By T. SCOTT BOATRIGHT, Lincoln Parish Journal
GRAMBLING – Mickey Joseph’s Grambling State football team looks to improve to 2-0 as the Tigers play host to Central State at 6 p.m. Saturday inside Eddie G. Robinson Memorial Stadium.
The Tigers are coming off a 49-7 win over Clark Atlanta while Central State fell in a 41-14 home loss to Kentucky State to open its season.
Joseph said the win by his Tigers was a good start but he wants a better performance Saturday.
“After reviewing the film, I’m going to take my hat off to my staff and those players, because going into that game blind – not having any film — once we caught on to some things, we were able to be successful,” Joseph said. “Their defense gave us a little trouble with their movement. We didn’t expect that much movement, but we didn’t know that much about them.
“On offense, we wanted them to be one-handed and at the end that’s the way they went. I was very disappointed in the penalties. I went over it with the team — all of those penalties can be fixed. And there were some problems with our special teams coverage. I expressed that to the coordinator and the coaches. But it’s on me,” he said.
Joseph said he’ll keep a close watch on special teams play against Central State.
“Some of those guys hadn’t played special teams since their freshman or sophomore year in high school. (The game against Clark Atlanta) was their first time being back on special teams. And they’ll get better. I asked (Special Teams Coordinator Alan) Ricard to give them one more week, and if they give us the same performance we’ll make some personnel changes on special teams. Not with the coordinator, but with the players.”
Grambling played four quarterbacks against Clark Atlanta, with starter Jakobe Robinson, a transfer from the University of Southern Mississippi, completing 7-of-11 passes for 71 yards, Ashton Frye connecting 2-of-5 passes for 26 yards while adding 24 rushing yards on three carries, Reginald Johnson, a transfer from Florida A&M, completing 15-of-17 passes for 133 yards, including an 11-yard scoring strike to redshirt sophomore receiver Tyson George and Hayden Benoit connecting on both of his two passes for 34 yards while conducting GSU’s final scoring drive.
During his weekly press conference, Joseph didn’t divulge who he believes will become his definitive starting quarterback.
“I thought (playing four quarterbacks) worked out well,” Joseph said. “I think if you’re honest with quarterbacks from the beginning, when they get in there and you use them to their strength, that the rhythm’s going to be there. As long as they stay close, they’re going to battle because it’s tight right now. We look at these out of conference games as the time to figure it out. But we’ve got to have it (the quarterback depth chart) figured out by the time we go play PV (Prairie View in GSU’s fourth game at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas on Sept. 26).
Joseph said against Central State, he wants to again see the kind of ball control that allowed his Tigers a 34:03 – 25:57 time of possession advantage over Clark Atlanta.
“(Clark Atlanta) only played 55 snaps,” Joseph said. “I think that’s the least snaps the other offense has taken since I got here. That’s because we ran it 39 times and threw it 35 times, so it was balanced. You want to do it like that — we played six running backs and four of them got touchdowns.”
But the main thing Joseph wants to see against the Marauders is continued improvement from his team.
“I think the biggest jump in college football is from Week One to Week Two,” Joseph said. “So I want to see less penalties. I want to see better special teams play. I want to see our run and get really better at the pass game also. Our RPO game was there, but I want to see five-step (QB) drops. We still have room to improve.
“On defense, I want to see us rush the passer. I want everybody to be on the same page. I don’t want to see palms up (signaling confusion). We’ve been running these coverages since the spring, so don’t give me palms up when you don’t get the signal. So, we’re looking for improvement across the board.”
Contact Scott at tscottboatright@gmail.com