Southeast Missouri State’s football team is experiencing offensive depth chart turnover, but one position appears to be stable heading into the team’s season opener: quarterback.
Senior quarterback Jesse Hosket, who won the starting job before the season from incumbent starter Dante Vandeven, will be the first quarterback to start consecutive season openers since Matt Scheible in 2011.
Last season Hosket threw for 2,332 yards, 11 touchdowns and seven interceptions, but coach Tom Matukewicz feels Hosket is much more prepared for the season than he was at this time last year.
“It’s really hard to get to chapters four, five and six when you’re new and still in chapters one and two,” Matukewicz said. “Jesse’s done a great job, him and coach [Jon] Wiemers have done a great job, they’re finishing each other’s sentences just the way you’d want it. Now we’ve just got to put it all together.”
For Hosket, the game has slowed down around him, and being more comfortable in his second year of offense has allowed him to just play football, rather than thinking too much.
“I think it’s less thinking and more playing by instinct now,” Hosket said. “Having that first year under your belt, you’re able to just play faster and overall be a better player.”
Not only does Hosket have more comfort with the offense itself, but also more of a rapport with his receiving core. The Redhawks are returning two of their top five receivers from last season, sophomore wide receiver Kristian Wilkinson and senior Tyler McLemore. Hosket has worked with the receivers during the end of last season to develop better timing on his throws.
“They’re more comfortable, Jesse a lot of times knows where they’re going, those guys have been throwing together for a year now and a lot during the summer,” offensive coordinator Wiemers said. “A lot of times quarterbacks get that mojo when they’re throwing to the same guys all of the time.”
Wilkerson, who led the team in touchdowns last year with four, is expected to take on the top receiving role this season left behind by Tremane McCullough.
Another top position with a void left by a senior from last season is running back, but the team feels the running game will actually be the strength of the offense.
Juniors Marquis Terry and Cameron Sanders are expected to be the lead backs for Southeast, with others also playing smaller roles.
“Running back is probably the highlight on offense right now,” Hosket said. “We’ve got four or five of them we can play right now. They can all do it and they all have their own aspects and strengths to the game, that’s the best thing.”
Terry, who led the NJCAA in rushing last season with Highland Community College, is a smaller running back at 5 foot 6 inches, but his speed has excited his teammates and coaches.
“It gives you some great advantages because it can give you some mismatches when linebackers try covering those guys,” Hosket said. “If you can get the ball out there to them on the edge, they have some open field to make some plays out there.”
Sanders on the other hand is a bigger back, and converted from safety last season. While he struggled at times to get on the field last season, the coaches said it was not because of physical ability, but more due to his inexperience with aspects of the game, such as pass blocking and finding holes in the offensive line.
“He’s a really good athlete, and obviously he’s done a lot of great things as a returner, for him it’s just learning how to play running back,” Wiemers said. “[Running backs] coach [Ghaali Muhammad-Lankford] has done a great job training him on his vision and cuts.”
The offensive line that will be creating running lanes for those backs are seeing major changes as well after losing three starters.
While the only returning starters are junior tackle Drew Forbes and senior guard Alex Snyder, Wiemers sees the current unit as potentially being a better run-blocking group than last season’s.
“We’ve upgraded as far as size goes, we’re big up front, but a lot of it is just getting those five guys to mesh up together,” Wiemers said. “They’re continually getting better and could be a really good group.”
Matukewicz agrees, calling this group the biggest he’s seen in his time at Southeast. The one concern the coaching staff has with the offensive line is chemistry, with three new starters in place.
“Chemistry is the most important thing you have at that position,” Wiemers said. “It’s more important there than anywhere else because they have to trust each other to do their job individually in order to play good as a unit.”
Last season the Redhawks ranked last in the Ohio Valley Conference in both points per game and yards per game.
Southeast Missouri State’s football team will only return four starters from last year’s defensive unit that finished third in the Ohio Valley Conference in scoring defense.
Among those who departed after last season were inside linebacker Roper Garrett and safety Eriq Moore, two of the most vocal leaders on the defense. Defensive coordinator Bryce Saia said while they will be missed, along with the other seniors, the team feels good about its current group, and they’ll have chances to prove themselves immediately.
“They were great leaders and they were loud,” Saia said. “Whenever you lose seven out of 11 starters, you have to try to reload as best and quickly as you can. The truth always comes out in what we do here, so we’re getting ready to find out if we reloaded or not.”
With seven new starters on the defensive side of the ball, coach Tom Matukewicz expects to see some growing pains, due to inexperience, even though he believes in their talent.
“We’ve just got to catch up the young ones,” Matukewicz said. “The talent is there, it’s just that everything is new. We’ve got to coach them up, get them through the hard times, sometimes just clap them through it and grow them up on the field. If we struggle, it won’t be because of talent, it’ll just be because they make some mistakes.”
All four returners are seniors, nose tackle Josh Wilson, cornerback Mike Ford and outside linebackers Kendall Donnerson and Chad Meredith.
Meredith, who was named preseason All-OVC and to the STATS 2017 FBS, and Donnerson tied for the team’s lead in sacks last season with four a piece. The duo is considered one of the top OLB combinations in the OVC.
Returning both of their top pass rushers is an advantage Matukewicz is hoping leads to success for the defense.
“We’ve got to be able to get to the quarterback,” Matukewicz said. “And those two guys we’ve got to keep fresh so when it’s third down or the game’s on the line inside two minutes they can really affect the game.”
Saia believes a pressuring the quarterback can help his defensive backs by allowing them to not have to cover receivers for longer routes.
“The best pass coverage is a pass rush. If a defensive back gives up a big play on game day, everyone sees the DB,” Saia said. “I always look at the pass rush first, that’s how I’ve always thought about it. If those two are on, it helps the secondary.”
While the secondary only returns Ford as a starter, senior safety Omar Pierre-Lewis played a significant role last season as well after Ford missed the final six games due to injury. While being sidelined, Ford was able to see different parts of the game, which he thinks will help him on the field this season.
“It helped me figure out what teams were trying to do from a different perspective where I wasn’t just focused in on one side of the field,” Ford said.
Ford is embracing his role as mentor on the field as well this season, helping the younger players around him, including sophomore wide receiver-turned cornerback Al Young.
“I have to keep these guys focused on the big picture because it’s easy for a young guy to lose focus but I’m always there to keep them on track and they’ve done a really good job,” Ford said. “I believe in these guys just as much as I would if I were with four other seniors.”
The Redhawks’ season opens on Saturday in Lawrence, Kansas, when Southeast faces Kansas.
