Season review: Toreros have ups and downs

The 2009 Torero football season played out like your average,
disappointing Hollywood blockbuster. You’ve seen it a dozen times before. There was plenty of hype going in before it even began and it started out by living up to the hype, but it took an early stumble and spent the majority of the time trying to get back on the right track. Even though in the end they put forth their best effort to try and salvage what they lost, it still fell well short of the lofty expectations. There’s a cliché to explain this phenomenon: “Too little, too late.”
And that sums up the disappointing
football season for USD. The team knew coming in to the season that they would have a difficult
time replacing star receiver John Matthews after he went on to make the cut for the 10-0 Indianapolis Colts. Little did they know just how difficult the game could be without a reliable playmaker.
With that pre-season hype at a high point, the game plan coming into the season was simply to run the ball with the plethora of backs that the team had on the roster. Graduate J.T. Rogan received another year of eligibility and he was joined by the team’s top two rushers from 2008, Phil Morelli and Matt Jelmini, as well as junior Brendan Feliczak.
The Toreros used the legs of these four backs to pound the ball at the beginning of the year, rushing for 786 yards as a team in their first five games. But the hype fizzled a bit as the team only managed a 3-2 record in that span, though one was to a non-conference scholarship program in Northern Colorado. The team was still in prime position to make a run at the Pioneer League crown.
However, that was when things began to spiral out of control. In the final six games to close out the season, the Toreros hit that rough patch that became too difficult
to overcome. They only managed
573 yards on the ground in those six games, and they struggled to an awful 1-5 record in that span.
USD did put forth their best effort to salvage some respect from the season, coming away with a 13-7 victory against Morehead
St. before falling to another scholarship
program, Southern Utah, in a hard-fought 37-32 defeat in the last game of the season. True freshman
quarterback Bo Stompro threw for five touchdowns in the loss, and the team showed a fight that hadn’t been seen earlier on in the season.
In looking back at the season, it is intriguing to try and find just what went wrong with this Torero football team. The unexpected failure of the running game meant the team needed a boost from other offensive weapons. Senior quarterback Sebastian Trujillo left the program following the victory over Marist after he was benched for red-shirt freshman Sam Scudellari
(he cited ‘‘financial purposes’’ as his reason for leaving) and it was up to the new quarterback to carry the load on offense.
The Scudellari Era got off on the right foot and showed some positive signs for the season to come. During his first three starts as a Torero, he completed 54 of 98 passes for 724 yards resulting in six touchdowns and zero interceptions.
Yet the offense struggled in the Red Zone during these starts and they won just one of the three. The following game against Jacksonville, Scudellari suffered a season-ending injury to his tibia en route to another disappointing defeat.
It was amidst this two game losing streak and a disappointing
3-4 record that true freshman
Bo Stompro took the reigns as the team’s quarterback. The freshman played well in his four games under center, but USD still only managed one win during that stretch. However, Stompro’s success, along with the return of Scudellari, creates an intriguing battle at the quarterback position heading in to the 2010 season.
In looking ahead to the 2010 season, it is hard to imagine that things will get any worse for this Torero team. On the bright side, only 12 seniors graduate following
the season. The biggest losses come on the defensive side as captains Gabe Derricks and Kevin Dunn have played their last games in a Torero uniform.
The two led the daunting
Torero defense, which was the brightest spot for the 2009 team, allowing
a respectable
21.6 points per game (which is largely inflated due to the fact the offense’s struggle to move the ball kept the defensive unit on the field for longer than they would have liked). Finding replacements for the talented defense is sure to be the top priority for Coach Ron Caragher.
On the offensive side of the ball, First Team All-PFL lineman
Patrick Calahan will depart along with fellow O-linemen Kyle Kofoed and Conrad Smith, and J.T. Rogan’s epic career at USD has finally come to an end.
The good news is that PFL Offensive
Freshman of the Year Kyle Warren is back for the Toreros, and he will join fellow receivers John McGough and Eric Fiege as the favorite
targets for either Stompro or Scudellari. McGough is the team’s star receiver, and Warren is a deadly, deep-ball threat, but Feige established himself throughout the season as a Wes Welker type target that always seems to find a way to get open, and the combination of the three should provide enough firepower for the passing game to find success.
Though the loss of Rogan may appear to be a big one, Jelmini and Morelli have proven they are more than capable of carrying the rushing load in the future. Jelmini should be the favorite to be the starter as his 4.8 yard per carry average
led the team, and he was the only Torero to record a 100-yard rushing game on the season.
If there is one thing that Caragher
needs to learn it’s to ride a player while he is hot in order to put the team in the best position to win with the best guys on the field at all times. Failing to do so could not only destroy another season for the Toreros, but it would put him on the hot seat as well.
It was too little, too late for the 2009 Torero football team, but the future is bright as many pieces are in place to make a stronger run back towards Pioneer League supremacy. It starts with putting the right guys on the field, and if that can happen, this team has the potential to become an above .500 team again.
Until then, perhaps the best thing to do is to take a page out of every Chicago Cubs fan’s book and repeat the mantra they have made famous: “There’s always next year.”