Ecu Spring 2023 Schedule – Michigan’s long and winding road to eternal college football glory will begin tomorrow with one of three non-conference slates for the 2023 season. First up on the schedule is the East Carolina Pirates, the first meeting between ECU and the Wolverines. The Pirates are coming off a strong 8-5 campaign out of the American Athletic Conference, though it didn’t live up to the program’s high expectations for the year. Now comes the expected fall, as the Pirates suffered major losses on both sides of the ball in the offseason: Bill Conley ranked ECU 130 out of 133 teams as returning production in February, and that’s before That they incurred further losses through the portal post. – Bihar This team is completely different.
Mike Houston is a good coach who has won all over the place, Lenoir Rhyne (DII), The Citadel (FCS), James Madison (FCS at the time), and now East Carolina. ECU was 9-27 in the three seasons before Mike Houston’s arrival and it took several years to get him on the field. They are 4-8 in 2019, then 3-6 in the COVID-shortened season. After the pandemic, Houston got ECU to qualify with a 7–5 season (the Military Bowl was never played due to BC’s withdrawal after the virus outbreak). They stepped up to enter 2022 comprehensively with veteran players throughout the roster, but had a furious 7-5 season, losing games by 1, 2 and 3 points. To ease the pain of the 2022 season was a season-ending bowl victory over neighboring Coastal Carolina.
Ecu Spring 2023 Schedule
The strength of ECU’s defense is probably its defensive line. On a team full of instability and fresh faces, the Pirates have three returning starters on the DL who profile better as run defenders than pass rushers. Last season the team ranked 21st nationally in passing yards per game allowing 118.9, and they will look to build on that this season based on experience in the trenches.
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East Carolina runs a 3-3-5, with an EDGE rusher you can count as a fourth DL if you choose. Chad Stephens is playing the one-handed EDGE spot, weighing in at 261, along with a pair of defensive tackles, the lightweight Elijah Morris (264) and the big D’Anta Johnson (294). Their backups are also very experienced, including behemoth NT Jason Shuford (6’4, 322), who I think will get pressured in short-yardage situations and on downs. If you factor in EDGE rusher Jeremy Lewis, who is better as a run defender than a pass rusher, you have a unit that was pretty strong against the run last season against Group of 5 offenses.
Of course, we’re talking about Michigan here, the Gof5 offense wasn’t run of the mill. And while Morris and backup J.D. Lampley have proven to be solid FBS football players, it’s hard to imagine they’ll be able to hang at all against Michigan’s big boys at the entrance spot. Now ECU wants to do what most 3-3-5 teams do with their DL, mix it up and let their backs go to work. They might cause trouble, but it’s hard to see them winning straight-up fights.
Joe focuses on the linebackers, a weakness for the Pirates. The LB spot was eliminated during the season, resulting in increased movement from the FCS side, returning players who weren’t used as often, and dropping down to P5. South Carolina State’s BJ Davis and Taylor Jackson (the only LBs to log >100 snaps last year) could be in line to start at WILL and MIKE, respectively, but I’m not sure how committed that is. Both of these players will go through a baptism of fire tomorrow, but the same can be said for their backups. If ECU picks up the EDGE rush for the real USA, it will be UNC transfer RaRa Dillworth, a former blue chipper who was awful last season and was jumped by the ACC. If you’re DC Blake Harrell, you can’t feel good about putting a lot on the plate for those LBs, but if 260 lbs. With defensive lines going up against Zak Zinter, you have no choice. Your defense might not be fine.
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Main Action: IOL of Michigan Vs. TUN DTOS DTs. We saw this matchup several times last year, Nebraska perhaps the most famous. IOL Michigan against a team with very few DTs and blew the opposition out of the water most of the time. If that’s the case for ECU, given the state of their LB room, Blake Corum and Donovan Edwards could have huge upside on the field.
If Michigan wants to promote JJ McCarthy and show that their pass rusher will be a major centerpiece of the offense in 2023, this game will likely be a good opportunity to do so. ECU was very good at generating sacks last season and their secondary has been just as good all season. Even if a few receivers get hit, the home team should have no trouble moving the ball in the total Parrett pass defense.
The same defensive front mentioned in the previous section was pretty strong against the run last season. He didn’t do all that much to generate a pass rush. The team ranks in the middle of the FBS in sack rate, but the reality is perhaps even worse: ECU ranks 125th in PFF team passer rating. For example, Jeremy Lewis, a rush EDGE, is a much better player against the run and doesn’t offer much of a pass rush despite the primary responsibility of his hybrid role. None of his DTs had a better than 61 grade at Rush and Lewis.
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Best pass rusher among EDGEs last season. They’ll probably blitz their LBs and DBs so that’s what a 3-3-5 defense does, but I don’t see much potential for an organic pass rush. In some ways, this would be a decent first litmus test for Michigan’s back, because if organic pressure comes to the ECU, that would be a very bad sign.
As for the secondary, ECU is rolling two starting safeties, Teagan Wilk and Julius Wood. They rotated with the now-departed third safety last season, so this isn’t their first run. The bad news is that the cornerbacks are brand new, losing their top four cornerbacks from last season. Former JUCOer Shavon Revel could start at one outside cornerback position, while the other could be among several players. Isaiah Brown-Murray is only 5’9″ and redshirted last season, so good luck. Other options are a mix of FCS up transfers and P5 down transfers. For many (all?) corners that ECU uses tomorrow, a trip to The Big House will be their first real dose of FBS action. They can help with safe return initiatives, but they won’t help much.
Key Tip: Freshman WRs Vs. Group of five patchwork. Let’s be real here. Michigan’s starting WRs can probably cook those guys, especially with McCarthy likely to throw a lot of time. This type of play is meant to see players further down the depth chart and we’ve heard a lot of good things in camp about Michigan’s new receivers, who have pledged to play in the opener. Let’s see them against this hodgepodge DB group!
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East Carolina University
ECU got raided at OL after spring practice (shouldn’t the Pirates be raiding?) and as a result his blocking situation is probably worse than it should be. After all the smoke cleared, the wreckage of the sunken Pirate ship showed only one returning OL starter, serviceable RG Isaiah Foote. An injury to an OL transfer shook things up a bit ($), but a decent USF transfer (Dustyn Hall), last year’s 6th man, former walk-on, could potentially replace his RS Fr at OL for ECU. will be added to the player collection. , and then feet. Ahh
Last season the East Carolina OL was ranked in the 100s in several run blocking metrics and statistics by Football Outsiders, and this group is likely to be worse. It will be surprising if they get any pressure against Michigan’s fearsome interior defense as well as EDGE players who play the run very well. All this is a long way of saying that I think you should now say some prayers for the benefit of their present end.
The running backs fill a huge hole left by star RB Keaton Mitchell, and it looks like some sort of combination will do the trick. These players were clearly off Mitchell last season and probably didn’t have the steals necessary to spend a precious day on the ground while their blockers fed the alligators. Marlon Gunn Jr. and Rahjai Harris 67 Last season, Harris has more of a moose back, even though they weigh the same. Gerald Green transferred from Georgia Southern and is third.