Everything you need to know for Coastal Carolina at Louisiana-Monroe

Last meeting

This is the teams’ first meeting

Coastal Carolina

Strengths: Running back depth

Weakness: Quarterback production

Louisiana-Monroe

Strengths: Dual-threat quarterback

Weakness: Allowing big plays

Key matchup

Coastal Carolina’s defense vs. Louisiana-Monroe quarterback Caleb Evans: The Chanticleers defense gave up more than 500 yards of offense and 52 points to Western Illinois last week, and now must find a way to stop ULM sophomore quarterback Caleb Evans, who is 6-foot-2 and 210 pounds. In last week’s 56-50 double overtime win over Louisiana-Lafayette, Evans completed 28 of 34 passes for 343 yards and a touchdown while rushing for 129 yards and tying a school record with five rushing touchdowns. Coastal expects to get sophomore linebacker Laqavious Paul back from injury but may be without senior linebacker Shane Johnson for the second straight week with an ankle injury. CCU interim coach Jamey Chadwell said Johnson was “doubtful” for the game and his availability would likely be a game-time decision.

Players to watch

Coastal Carolina

Junior safety Fitz Wattley: He leads the team with 28 total tackles, has recorded 11 in two games this season, and has a team-high six tackles on special teams.

Sophomore receiver Ky’Jon Tyler: With kick returner Chris Jones out with an injury last week, he had 191 all-purpose yards against Western Illinois after tallying 102 all-purpose yards against UAB.

Junior receiver Malcolm Williams: He had game-highs last week with five receptions for 79 yards, including a 50-yard gain, and he’s playing close to his hometown of Shreveport, La.

Louisiana-Monroe

Sophomore quarterback Caleb Evans: He has completed 46 of 72 passes for 503 yards and two touchdowns without an interception this season, while gaining 227 yards on 36 carries with seven rushing TDs.

Senior running back Derrick Gore: He has gained 214 yards on 56 carries and scored three rushing touchdowns this season.

Junior wide receiver Marcus Green: Last week he caught eight passes for 117 yards with a long of 39 yards.

He said it

“I think it reiterates the fact that nothing is ever for certain. You have to go hard every single second that pre-clock is running, every single second between snaps to get your mind right, focus up and bounce back. Even when you face adversity you have to keep pushing, keep plugging, so that way if something doesn’t go your way you can at least look at yourself in the mirror and you can at least be proud of the effort that you gave.” – CCU senior defensive tackle Dwayne Price

“It’s an open competition right now. … It’ll probably be a game-time decision. We have to be better than what we’ve been so we’ve repped a couple more people this week in certain situations. I have an idea of who it’s going to be.” – CCU interim head coach Jamey Chadwell on a starting quarterback

“The one shining light is we haven’t been in conference yet. It’s non-conference and even though it was ugly we’ve still got a lot of things we need to try to work on to get better, but we’ve still got our first conference game coming up. … You still have all the conference ahead of you so it’s not like your season is over. There are still a lot of things to do.” – CCU interim head coach Jamey Chadwell

Scouting report

Coastal Carolina plays its first-ever Sun Belt Conference game coming off the worst home loss in school history, a 52-10 drubbing at the hands of Western Illinois. The Chants have dropped two straight games after opening the season with a 10-point win over Massachusetts, which was the team’s eighth consecutive win.

ULM opened the season with a pair of losses, 37-29 at Memphis and 28-17 at home to Southern Mississippi, and in between had a scheduled game at Florida State postponed because of Hurricane Irma. The Warhawks are coming off a big win last week, 56-50 over rival Louisiana-Lafayette to open Sun Belt play with a victory. The Warhawks, who were 4-7 overall and 3-4 in the Sun Belt last season, blew a 21-point lead in the second half.

Louisiana-Monroe can score but will also give up points and yardage. In last week’s game against Louisiana-Lafayette, the teams combined for 1,119 yards and 59 first downs.

Coastal hopes to find an answer at quarterback this week. The team’s 137 yards passing last week marked the first time in six games it threw for more than 100 yards. CCU will also have to protect the ball better than it has in the past couple weeks if it hopes to pull off the upset. After not turning the ball over in its opener, CCU has committed seven turnovers in the past two weeks, including six interceptions.

Notes

▪ CCU had forced a turnover in 15 consecutive games with a total of 33 turnovers in that span prior to last week’s loss, in which it forced no turnovers.

▪ Coastal was 10-3 in Big South Conference league openers, including 4-0 when it opened league play on the road.

▪ Prior to its 42-point loss last week, Coastal’s previous eight losses dating back to 2014 were by a combined 29 points.

Line

Louisiana-Monroe -7.5

Prediction

Louisiana-Monroe 44, Coastal Carolina 27: The Sun Belt Conference opener on the road should be more than Coastal can handle.

This story was originally published September 29, 2017 at 6:16 PM with the headline "Everything you need to know for Coastal Carolina at Louisiana-Monroe."