VSU prepares for Catawba

By Bryan Fazio
The Valdosta Daily Times

November 18, 2007 10:41 pm

— VALDOSTA — The Valdosta State football team started its game week Sunday with a clear picture of its second round opponent for the first time since the Blazers were named the No. 1 seed in the Southeast Region eight days ago.
Catawba’s 66-35 victory against Albany State Saturday set the stage for the Indians to face VSU at Bazemore-Hyder Stadium this Saturday at 1 p.m.
The Blazers earned a bye week through round one of the playoffs, and spent it trying to heal up injuries to several players, including defensive lineman Melvin Black, running back Ronnye Nelson and quarterback Willie Copeland.
Sunday focus resumed back on the game ahead.
Blazers’ coaches have been watching film on Catawba since Friday and started drawing up a game plan Sunday morning. VSU players were rehearsing those plans Sunday afternoon.
“They’re a good football team,” VSU coach David Dean said. “Offensively they’re very, very productive.”
The Indians pose a strong offensive threat, having averaged 40 points a game on the season, and scored 66 against Albany State.
The Indians’ 66 were the most points Albany State allowed since it gave up 41 to VSU Sept. 1.
“They’re a scary bunch, averaging over 40 a game,” Dean said. “Any time you can score 60 points on Albany State, you’re very good, because that Albany State defense is pretty good.”
The Indians are led by the passing attack of Brad Roach. The 6-foot-6 signal caller has thrown 205 passes this season, at a rate of 59 percent for 3,044 yards and 29 touchdowns.
Roach spreads the wealth, with his two favorite receivers being Brent Johnson with 57 catches for 823 yards and eight touchdowns and Antwan Strong with 46 catches for 795 yards and six touchdowns. Roach threw five touchdown passes against Albany State, to set a new school record.
“They do a good job of play action passes,” Dean said. “They pound you with the run, get your safeties cheating up, and pull the ball out and throw a post over the top of you. So, they make you play honest, and they do a good job with the run game, and their play action passes.”
While the Indians have scored 45.8 points per game, they have allowed 18.6 by their opponents.
“They’re not very flashy on defense,” Dean said. “They’re solid. They’re good tacklers in the secondary, and they do a good job mixing up coverages.
“They gave up good plays against Albany.”
The Golden Rams, who scored three points against VSU, scored 35 points against Catawba Saturday.
The only other link from Catawba to VSU is two games in 2001 and 2002.
The Indians played VSU in the second round of the ’01 playoffs, and came away with a 37-34 come-from behind win, to eliminate the Blazers.
The following year, the last year the two teams faced each other, VSU got its revenge, winning 24-7 in the opening round of the playoffs.
The Blazers started working toward a repeat of 2002’s result rather than 2001 by keeping their timing during the bye week.
The Blazers’ will need their offense to be clicking against the high-scoring Indians, and are hopeful that the week off will not slow down their timing.
“We came out, and had good work last week,” Dean said. “We tried to address the issue with timing. We did a lot of team work, and tried to keep our timing like we we’re playing a game, the only difference is, we didn’t hit each other.”