Eastern ready for the Salukis
CARBONDALE, Ill. – The following is not for the faint of heart.
The top-ranked I-AA football team that awaits No. 14 Eastern Washington (8-3) for this afternoon’s kickoff at McAndrew Stadium doesn’t appear to have any weaknesses.
The Southern Illinois Salukis are 10-1 for a reason – make that many reasons.
The Salukis are big and balanced, fast and physical.
SIU has the second-ranked offense and fifth-ranked defense in the country; second in scoring at 43.6 points a game and first in points allowed, 11.2. And the Salukis have a darn good kicker in sophomore Craig Coffin, who has made all 62 of his extra points and 12 of 14 field goals.
“They’re probably the most complete football team we will see this year, without question, and one of the better teams we’ve seen on film in a few years,” Eastern coach Paul Wulff said. “They remind us the most of Portland State. They’re real similar in styles and personnel in terms of physicality. I just think Southern Illinois has a few more weapons overall than Portland State does.”
Maybe more than a few more weapons.
There is a stable of running backs dubbed “The Perfect Storm.” Junior college transfer Arkee Whitlock, Auburn transfer Brandon Jacobs, Minnesota transfer Terry Jackson and true freshman Craig Turner have combined for 2,477 yards and 32 touchdowns.
“They all have a little bit different style of running,” Wulff said. “They kind of just go with who’s hot. Obviously for short yards they like to use the bigger back. I don’t know if there is necessarily a rhyme or reason.”
Whitlock, a 5-9, 195-pound speedster, leads the pack with 874 yards, but Jacobs, a 260-pound bruiser who had 446 yards with a team-high 6.2-yard average at Auburn last year, is right behind him with 826 and a team-high 15 touchdowns.
Two years ago, Jackson, who has missed two games with injuries and only has 441 yards, had 1,317 yards for the Golden Gophers, including back-to-back 200-yard games. When Jackson missed the third game of this season, Turner had his redshirt pulled and has averaged 11.6 yards a carry on 29 carries.
“The first thing we have to do is slow down their running game. They have dominated people with the run,” Wulff said. “We need to force them to pass the ball.”
Easier said than done considering the offense operates behind a 1,500-pound senior-dominated line that goes 310, 295, 315, 295, 295 across the front and has combined for 128 starts. The leader is 315-pound All-American center Elmer McDaniel.
Junior quarterback Joel Sambursky has a handful of school records already, including career touchdown passes (43) and total offense (6,060 yards) and is second in the nation in passing efficiency (175.28), just a fraction behind Eastern’s Erik Meyer.
Forcing Sambursky to throw isn’t a guarantee of success. He has completed 128 of 203 passes (63 percent) for 2,061 yards and 19 touchdowns with four interceptions. Sambursky, who has started 35 straight games, has also rushed for more than 1,000 yards in his career.
“They don’t ask him to throw the ball nearly as much as (Montana State’s) Travis Lulay or even Erik,” Wulff said. “He runs a lot of rollouts and bootlegs. The thing he does very well is not force the football. If the throw isn’t there he’s not going to risk it.”
That’s why the Salukis are a plus-13 in turnover margin. And to think they may be even better on defense, not surprising with nine returning starters from a team that was fifth in the nation last year.
“We said all along we were only going to be as good as our defense,” SIU coach Jerry Kill said. “And they’ve been good all along.”
SIU has yielded just 13 touchdowns in 11 games and four opponents failed to score a touchdown.
“I think they’re very good but I don’t think those numbers would be the same if they had our schedule,” said Wulff, whose team beat four of the five ranked opponents it faced. “They do play very good defense, they’re very physical. … It’s going to be a big challenge for our offense. We always go in with the idea we’re going to run and throw equally. We need to find a way to do both. We have enough in our playbook to do some things we think should match up and give us a chance to have success.”
Safety Alexis Mooreland, a two-time All-American and NFL prospect, has 48 tackles and four interceptions, returning one 95 yards for a touchdown. Junior linebacker Royal Whitaker leads the team with 84 tackles. Jeff Jones, a 275-pound junior defensive tackle who started five games at linebacker as a freshman, is a good run-stopper and has 7.5 tackles for loss.
SIU limited opponents to 32 percent success rate on third down, while Eastern had an impressive 52 percent success rate. The Salukis were also solid in the red zone, giving up 15 scores in 21 opportunities, but only seven touchdowns.
The Salukis won a national championship as an independent in 1983 but then fell on hard times. Before last year’s team – Kill’s third – went 10-2 and lost at eventual champion Delaware in the first round of the playoffs, SIU had not won a Gateway Conference title in its first 16 years in the league and only had a winning record twice.
The lone loss this year was at Northern Illinois, which is 7-2 and ranked 22nd in the I-A coaches poll. SIU fell 23-22, failing on a two-point conversion with 57 seconds remaining in the game.
Wulff is banking on his team’s challenging schedule to offset the lack of playoff experience and facing the top-ranked team.
“The fact we had a very, very difficult schedule helped us,” he said. “I don’t think we’re worried. We’ve had our backs against the wall all year. We should be relaxed and play football like we’ve been playing. We’ve had time to let (the opponent’s credentials) sink in. We had a bye week. Then it was time to get back to work. These kids know how to work. We had a good week of practice, that’s all you can ask for.”