2020 Season Opener

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The Cajuns are (less than) nine days away from their first game of the season and unfortunately, the injuries keep racking up. That list of growing injuries includes wide receiver Brian Smith who’s out with a broken hip.

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KATC
Briana Aldridge

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If you don’t believe in reaching for the stars, you may not want to talk to UL junior right tackle Max Mitchell any time soon.

Ask him about his expectations and he doesn’t believe in setting the bar very low.

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Advocate
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How is the UL football team shaping up by position as the Ragin' Cajuns head into the 2020 season with a visit to No. 25 Iowa State?

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They’re no longer up-and-comers in this crazy world that is college football coaching. It’s doubtful that anyone even dares to call them that anymore. All right a few years back, making that cliché claim today is one gigantic show of disrespect

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Des Moines Register
Randy Peterson

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One Iowa State player UL coach Billy Napier didn’t have to watch a minute of film to be sold on was junior quarterback Brock Purdy.

Not only is the 6-1, 212-pound quarterback already on such watch lists as the Davey O’Brien, Manning, Maxwell and Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award, but Napier was recruiting Purdy even before his three seasons as UL’s coach.

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Advocate
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[RaginDave]

Fist off, lets talk about Iowa State in general, they are predicted to be in the top of the Big 12. I have seen them picked anywhere from 2nd -5th. At least one "expert" thought they had a chance to be in the final 4. I will not go that far, I believe they are a bottom half top 25 team. A win Saturday would be a huge accomplishment for the Cajuns and this staff. This team is really good on offense and not bad on defense either. They are very mixed on offense both throwing and running the ball. This team finished 7-6 last year with wins vs Northern Iowa (triple overtime), ULM in a route, West Virginia, Texas Tech, Texas and Kansas. They had losses to Iowa (by 1), Baylor (by 2), Oklahoma State (by 6). Oklahoma (by 1), Kansas State (by 10) and then beaten soundly in the Camping World bowl by Notre Dame, but as you can see they could have easily won many other games.

QB--Very good. Brock Purdy threw for almost 4000 yards last year with a completion percentage at 65.7%. He ended the year with 27 TD's and 9 INT's. But he is also pretty good with his feet as well. The was the 2nd leading rusher on the team behind a near 1000 yard rusher. He ended the year with 9 TD's on the ground and 394 yards rushing, that is not counting losses for sacks. He will take it and run occasionally as he had 93 carries which was 2nd most on the team. He is really good, and I know we say this allot, potentially the best QB we will see all season, but this time I truly believe he is the best we will see all season. And that is saying allot as we will see some pretty good ones this year. By most publications, Purdy is the 2nd team Big 12 QB, behind Sam Ehlinger of Texas and I have seen some people claim he might be better. The good news is behind Purdy they have very little as far experience goes, but that might not mean much as Purdy threw all but 4 of their passes last year. The backups are both true freshman, but the are both highly recruited guys.

RB--Again a spot where they are very good, but very limited in experience behind their #1 guy. Breece Hall a sophomore is the #1 guy, he finished with 956 yards on the ground last year, good for a 4.8 yard per carry average. He also caught 23 passes for 252 yards and a TD. On the ground where he is most effective he scored 9 TD's. The expectations are for Hall to carry most of the load, but a few guys behind him have been on the team a while, just not allot of carries as Hall is he main guy. Hall is predicted to be 1st or 2nd team big 12 guy as well as rush for over 1000 yards this year. So as you can see they are very balanced.

WR/TE--They lose their #1 WR from last year a very good one in Deshaunte Jones, Jones ended the year with 76 receptions, 877 yards but only 2 TD's. They also lose their #4 WR who had 55 catches for 676 yards and 6 TD's. But they have #2 and #3 back. Tarique Milton and Charlie Kolar combined for 86 receptions, 1419 yards and 10 TD's. Kolar is a Junior that is 6'6" and 252 lbs and his partner in crime at TE Chase Allen who is 6'7" 245 lbs. They are good at TE. Xavier Hutchinson comes in from JUCO and should be a pretty good receiver. Their starters are good at the WR and TE position, in fact they may have the best combination of TE's in the country as as stated they are big.

OL--This could be a weakness for them, they have to replace 4/5's of their starting line from last year. The only returning offensive line starter from last year is Trevor Downing at Left Guard, they lose their Left Tackle, Center, Right Guard and Right Tackle who were all seniors last year. Most of what is returning for them will be backups moving into starters rolls on the O-Line. The Cajuns will need to take advantage of a young group of players on the O Line considering the only returning starter from last year is only a Sophomore.

Defense--This was not their strength last year, but again they were not terrible, it is just their offense was by far their strength. They are experienced on the Defense with 9 returning starters from last year.

DL--They lose 1 player on the D-Line in Ray Lima at Nose Tackle, but they are strong on with most of their guys returning. Jaquan Bailey at DE and Zach Peterson at the other DE return.

LB--Here is where they lose quite a bit, specifically with one guy. Their leading talckler from last year Marcell Spears Jr. is gone, Spears ended last year with 92 tackles, including 2.5 sacks and 5.5 TFL. The other 2 LB's do return with O'rien Vance and Mike Rose. Rose and Vance were the 3rd and 5th leading tacklers respectively and Vance led the team with 6.5 sacks. Jake Hummel takes over for Spears at WLB and is a senior with tons of experience. He actually ended the season with 36 tackles as a backup.

DB--Another position where they lose a very important player but return quite a bit of talent. Their number 4 leading tackler was Braxton Lewis is gone. Lewis had 68 Tackles last year from the Strong Safety position. But they return a really good Free Safety. Lawrence White ended the year as the #2 tackler with 84 tackles. He is a good one. They do return both starting corners and should be pretty good in the back half.

Special teams--They return both of their starting kickers. Joe Rivera comes back after only starting one game last year, but had 13 starts in 2018. He had a 40.6 yard per punt average with a long of 65 and 27 punts inside the 20. Corey Dunn started last year and was pretty good as well, so they have options as far as the punting goes. Their place kicker will probably be Alex Probert who is a Liberty Grad Transfer or Connor Assalley Assalley was 31-42 on FGfor his career and Probert is 46-63 in his career, whomever gets the nod will have a lot of experience. Both of their returning return men return. Kene Nwangwu as the Kickoff returner and Tarique Milton as the punt returner. Miller returned 7 punts last year for 81 yards with a long of 36, and average of 11.6. Nwangwu is a 4 year returner at KR who averages 26.3 yards per return in his career and has a 97 yard return for a TD to his resume. Last year he only averaged 25.4 yards on this returns, which was down from his previous 2 years, but still very close to his 26.4 in 16 and 26.8 in 18, so he is very consistent as a returner.

Coaches--Matt Campbell returns for his 5th as HC in Ames, Iowa. He is going for 4 straight winning seasons, which is unheard of in Ames, Iowa. Campbell was previously the HC at Toledo where he put together an impressive 35-15 record. Their DC is Jon Heacock who has been with the program for 5 years as well last year was his first as DC, he was the HC at Youngstown state from 01-09. The OC is Tom Manning in his 2nd stint as OC at ISU. Manning was the OC in 2016-2017, then coached in the NFL as TE coach for the Colts in 2018, he came back in 2019 as OC where he is today.

Make no mistake about this, this is a good football team, they are very good offensively and pretty good defensively, specifically at certain spots. As a team they averaged 32.15 points per game on offense while giving up 25.92 on defense. They had a total of 1729 yards on the ground for an average of 133 ypg on the ground and 4047 through the air for an average of 311 ypg in the air. So they like to throw it, but they can run as well. Their time of possession was 30.24 vs 29.36 for their opponents. They gave up 139.5 ypg on the ground and 229.77 ypg in the air.

I think this will be a fun game to watch, we need to establish the run game and get Mitchell and Ragas as well as Smith going. Levi can not have the type of game he had vs MSU to open the season last year, but if he plays like he did for the majority of the season we will be able to keep it close, specifically if we can own the TOP by controlling the clock with our run game. Our D-Line has to play well and control the Line of scrimmage vs a less experienced O-Line at ISU.

Geaux Cajuns

[Turbine]

Fantastic breakdown Dave. Thanks.

Since I believe offensive success begins with the Time Machines, I hope their stellar QB is hurried a lot.

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The atmosphere will be nowhere near normal for a season opener with no fans in the stands when No. 23 Iowa State plays host to Louisiana on Saturday in a nonconference game at Jack Trice Stadium in Ames, Iowa.

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CBS Sports

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Louisiana will face arguably the most talented team on their 2020 schedule this Saturday. Here are the Cyclones who stand out most.

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ESPN 1420

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AMES — Louisiana isn’t a typical first-game-of-the-season easy win that most Power-5 teams schedule. The Ragin’ Cajuns are for real and are led by senior quarterback Levi Lewis, who was named the Sun Belt Preseason Offensive Player of the Year.

WCF Courier
Ben Visser

[zephyr]

I also think we have a slight advantage as they can't draw from their home crowd. Toughest thing to do in college football is win on the road, especially at a P5 school.

[axg8750]

Great information! Thank you for putting this together and sharing.

[Duckster]

Tip of the hat to you Ragin Dave. Appreciate it!

[moorecajun]

In this time where there are many protests over the color of our skin this is a good time to look into the life of Jack Trice, the person Iowa State's stadium is named after: https://theundefeated.com/features/j...lly-cut-short/

[SlickRick]

I also think we have a slight advantage as they can't draw from their home crowd. Toughest thing to do in college football is win on the road, especially at a P5 school.

What conference are the refs from? If from B12, (very likely) that's the toughest thing when playing P5s at there place.