Welcome to my substack - TipsTrendsTakes. I (Luke) do a podcast with my co-host Justice called The G5 Hive every Monday night ~10:15 EST. This is live on Twitter and YouTube. You can also follow us in podcast form (Spotify and Apple). We recently started our Worker Bee Series where we do interviews with G5 beat reporters, student paper journalists, and in some cases superfans. We aim to give you the most accurate information out there, and who else better than the ones who are around the teams the most.
These articles will be transcripts from the interview. I would like to note these are not a complete transcript. These articles will only cover the offensive side of the ball. If you would wish to hear about the defensive side of the ball or NIL type questions, I would highly suggest watching/listening!
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Welcome to the G5 Hive and our next lecture. Welcome to this installment of our Worker Bee Series where we deep dive into the G5 college football landscape with the folks that know the teams the best. If you're watching us on YouTube, please hit that like and subscribe button.
And if you're listening to us in podcast form, please rate and review. Today we will be taking a look at the James Madison Dukes, who finished an impressive 11 and 2 in 2023 and only their second season in the FBS. And they went to their first ever bowl game, the Armed Forces Bowl.
They recently wrapped up their 2024 spring practice for their spring game on April 20th. We have a special guest joining us today. Please welcome to the show Shane Mettlen.
Shane covers JMU athletics for the Daily News Record. He's a member of the United States Basketball Writers Association and the Football Writers Association of America. He's the co-host of the Purple and Bold and the Fun Belt podcast.
Shane can be found at Shane_DNRSports on X. Welcome to the show, Shane. Hey, thanks for having me. We were glad you're here.
Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and, you know, what led you to be interested in sports journalism and covering the JMU Dukes? Yeah, I mean, getting into sports journalism in general was kind of one of those things where, like, we all love sports when we're kids, right? And then at some point, at some point, you know, it dawns on you like, hey, my career is not going to be playing in the NBA or whatever. And if you want to stay in sports, you find something to do. And, you know, kind of in my tiny hometown in the Midwest, it was kind of like, you know, most people would like to go into teaching and become a coach if they really wanted to stay in sports.
And I didn't really want to teach that much. I did OK in English. It just kind of became something I thought I might really like to do.
You know, I was one of those guys who picked up the newspaper and took out the sports section and poured over that every day growing up. And eventually it kind of dawned on me, like, yeah, maybe I can write those articles and be that guy. So that's kind of how I got there.
And then wound up on the East Coast after college and family wound up settling down in Virginia here in Shenandoah Valley, which is a really lovely place to live and raise kids and relatively affordable and everything else and just love it here. And so I'm fortunate enough to cover JMU, which has turned into a big time athletic department, which kind of gives you the best of both worlds around here. It's a small, smallish town feel, but also got some great sports happening right now.
Yeah, they do. Actually, baseball's got a big game tonight, right, 6:30, I think. So yeah, yeah, that's even a surprise this season that the baseball team's got a chance for the NCAA tournament, too.
It's just been a whirlwind kind of for JMU in this school year. So, you know, we talked earlier about how JMU had an impressive season in 2023 and also in 2022, for that matter. But obviously with success, especially when you're a G5, there's always some change that usually follows and it's usually the form of losing your head coach.
So you guys lost your head coach and virtually all the coaching staff to Indiana this offseason. They do bring in Bob Chesney, who was previously the head coach at Holy Cross. What can you tell us about Coach Chesney and what he brings to the table for the Dukes? Yeah, his resume is good.
I mean, his track record is good. He's now been at the Division three, Division two FCS level. He won big everywhere he's been and at places that hadn't really won before.
He comes to JMU and he's getting that shot at the FBS level now and also probably the first time in his career that he's come in, taken over a place where they've been winning. And, you know, maybe they're ahead of their peers in some things as far as resources and facilities and things like that. So I think just thinking about it that way, you've got to expect he should be able to continue to have some success at JMU.
Now, you know, he's never coached quite at this high level. JMU is coming off an 11 win season, which is something that's going to be hard to match on a year in, year out basis. Things kind of clicked together perfectly last year.
So, you know, whether or not there's some growing pains, it's hard to say. But I think it was a really, really good hire on JMU's part to try to continue to build the momentum that the program has. Yeah, I think JMU has done a really good job, like in recent history anyway, of coaching hires.
At some point, you got to wonder, like, when does that happen, when does that string of luck kind of run out? But maybe this time it'll stick again. Yeah, I mean, and you talk about that and I don't know if it's always luck. There's a lot of it that has to do with the culture of the school.
They had an athletic director, Jeff Bourne, who was there for 25 years and he had local ties and didn't look to move on. He made some really, really good hires and, you know, football, basketball, you know, across the board. He was good at hiring coaches.
Now he just retired. They bring in Matt Roan from Eastern Kentucky. So it's, you know, it's up in the air kind of, you know, what he does to kind of continue things.
So far, he's made a good impression. But, you know, we'll wait and see. The good thing for him is he probably has a couple of years before he has to make a big hire again.
We'll see. But, you know, hopefully they'll keep the guys in place for a little while. And talk about coaching changes.
I mean, and we're talking about other sports earlier. Basketball, we're going to have a new coach, right? Yeah. So, yeah, big, big changes there at JMU across all sports.
But getting back to football, as that often happens when you get that new head coach, it means new assistants and coordinators. JMU is no different in that regard. Coach Chesney brings over Dean Kennedy with him from Holy Cross, where he served as offensive coordinator.
Can you describe the type of offense that Coach Chesney and Kennedy will bring with them and plan to run there at JMU? You know, it's not particularly easy to just describe it because they've done different things throughout the years where they've been. And, you know, last year they had, you know, one of the most dynamic dual threat quarterbacks in the country at Holy Cross. And so the offense really, you know, gravitated towards that.
They had a lot of design run plays for the quarterback. They threw the ball some. But, you know, he had almost as many rushing yards as passing yards there at Holy Cross.
But that hasn't always been like that for Holy Cross and Chesney's teams, Kennedy's teams in general. They'll kind of adjust the play calling in particular and the designs of things to their personnel. And they're going to have some deep, fairly deep running back room going into this season.
At least it looks that way. And they bring in Dylan Morris, who I'm sure we'll talk about some more as a quarterback who's not the same kind of dual threat guy that they had up there in Massachusetts. So it'll look a little different.
And I think they're going to throw the ball more. I think it'll be more of a balanced run pass, but not so much with the design of quarterback runs, as we saw from Holy Cross the last couple of years. So speaking of the quarterback, we'll move on over there. They lost last season's starter and Sunbelt Player of the Year and Jordan McLeod, who transferred to Texas State.
They brought in Dylan Morris from Washington, who you mentioned just a moment ago, and they return Alonza Barnett III, Brett Griffis and Billy Atkins. How did the quarterback room look and shape up in the spring? You know, it looks like it's definitely Dylan Morris's job to lose. You know, he's a guy who comes in who 's really kind of an interesting background for him.
He was a starter early on in his career at Washington and does OK. He does pretty well in a shortened COVID season where they only played, I think, you know, maybe six or seven games. He ended up being, you know, honorable mention, all Pac-12.
So he got off to a good start there. Then Michael Penix comes into Washington, is having, you know, back to back Heisman caliber seasons. And so he's not getting the same kind of playing time.
He transfers out. He arrives at JMU. So, you know, we'll see what he can kind of do at the Sunbelt level.
But he brings experience. He brings things that I think, you know, will probably end up winning him the job. Beyond him, I think they probably got to feel a little bit better than they did in the last couple of years as far as their backup quarterback, just because, you know, Alonza Barnett has a little bit more experience.
I think the change in coaching staff is probably good for him as far as a fresh start. And I was expecting to probably be the number two. He actually started the season opener last year.
He looked good in spring ball, through fall camp last year and then really struggled in the season opener, his first college action, really. He struggled and never really kind of got over it. And I think maybe the change of pace, that change of scenery with a new coaching staff potentially gives him a better opportunity to come in and maybe clear his head and be the number two guy.
But, you know, Billy Atkins also has some experience. Brett Griffis, you know, that name's kind of known. His brother was a starter at Wake Forest.
He maybe doesn't have the same level of arm as the other guys, but he's a smart kid. Who I think if they end up having to put him in, he's a guy I don't think you expect to make too many mistakes. But it really looks like it's Morris's team to lead going into the fall.
So, you know, we alluded to this earlier about Morris and he's not he's not he's not really a dual threat, not to say he can't move, but he's not going to rush for fourteen hundred yards like Matt Sluka did. And then with Barnett kind of being the backup, as you mentioned, their styles are very different. And so like from an offensive perspective, I mean, I realize they can adjust, but you would think maybe they don't want to change things too much.
I mean, so like how are they dealing with that contrasting styles with those two quarterbacks? Yeah, I mean, they're different and, you know, Barnett's definitely more of a runner, I would say. I don't think he would be like a Sluka type, you know, rushing for over a thousand yards. But there might be more designed runs, you know, RPO type things if they go with Barnett.
So I think that's part of the reason he won the job early last year, too, is that he looks really good in those like RPO situations and things in practice. It didn't translate to his opportunity in the game. And they kind of pulled the cord on him really fast, probably knowing that they had talent behind him.
But yeah, I think it's like I talked about earlier, I think what you'll see from the coaching staff is they will adjust things based on, but, you know, at the same time, your playbook is your playbook to a certain degree. It's hard to completely change, change directions in the middle of the season if you have to change quarterbacks. But I'm guessing they'll have some things that both guys can do well.
Moving on to the running game, which had its share of success in 2023, but they lost their top five rushers from a year ago and Kaelon Black, Ty’Son Lawton, Latrele Palmer. But they rebuilt that room through the transfer portal, bringing in one thousand yard rusher from North Texas, Ayo Adeyi, a former four star recruit, and George Pettaway from North Carolina and Tyler Purdy followed that stuff over from Holy Cross. How is this running back room looking here in the spring? Yeah, well, you mentioned the three guys that looked good in the spring and I think will be on the field a lot.
You know, George Pettaway, at least in the spring game, he looked really good. He's got a ton of speed. I think he's a guy who's going to get a lot of carries.
But, you know, Ayo Adeyi is the kind of a proven guy. He's one somebody that they gave, I think, a lot of attention to even just, you know, sometimes you can tell what the coaches are thinking by like who they choose to come talk to the media after practice and things like that. He's a guy who's been out there and I think is going to be going to be a key to the offense.
And then Tyler Purdy, who you mentioned, is the only guy on the roster that they list as athlete rather than another position, which was pretty interesting coming out of the spring game. You know, he's a guy who I think, you know, you'll see him in the backfield. You might see him in the slot other times.
He's a bigger guy. He can maybe be a short yardage guy, but he's also going to catch the ball. So it'll be a different, different look with the running backs than it has been in previous years.
Two years ago, you know, we talked about how hard it is to pronounce the names. Percy, Ayo Adeyi, I always have to stop to get his name right. But, you know, he was their featured back a couple of years ago and they were pretty solid in the running back department there.
Last year was a little bit disappointing, maybe in like how they struggled to get a lot of yards, a lot of yards after contact from their running backs. So I think there'll be one area where I would say. No guarantees, but like it's almost expected they're going to be better than they were last year, running back is one place where things are looking pretty good.
So former head coach Kurt Seneca, you always seem to take more of that committee running back approach. What have you seen from the new staff and what do you expect if we're going to see a healthy dose of the running game? Are we going to see a workhorse running back, a committee approach, 50/50, 40/60? I think the committee because all three of the guys we mentioned looked good in the spring and they look capable. They do some slightly different things.
But, you know, yeah, I would expect it to be sort of a committee type of situation. You know, maybe Adeyi, just with his experience and his proven track record, you know, gets to nod more often than not. But I think all three of those guys are going to get touches.
So JMU last year was very successful passing the ball featuring 2000 yard receivers. Fortunately, they lose them both. And Elijah Sarrat, who followed the staff to Indiana and then Reggie Brown and graduated.
They also lose a third leading receiver, Phoenix Sproles. The returned Taji Hudson, Yamir Knight, Omarion Dollison, Maxwell Moss, Troy Lewis and others. They bring in Cam Ross from UConn and Nakai Poole from Mississippi State.
How did the wide receiver room look in the spring? If you know, it's going to be like you said, it's going to look a lot different. Some of those guys, you know, did kind of stand out. Nakai Poole ended up leaving after spring ball because, you know, I'm not sure he was as high on the depth chart as he was maybe expecting coming from Mississippi State.
So he's gone. But, you know, Taji Hudson had a really good spring. I think his role probably increases quite a bit going into next year.
Omarion Dollison has shown flashes at times, which is kind of buried behind some of those guys last year. Those guys definitely have a chance to step up and get more done. You know.
To expect 2000 yard receivers again, which they've had over the past couple years, I don't know if that's, you know, necessarily reasonable to expect, because I just don't know if they're going to put up as many passing yards. I think it's going to be a little bit more balanced. So, you know, statistically, they might not look as good, but they do seem to kind of have the spots filled anyway.
And, you know, they were really, really good at the wide receiver spot last year. I mean, we'll continue to probably say that almost every position group we break down, they were good there last year and, you know, they may not be as good this year, but they do seem to like have some guys who can compete and they might not rely on them as much as they have in the past. So they recently brought in a couple of more additions to the transfer portal they brought in, or they got commitments anyway, from Brionne Penny from San Diego State and Ahmarian Granger from Old Dominion.
Do you think either of those two might have a shot at kind of cracking the starting rotation? Yeah, I mean, I think they have a shot. I think it's pretty open to competition going into the fall just at that position. And they bring those guys in for a reason.
Right. You know, they're guys who have the G5 experience and they didn't put up huge numbers, but have been on the field. If nothing else, it adds to the depth, which I think, you know, but having not seen a ton of those guys, it's hard to say.
But I think, you know, I think they were probably told to come in, hey, there's an opportunity to come in and compete for playing time and they'll do that. I realize we're here, it is late May and we have a lot to change before the first game of the end of August, first of September. But who do you think, if you had to pick who the starting receivers were against Charlotte in week one, who do you think that might be? You know, depending on who, depending on what kind of set they go out in, I mean, I would probably guess Hudson, Dollison, you know, maybe a Cam Ross.
But, you know, you might see something strange where they got a couple of guys in the backfield and, you know, like we said, Tyler Purdy in the slot or something. So things could look weird at times, things a lot different than the kind of formations we saw last year, where a lot of times it was, you know, three or four wide receivers out there. But I think those guys are at least kind of guaranteed to get snaps, whether they're starting or not.
It's hard to say, but I think I think we'll see a lot of those guys. Let's take a look at this tight end room. Can you describe for us how you expect the tight ends to be utilized in this Chesney/Kennedy offense and how much of a role will they have in the passing game? Yeah, I mean, their role in the passing game will be there.
They might be used like in the running game as blockers even more than in the past. And that's to say, you know, a guy like Zach Horton last year who had a really good year was a really good blocker and he was a good blocker downfield. But, you know, they've got some size with their tight ends this year.
You know, Kyi Wright was a guy we talked a little bit about offline who is just a huge dude. And I think he might get a little bit more of an opportunity than he got last year. And, you know, Taylor Thompson coming in as a transfer guy who I think is probably going to be on the field a lot.
He seems to be a good pass catcher. But, you know, similar to talking about the wide receivers, I just don't know for sure how prolific they're going to be numbers wise compared to last year and the year before that, where they had guys in those positions putting up big stats, getting all conference honors because of that. I don't know if they're going to look for those guys to be as prolific as in years past.
And I mean, we talked about Kyi Wright and Taylor Thompson, but they also brought in Logan Kyle from Vanderbilt this summer. Did anybody step up to assume that tight end one role there in the spring? Or is that going to be a position battle come in the fall? I think it's possibly a position battle. And I think it's I think it's a position where you may see a lot of guys rotating in and out, you know, based on different things.
But, you know, like I said, we didn't see everybody in the spring who's going to be in there battling for that. So it's another one of those positions where it's kind of hard to guess exactly who's going to start. But if I was going to put odds on it right now, I say, you know, Taylor Thompson is probably the guy I would guess is on the field for the first snap.
But again, I'm not sure how much that first snap matters as much as who's getting what percentage of the snaps. And that could change based on a lot of factors. So we've talked about a lot of position groups on the offense and all the personnel losses.
The offensive line, though, seems to have fared much better compared to the other groups, losing only two starters from a year ago and Tyler Stephens and Carter Miller. They return Cole Potts, Tanner Morris, Tyshawn Wyatt, Josh Toner and others. How did that unit look in the spring? It's good, like you would expect.
I mean, and it's not that they're, you know, necessarily go in full contact a lot in the spring and everything. But I mean, it's an experienced group. You know, you talked about losing the entire staff, basically, the one guy who they thought was going to be back from the staff was Damian Wroblewski, who was the offensive line coach.
And he was the interim coach during the bowl game and everything. He ended up moving on to Maryland because he had a lot of reasons, you know, with his son's health to want to stay in this general vicinity. So he didn't go to Indiana.
But then, you know, the Big Ten money is hard to pass up for anybody. And he ends up in Maryland. And, you know, that's a tough loss.
But then, you know, they bring in people who can replace them. You know, the staff looks really good. But you know, that's one thing where they might be a little different.
They lose the continuity that otherwise they've got a lot of guys who played a lot of snaps together, which is what you want in the offensive line. And, you know, like you said, that's one area where there's not going to be a ton of new faces and things are going to look much more similar than than pretty much everywhere else on the offense. All right, Shane, if you had to pick an offensive player to have a breakout type season here in 2024, who are you picking? That's a tough one.
But, you know, it could be Dylan Morris, where maybe people have forgotten about him having that good year. You know, back in 2021 for Washington, you know, partially because they didn't play a ton of games and partially because it's been a while. But you know, if he ends up being one of the better quarterbacks in the Sunbelt, I wouldn't be shocked.
On the other hand, you know, I think people are looking for it, maybe from a maybe as we talked about running back. I think George Pettaway has a chance to be really good to maybe, maybe a guy who makes the big plays and you know, the long runs that, you know, the breakaway speed. So I don't know if they're gonna have anybody who just puts up ridiculous stats like they've had in recent years.
But, you know, those are two guys who I think maybe by midseason, people could be like, oh, wow, I kind of forgot about him. And, you know, even though they came in with some accolades when they came into college. Before we move on to the defensive side of the ball, something I was thinking about, you know, here in the spring, did you notice any rapport being built up with Dylan Morrison, a particular wide receiver in the room? Um, I don't know.
It's hard to say. I mean, Omarion Dollison maybe is a guy who has, I think he did it some last year with Jordan McCloud in a similar situation where the guy was coming in as a transfer and hadn't been around a lot. And but they had some, you know, prior history, and I think they connected pretty early on.
And I think, you know, just a guy who's been around for a while, Dollison is maybe one of those guys who, who recognizes, hey, it's also sort of on the wide receivers to help with this leadership and this transition and everything. And they're two guys who when they talked about, you know, who they connected with, I think I think there was, you know, some chemistry there.