LITTLE ROCK — It won’t take long to find out if Arkansas State’s change in offensive philosophy will be effective. An effective football season depends on it.
Arkansas State Coach Steve Roberts said Tuesday he’s excited about the no huddle, no fullback, Spread attack his team will employ this season.
“It’s going to be critical to our overall success,” said Roberts, who was speaking as part of the Sun Belt Conference’s football media days. “In order to meet your goals and have a successful season, you have to win your conference games. It will be critical for us to get off to a great start on both sides of the football and in the kicking game and start to develop some confidence.”
The Red Wolves open the season Sept. 4 at Auburn before beginning Sun Belt Conference play Sept. 11 at Louisiana-Lafayette. The home opener is Sept. 18 against Louisiana-Monroe.
Roberts said the biggest difference will be in the tempo.
“We use tempo as the primary part of our offense rather than something that we did 25 to 30 percent last year,” he said. “That will be something that every team has to prepare for from the first snap throughout the end of the ballgame. More motions and ways to keep the defense off balance.”
Roberts said the change in offensive philosophy had less to do with the players returning this season and more to do with the hiring of Hugh Freeze as offensive coordinator.
Freeze and his offense built a dynasty at Memphis’ Briarcrest Christian, where he won two state championships. He spent time on the staff at Ole Miss before leading Lambuth, an NAIA school in Memphis, to a 20-5 record the past two seasons. Lambuth averaged 465 yards and more than 40 points per game during Freeze’s tenure.
Freeze was hired as San Jose State’s offensive coordinator Jan. 5, but he left there Feb. 26 to take the same position at Arkansas State.
Since then, it’s been a race against time to modify the Red Wolves’ habits and approach to offense.
There were both positives and negatives in spring practice. With quarterback Ryan Aplin, who started three of the final four games last season, out after shoulder surgery,Phillip Butterfield took most of the snaps.
Butterfield threw four interceptions in the spring game, but Roberts said he was “productive and showed a lot of poise.”
Roberts said he isn’t ready to name a starter at quarterback yet. He’ll let Aplin and Butterfield battle it out.
“Obviously, there’s a lot of difference between spring football and playing an outside opponent. There’s still a lot of ifs and unknowns right now,” Roberts said. “I know our players will give it everything they have, and I’m confident from a scheme standpoint that we’re going to be extremely exciting and hopefully score some points.”
Freeze’s approach is to use the no-huddle scheme to exploit the defense with different tempos throughout the game.
“I think our players believe in what we’re doing offensively, they enjoy what we’re doing,” Roberts said. “It’s a very demanding system from a physical standpoint and from a reaction and quick thinking standpoint.”
With the new approach also came new terminology and not a lot of time for everyone to learn it.
“We’ve done enough of it that I’m comfortable with what we’re doing and very confident in our offensive coaching staff and Coach Freeze and his ability to call a game, his ability to design a game plan, his ability to motivate our players to play efficiently and productively,” Roberts said.
Keeping that confidence high after visiting Auburn will be important.
“Hopefully we can start developing more confidence here in fall camp from an offensive perspective,” Roberts said. “That will help us in those early conference games.”
Sports, Pages 24 on 07/21/2010