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SUN BELT CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA DAYSJuly 22, 2019Steve CampbellNew Orleans, Louisiana STEVE CAMPBELL: Thank you all for coming out today. We're very excited about getting started with the 2019 campaign. Our guys have been working tremendously hard since January in preparation for this upcoming season. Very challenging, but it's a schedule that we really look forward to playing. We've got a great home schedule, outstanding schedule on the road, which opens up August 31st against Nebraska. We're really looking forward to this upcoming year. Any questions? Q. Obviously you've built National Championship-caliber teams at more than one level. Where are you in the process of building a strong, competitive team at South Alabama? Where is it compared to where you want it to be? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, you know, that's one of the reasons I'm so looking forward to season 2, just to see how much progress we've made. I know we're going to be a lot better football team in year 2 than we were year 1. I thought we started playing better football towards the end of last year. We traveled over to Lafayette and played a University of Louisiana team to a four-quarter football game, and they were a team that of course went on and played in the conference championship. We gave ourselves a chance to be very competitive in that game. Then the following week we beat, really jumped on top of Coastal Carolina 17-0, and held on and won that game, and they were a team that was fighting for bowl eligibility, and they were a good football team. So I liked the way that we played towards the end of last year. Now, I like the way the guys attacked the off-season in January. I thought we had an outstanding spring training. The summer program has been very, very productive. We're a bigger, faster, stronger football team. We're able to get some transfers in to help us on the lines, to help us at linebacker and tight end and then the middle levels and at the skill positions. We got a grad transfer in from Memphis at wide receiver, the top junior college wide receiver in the nation in, a great junior college defensive back in, and two great junior college linebackers in, a great junior college offensive lineman. At each phase of the program we've made improvement, and we were able to get in some transfers to give us an immediate infusion of talent and speed. I'm with you; I'm anxious to see where we're at in year 2 because I know we've made a lot of progress. Now, we needed to make a lot of progress. I'm interested to see just how far we've been able to come in one year. The guys worked tremendously hard. Our guys have worked really hard in going out and recruiting and getting some guys in to be able to come in and help us right off the bat. I'm anxious to get out and let's play some games and let's see exactly how far we've been able to come in a year. It's an exciting time. If you go back over any of those championship teams, I'm not sure that we knew that we were a championship -- we won the National Championship at Delta State, that year we were picked sixth in our own league. You had Valdosta, North Alabama and probably West Georgia and who knows who, but I do remember we were picked sixth out of 12 preseason when we went on to win the National Championship there. At Mississippi Gulf Coast, I remember we were coming off Hurricane Katrina, we were a 5-4 football team the year before and we weren't picked in the top 20. That year we went on and won the National Championship. And then for the next nine years in a row didn't fall out of the top 10. But we didn't know that going into that year, we just hoped that we would be better than we were the year before. So I'm very anxious and excited about this upcoming season just to see how much progress we've made. Q. You mentioned your summer program; are there any players that have stepped up and grown into leaders that you've seen during summer workouts? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, we've had quite a few at each level, from the lines to the big skill to the skill that have stepped up. One of the guys I'm most impressed with, Cephus Johnson, who is our starting quarterback entering this year. The guy has really worked hard. He's put on about 10 pounds of muscle and has really taken on a leadership role for us at the quarterback position. Jalen Tolbert is another offensive skill guy with Jamarius Way, of course, moving on due to graduation, left a big void there. There was like 60-something balls that Jamarius Way caught that have to be made up somewhere, and Jalen Tolbert has really stepped up as a leader there. Davyn is a guy that played a lot of special teams last year, but now his role will be different entering this year. He's really stepped up and taken on a leadership role. I don't know, Roy Albritton. A year ago, Roy was a guy I was hoping was ready to step up and be a guy to give us some help on the offensive line. Here we are a year later, I'm counting on him to be an all-conference kind of guy. Troy Thingstad. Troy was kind of thrust into a starting position last year. Well, now he's got 12 starts under his belt. Brian Ankerson, a year ago at our starting center, Ank had never played a college football game. This year he's on the Rimington Award watch list. So those guys have stepped up and are taking on new roles, and I like the way they have worked in the summer conditioning and strength program in those leadership roles. So there's quite a few guys that have stepped up. Another guy, defensively, Jeffrey Whatley, Tyree had a great spring and is an outstanding football player, Sean Brown is a great football player. Jordon Beaton was an All-Conference guy on the defensive line. A guy who had as good a spring as anybody, Jeffrey Whatley has stepped up and has really become a leader for us defensively. Nick Mobley is a linebacker that last year was thrust, again, into -- due to injury, he had to start six or eight games at linebacker. This year, I'm looking forward to him starting. I like the way Mobley -- I like the way he finished the year. I love the spring that he had, and I love the way that he's working this summer. I feel really good about him in one of our starting linebacker spots. I've had quite a few guys step up and take those leadership roles. Q. You talked about the progress your team has made from last year to this year. Is there a tendency to put too much weight on the Nebraska game, and how do you talk to them about perspective and overall season? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, you know what, I think our schedule sets up really well for us, both from a week 1 opening up -- if you could draw up, who would you want to open with. You could open with anybody in the country, who would you want to open it. You'd want it to be somebody who is nationally renowned. You'd want to if you were traveling somewhere, you'd want to go somewhere where they're going to be a boisterous and loud and going to pack the place. Well, nobody has had more home sellouts in a row in the history of football than Nebraska. There's not a more traditional place than University of Nebraska. So we get to go to Lincoln, Nebraska, open up on national TV at 11:00. If you asked me what time would you want to play, Coach, well, let's pick the hottest part of the day and let's play them. So we get Nebraska at 11:00 in front of 85,000 on ESPN. If you could draw it up any way you wanted to draw it up, that's how you would -- we're putting a lot -- I've never been a -- there's a lot of people -- and it works. There's a lot of ways to skin a cat. Some people don't get too high or too low. We get tremendously high, and we do wear our heart on our sleeves, and we're going to put everything we've got into that one game. And then when that game is over, we're going to put everything we've got into that next game. Then when that game is over, we're going to do the same thing next week. Our mantra, our deal this year is one time, and that's what that -- let's get up for one time, one game. That's the beauty of football. There's only 12 regular season games. Pro baseball, they play 162 games. Basketball, what do they play, 72 or something. In football you only play 12 games. Come on, now. You can get crunk up, all you got, one time, 12 times in a row. That Nebraska game, we're putting a lot into it. And then when that one is over, we'll put that one behind us and we'll start getting ready for Jackson State, and we'll do that 12 times. We're looking forward -- I think our schedule sets up really well. Again, we've got some of the top-ranked teams in the -- Appalachian State, what did they win last year, 10 or 11 ballgames, they come to Mobile this year. Georgia Southern won 10 games, they come to Mobile this year. Memphis played in the conference championship game and they come to Mobile this year. We've got some great football teams coming to Mobile this year. Then you look at where we get to travel to, we get to travel to Lincoln, Nebraska, which is a great trip. Q. We heard the Troy coach talk about their facilities. Right now South Alabama is in a little bit of a battle to upgrade your facilities. Where are you on that, and how do you get the kids not to focus on what might be? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, you know, our guys, we've put our facilities up against anybody in the country's. Right now if you look at recruiting rankings, which we don't put a lot of emphasis on that, but it is good to look at every now and then because I can tell you tell you where you're at facility-wise. We're ranked at the very top of the national recruiting rankings as far as -- in the Sun Belt Conference. One year ago, we opened up the largest indoor practice facility in the state of Alabama. You know, there's a really nice one in Tuscaloosa and there's a really nice one in Auburn. It's not as big as the one in Mobile, Alabama, or as nice, and that has definitely helped in recruiting. The players when they come on campus, they love looking at the JTC, the Jaguar Training Center. This year it was great having the NFL Network. It was great having Jon Gruden and John Elway, all those guys out too our Jaguar Training Center to train for the Senior Bowl. I mean, the Senior Bowl practiced there this year. So our facilities are second to none. Then you throw in the fact that we've got a medical school at the University of South Alabama. And I know there's some top academic schools in the Sun Belt Conference, tremendous reputations, but we're one of the only schools with a medical school and an engineering school. You throw in one of the largest indoor practice facilities in the country at any level, and now we're well underway with the new Hancock Whitney Stadium. That stadium is somewhere close to 50 percent completion. We finished pouring the whole bottom section. The four-story academic and administrative building has already been poured. It's well underway in construction. Right now the lights are already up. Right now we're fixing the second floor of the stadium. So the facilities, when you look at the indoor practice facility, the new stadium will be second to nobody's in the country. The Jumbotron that we're having put in I think is the largest in all of the Group of Five. It's like the 21st biggest in the country, something like that. So the facilities will be second to none. We're glad -- we think that people upgrading in our conference is great because we're -- through the leadership of our president and our athletic director, we're setting the tone as far as our facility enhancements are concerned. Q. Just taking a quick step back to when you were at Central Arkansas, what did you see in Dan Ellington when you made an offer to him there? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, I thought Dan was -- I thought Dan was an outstanding talent. Dan can run, Dan can throw, Dan is an outstanding football player. You know, and one of the main reasons, the biggest things I knew about Dan, Sean Cannon was the head coach and Itawamba Community College and was Dan's junior college coach. Sean was my defensive line coach back when we won the National Championship at Delta State. And he told me what a great kid, just how all those intangibles that you can't see when you watch the film. All those things, work ethic, heart, all that type of stuff. He just loves Dan. And you could watch the film and see what a great player Dan was, but all those things you don't know unless you coach the guy, and Cannon really bragged on what a great one that Dan was. I'm proud to see Dan having a good career. We look forward to -- I wish Dan the best of luck other than the game that we play him this year. But he's an outstanding talent and a great young man. Q. How would you describe the level of competition in the Sun Belt Conference this year compared to last season? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, you know, I'm interested to -- nobody has played a game yet, but I'm sure that if everything follows the trends that have been set, the Sun Belt Conference has been getting better and better year after year after year. So I would -- if everything stays true to form, Sun Belt Conference this year will be one of the toughest conferences in the country, Group of Five or Power Five. Last year we were one of the top Group of Five conferences. Appy State took Penn State to overtime, had a chance to beat them there in Happy Valley. Troy goes to Nebraska and knocks them off there. Memphis was a bowl team, played in the conference championship game, and it's a three-point game late in the fourth quarter against us. We had opportunities there. Louisiana Tech was a four-point game with us. So everybody in our -- in the Sun Belt Conference are competing at a very, very high level. You look at our out-of-conference record, we've got the best out-of-conference record of any of the schools, G5 or Power Five, the best bowl percentage, win percentage of any of the conferences, SEC, ACC, Pac-12, throw them all in there, Big Ten. So the level of competition in the Sun Belt Conference is second to nobody. Q. Last year you played Texas State and got the win, but this year obviously they have coach Jake Spavital coming in. What would you say is the biggest difference looking at Texas State when you think about them last year in comparison to this year? STEVE CAMPBELL: Yeah, you know, just Jake's reputation-wise, being an offensive-minded guy and a guy that has been able to score points wherever he's been, and he does a great job of utilizing their talent, I know that he will put his -- he's going to try to get the ball in space to his playmakers and all of those things. So you would know that last year they were -- Texas State was really good on defense, had one of the top-ranked defensive teams in the league. I know he will try to keep that mentality, and then they'll want to be strong on defense. I know Jake will open it up offensively and spread the ball around the park and throw it around. We look for Texas State to have an outstanding football team this year, and it'll be a big challenge for us, but it's one that we're looking forward to. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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