East Central hopes veteran ballhandlers will produce wins
ADA — East Central has experienced ballhandlers.
In East Central University's first five football seasons in the Great American Conference, 2011-15, the Tigers fashioned a record of 31-23. Since then, ECU is 9-35.
We continue our series of state-college football previews, today looking at East Central, and the Tiger story is mostly the story of all the Oklahoma schools in the GAC. Trouble keeping up with the Arkansas teams, primarily Henderson State, Ouachita Baptist and Harding.
Can ECU reverse the trend? There are some positive signs.
In the spring, East Central went 2-0, beating Southern Nazarene 35-28 and Division I-AA Tarleton State 21-14.
And ECU coach Al Johnson returns a load of talented ballhandlers.
“Can't tell you for sure,” Johnson said. “We haven't played a full season since ‘19. But the spring showed our guys they have the talent to play with just about anybody in the conference. We have to show up and do it every week.”
From the 2019 ECU squad, the Tigers return quarterback Kenny Hrncir, who completed 58.7% of his passes, for 1,876 yards and five touchdowns.
Also back is tailback Mookie Douglass, of Lawton Eisenhower, who rushed for 1,132 yards and scored 18 touchdowns in 2019.
ECU's veteran talent extends to receivers. JayQuan Lincoln, from Lawton High, had 49 catches for 649 yards in 2019, while Teslim Abubaker had 24 catches for 337 yards.
Johnson even has talent and experience at backup quarterback, with Taye Gatewood, who has played extensively.
“We have an unbelievable set of skill positions,” Johnson said. “We have a bunch of guys coming back that have some ability.
“The O-line is getting better. It is hard to find good, tough, dirty little guys that are going to come out and roll up their sleeves and go to work.”
Defensively, ECU will be led by safety Cam Jones of Sulphur, linebacker R.J. Williams and linebacker Ke'Von Curry of John Marshall.
“We were lucky to be able to play in that springtime,” Johnson said. “I tried to fight for as many games as we could get in the spring.
“We were the youngest team in all of Division II at the end of year, 2019. We started nine freshmen on defense, seven on offense. We needed to play in 2020.”