Coastal Carolina stunned college football in 2020. Can the Chants provide an encore?
Coastal Carolina was the darling of college football in 2020.
The Chanticleers went 11-1 with an overtime loss to Liberty in the Cure Bowl after not posting a winning record in three previous seasons at the FBS level.
CCU cracked the top 10 of the AP Top 25 Poll and finished the season 12th in the final College Football Playoff Ranking.
So what can the Chants do for an encore?
Coastal wants to make 2020 the standard for the program rather than an anomaly, and has the pieces to repeat the success in 2021.
With several players taking advantage of an extra year of eligibility granted by the NCAA because of the impacts of the coronavirus on the 2020 season, CCU returns 19 of 22 starters on offense and defense and nearly all of its significant special teams players.
Coastal had 13 seniors and graduates return for their extra year, and gave head coach Jamey Chadwell a raise and contract extension to keep him. So expectations are suddenly high in Conway.
“It’s a credit to the culture coach Chadwell created because there are a lot of schools that lost those guys because they were like, ‘You know I’m done with football.’ But these guys are hungry to come back,” said third-year CCU defensive coordinator Chad Staggs. “. . . We’ve got the best [player] leadership I’ve ever been around.”
The Chants were picked to finish last in the conference in 2020 in the preseason coaches’ poll, and this year are a co-favorite with App. State in the East Division, though both are behind Louisiana of the West in voting points.
Coastal begins the season ranked 22nd in the preseason AP poll and 24th in the preseason USA Today Coaches Poll. Louisiana is No. 23 in both.
“For us it’s always about hunting something.” Chadwell said. “We’re always looking for a challenge, or looking for something that gives us added motivation or a chip on our shoulder to continue to go prove who we are, because all of us at Coastal were told we weren’t good enough. . . . So there’s a chip on a lot of our shoulders and that’s got to be the mentality that always stays with you.”
Carrying the load
▪ QB Grayson McCall, redshirt sophomore. The Sun Belt Player of the Year returns to run CCU’s triple-option spread offense. In 2020 he completed 172 or 250 passes (68.8 percent) for 2,488 yards with 26 touchdowns and just three interceptions. He also rushed for 569 yards (5.1 yards per carry) and seven touchdowns.
▪ TE Isaiah Likely, senior. He’s an NFL Draft prospect with size (6-foot-4, 240 pounds), speed and great hands. Likely caught 30 passes for an average of 20 yards per catch in 2020 despite playing most of the season with a foot injury that required postseason surgery, so he could put up big numbers if he’s healthy for the entire season.
▪ WR Jaivon Heiligh, senior. He was McCall’s favorite target last season with 65 receptions for 998 yards and 10 TDs, hearkening back to his senior year in high school when he set Florida single-season state records with 131 receptions, 2,359 receiving yards and 32 receiving TDs.
▪ LBs Teddy Gallagher/Silas Kelly, super seniors. They combined for 156 tackles at the inside linebacker positions last season, when they were first and tied for second on the team in tackles, and are leaders who help organize the defense.
▪ DL C.J. Brewer, super senior. The anchor of the defensive line was named an AP Third-Team All-American after recording 60 tackles, 6.5 sacks, 11 tackles for loss, six QB hurries, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery in 2020.
▪ OLB Jeffrey Gunter, senior. After returning to CCU after transferring to N.C. State for one year, the First Team All-Sun Belt selection was second on the team to Tarron Jackson with 12.5 tackles for loss and 12 QB hurries last year.
▪ CB D’Jordan Strong, senior. The Sun Belt Newcomer of the Year as a JUCO transfer tied for third in the nation with five interceptions in 2020 while also defending six passes and recording 30 tackles.
Areas of concern
▪ How will the Chants react to a loss, if there is one? The suspense and excitement built with every win in 2020, and the Chants never had to play a game after the disappointment of a loss.
With Coastal’s goals so lofty in 2021, will a loss during the regular season be deflating and impact the team’s intensity thereafter, leading to sub-par performances?
▪ Can Coastal withstand injuries to key players? The Chants were amazingly healthy in 2020. On defense, they started the same 11 players in nine of 11 regular-season games, and the other two lineups had minimal changes. On offense, three starters missed one game apiece. Health was a major factor in the success.
The continuity helped CCU rank second nationally in fewest penalties per game with 3.67.
But at the Group of Five level, there is often a notable dropoff from an all-conference starter to a backup.
Coastal should have considerable depth in 2021, however, because of all the players taking advantage of the extra year of eligibility. With 13 sixth-year seniors CCU has a plethora of older players in reserve roles who would normally be starting.
▪ Can Tarron Jackson be adequately replaced? Coastal got 54 tackles, 14 tackles for loss including 8.5 sacks, 18 quarterback hurries, three forced fumbles and a fumble recovery from the Sun Belt Defensive Player of the Year last season before he was drafted in the sixth round by the Philadelphia Eagles.
Trying to get that production from his vacated defensive end position might be a group effort, as redshirt freshman Braylon Ryan of Greenwood has been named the Week 1 starter, Jackson’s primary backup Rolan Wooden II returns as a junior, and CCU added defensive end transfers Emmanuel Johnson from Georgia Tech and Amadou Fofana from Oklahoma State. The task became a little more difficult when Fofana was lost for the season to an injury incurred early in fall camp.
“We know we’ve got to figure out a way to replace Tarron, and that’s extremely hard to do with one person,” Staggs said. “So we were hoping to get a depth there that we might be able to do it with several people and get some production out of it.”
Can’t-miss game
▪ at Appalachian State, Oct. 20
The game will be played on national TV in prime time on a Wednesday night, and it might be the key to CCU keeping all of its grandiose goals in play through seven games.
Without 2020 co-Sun Belt Conference champion Louisiana, which also returned most of its key players, on the regular-season schedule, App. State figures to be the best team the Chants will face. And trying to leave Boone with a victory is always a difficult task.
Because App State is also in the Sun Belt’s East Division, the Chants would have to rely on the Mountaineers losing at least two conference games to have a chance to claim the division and qualify for the Sun Belt championship game.
The Mountaineers have generally been the class of the Sun Belt since joining the conference in 2014, winning four conference titles and going 47-9 in conference play and 6-0 in bowl games.
After losing three straight to App State from 2017-19, the Chants scored a go-ahead touchdown with 2:24 remaining and added a Strong interception return for a score with 1:20 to play to claim a 34-23 win last Nov. 21 in Conway. The first-place showdown featured six lead changes, and a similar game is anticipated this season.
A successful season is ...
The bar has been raised in Conway, and after just one miraculous season it has become all or nothing for the Chants.
Because the same players who were responsible for last year’s 11-1 season have returned, both the team and its fan base expect similar results.
The schedule sets CCU up for success, as Sun Belt favorite Louisiana is the only conference team CCU won’t play. CCU also has three of its four non-conference games at home, including the only Power Five opponent, Kansas, giving CCU seven home games and five road games.
CCU will be heavily favored against FCS foe Citadel and UMass, and likely against Kansas. Its non-conference road game at Buffalo is a matchup of teams that finished in the AP Top 25 in 2020 — Buffalo (6-1) was No. 25 — but Bulls coach Lance Leipold left with most of his coaching staff to replace Les Miles at Kansas and several key players transferred with him.
It will be a disappointment if the Chants don’t at least win the East Division to qualify for the conference championship and a bowl game.
Coastal Carolina schedule
| Date | Opponent |
| Sept. 2 | Citadel |
| Sept. 10 | Kansas |
| Sept. 18 | at Buffalo |
| Sept. 25 | Massachusetts |
| Oct. 2 | Louisiana-Monroe * |
| Oct. 7 | at Arkansas State * |
| Oct. 20 | at Appalachian State * |
| Oct. 28 | Troy * |
| Nov. 6 | at Georgia Southern * |
| Nov. 13 | Georgia State * |
| Nov. 20 | Texas State * |
| Nov. 26 | at South Alabama * |
* — Sun Belt Game
This story was originally published August 31, 2021 at 9:06 AM with the headline "Coastal Carolina stunned college football in 2020. Can the Chants provide an encore?."
