Alabama News Center 2023 football preview: Faulkner University
One of coach Rob Gray's chief jobs this season will be to get more production out of the Faulkner Eagles offense. Lineman Phil Jackson (73) will play a big part in that. (Faulkner University Athletics)
Rob Gray said various circumstances contributed to his Faulkner football team winning just four of its 11 games in 2022.
The Eagles had to adjust to a new conference — one with frequent meetings with top 20 teams — and the team was young in key areas, partly because of the loss of more seasoned players to the transfer portal.
But Gray shoulders full responsibility.
“I didn’t have them ready to play, week in and week out,” he said. “For the most part, we were really young in a lot of key areas. That’s no excuse.
“My job is to find a way to get our guys ready to play and win games,” Gray continued. “I didn’t really do that last season. I’ve got this season to make up for it.”
College football season is approaching, and Alabama News Center is previewing the 2023 season. Next up is Faulkner.
Alabama News Center: What are the prospects for this season?
Rob Gray: Those (young) guys, a lot of them, are coming back this year, so we expect a different result from this past season. We expect a different result.
ANC: What is the strength of this year’s team?
Gray: I would say defensively. That’s where most of our experience returns. Offensively, there’s not many key guys who will return from last year’s team. It’s going to look totally different for us offensively. Then you factor in having to replace special teams coordinator, defensive coordinator and offensive coordinator and try to do that in the span of a couple of weeks and get ready to play a top 10 team in Reinhardt, that’s pretty tough to do. Again, there are no excuses there. My job is to put these players in position to make plays and try to win games. That’s what we’re going to try to do.
ANC: Who are your team’s standouts?
Gray: I think Jerrell Williamson will be a key guy for us on defense. He played as a true freshman and last year was his sophomore year. He had a really good year this past year. I think defensively, those guys will really rally around him. We have Jakai Stephens at defensive line. He played a lot of football for us. Terry Brown played a lot of football for us. I think that side of the ball is going to keep us in a lot of games. We’re going to have to score some points to take a little pressure off those guys. Offensive line-wise, we have Phil Jackson returning. He’ll be a big part of what we do. He plays left tackle for us. Other than that, it’ll be totally new, really. At the quarterback spot, we’re figuring it out there. We’ve got three guys (Ben Anderson, Raequan Beal and Nehemiah Broussard) who are battling for the starting spot now. We’ll probably have that decided by the end of this week. From the receiver standpoint, the most experienced guy we’ll have there is Tony “T.J.” Hall. He played a lot of meaningful football for us.
ANC: What game(s) do your fans have circled on your schedule?
Gray: I hope they’ve got the Reinhardt game circled. It’s a really big one. We’ve felt like we’ve been in games with them. We just haven’t found a way to beat those guys. They’re a thorn in my behind right now. (Coach James Miller) does a really good job with that program. We’re trying to figure ourselves out. Hopefully, we can knock those guys off.
ANC: What is your lingering question?
Gray: I think the big question is, who are we? What kind of defense are we going to be? Offensively, what are we going to be? Can we sustain drives? Can we win on third down? Can we score touchdowns in the red area? There’s a lot of uncertainty with a young group of dudes.
Alabama News Center is posting season previews for all 16 college football programs in Alabama. Read previews for Birmingham-Southern College, the University of West Alabama, Jacksonville State University, the University of North Alabama, the University of South Alabama, Tuskegee University, UAB and Huntingdon College, and look for a new football preview each weekday until the 2023 season begins.
