East Carolina had its first day of football practice on Wednesday from 9:40 a.m. until 11:50 a.m., wearing only helmets in terms of equipment. ECU coach Mike Houston said heat became a factor later in the session.

Anticipation is building nationwide for the season, which will begin for the Pirates at home against Norfolk State on Saturday, Aug. 31, with a 6 p.m. kickoff. The 2024 campaign will culminate with the first ever 12-team playoff in the Football Bowl Subdivision.

“First day of practice, always an exciting time of the year all across the country every single year,” Houston said “Today’s no different. The guys have been itching for this and they were excited last night, excited this morning. You get out there and that sun comes out and that humidity kicks in and it hits you that it’s camp.

“It was the first day, and I’m glad we got some heat and humidity because we’re going to need that to acclimate us here in August. Good first day, as far as getting the practice in. That looked like a first day, sloppy as all get out. The heat comes out and you lose some discipline with your young guys.

“Then your old guys, Rahjai Harris, Dustyn Hall, Casey Kelly, D’Anta Johnson, Suirad (Ware), Eli (Elijah Morris), Chad (Stephens), the guys that have been there and practiced a lot, Hampton (Ergle), the old guys. They just go, because they’ve been through it.

“They have the mental capacity and toughness to handle it no matter what. That’s what we’ve got to have from our whole program. Good first day, get meetings in this afternoon, walk through in the night, and then get ready to go tomorrow morning again.”

Schedule adjustments

Practice times will vary to help the Pirates prepare for differing kickoff times. ECU will don shells for workouts at 3:40 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.

“We’ll switch it up going into the weekend,” Houston said. ” … Give them a little bit more rest between Thursday’s practice and Friday’s practice and get some afternoon work. That’s a 4 p.m. kickoff (Appalachian State, Sept. 14), so we’ve got to prepare for that. Then we’ve got a night practice next week (Wednesday, Aug. 7) to get ready for the opener. Three of our first four are at night, so we’re going to get plenty of practice at night during preseason camp.”

Heat

The players had contrasting reactions as the mercury climbed the first day.

“It was great,” Houston said. “Then that sun hit them and then about half of them were great and the rest of them were just trying to survive.”

Evaluation circumstances

Houston indicated that allowances have to be made in evaluating new additions to the program.

“You try to take all factors into consideration,” he said. “My big thing with the young kids today when we were talking in team meetings this morning is ‘There’s going to be times you don’t know what to do. Just go hard.’ That way we can evaluate effort, we can evaluate athleticism.

“The big thing is for the next several weeks. It’s figuring out who can do what, Also what can we do? For the most part, we know defensively what we can do. Some of those guys have played so many snaps, but offensively you have a new system, a lot of new players, so you’ve got to figure out who can do it and then what can they do and what are we best at, because we’ve got a huge offensive playbook. You want to focus on the things that you do well and that’s what we want to major in going into the season.”

Quarterbacks

Transfer quarterbacks Katin Houser and Jake Garcia will alternate days taking snaps with the first unit.

“Rock, paper, scissors,” Houston said. “Katin went with the ones today, Jake went with the twos. Tomorrow they’ll switch and we’ll keep on that way throughout the next several practices. If at some point in time somebody separates themselves, then so be it. We want to give both of them an equal opportunity.”

Growth and development of QBs

Houston discussed how the quarterbacks have adjusted and matured since coming to ECU before spring practice.

Houser transferred from Michigan State after throwing for 1,130 yards and six touchdowns as a freshman. Garcia, a junior, played at Miami before serving as a back-up at Missouri in 2023.

“I think they’re more comfortable,” Houston said of their progress since becoming Pirates. “They know the offense. They’re both smart kids, smart football players. They know where the ball is supposed to go. They’re both good decision makers. I think that you’re going to see that from that position. It’s just figuring out the other pieces around it and then who functions best.”

Summer prep

The learning curve that began in the spring continued afterward.

“With the rules the way they are, we practiced all summer,” Houston said “We were on the field two days a week in June, three days a week in July. We’re allowed two hours a week with a ball. The coaches are out there and the kids can get out there on their own also. We have practice all summer.

“Offensively and defensively, we’ve installed the schemes multiple times now. This is just another install. We started over today. Today was install one for the offense. Install one and two for the defense.”

Leadership qualities

Houston commented on the leadership abilities of the potential starters at quarterback.

“They’re both trying to do a good job,” he said. “It’s tough in the situation that they’re in, because neither one’s been named the clear-cut starter. They both have the attributes to do it, and they both have the respect of the locker room. It’s just going to be who establishes himself as the guy.

“I think then it’s easier for you to be that Holton Ahlers. I mean for the last two years of Holton’s career, there was no doubt who the leader in the locker room was, but that took a while for him to establish. Okay. Same thing here. They’ve got to establish themselves as the starter and the guy, and then they’ll embrace the leadership piece.”

Versatile Nash

Dontavius Nash, a transfer from North Carolina prior to the ’23 season, may move from safety to corner.

“Obviously, he has experience at safety and has played well there,” Houston said. “He played corner at UNC. You look at his body type and his skill set. He can do both. He was probably better suited to be a corner when he first got here and we made him play safety.

“He embraced it and became a good tackler and made some good plays for us last year. We feel like we’ve got a good pair at corner. We just don’t know who’s next and we’re figuring out who’s next. D. Nash, athletically, is certainly skilled enough to be a really solid corner. We’re going to look at him there during preseason camp and he’s going to be prepared to play both during the season.”

Up tempo offense

New offensive coordinator John David Baker will direct an up tempo attack.

“We’re not tempo-ing yet,” Houston said. “We’re still installing, so we probably won’t tempo until early next week. Once you start moving the ball during the team setting, then that’s really when the offense will be the most effective and when our defense will be tested.

“We’re going to need it. Game two, Old Dominion, they snap it as fast as anybody in the country. The good thing for us, whether it’s ODU or Texas San Antonio or Florida Atlantic, whoever it is, our defense is going to be so much better prepared for the tempo offenses this year. Not only for the speed, but also for a lot of the scheme specific things they do in the passing game that we got hurt on last year.”

Expectations in trenches

Houston was asked what he’s looking for from the offensive front under new position coach Matt Mattox at this point.

“Execution, playing together,” said the sixth-year Pirates coach. “That’s the one thing is this time last year we went out there on day one and you had five new guys playing together that had not played together ever before. You go out there today and you’ve got four that took a ton of snaps last year together.

“Then you’ve got another one that’s a veteran guy that transferred in, that did well in the spring. You add in Karson (Jones), who’s an older guy from Houston, (Jason) Tarpey, he’s been through a spring. He’s an older guy. We at least have guys that have played. That’s a huge, huge deal — is having experience.

“I’m going to look at the film. I expect to see pretty good execution and pretty good play together. Now going into the weekend, then we’ll find out because I expect our fronts to be better than we were last year. I expect our offensive front to be significantly better than it was last year. We’re going to be able to test each other.

“We know what we;ve got up front with those guys defensively, and I’ve challenged them that they’ve got to be better. Those guys have started for four years now.

“There’s no excuse for them not to play at a high level and they expect that in themselves. That’s not just me expecting that. They expect that of themselves. That’s going to be a great way to evaluate both sides is just the experience we have coming back.”

Rahjai jumps in

Houston said veteran running back Rahjai Harris showed some quick leadership in the initial practice session.

“He had a great practice today,” Houston said. “One of those young backs — he’s down on a knee over there.

“Rajai jumps into the third group and he’s taking snaps there. Now I’m over there ripping the young kid because my fifth-year senior shouldn’t be out there taking every snap because you can’t catch your breath. Just because you sat around all last week and didn’t listen to us and you weren’t prepared for today, doesn’t mean you get to take the day off.

“It’s great to have him, his leadership, his positive enthusiasm. I want to see him back to him, back to that kid that we saw in 2020, back to that kid that we recruited. He’s had the injury stuff and dealt with some stuff and he is in as good a shape and is healthy right now as he’s been since his freshman year. I can’t wait to see him play on the 31st.”

Special teams

Special teams got attention as practice opened. Veteran Andre Powell is in his first year as special teams coordinator.

“We did punt and kickoff both today,” Houston said. “Worked the returners a good bit today. We worked both kickers, place kickers at the end of practice today. We had a scripted deal for kicks. It starts today.

“I just want to say Andre Powell, I have known him for 20-some years. We’ve told the story about when I used to go visit with him when I was a young high school coach. A lot of the stuff that we did at The Citadel, James Madison, a lot of the stuff that we’ve done here, from a standpoint of our schematics, has been stuff (from Powell).

‘Every special teams coordinator I’ve had went and visited with Andre Powell before the season, just to have his experience and his leadership, not only with the special teams, but this is a veteran guy.

“He’s been through a lot and seen a lot. It’s great to have that wisdom in our staff room and that leadership for our special teams units.”