior also.
My take is that the biggest UNT story next year will be about who takes over at RB. Dan MacCarney redshirted his 6 best recruits from his 1st class this season: 2 RB's (Zac Whitfield and Antoinne Jimmerson), 1 WR (Chaz Sampson), 1 QB (Cooper Jones), 1 FS (Kerry Swarn), and 1 OL (Grant Shaw).
Of those freshmen that played, 3 made immediate impacts, LB Mike Stojokovic, CB Freddie Warner, and RG Cyril Lemon. A few others made some plays too, most notably Lairamie Lee in the secondary and on Special Teams, Derek Akunne at LB and Alex Lincoln as a sub at DE. All in all, pretty good for a class recruited in a hurry last Dec/Jan by this staff.
Starters lost are 2 on Offense (Dunbar and RT Matt Tomlinson) and 4 on Defense (DE Brandon Akpunku, CB Royce Hill and safeties Ryan Downing and Brad Graham. Of those, the safeties are easily replaceable, both were JUCO's with a record of occasionally good play (Downing) and one playing because he wasn't as bad as the other JUCO backing him up (Graham). Swarn will be an immediate upgrade over either of them.
The other safety will be Oklahoma transfer Marcus Trice, who saw significant playing time as a true freshman at OU in 2010. Warner will return at one Corner (he missed the last few games in 2011 with an injury), the other will likely be a JUCO or Trice if another good safety can be found. There is a 3-Star CB committed in the upcoming class (Xavier Kelly), but obviously he has to actually sign first.
The LB corps will be contesting the OL for best unit in 2012. Zach Orr return for his Junior year at MLB, he would have been a 1st team All-SBC and contender for SBC Def POY if not for a broken leg in week 9. OLB's will be Stojokovic and Jeremy Phillips. The backups are quality as well, especially Akunne who played well filling in for Orr. This group could potentially be a good as the 2002-2003 group.
Part of what made the NT linebacker play so great during the early SBC years was the DT's, as :ncaabbs: Booger and Michael Pruitt required 3 to 4 OL's dedicated to just them, allowing the DE's to get single blocking and the LB's to roam all over the field. Sadly, NT doesn't currently have anything resembling Kennedy or Pruitt in the middle of the DL. Both starters Tevinn Cantly and Richard Abbe return, but that's due to not having anything better available yet. In fairness, both Abbe and Cantly made big strides in 2011, improving from inadequate to passable. One backup, Ryan Boutwell, plays very hard and makes the occasional play but is very undersized at 265 and is about as big as he's gonna get. Help is likely on the way in this next class here as well as Sir Calvin Wallace has excellent size and dominates his opposition. If either Cantly or Abbe do not take another step up in their development, Wallace could beat one of them out fairly early next fall.
The DE's are in better shape however, as Brandon "Sarge" McCoy returns from a good sophomore season. Opposite him replacing Akpunku will be the winner of what is shaping up to be a heck of a spring/summer battle between Lincoln and returning backup (and special teams demon) Aaron Bellazin. Both are prototypical DE's at 250+ as opposed to the outgoing Akpunku, who was an undersized speed-rusher. LaChris Aniyam is a possibility to return to the DL after having been moved to OL last summer due to the uncertainty of all the turnover on the OL going into the 2011 season.
That turnover, which saw 2 RS Fr (LG Mason Y'Barbo and LT Antonio Johnson) and 1 true Freshman (RG Lemon) combine with outgoing RT Tomlinson and holdover C Aaron Fortenberry to exceed everyone's expectations. What's coming is a big part of the story too as transfer Cam Feldt, a former 4-Star by way of Arkansas, will step right in at RT. Cam's younger brother Boone Feldt (3-Star) is one of the upcoming class's highest rated recruits, and could challenge Fortenberry at C or Y'Barbo at LG right away. Add to that redshirt Grant Shaw, who could win the RT spot himself moving Cam Feldt to LG and it's easy to see why the next NT RB will have plenty of holes to run through. Only one of all these players (Fortenberry) will be a senior next year, and none will be juniors.
Looking to run through those holes will be the winner of a off-season battle between RS freshmen Zac Whitfield and Antoinne Jimmerson. Whitfield is the faster of the two, with Jimmerson the larger at about 205. Holdover RB Brandin Byrd, a big back at 215, has gotten even bigger and may be about to become a FB. Incoming commit Andrew Tucker is a 3-Star who could challenge as well. So, who will it be ? Nobody knows, probably not even MacCarney yet, but my guess is Whitfield.
QB is finally somewhat stable, with RS soph Derek Thompson progressing nicely all year. Another offseason with Canales will only improve things. Backup QB is somewhat puzzling though as highly touted JUCO Brent Osborn lost his #2 spot to undersized true freshman Andrew McNulty. McNulty didn't play well at all during his 2 turns, which left most of us puzzled as to why Osborn didn't get a shot, as he'd done better than McNulty in his brief playing time. Add in that the McNulty family are long-time friends of the MacCarneys (Andrew's father played with Dan MacCarney at Iowa) and some are suspicious of a possible less-than-arm's-length relationship between HC and QB. (we've had some recent experience with that, of course). Upshot is, if Osborn doesn't come out of spring ball at the #2, he likely will transfer to a FCS program, as he will have 2 years eligibility left next year. Which brings one of MacCarney's 2011 3-Star redshirts, Cooper Jones. It's been rumored that Jones might transfer to safety, but I'm thinking he will be the #2 QB next year.
WR's figured to be decent to good going into Summer 2011, but 2 quick events changed all that. First, returning underclassman All-SBC Darius Carey decided team rules were overrated, and is now running patterns in Lake Charles. Second, highly talented but underachieving transfer Tyler Stradford quit football following a disaster of a 2010 season that included an injury running from a pit bull. What was left was Chris Bynes (coming off an Achilles Tendon tear), and Brelan Chancellor, who had show a few glimpses at WR but was far more dangerous as a kick returner. It turned out OK as Bynes stepped up to become reliable and Chancellor improved his routes as well. Unfortunately, Sun Belt Special Teams Coordinators proved their VCR players were working just fine as all SBC teams repeatedly kicked the ball away from Chancellor on kickoffs. The biggest story at WR was the mid-season emergence of walk-on Ivan Delgado. Delgado was a walkon transfer from a few Div 2-3 schools, where he had played QB. He turned out to be an excellent route-runner with superglue hands, even if he didn't have deep speed. Sort of a Sun Belt version of Wes Welker. All 3 return next year. Like OL, there's highly touted help on the way with some good 3-Star recruits at WR. The biggest new impact though should be the last of MacCarney's Super-redshirts, Chaz Sampson. Big (6'5) and fast, there are high expectations of him.
The specialists are a strength as Will Atterberry and Chancellor are all-conference quality at punter and kick returner. Zach Olen is a good kicker with FG's of over 50 yds in his career. All will return in 2012.
To make a long story longer, NT will return 9 starters on offense, and 7 on defense, as well as all specialists. LB and OL will be the top-notch units, QB good, WR and DL fair to good, with DB and RB impossible to tell at this time, but with good reasons for hope at each.
