BRIAN BAILEY'S TAKE ON PIRATE SPORTS

From the Anchor Desk
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
-
By Brian Bailey
WNCT-TV 9 Sports Director

Young talents to take center stage

Audio: Brian Bailey Show

The Brian Bailey Show airs on Pirate Radio 1250 on Mondays at 6:30 p.m. Brian's guests this week were ECU football coach Ruffin McNeill (left) and Cutter Creek golf professional Burt Williams (right): Replay show...

 
 

BASEBALL

Pirates shut out USF

TAMPA, FL — Four East Carolina pitchers combined to shut out South Florida in a 6-0 American Athletic Conference win on Sunday. David Lucroy, Nick Durazo, Joe Ingle and Jimmy Boyd limited the Bulls (24-12, 7-2 AAC) to a total of five hits and totaled 11 strikeouts. ... More...

Tuesday: ECU vs. UNCW | (rained out)

Next: ECU at ODU, Wednesday, 4 pm

 

BASEBALL

USF rolls past Pirates

TAMPA, FL — South Florida scored three runs in its first at-bat and went on to a 10-0 American Athletic Conference win over visiting East Carolina after a 75-minute delay on Saturday night. Casey Mulholland (4-4) pitched eight innings of the shutout. He allowed seven hits and struck out 10. ... More...

 

BASEBALL

Bulls edge ECU, 2-1

TAMPA, FL — South Florida took a 2-1 American Athletic Conference win over visiting East Carolina on Friday night on a 2-run home run by Luke Maglich in the bottom of the fifth inning. Maglich connected with a 2-1 pitch from Reid Love (3-3) after Luke Borders started the inning with a single to left field. ... More...

 

BASEBALL

ECU tops Camels, 7-5

BUIES CREEK — East Carolina scored three runs in the second inning and led the rest of the way in a 7-5 nonconference win at Campbell on Tuesday night.

A two-out single to right field by Jackson Mims got the Pirates (20-13) started in the second. ... Story & pictures...

Post-game: Cliff Godwin, Eric Tyler...

Pictured: ECU coach Cliff Godwin encourages a batter during the Pirates' 7-5 win over Campbell on Tuesday night in Buies Creek. (Photo  by W.A. Myatt)
 

BASEBALL

Pirates hit the road after series win

It wasn’t a sweep but East Carolina coach Cliff Godwin will certainly take it. The Pirates beat Tulane in the first two games of their pre-Easter series at Clark-LeClair Stadium, giving ECU its first series win in American Athletic Conference play. ... More from Brian Bailey...

MULTIMEDIA
Audio: The Brian Bailey Show

The Brian Bailey Show airs on Pirate Radio 1250 on Mondays at 6:30 p.m. Brian's guests this week were Todd Gibson, Cliff Godwin and Donnie Kirkpatrick: Replay show...

 

FOOTBALL RECRUITING

Recruiting wars: Running Backs

Even though East Carolina may well have acquired the best crop of running backs in program history via recruiting and transfers over the past year, don't expect the Pirate to ignore the position while pursuing prospects for the Class of 2016. ... More from Sammy Batten...

Recruiting Wars: QB | RB | WR | TE | OL | DE | NT | LB | DB

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

By Brian Bailey
©2015 Bonesville.net
All rights reserved.

VIEW MOBILE VERSION OF THIS PAGE

Are you ready for some East Carolina football?

Get ready for a bar-b-cue plate with a side of pigskin for the 32nd annual Great Pirate Purple-Gold Pigskin Pig-out Party this weekend.

The highlight of the festival is the spring football game, which will feature the ECU starters on offense against the second team defense, and the second team offense against the first team Pirate ‘D.’ The third teamers will also square off against one another.

“The biggest key is that we just want to stay healthy,” said Pirate coach Ruffin McNeill on my weekly radio show [REPLAY AUDIO] on Monday night on Pirate Radio 1250. “We will treat it like a very important practice, but some of our best players won’t play a whole lot.”

McNeill explained it like this.

“I know Montese Overton can tackle,” he said. “I know Zeek Bigger can tackle. What I want to see is some of the younger players. How will they react when the lights come on?"

Saturday’s second spring scrimmage was highlighted by several big plays by the offense and various penalties.

On the positive, the Pirate offense had a good day throwing the deep ball. That success, however, came at the expense of the Pirate defense and their always colorful coordinator, Rick Smith.

“I’m upset with them,” said Smith when asked about his defensive backs. “I told them that if they kept playing like that then somebody would be fired. Either I’ll get fired or they will get fired. And I’m not getting fired.”

Smith has this philosophy on giving up big plays.

“Our goal is to never give up a pass over 20 yards and never give up a run over 12 yards,” he explained. “We can give up a 10-yard run every now and then and still come back and play, but it’s hard to overcome 40 yards here and 40 yards there in the secondary.”

Speaking of philosophies, first year offensive coordinator Dave Nichol shared some of his ideas after Saturday’s scrimmage.

“We were better today,” said Nichol. “We had two late turnovers with our threes, which they need to protect it better. It was better. I’m going to say the same stuff. Better energy, better attitude, equals better play. They were more ready to go and hopefully they can continue that, that’s going to be the deal.”

Nichol doesn’t plan on naming a starting quarterback out of the spring, but Kurt Benkert still appears to be the odds on favorite. Benkert says he is taking things slowly and trying to get better every day himself.

Even though he’s not the starter, he is still playing the part.

“You have to talk like that every day,” said Benkert. “You have to act like you’re the starter every day. Even when Shane was here I was conducting myself as if I were ready to play. You have to conduct yourself the same way every time. I feel like I have a lot of big play capability. Like I’ve been saying, I want to work on just getting routine plays and not just random balls here and there that I can make in my sleep and just being consistent, being consistent as possible.”

For Benkert it’s his first real chance to play the position in front of the Pirate Nation.

“I’m always excited,” said Benkert. “Anytime we get to be on the field with this team it’s awesome. I feel like we are different from most other places and we just always have fun with each other. It’s going to be different having more people here, but there have been 50,000 here before and I’ve played, so it’s really not anything new.”

The spring football game won’t be the greatest game you’ll ever see. It never is. But it does give fans one final glimpse, one last taste of football before the spring breeze blends into the dog days of summer.

Kickoff is set for 2:30 on Saturday and there is no admission charge. That means there is no excuse not to check out Pirate football on Saturday.

Get your ECU football fix while you can. August is a long way away.

BB

E-mail Brian Bailey.

Brian Bailey Archives

04/14/2015 08:57 PM
----------