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HARRISONBURG – Despite boasting a pair of potential I-AA All-Americans on its defensive front – including the player leading the nation in tackles for loss – James Madison has struggled to record sacks so far this season.
JMU ranks 10th in the Colonial Athletic Association and 81st in all of I-AA football in sacks, averaging 1.3 per game. Its four total sacks are the fewest in the league, tied with Hofstra and Towson.
“It is a concern,” JMU coach Mickey Matthews said. “We’ve got to do better.”
And it has to start Saturday when the 2-1 Dukes – ranked seventh in I-AA – visit Hofstra for a 3 p.m. game. Matthews anticipates the Pride (2-2) throwing the ball much more than any of Madison’s first three opponents – I-A Maryland, option-based VMI and Liberty, which played in a heavy rain storm.
Still, despite the factors that may have limited sack production in the first three games, Matthews said he’s not satisfied with the defensive front.
“You can say all you want about playing the option and playing in the rain,” Matthews said. “We’ve just got to get back there and make some plays. You’ve got to sack the quarterback.”
Senior defensive end Arthur Moats – who leads the nation with an average of 2.2 tackles for loss – said the Dukes aren’t too far away from improving their production.
“If you look on the film a lot of times we were almost there,” said Moats, who has two of the team’s four sacks this year. “We’re going to get hits on the quarterback. Whereas last year at this point I feel like we were getting there a second earlier so we would have the sacks.”
Last season, Madison totaled 34 sacks in its 14 games, led by 11.5 sacks from Moats and six from fellow All-American candidate Sam Daniels, a defensive tackle.
JMU opened the 2007 season with a similar sack slump to this season, managing just six sacks in its first four games. That year, players like defensive tackle John Baranowsky insisted the Dukes’ defensive line was playing well, pressuring quarterbacks into quick throws and chasing them from the pocket, even if the plays weren’t ending in sacks.
They said the sacks – eventually – would come.
And they did. JMU recorded 20 sacks over the final eight games that year.
Aside from the opponents and elements, JMU’s productivity – or lack thereof – could have something to do with the unsettled situation at the second defensive end spot. While Daniels and Ronnell Brown are entrenched in the middle, and Moats is a star on one end, the Dukes have juggled a trio of players in the four defensive line spot. Right now, JMU has D.J. Bryant, Aaron Harper and Sean O’Neill rotating there.
Bryant had a strong game against Liberty, totaling four tackles, half a sack and an interception. Harper, who had been battling the flu all week, struggled and finished with just one tackle.
O’Neill, a true freshman who sat out the first two games with an ankle injury, may be the most intriguing prospect at the position.
JMU should have a chance to get its sack numbers up Saturday. Matthews anticipates the Pride throwing the ball more than any of JMU’s first three opponents and Hofstra ranks ninth in the 12-team CAA, having allowed nine sacks in the first four games.
“Hofstra’s going to throw the ball 40 times against us, so we’ve got to have a great pass rush,” Matthews said. “That could be the determining factor in the game, how well we rush the passer up there.”
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