GMC football cranks up with home opener

Published 8:30 am Saturday, August 24, 2024

The number 155 received a lot of play this summer as the total for football players in the Georgia Military College program.

The time has arrived to see what at least 11 of those Bulldogs (per snap) can do on the playing field. GMC’s 2024 season opens today (Aug. 24) with a 1 p.m. kickoff at Davenport Field against the Jireh Prep squad from North Carolina. After that, there’s many familiar names on Rob Manchester’s schedule plus some new in-state rivals entering the NJCAA for the first time.

“We’ve really gelled well,” said Manchester, about to begin his fourth season as head coach after 14 as Bulldogs’ defensive coordinator. “All the young men got here in June. Those eight weeks were key getting systems and schemes in, getting to know each other. Now, we’re all one big family. We’re just ready to start going against somebody else in a different colored jersey. We’ll put it all together (today) and see where we are.”

Not only are there a slew of new Bulldog players, but Manchester hired some new coaches during the offseason. That includes defensive coordinator Thad Turner. He has high school coaching experience in Georgia at Whitefield Academy and Pace Academy and previously served as DC at Dodge City Community College.

Also on the defensive side, a new GMC coach is Ty Phillips, who played on state championship teams at Colquitt County High School and went on to Georgia Southern. His responsibility is with the defensive line. The new linebackers coach is Demetrius Briggs, a former high school coach in Arizona and college coach at Winston-Salem State.

Leland Ready returns as the offensive coordinator as does offensive line coach Bryan Crawford and receivers coach Emil Smith. Mike Summers comes over from West Georgia as the new running backs coach and Thomasville native Nic Lauderdale is the new tight ends coach.

It’s these assistants, particularly the coordinators, that Manchester lets set those schemes and systems.

With Turner, Manchester said they are running a 4-2-5 similar to the stack from previous seasons.

“He’s putting his own stamp on that, and the kids have bought into it,” said Manchester. “It makes you have an extra defensive lineman, which I think is one of the strong points we’ve recruited really well. We’re excited to see how that goes in live game action.”

On offense, quarterback Chip Cooper returns for his sophomore season. In 2023, he threw for seven touchdowns and 633 yards while also rushing for 733 yards and four more scores. Under Ready, GMC led the NJCAA in rushing yards (242 per game), and Manchester said he’s adding some new wrinkles though it will still be a run-first attack.

“Little bit of triple option, which makes teams work on that kind of stuff,” the coach said. Trequan Jones, from Florida, returns after gaining 464 yards on the ground and scoring seven times one season ago. “He had a really good second half of the season. We have a couple of linemen who played a significant amount of time last year. We have a receiver back, J.B. Flud, and we’re looking for him to have a big year. Everybody else is new.

“Really, the same thing defensively. It’s all new personnel. We have a couple of returning defensive linemen who are doing well. All new linebackers. In the back end, safeties are two guys who played a significant amount last year, Jacorey Walker (one interception, three pass break-ups) and Jakyri Jones (one interception, two pass break-ups). Everybody else is new.”

So there’s no doubt a big part of junior college football is freshmen straight out of high school and how they adapt to the next level. Teams can’t practice until Aug. 1, but that 155 came in as soon as possible to lift weights four days a week, conditioning without the use of a football and get coached up.

One number the coach isn’t paying much heed to is 12, which is the GMC preseason national ranking. In the Jireh Prep team, Manchester expects to see some four-year school transfers and good athletes. Up next is No. 1-ranked and defending national champion Iowa Western, also at Davenport, on Aug. 31.

“(Our schedule) has a bunch of heavyweights,” said Manchester. “It’s hard to get games, and everybody wants you to go there. They don’t want to do home at-home. Iowa Western and (No. 5) Snow (from Utah) is always willing to do home at-home.

“Tyler College is always strong. We play Lackawanna twice. Monroe up in New York. Louisburg. And we’re excited about the new junior colleges in our state, Andrew and Central Georgia Technical College. They’re just now getting going. Should be great atmospheres at the games.”