CCU Notebook: Why this three-headed monster is making Chants’ offense even more potent
C.J. Marable has been the workhorse for the Coastal Carolina offense in each of the last two seasons.
In 2018 and 2019 combined the senior running back had 375 touches on offense, rushing 322 times for 1,804 yards and 17 touchdowns while also catching 53 passes for 475 yards and five scores.
But with the emergence this season of junior college transfer Shermari Jones and sophomore Reese White of Sandy Springs, Georgia, the 5-foot-10, 200-pound Marable hasn’t had to be the workhorse that he’s been, particularly in the past two games.
Marable is still productive, leading the team’s running backs in rushing attempts (98) and yards (370) as well as receptions (20) and receiving yards (154), but Jones and White are now sharing the load.
“We’re a very dangerous offense,” White said. “If you guys want to stop one person, you have to find a way to stop the rest of us because a lot of us can make plays.”
Coastal rushed for 236 yards on 33 carries for a 7.2 per-rush average in Saturday’s 23-6 win over South Alabama despite Marable being held to 17 yards on five carries and 21 receiving yards with a touchdown and lost fumble.
The ground game was by committee Saturday, as White (5-10, 185) led the way with nine carries for 81 yards, followed by quarterback Grayson McCall with eight rushes for 72 yards, and Jones (6-1, 220) with 10 attempts for 60 yards and a score.
“Both of those guys have gotten better each week, and if you’ve seen we’re giving them more opportunities because they do have some specific skills sets and they run hard,” CCU coach Jamey Chadwell said. “We were able to run the ball the way we needed to, I felt like, but some of the passes we normally hit we didn’t hit to get the big plays and some of those things. We just weren’t as crisp there.
“For those guys to be able to run the ball when maybe C.J. wasn’t at his best, that’s a big deal. So that shows you we’ve got some guys that can step up when we need them to.”
The rushing yards in the game by Jones and White were season and career highs, and a 46-yard run by White in the first quarter is the longest of his career.
“[White] runs hard. He makes people miss, he’s a physical guy, and he gets better every week,” Chadwell said.
Marable averaged 16.6 rushes per game through the first five games, but is down to 7.5 per game over the past two. White now has 309 yards and three TDs on 48 carries this season, while Jones has 268 yards and three scores on 53 rushes and has yet to be thrown for a loss.
“They kind of use me to run between the tackles. Me and Shermari are more of the dive back guys and C.J. is more of the pitch back,” White said. “But I can be the pitch back with C.J. because Shermari is more of a bigger back, and me and C.J. are more of the elusive, short backs, and we can kind of play both roles. So we kind of complement each other.”
Marable, who has more than 3,000 yards rushing in college including his freshman season at Presbyterian, has been providing more than just production to the running back group.
“C.J. has taught me a lot,” White said. “He’s been leading us well, teaching me how to stay humble and if I make a bad play to keep my head up and not dwell on it too much. I just think he’s been a great role model for me the past couple years.”
In the polls
Coastal remained at No. 15 in the AP Top 25 Poll on Sunday and dropped a spot in the USA Today Amway Coaches Poll, swapping places with Iowa State to fall to No. 17.
Among schools that aren’t members of Power Five Conferences, the Chants are the third-highest team in the AP poll behind No. 7 Cincinnati of the American Athletic Conference and No. 8 BYU, an independent. No. 16/15 Marshall of Conference USA is behind CCU in the AP poll and ahead of it in the coaches poll.
The Chants entered the AP poll at No. 25 on Oct. 18, and moved up to Nos. 20 and 15 over the past two weeks. The more they win, the more spoils may be awaiting.
“Our guys are smart enough to realize there’s a lot of opportunities potentially out there that could happen, but that’s a could happen, and that’s sort of out of our control,” Chadwell said. “What we do control is how well we play each week. So I let that sort of go unspoken. Guys are smart enough to figure that out. We don’t need to put any added things on there because I don’t want anything to take away from what we have to do each week. When you start looking at things down the path so to speak, then you lose sight of what got you to that point.”
Race to the QB
Senior defensive end Tarron Jackson set the CCU sack record last season with 10, and he’s looking to break it this season. But he’s not alone.
Fellow senior defensive lineman C.J. Brewer and junior outside linebacker Jeffrey Gunter, who returned to CCU after a year at N.C. State in 2019, are chasing the mark as well in a friendly competition.
“It’s a competition between me, C.J. and Tarron every time we pass rush,” Gunter said. “The excitement just shows. I love playing with those guys. They push me to get better.”
The competition was in full effect Saturday, as Brewer and Gunter were each in on sacks early in the game.
“I saw C.J. and Jeff get that first one and it kind of flipped the light on for me,” Jackson said. “We just have to keep competing against each other. Iron sharpens iron so if we keep doing that we’re all going to get our sack totals up.”
Jackson went on to record 2.5 sacks on Jaguars quarterback Desmond Trotter, causing a fumble on one, to retake the season lead in sacks. Jackson now has six, Brewer has five and Gunter has four of CCU’s 25 sacks on the season.
“When you can get a pass rush like that, and you have to try to max protect to block four, that allows your coverages to be better,” Chadwell said. “So our front four is really getting after the opposing quarterback, especially the last three weeks.”
Catching on at WR
The Chants are a little light at wide receiver with the losses to injury either in the preseason or early this season of sophomore Aaron Bedgood, redshirt freshman Deon Fountain and freshman Tyson Mobley. Bedgood and Fountain are out for the season.
So junior quarterback Bryce Carpenter, who started eight games behind center over his freshman and sophomore seasons, is getting some looks at wide receiver and caught the first pass of his career in the second quarter, a 13-yarder.
He then took a snap from center on the next play, with McCall split to the left as a wide receiver, and gained 6 yards on a QB run.
“We are banged up there so we needed to use him some,” Chadwell said. “. . . Going into the season we’ve lost three receivers to season-ending injuries that would be playing, so we were already thin then you get guys going into this [game].
“So we’ve got to find some more guys and Bryce is a guy that’s got some talent and ability to do that, so we worked him there and he caught a pass and rushed once so that was pretty cool.”
Not a first-born win
Coastal didn’t play as clean a game as it would have liked on Saturday – Chadwell referred to it as an ugly win – but that apparently didn’t temper the celebration in the locker room.
“I told them they’ll understand if they have their own kids that there is no ugly baby,” Chadwell explained. “It might have been ugly but we celebrated it just as much.”
This story was originally published November 8, 2020 at 3:22 PM.
