The Georgia Southern Eagles are coming off arguably their most impressive win of the season as they knocked off James Madison 28-14 and improved to 5-2 overall and 3-0 in Sun Belt play. This week the Eagles hope to remain on top of the Sun Belt standings as they travel to Old Dominion for a Thursday night matchup on ESPN2.
After a nearly flawless first half where they took a 21-0 lead, the Eagles had to overcome three second half turnovers including one interception returned for a touchdown. The Eagle defense stepped up Saturday though as they did not allow any points after the turnovers, and held the highest scoring team in the Sun Belt to only one touchdown on offense.
“We knew we were going to have to be aggressive against JMU and that started with the defense,” Helton said. “We tried to get pressure on the quarterback and put them in third and longs. We had six sacks and nine tackles for loss and held their run game to only 67 yards.”
The Eagles were able to make life tough on JMU quarterback Alonza Barnett as they came through with a season-high six sacks in the game. This week the Eagles go up against an Old Dominion team that has only allowed a total of two sacks in their last two games.
ODU quarterback Colton Joseph passed for 130 yards and rushed for 111 yards and three touchdowns in the Monarchs 24-14 win over Texas State last week. This will mark the third straight week the Eagles have gone up against a dual threat quarterback and they are hoping for similar results.
“We have just done a good job of spying the quarterback,” said Eagle defensive lineman Latrell Bullard. “I heard this guy is unique in the backfield and very fast. We know we are going to have to spy him and contain the quarterback the best we can. We have to keep him in the pocket and not let him get out where he can run.”
Coach Helton feels one of the reasons for the Eagles success this year has been their tough non-conference schedule which included playing Boise State and Ole Miss who are both ranked in the top-20. The Monarchs have played a competitive non-conference schedule as well traveling to Virginia Tech, and nearly upsetting South Carolina.
“I think our two teams have taken similar paths to success,” Helton said. “They only lost 23-19 at South Carolina, and the Virginia Tech game was close until the fourth quarter when they kind of pulled away. This is a good football team who challenged themselves in the non-conference and then you look up and they have won three out of their last four, which is no surprise.”
Helton has been particularly impressed by the ODU defense who were able to shut down Texas State quarterback Jordan McCloud, holding him to 173 yards and came up with two interceptions. McCloud came into the game with over 1,700 yards and 19 passing touchdowns.
“It is hard to hold Texas State to only 14 points,” Helton said. “That is an explosive offense they shut down. The ODU defense is kind of like playing Army or Navy on offense as they do something you don’t normally see. You don’t see this odd star, multiple defense except maybe once a year. You can see what it did to one of the best quarterbacks in our league last week. We have to do a great job of being simple and make great decisions as a quarterback and lean on our run-game which has been good.”
It's a short week for both teams who are excited to get a chance to be on prime-time national television.
"We have talked about becoming a national brand and so you want to get seen, so this is exciting,” Helton said, “Coming off a very physical game you really have to be smart with your players. Two games in 11 days is pretty short. We have challenged them to get in reps, but we are not going to bang them this week. You don’t want to make it a war on the practice field with just 72 hours between games.”
