Why Coastal Carolina football is the only team in the nation practicing right now
If it seems like the Coastal Carolina football team just played the 2020 FBC Mortgage Cure Bowl about a month ago, that’s because it did.
Yet the Chanticleers were back on the field Wednesday for the start of 2021 spring practices.
The Chants are the first team in the nation to begin spring practices, and with CCU’s spring break pushed back into April, head coach Jamey Chadwell wanted to complete the spring and give his team a chance to have a seven-week on-campus workout program that it missed last year because of the suspension of in-person classes caused by the coronavirus. Chadwell is unsure if Coastal will allow students back on campus following spring break.
CCU and Connecticut, which didn’t play a 2020 season, were the only programs to get through a full spring practice period last year. The Chants began that in early February.
“I’m a big believer with an earlier start there are a lot of benefits to it,” Chadwell said. “. . . If something major happens with COVID maybe we’re ahead of the game, and if it doesn’t we’ve got more time to really work out and get our team ready to go.
“I felt like the early spring practice really helped us last year but we really missed that offseason conditioning and the weight program, and I think that really showed up throughout the season and I didn’t want to miss it this year.”
There are seven January enrollees who are new to the team taking part in practices.
There are also a number of familiar faces, some who are back for their sixth seasons in the program.
Seniors remain in Conway
The NCAA allowed all fall sports athletes to retain a year of eligibility, so even 2020 redshirt seniors have an opportunity to play another season in 2021.
The Chants returned most of their key seniors from 2020.
The returning seniors include three of the four team captains in defensive lineman C.J. Brewer, linebacker Teddy Gallagher and offensive lineman Trey Carter, linebacker Silas Kelly, a 2020 Mayo Clinic Comeback Player of the Year, and the long snapper and punter/holder combination of C.J. Schrimpf and Charles Ouverson of Murrells Inlet.
The two primary losses are defensive end Tarron Jackson and running back C.J. Marable, who have both declared for the NFL Draft.
“I think it’s exciting. I was pumped because you never know, sometimes young people might really be ready to move on, they’re not having fun, they’re not excited,” Chadwell said. “But I think because of what we did and the trajectory of our program they wanted to come back and do it again.
“One, it’s awesome because you’ve got a lot of good players returning, and two, the leadership of that and the example it sets I think will be a huge benefit for us longterm.”
Gallagher and Brewer both said they returned largely to have another chance to impress pro scouts.
“I kind of knew all along we were going to have a lot of guys coming back, a lot of guys that people probably didn’t expect to come back,” Gallagher said. “It was just weighing my options. Obviously the goal is to play football after college, and you have to decide what gives you the best opportunity to do that, and I thought coming back was the best opportunity for me.”
Chadwell will attempt to navigate an extra class compressed into the depth chart.
“It is a challenge but also I think it creates competition among each other, and I told those guys returning, we know they’re good players, but you’ve got to come back and earn it too. I’m not going to let you just cruise and then think you’re going to just go out and play, you’ve got to do some things. . . . I think our young people still know there is going to be opportunities to play and continue.”
A handful of CCU players have entered the NCAA transfer portal seeking another place to play and they were largely second on or further down the depth chart including quarterback Fred Payton, offensive linemen Cesar Moreno and Sean Fitzgerald, who is going to Missouri State, running back Baden Pinson, tight end Michael McFarlane and defensive backs K.J. Johnson and Damari Kelly.
The Chants are adding from the transfer portal offensive lineman Zovon Lindsay from N.C. State, freshman defensive end Emmanuel Johnson from Georgia Tech and defensive back Tre Douglas from Vanderbilt, according to 247Sports and other recruiting websites.
“I’m extremely excited. Definitely the leadership part is going to be huge. They’re great players and they’ve build the culture here for us so we’re really excited to have them back,” McCall said.
National signing day for the second semester is next Wednesday, and Chadwell expects to sign just one more player to add to the 17 he signed last month. That will leave at least three scholarships that he anticipates will go to more players from the transfer portal.
“We’ve got such a good nucleus coming back, you can be really selective about hey, ‘Is there a specific need we may have?’ and we’ll try to find that need through the spring and through the summer,” Chadwell said.
Much to look forward to
For the first time in a few years the Chants have a clear No. 1 at quarterback going into a season with the return for his redshirt sophomore season of Sun Belt Conference Player of the Year Grayson McCall.
He is recovering from a few injuries suffered during the 2020 season, including a torn ligaments on his right (throwing) thumb that he initially thought would require surgery. “But it actually healed really well and I’m now like 90 percent in my right hand, so that’s good and I feel pretty good for the most part.” So the QB job on the line this spring and fall is the primary backup position.
“One of our main goals is to find out who is going to be our No. 2 and how are we going to use him, and that starts obviously today to see who is really going to take that spot over,” Chadwell said.
Chadwell has pinpointed the ways he believes the team can improve this upcoming season.
“That’s going to be our whole focus is about finding a way to get better, individually and as a team.
“We have to improve from a special teams standpoint. We didn’t finish strong in a lot of areas . . . so that’s one of the areas we definitely need to improve and get better at. From an offensive standpoint when we didn’t play as well it’s because we turned the ball over, so that’s another emphasis. . . . And defensively the last couple games from a standpoint of getting the ball in space, and people did some things to us in space, so we’ve got to change some things up.”
The team will be trying to recreate its breakout 2020 season, this time with a better ending, and Gallagher believes the team can improve upon the year and the 11-1 record.
“The year before we lost close games at the end of the game, and we worked the whole offseason preaching about finishing games, finishing games, paying attention to details,” Gallagher said. “I wouldn’t say it was magic I’d say it was the hard work that went into it. Our word for the spring right now is better - get 1 % better every day. I wouldn’t say it was magic, I think we’ll be able to play better than we did this past season.”
This story was originally published January 27, 2021 at 4:24 PM.
