Cam Cason road-trip blog takes you behind the scenes at Murray State
CARBONDALE, Ill. — Southern Illinois cornerback Cam Cason takes you behind the scenes for a look at Saluki Football’s recent road trip to Murray State (Sept. 25-26). Special thanks to StrongDawgs subscribers for directly supporting these and so many other player opportunities.
Friday, Sept. 25
We left Carbondale around 3:30 p.m. for a short bus ride to Paducah to stay the night at a hotel. On the bus, I either listen to music, watch movies or sleep. Today, I did all three. We got there around 5 p.m. and checked into our rooms. I’m rooming with Stix (Joshua Newkirk) on this trip. We had team dinner at 6 and I had some steak, pasta and mashed potatoes, and then I had a plate of fruit. It was all really good.
After dinner, Coach Hill talked to the team, and he played a pregame speech from one of his old coaches. The coach’s name was Carl Mauck, and I know he played in the league and coached here, too. It was super-inspirational. He basically said to play every down, every play like it’s your last game, because you never know. It kind of stuck with me that you truly never know when it's the last time. Some people go on the field and don't have the ability to walk off.
Next, we had our defensive meeting with Coach Pron (Lee Pronschinske). Basically, he puts plays from our opponent on the screen and gives us a call, and we go over the communication aspect of the play. We talk through our checks and support calls. Communication is key for every position. As a cornerback, I don't have to do much of the talking, but I have to know what's going on. If the safety makes a call, I gotta know what that means for me. The only time I really have to communicate is if I'm talking about unbalanced formations or if a receiver’s off the ball, but mostly, it's just us listening to whatever the call is and then us echoing the call to make sure everyone is on the same page.
The last meeting of the day was just the cornerbacks with Coach (Eriq) Moore. He gives us a little test with eight boxes of formations and routes with a certain call to it. Then you have to draw out what you would do, draw out where you're going to end up on the play, draw up any calls you would make on the play. Every corner gets one play that they have to present to the rest of us and talk it through. It’s a good chance to see if you know what you're doing and make sure everyone's good. Murray State does a lot of shifting, so it will be important to talk fast and loud enough so everyone can hear. Then we just have to win the one-on-ones when the opportunity presents itself. It’s very important that we win that matchup at least 60 percent of the time.
After the meetings, I went back to the room, took a shower, watched some football and went to bed.
Saturday, Sept. 26
Since it’s a night game, we had team breakfast at 9 a.m. The pancakes were real good, and I had a bunch of water for hydration.
We did more walk-throughs out in the parking lot. First, we did a special teams walk-through where we have a makeshift sideline and Coach (Nathan) Frame gives us our formations. I’m on punt and punt return. We go out there and make sure we have all 11 on the field. Then we split up into scouts versus the defense and walked through some of the main plays Murray State runs.
After the walk throughs, we went back to the room and watched Illinois versus Ohio State. Then it was time for pregame meal. I had teriyaki chicken with rice, some more fruit on the side and a salad.
It was about an hour drive to Murray State. There were not too many people outside when we got there, not too many distractions around us. We were locked in, headed straight to the locker room and got dressed. Right before kickoff they had a horse run out on the field. It’s a cool entrance.
The game itself, that first drive, we didn’t play to our standards. After that touchdown, we had a good response and everyone was locked in with great communication, great execution. We just stepped up, stayed together.
I was on the field for the big punt block by Stix. My responsibility was to guard the gunner on the outside. I didn't even know it was blocked at first because I'm just focused on my man. The returner, Tae (Marrero) is yelling “poison” which is the call to look back for the ball. I saw Stix running to the end zone. I didn't really know what happened, but I ran down there because everyone's down there. I had to go look at the iPad to see that it was blocked. Man, Stix was excited and I'm excited for him. He’s been working and he deserves the plays that are coming to him.
It was a great night for the corners with Bash (Sebastian Vargas Escobar) getting another interception. He’s really smart and good at reading routes. He's just there at the right time. When you do your job every single time, you just get rewarded for it. He's a great player and super-excited for him. Go get another one next week, too.
There's no better feeling than winning with your brothers, especially the way we won, holding them to only six points, playing lights-out defense. It felt amazing and the energy was just extremely high after the game.
It was a fun bus ride home. We had Zaxby’s chicken tenders with some chips and cookies for our post-game meal. We got back to Carbondale around midnight. Overall, it was a great trip and excited about this team and for what’s next. Appreciate everyone’s support of StrongDawgs. Go Dawgs!
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