Kick-Off 2015
Football is back! And for the second-straight year, the Southern Arkansas Mulerider football team opens the season at home as they take on GAC-foe Southwestern Oklahoma in the opening game of the 2015 season. Last year, the Muleriders won a thriller of a season-opener against Southeastern Oklahoma 30-29. In that game, SAU overcame over three hours of lighting delays and a late fourth quarter deficit to upend the visiting Savage Storm. The game-winning play for the Muleriders came with no time remaining on the clock as QB Si Blackshire found wide out Aaron Johnson in the back of the endzone from 24 yards out. 

In the this year's season-opener, the Muleriders will be looking to exact some revenge over SWOSU as the Bulldogs scored 14 unanswered points in the fourth quarter in the 2014 affair to come from behind and beat SAU by a score of 27-24. This will be the fifth meeting all-time between the two schools with SAU leading the series 3-1.
 

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About Southwestern Oklahoma
SCHEDULE
The Southwestern Oklahoma Bulldog football team is set to open their 2015 season on the road against Southern Arkansas. Over the last three years, the Bulldogs are 1-2 in season openers with that win coming in 2013 when SWOSU upset Harding University 27-23 at home. The Bulldogs would open that year 2-0 before losing to Southern Arkansas in week three. This also marks the second-straight year in which the Bulldogs will open the season on the road as they went to Searcy, Ark. last year and were handed a 42-6 revenge loss by Harding.

THE COACH
The Bulldogs are coached by Dan Cocannauer, who enters into his seventh season with SWOSU. In his six previous years, Cocannauer has amassed a 21-43 overall record. His best season on the sidelines for SWOSU was in 2013 when he guided the Bulldogs to a 6-5 record, the only winning season in his tenure thus far.

SCOUTING THE OFFENSE
Offensively, the Bulldogs will have a lot of new faces as eight starters from last year are gone. Included among the positions that will feature new starters are the quarterback and running back positions. Last year, the running back position found more success in the Bulldogs' offense then the quarterback position as the Bulldogs averaged 135.0 yards per game on the ground and just 166.7 yards per game through the air. Overall, the Bulldogs averaged just 301.7 yards of total offense to rank 8th in the GAC in 2014.

Perhaps the biggest loss on offense comes in the backfield as near 1,000-yard running back Karl Hodge was lost to graduation. Hodge's 980 net rushing yards in 2014 were third-best in the GAC and his 11 rushing TDs ranked second in the league. Despite the volume of starters lost, the Bulldogs do return some experience on offense with two of
their top-three pass catchers back as well as a pair of starting offensive lineman in Nathan Butler and Landen Carson.

SCOUTING THE DEFENSE
Defensively, Southwestern Oklahoma remains largely intact from a year ago as six of the 11 starters return, but the Bulldogs most difficult task defensively may be filling the void of 2014 GAC Defensive Player of the Year and consensus All-America selection in Devin Benton. Benton was virtually an unstoppable force along the interior of the defensive line for the Bulldogs in 2014 as he led the GAC and ranked fourth in Division II in tackles for lost yardage with 23.0. Of those 23.0 TFL, 5.0 came via the sack as Benton ranked fifth in the GAC in that stat category.

While replacing Benton will be no easy feat, the Bulldogs do return a pair of starters along the defensive line as well as their leading tackler from last year in linebacker Tanner Thompson. Last season, Thompson recorded 87 total tackles with 42 being solo as he manned SWOSU's Dawg Linebacker position. Thompson's 87 tackles also ranked him seventh in the GAC. Last season on defense, the Bulldogs allowed 367.4 yards of total offense per game to rank fifth in the GAC. 156.6 of those yards came on the ground for SWOSU opponents while just 210.8 yards per game came through the air, ranking SWOSU sixth in the GAC in pass defense.

THE SERIES
This will be the just fifth meeting all-time between Southern Arkansas and Southwestern Oklahoma as the two teams first began playing each other in 2011 as conference opponents in the newly-formed Great American Conference. The first three games of the series went in favor of SAU, but the combined margin of victory was only 12 points. Last year marked the first victory in the series for SWOSU as they beat SAU 27-24.
 

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SAU News and Notes
"It's Our Time"
With the departure of several househould names within the Great American Conference ranks including the starting quarterbacks at Harding, Henderson State, and Ouachita, it appears that landscape that has been the top of the GAC over the last three-to-four years may be in for a shakeup in 2015. While the Muleriders are among those that will feature a new starting quarterback, head coach Bill Keopple feels that his 2015 team may be the most talented team in his tenure and feels that this year is when the Muleriders make their move to assert themselves as the class of the GAC; rallying his team on a single mantra since spring ball; "It's Our Time."

Under Center in 2015
For the second time in as many years, the Muleriders will have a brand new starting quarterback under center after the loss to graduation of SAU's 2014 starter Si Blackshire. Last year, Blackshire led the GAC and ranked 10th in NCAA DII in Total Offense at 331.3 yards per game. Additionally, Blackshire would toss 30 TDs while running in seven more as well as throwing for nearly 3,000 yards and rushing for over 350 more. 

Prior to Blackshire's lone year as the starter, the Muleriders featured record-setting QB Tyler Sykora for three years. In his time as the SAU signalcaller, Sykora would set or break over 15 school records, with many of those being career marks. Waiting to fill the shoes of Blackshire and Sykora are a pair of redshirt freshmen in Omari Jones and Barrett Renner. Both are 6-3 with Jones a right-hander and Renner a lefty. Both are also agile with big arms to throw downfield. With both Jones and Renner possessing many of the same skill sets, both figure to see time on the field this year.

.500 or Better Three Years Running
Last season, the Muleriders finished the year 5-5 over their 10-game schedule to give them a .500 winning percentage. That marked the third-straight season in which the Muleriders have finished with a .500 winning percentage or better. In those three years, the Muleriders are 19-12 overall for a .613 winning percentage, which marks the best three-year stretch ar SAU since 2002-04.

Fountain of Youth
After losing over 25 seniors a year ago, the Muleriders appear to have found the ever-elusive fountain of youth heading into the 2015 season as an overwhelming majority of the roster will be underclassmen. This season, the Muleriders will field only 20 upperclassmen with 12 of those being seniors. While the Muleriders will be young in terms of experience, they figure to be a talented bunch all the same. Listed among the preseason two-deep, the Muleriders have 28 underclassmen that are projected to either be a starter or backup in 2015.

Jenkins to Lead Stable of Running Backs
Last year, Deandre Jenkins made the successful move from the defensive side of the ball over to the offensive side and the Mountain Pine native enjoyed a breakout year as one of the Muleriders' featured running backs. For the season, Jenkins led the team in rushing as he ran for 670 net yards and found pay-dirt four times, which was second-best on the team.

This year, Jenkins is back for his senior season and he looks to improve upon all of those numbers from a year ago while also being tasked with leading the stable of running backs that SAU will possess in 2015. Among those other backs will be sophomore battery ram Michael Nunnery, senior transfer Robert Clay, and true freshman William McKnight. All four of these backs figure to see carries throughout the season.

Defensive Resurgence
The Muleriders are counting on having a defensive resurgence in 2015 as they look to make the defensive side of the football a strength. Last year, the Muleriders featured one of the most prolific offenses in all of Division II, but were unable to avoid high-scoring shootouts at the same time and on three occassions, the Muleriders lost a game after holding a fourth-quarter lead. 

One of the lynchpins to this defensive resurgent effort will be linebacker Dominic Kelly as the SAU coaching staff continually rave about the junior's leadership skills on-and-off the field as well as his abilities on the field. In front of Kelly will be a D-Line that has experience returning on the interior in Phillip Gahr and Calvin Lyons, but two new faces on the ends in Davondrick Lison and Kendrix McCann; both redshirt freshmen. Behind Kelly figures to be an early strength of the Mulerider defense in returning DBs Darren Crawford, Elgin Moore, Q'Niko Thomas, Quan Warren and Chris Wilson.