OU Football: A Closer Look At Louisiana Monroe

<p>Here's a closer look at Louisiana Monroe as the Sooners get set to take on the Warhawks Saturday at 6 p.m.&nbsp;</p>

Thursday, September 8th 2016, 5:47 pm

By: Brett Coppenbarger


While the Oklahoma fan base continues to lick their wounds from the season opening loss to Houston, the No. 14 Sooners will attempt to right the ship on Saturday evening against Louisiana Monroe (1-0).

Related: Stoops & Mayfield Praise Play Of Offensive Line

Along with OU’s quest to get back to its winning ways, the Sooners will be debuting a new south end of Gaylord Family – Oklahoma Memorial Stadium. In addition to a beautiful 8,500-square-foot video board, the $160 million project bowled in the south end zone while adding 22 suites, 60 open-air loge boxes and 2,000 more club seats.

There will surely be a lot of talk about the renovations throughout the game, but what matters is the results on the field. The Sooners will be squaring off against a ULM team fresh off a 38-21 win over Southern to open the season and appear to be reinvigorated under first-year head coach Matt Viator.

“Tough position to start right now being 0-1, but we’ve got a long season ahead of us, our guys are very aware of that, we get a chance to start off at home this week against Louisiana Monroe, a team that got their first win under a new coaching staff, they’ve got a lot of new life so we’ve got to do a lot of work this week to push for improvement.,” head coach Bob Stoops said.

Here’s a look at what the Warhawks will look like when they come to Norman this weekend.

Offense

In his second season as the ULM starter, Garrett Smith will lead the Warhawks’ offense from the quarterback position. Smith, who missed the final three games of last season with a shoulder injury, is an efficient passer who is capable of managing a game.

Last season Smith threw for 2,033 yards and 17 scores while completing 57 percent of his passes, but the start of 2015 went smoother for the quarterback than the end. Through his first two games as a starter against Georgia and Nicholls state, Smith completed 70 percent of his passes and totaled five touchdowns. He appeared to be on the path to greatness, but injuries to the Warhawks’ receiving unit slowed down his development.

Along with passing the ball, Smith can get the job done on the ground as well. Last week Smith ran for a career-high 150 yards as ULM totaled 325 yards rushing.

Now Smith will look to continue his strong start to 2016 with a solid performance against the Sooners.

Redshirt sophomore running back Ben Luckett is another factor on the ULM offense, and last week rushed for 110 yards against Southern and scored a touchdown. Luckett’s a dependable back who normally gets at least five yards per carry. Despite sitting as the Warhawks’ lead runner, Coach Viator likes to rotate more than one guy in the backfield, with six ULM players getting at least one carry against Southern.

Wideout Ajalen Holley was a preseason All-Sun Belt Second Team selection, and the senior leads a receiving corps that features seven players who caught passes against Southern. Another big contributor should be sophomore Marcus Green, who led the team with 59 receiving yards against the Jaguars while both he and senior Jared Mapps found the end zone.

ULM returned 51 starts on their offensive line this season and only had to replace the center and right tackle position. New o-line coach Rob Sale, who was at Georgia last year, helped coach up a unit that helped protect a Warhawks’ offense that totaled 533 yards against Southern.

Defense

While the Warhawks’ offense returned plenty of experienced playmakers, the ULM defense lost their entire front seven from last year and returns only three starters.

Senior safety Tre’ Hunter was a preseason All- Sun Belt Second Team selection and returns as the Warhawks’ most reliable defensive player. Hunter recorded 10 tackles from the secondary last week to go along with a sack. He’s joined by corner Justin Backus in the defensive backfield as the only two secondary players with experience.  

Sophomore linebacker David Griffith is another big time player, and his 14 tackles against Southern is evidence of that. Griffith will need to continue to play a big role for the ULM defense throughout the entire season seeing the Warhawks lost its four leading tacklers from last year’s two-win team.

Just like the Sooners’ defense in the opening weekend, ULM’s second half went much better than the first. After Southern rushed for 168 yards in the first half, the Warhawks were able to buckle down defensively and only allowed the Jaguars to run for 71 yards after intermission.

Oklahoma’s offense should be able to move the ball with somewhat ease against ULM seeing the Sooners’ offense should be motivated after the blunder against the Cougars. 

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