Georgia Southern Eagles 2022 College Football Preview

Georgia Southern Eagles 2022 College Football Preview

July 17, 2022

2021 Recap

Record – 3-9

ATS – 6-6

The Eagles struggled to a mark of 3-9 which was their first losing campaign since 2017 when they finished 2-10. In fact, last year was really disappointing when you consider that they were 25-14 (.641) from 2018 thru 2020. Georgia Southern didn’t even beat anyone of consequence as their victims were a collection of TOMATO CANS.

There’s hope on the horizon tho as Georgia Southern brings in former USC (!) HC Clay Helton to lead the progam. Let’s go!


Georgia Southern Eagles 2022 Outlook

OFFENSE

The offense was OFFENSIVE last year as the Eagles managed just 20.3 PPG (dead last Sun Belt) whilst suffering a massive drop in production on the ground (267 YPG to 193 YPG) and doing nothing thru the air (#124 FBS passing offense). Clay Helton and company are gonna move these guys to a more traditional attack with a THROW GAME focus and the new starting QB will be former Buffalo Bull Kyle Vantrease who was decent in a run-focused Buffalo offense (15-9 TD to INT L2Y, 62% completions). The top-three players in terms of receiving yards are back in the mix but note that nobody had 500+ yards LY and the leader in TD receptions was TE Beau Johnson (3). Adding Houston WR Jeremy Singleton will help but it’s unclear how much production the Eagles can expect from the air attack. The RB unit is very deep despite the loss of #1 rusher Logan Wright and recall that JD King had 804 yards on the ground in 2019 (7.0 !). Georgia Southern will feature four upperclassmen starters up front and should be fine despite the big shift in philosophy. We expect the Eagles to be about a TD better per game on offense in 2022.

DEFENSE

Georgia Southern was a mess on defense LY and went from allowing 20.8 PPG and 326 YPG to 31.4 and 442 respectively. Not good, yo. New DC Will Harris has just five returning starters to work with but there are some decent holdover pieces. The DE combo of Justin Ellis and Dillon Springer combined for 8.5 sacks and 9 QBH LY and leading tackler safety Anthony Wilson leads an experienced secondary. LB looks like a bit of a black hole and they’ll have to be a LOT better defending the pass overall (#119 FBS pass efficiency D LY, 28-5 TD to INT!). It’s hard to expect more than mild improvement on this side of the football.

SPECIAL TEAMS

The Eagles were mediocre on special teams LY but the good news is that everyone of consequence is back for another run in 2022. The kicking game looks average and they really need to SPICE up the return game.

Schedule Analysis

Overall – There are two nasty road games to deal with in non-conference play (UAB, CORN) but they also face a pair of cupcakes at home (Morgan St, Ball St). They have a stretch of five road games in seven weeks starting in week two and their final three games are nasty (at Cajuns, Marshall, App St).

Potential ATS Trouble Spot – October 22 – at Old Dominion

This will be the Eagles’ 5th road game in seven weeks and there’s a bye week up next. Not a great spot to battle an improving Monarchs program.

Season Win Total

per BetOnline July 17

Over 4.5 +120

Under 4.5 -150

MEGALOCKS says:

No leanage.

We have them booked for four or five wins.

MEGAmazing Tidbit

Clay Helton was 46-24 (.657) with the Trojans but he didn’t garner much love with PUNTERS as he was just 31-39 (44%) vs Vegas.


MEGALOCKS Outlook:

It’ll be interesting to see how quickly the Eagles can develop a productive modern attack. The offense should be fine but we’re not sold on the talent on defense and they play in the rough and tough FUN BELT East division. There was a yuuuge coaching staff upgrade in Statesboro but we’ll call for them to miss out on a bowl game and build towards 2023.


Want more Georgia Southern football ?

WEBSITE

https://gseagles.com/sports/football

FORUM

http://www.gsufans.com/tsc/forum.php

NEWS

https://www.underdogdynasty.com/georgia-southern-eagles

http://www.thegeorgeanne.com/sports/

http://www.espn.com/college-football/team/_/id/290/georgia-southern-eagles