New Bobcats coach scrambling to catch up

PARK CITY, Utah – Rob Ash prides himself on being organized.

But Montana State’s first-year head football coach admitted Monday morning during the first day of the Big Sky Conference Football Kickoff that he’s been in a bit of a “scramble mode” since taking over the Bobcats program just a little over a month ago.

“It’s been weird,” said Ash, who spent 18 years at Drake University before being named to replace Mike Kramer back on June 11. “At Drake, everything was structured and organized. I’ve always tried to have a year-long plan in place – a plan for everything – and be very systematic. But this has been hard, because we’ve had to start from scratch, and I’m not used to being in scramble mode.”

It helped that Ash was able to bring both his offensive coordinator, Dale Ploessl, and defensive coordinator, Jamie Marshall, with him from Drake. But it wasn’t until Sunday that he was able to fill the last position on his staff.

“So we won’t have our first full staff meeting with everybody present until next Monday, just two weeks before practice starts,” he noted.

On the plus side, Ash claims he found a solid foundation still in place when he arrived in Bozeman, despite the long litany of legal problems that plagued the Bobcats under Kramer, who was fired over the summer.

“The guys on the team are terrific guys who are positive and working hard – the ones that I’ve met, at least,” he said. “But there are still some on the team I haven’t seen yet, and our first practice will be the first time I’ve met them.”

As for the chaos surrounding Kramer’s departure, Ash said he has not allowed himself or his staff to look back.

“We really haven’t dealt with anything in the past,” he explained. “Our approach has been that June 11, the day I was hired, was Day One, and we’re just going to start from that point and work hard.”

Senior linebacker Will Claggett thinks the returning players on the Bobcats roster are buying into Ash’s ignore-the-past philosophy quite well.

“It was difficult on all of us – some more than others,” he said of the hectic off-season. “A lot of us, myself included, liked what we had before. But all you can do is ignore it.

“Our strength coach met with us when we got back this summer and said, ‘Hey, it is what it is. There’s two things you can do. You can sit here and dwell on it and not win a game next year, or you can work hard and do everything you can to be ready when fall camp gets here.’

“That’s the mind frame we’re in – just doing everything, physically, we can do, so that when fall camp starts we can get on with the mental process and just go from there.”

Name change

The NCAA has scrapped its Division I-A, I-AA and I-AAA designations that were once used to differentiate the administration of schools’ football programs.

They were replaced, last December, with the designations of Football Bowl Subdivision (FCS), which consists of schools whose football programs compete to participate in one of the 32 NCAA-sanctioned bowls that make up the Bowl Championship Series, and the Football Championship Subdivision that includes Big Sky schools and all others that participate in the NCAA championship postseason structure.

Big Sky Conference commissioner Doug Fullerton, who was involved with the name changes, explained they were made, primarily, to clear up confusion in basketball, where there is no differentiation between Division I-A and Division I-AA schools.

Big day for Eagles’ Alfred

The start of fall camp is still a couple of weeks away, but Eastern Washington’s Matt Alfred had a pretty good day on Monday.

The 6-foot-3, 310-pound senior offensive tackle was named to both the College Sporting News preseason NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision All-America football team and the preseason All-Big Sky team.

The former Gig Harbor High School standout was the only Eagle honored on either team.

Defending champion and preseason favorite Montana landed nine players on the All-BSC team, including offensive lineman Cody Balogh and wide receiver Eric Allen, who were unanimous first-team all-conference picks as juniors last fall.

Where’s the skill

In a dramatic departure from the norm, not one quarterback, running back or wide receiver were among the nine players invited to attend this year’s two-day Kickoff.

Of the nine seniors in attendance, three are defensive linemen, three are linebackers, two are offensive linemen and one is a defensive back.