Big shoes to fill, but coach says ‘we’ll be fine’ at running back
By CON MARSHALL Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Chadron State running backs coach John Reiners said he’s been asked the question many times since the 2007 football season ended, “What are you guys going to do without Danny Woodhead?”
The question is a legitimate one. After all, Woodhead was one of college football’s all-time most successful players, setting all kinds of records and winning two Harlon Hill Trophies as the outstanding player in NCAA Division II. Stats show that his 7,962 career yards rushing the accounted for 76 percent of the Eagles’ ground game the past four years.
But Reiners is not panicking now that Woodhead has used up college eligibility and is with the New York Jets.
“We know we’ve got some big shoes to fill, but we’ll be fine,” said Reiners. “We’ve got some capable backs, in fact we’ve got a lot of them. We don’t expect any one player to take over for Danny, but we know the guys we’ve got will play hard and do their best. “
Reiners also expects the Eagles to continue running the ball frequently.
“Coach O’Boyle uses a zone offense and likes to run the ball often,” he said.
There are 14 running backs on the Eagles’ preseason roster. Twelve of them play tailback, Woodhead’s old position, and two of them are fullbacks, the spot that Butch Cassity filled the last two seasons when the Eagles shifted to their offset I.
“We’ve certainly got a lot of depth,” Reiners said. “That’s something we haven’t had much of the past few years because it was pretty hard to recruit good running backs when Danny was playing. Everybody knew they probably wouldn’t play much if they came here.
“Now we’ve got a lot of backs. Collectively, it’s as good a group as we’ve ever had. We anticipate that the five freshmen will redshirt, but that still leaves us with a lot of possibilities. It’s a good situation in a lot of ways because competition makes everyone better. No one can take a break or someone will run past them. I don’t want anybody looking over their shoulder. I want them all to think they are the guy.”
On the other side of the coin, Reiners said he knows there will be some players who are unhappy because they aren’t getting much, if any, playing time.
“We’ll put the best guys on the field. We can’t play them all. But I’ve told them that the player who starts the first game may not be the guy who starts at the end of the season. We’ll go with the ones who are having the hot game.”
Reiners added that after the first week of practice, he is pleased with what he’d seen. He said he likes the work ethic, attitudes and desire he’s observed. He’s also appreciated the leadership that the two more experienced players have provided.
The two are juniors Mark Haag and Aaron Cookley, the primary backups to Woodhead the past two seasons.
“Not only did we lose our rushing leader, we lost our practice leader and the guy who was at the front of the line in the drills,” Reiners noted. “I was concerned about that. But Mark and Aaron have stepped up and are handling those responsibilities well.”
Haag and Cookley have been getting most of the repetitions with the first team offense. Bolstered by a 202-yard game against Western State when Woodhead was hurt, Cookley carried 89 times for 547 yards and six touchdowns last fall. Haag had 60 carries for 256 yards and four TDs. Both are also capable receivers out of the backfield. Cookley caught eight passes for 92 yards and Haag six for 77.
Also very much in the picture during the preseason is Chadron native John Ritzen, who had 20 carries for 85 yards last fall, most of them before he suffered a sprained ankle while playing on special teams during the fourth game at Colorado Mines.
“Johnny’s got a burst of speed that makes him a threat,” said Reiners. “He’s definitely in running for some playing time.”
Also on the list of possibilities is Brett Gumb, redshirt freshman from Burwell who at 5-10, 220-pounds, is bigger than most of the other tailback candidates.
“He’s a tough kid who will find his way on to the field,” Reiners said. “For a big kid, he can really run. We’re sure he’s going to be on some special teams and he may also see time as a ball carrier.”
Another redshirt freshman is Evan Pilkington, who rushed for nearly 1,200 yards as a junior and 1,369 as a senior at Silver Creek High at Longmont, Colo. Reiners said it may be difficult for Pilkington to see much action this fall, but he likes his potential, putting him in about the same category as Cookley and Haag when they were redshirt freshmen.
The other tailback candidates include two transfers. They are Brunau Augustin, a native of Florida who was on the team at Northern State at Aberdeen, S.D., last year, and Donald Oliver, a Californian who carried 73 times for 241 yards at Glendale Community College last season. Reiners said both could redshirt to give them more time to learn the system. He said both are athletic. Oliver spent much of the summer in Chadron working out with other CSC players.
“He’s big (5-10, 225), gives a good effort and can run. He often finishes in the front during our sprints,” Reiners said of Oliver.
The freshmen include Matt Harris of Alliance, who rushed for 1,629 yards for the Bulldogs last fall, and Joel Woodhead, Danny’s younger brother who gained more than 600 yards while sharing playing time in the backfield at North Platte High a year ago.
The other freshman tailbacks are from much farther away. They include Anton Harris, whose father is in the military and he played his high school ball in Germany; Todd McCormick, who is from North Pole, Alaska; and Maurice Threatts of Clearwater, Fla.
“From top to bottom, this is as talented bunch of freshman running backs as we’ve ever had,” Reiners stated.
At fullback, the Eagles have Danny Hanlon, a Crawford native who moved from linebacker to help take up the slack for Cassity’s graduation, and Willie Pippen, a redshirt freshman from Millard North in Omaha. Both are about 240 pounds and are hard workers.
Reiners said it’s possible that Joel Schommer, a former running back who emerged as an outstanding inside receiver last season, could shift to fullback when the Eagles want to use their I formation.
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Photo by Alex Helmbrecht Junior Aaron Cooksley, a two-year letterman, is a leading candidate to get lots of playing time at tailback this fall. He’s shown carrying the ball in practice on Monday.
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