Mike Houston knew change was needed after a 2-10 season in 2023 and the East Carolina football coach got busy at the outset of the offseason.

His sixth season at ECU starts Saturday at home against Norfolk State at 6 p.m. and some of the changes will be readily apparent.

That includes an up-tempo offense brought from Ole Miss by new coordinator John David Baker and a starting quarterback that emerged from the transfer portal, Jake Garcia.

“Last year, I was not pleased with where we were with the results of the season and I was determined to fix everything,” Houston said. ” … A lot of changes were needed, whether it’s philosophy, staff, personnel, because you operate your mindset and philosophy as the head coach.

“I made a lot of changes, and so probably as many as I’ve ever made in my career. And so, this is a much different program today than it was at the end of last November.  I’m excited about who we are. I’m excited about the players we have on the roster. I’m excited about what we’re doing in all three phases, offense, defense and special teams.

“And I’m excited that game week’s here. It’s what we all work for. You can talk about preseason predictions and perceptions and what we think’s going to happen, but we get to kick it off at 6 o’clock on Saturday night.

‘Then, it’s go time. You get to see what happens when the ball is snapped. That’s something I’m very excited about.”

Morning practices

One of the changes this year is the institution of morning practices. It was an innovation in the Scottie Montgomery coaching era at ECU between 2016 and 2018 because Montgomery liked what he felt like the early sessions did for Duke.

Houston likes the extended recovery time from physical morning workouts on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

“That’s something that Coach John Williams (strength coach) and I started discussing last fall because you have to really look pretty far down the road to make an adjustment like this because of the academic calendar with the school.

“We started talking about it towards the end of the regular season. I’ve thought about it before. We’ve done research on it before. The whole deal is trying to have the freshest, most prepared team come game day that you can have.

“At the end of the day, we felt like there were two or three key pieces that led us to feel like this was what was going to be best for us. So, we made the adjustment. We’re only one weekend in, so this will be our second week of it with school going, but hopefully it results in a much better prepared team on game day.”

Spartans edged

Norfolk State was topped, 24-23, by Florida A&M in Atlanta on Saturday night, so the Spartans will be playing their second game.

“They went out there against Florida A&M, which is one of the better FCS (Football Championship Subdivision) programs in the country and really got after them up front. That offensive line allowed Norfolk State to run for 227 yards and went up 14-0.

“You saw the big counter plays that popped. And number 13 is (Kevon) King, went for 82 yards. I was very impressed. I did not see that from him last year, but I thought he and (Xzavion) Evans both did a good job of getting downhill, whether it’s on the counter plays, which they ran a lot or some of the zone plays, the split zone, same side zone, zone insert.

“I thought that the offensive line really gave them a chance. Certainly they’ve got some speedy wide receivers. They’ve got (Jacquez) Jones, number 3, the transfer from Lane College. He had a really good night the other night.

“The quarterback (Jalen) Daniels transferred from Garden City Community College after going to the University of South Carolina. I thought he played well, but the thing that impressed me the most is that offensive line.”

Pirates relatively healthy

Houston said the team is injury free for the most part.

“Not too bad,” Houston said. “We’ve got a couple of guys that are banged up. But for the most part, we’ll have the vast majority of our number one guys Saturday night.”

Confidence in passing game

Houston isn’t looking for the ground game to take pressure off the passing dimension.

“I don’t think we have to worry about taking pressure off the passing game,” he said. “I think we’re going to be pretty good throwing the football.

“I do think we’ve got a lot of potential in the run game as well, but I think we have an opportunity to be a very explosive, high-octane offense and we feel very good about those quarterbacks.”

Proven defense

ECU allowed just 22.4 points per game in 2023, which ranked 37th nationally. The problem was an offense that averaged 17.3 points, which ranked No. 124.

Houston said the defense may be better in 2024.

“We have a chance to be a better unit this year than last year,” Houston said.  “We lost Julius Wood and Jeremy Lewis, two really good players. But we have a ton of guys coming back who have a lot of experience and they have played at a very high level and I’ve challenged them.

“I expect us to be better this year on the defensive side of the ball, and I think we’re playing like that right now. I think there’s lots of reasons. We got really good cover guys in the secondary. I think our safeties are good tacklers. We have two really solid corners.

“We have a defensive front that I think is as good as anybody in the league. I think we have really capable linebackers that have really come on during preseason camp. I’m excited to see how we play Saturday night.”

Excitement builds

Houston likes the excitement building within the university community and Pirate Nation. He had a live radio program Monday night.

“I’m sure that Tiebreakers will be buzzing tonight,” Houston said Monday afternoon. “The first coaches show, we’ve got a couple of players coming with me. You’ve got everybody doing the preparations in the stadium today, getting everything ready for game day.

“Last night at practice, the players, they had different buzz in them, the older players especially. They understand it’s time to go. … With all the anticipation, with all the changes in the offseason, I think everybody’s ready to get to Saturday night.”