Saturday September 6th, 2003, 1:00 pm Eastern

TV: none

Forecast (from WeatherUnderground.com):
Click the "Blacksburg Weather" link to the right.
As of Thursday morning, "Partly sunny. Highs in the mid 70s."

Click here for TechSideline.com's VT/JMU roster card

JMU Preview
by Jeff Ouellet

This Saturday a crowd of over 60,000 Virginia Tech fans will see what is effectively a refereed scrimmage between the ninth-rated Hokies and the James Madison Dukes. This weekend’s game should make David versus Goliath look like a pick ‘em, as JMU simply doesn’t have the horses to hang with the Hokies. With that being said, it is a great opportunity for VT’s coaches to continue to refine their schemes and get playing time to some of the younger players.

JMU is a Division I-AA team and plays football in the Atlantic 10, an eleven team conference, and the Dukes were picked to finish eighth by the media covering the league. Five players were preseason all-conference selections, so the Dukes do have some talent.

James Madison opened the season with an impressive 48-6 win over Liberty. The Dukes, led by fifth year head coach Mickey Matthews (22-25 career record), thrashed Liberty in the first half while putting up 369 total yards and scoring on six of their seven first half possessions. The seventh possession resulted in a missed field goal.

The Dukes use multiple formations but traditionally work a lot out of the I formation. The headliner in week one for JMU was R-FR tailback Alvin Banks, who racked up 157 yards in his debut on 20 carries. 138 of those yards were in the first half. Banks has nice size at 215 lbs., and his 5’10" frame would suggest a build similar to Alex Haynes of UCF. JMU also has some depth at tailback as JR Pervis Binns is a solid player who contributed 79 rushing yards and two rushing touchdowns to the cause. Binns is a change of pace player at 5’8", 200 lbs.

The Dukes starting quarterback is 6’1", 205 lb. JR Matt LeZotte, who is billed as an accurate, experienced passer. LeZotte likewise had a solid opening game as he completed 16 of 26 for 210 yards. JMU likely will try to use the run to set up the pass, although if they watched any VT/UCF tape they will probably try to focus on misdirection running plays rather than run a traditional I formation fullback lead.

At wide receiver, the Dukes are led by preseason second team all conference selection SR Alan Harrison. Harrison had a modest first game with 3 catches for 45 yards, but he is an established weapon and probably the guy JMU will look to in tough situations. He is a jumbo wide receiver size-wise at 6’3", 230. 6’2" SO Nic Tolley was the leading receiver in week one with 6 catches for 83 yards, both career highs, so he may be on the verge of a breakout season.

The best way to describe the JMU offensive line is young. The current depth chart suggests they will start 1 junior, 3 sophomores and a true freshman. These guys aren’t small – they average over 305 lbs. – but it’s hard to imagine them being able to handle the VT speed. Probably the hardest thing for a I-AA team to recruit is big guys with good feet as they are always at a premium, so my guess is that they will have serious problems handling VT’s defensive ends in the passing game. In particular, their sophomore tackles could be in for a long day with R-SRs like Cols Colas and Nathaniel Adibi playing tough and solid subs like Darryl Tapp and Noland Burchette giving them a blow.

JMU is young everywhere you look on offense. With Harrison the only projected senior starter against the Hokies, it is very hard to see the Dukes having any type of sustained success on offense.

JMU plays a traditional 4-3 defense and has slightly more experience on this side of the ball. There are three senior starters, and this group as a whole did a nice job in the opener against Liberty, holding them to 82 first half yards. In the second half there was a letdown as Liberty finished with 338 total yards – including a high 4.8 yards per rush, given that it was a blowout – but I am assuming those yards came primarily against the JMU backups.

The headliner on defense is preseason all conference and 6’2", 210 SR DE Jerame Southern. Southern is a solid pass rusher, but he is really small to be matching up with the Jon Dunns of the world. He is a playmaker, though, and will compete all day long. The other end is SR Tim Smith, who is only 225 himself. Inside, the Dukes have a pair of 260 lb. juniors, Sid Evans and Ryan Bache. They obviously are giving up serious size to the Hokie offensive line.

As with most 4-3 defenses, the linebackers will make the majority of the plays, and that is the strength of JMU’s defense. Both middle linebacker Dennard Melton and weakside linebacker Trey Townsend were preseason all conference selections. Melton, a 240 lb. senior, had 12 tackles in the opener and Townsend, a 220 lb. junior, is experienced. The third member of the linebacker corps, SO Isai Bradshaw, had 10 tackles in the opener including one for a loss and has decent size on the strongside at 230 lbs.

One name for Hokie recruitniks to watch is T-Fr Akeem Jordan (#35) from Harrisonburg, who was given a cursory glance by the VT coaches before matriculating at JMU. Jordan is a talented athlete, and he was the fourth leading tackler for the Dukes in his opening game. He backs up Melton in the middle.

The secondary starts three juniors and a sophomore, and both the corners are under 5’10". Given the height of the Hokie wideouts, the passing game should be able to function without much resistance. Reserve Hokie QB Chris Clifton should be given some opportunities to show off his arm against the JMU defensive backs.

The Dukes are strong here. Punter Nick Englehart is a sophomore that was named the A-10 specialist of the week after averaging 43.7 yards per punt, and more impressively having each of those punts downed inside the 12 yard line. Kicker Burke George is a junior who is solid. He connected on two of three kicks last week with his only miss being outside 40 yards.

JMU is developing a reputation for blocking kicks, and they managed to snuff out seven tries last year. That is something to watch, as I expect VT will attempt to kick some field goals this week to give Carter Warley some work under game conditions.

Even discounting the difference in talent between the teams, JMU is a very young team. Very few of their players made the trip to Lane back in 1999 when the Hokies shutout the Dukes 47-0, so the environmental may also prove daunting. It really is tough to see the result being any different this time, given the size differential along the lines. In deference to my former VT roommate though, a Dukes diehard, I’m going to predict that JMU averts the shutout.

Will Stewart's Take: Sounds good to me.

Will Stewart's Prediction: VT 51, JMU 6.

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