The Mid-American Conference held its first conference call of the 2018 season Monday morning. The conference enters its 72nd season with one game slated for Thursday, two on Friday and nine on Saturday.
The 2018 MAC season will conclude with the 22nd Marathon MAC Football Championship game on Nov. 30 at 7:00 pm ET (ESPN2) at Ford Field in Detroit.
Here are the takeaways from the conference’s first coaches teleconference of the season:
- Among the 12 games in week one, the conference will see six of it teams play a Power Five opponent. It’s the norm for a Group of Five conference in the first week of its non-conference schedule, giving some of the FBS’ smaller athletic departments a nice paycheck to start the academic year.
- Ball State will kick off Thursday against Central Connecticut State. The obvious conversation topic with coach Mike Neu was the return of a fully healthy roster. Seven of the 11 offensive starters in the 2017 season opener at Illinois suffered a season-ending injury at some point during the year. Ball State started four quarterbacks throughout the season.
- Tim Lester will return for his second season at the helm of Western Michigan on Friday night for a 6 p.m. game against Syracuse on CBS Sports Network. Lester was Syracuse’s offensive coordinator from 2013-2015.
“I have a lot of connections there and really enjoyed my time there,” he said. “Some people think I set up this game, but it was set up way before I took the job here (Kalamazzo). Not that exciting because I recruited Eric Dungey, the quarterback. When I recruited him I never thought I’d have to coach against him.”
- First-year Kent State coach Sean Lewis — the youngest FBS coach in the country at age 32 — will lead the Golden Flashes to Champagne, Illinois, for a 1:30 p.m. kickoff Saturday. Lewis attended Richards High School in Illinois, about a two-hour drive from Memorial Stadium. He grew up rooting for the Lovie Smith-era Chicago Bears. Smith is currently the coach of the Illini.
- It’s no secret Chuck Martin and the Miami RedHawks struggled to close out games last year. They lost five games within one touchdown, including last year’s 31-26 loss to Marshall. Miami will have a rematch against the Thundering Herd on Saturday at Yager Stadium. The RedHawks will also be celebrating homecoming in week one, the first time Martin has ever heard of homecoming happening so early in the football season.
“Nobody asked me about it, and I really don’t understand why we’re doing it,” he said. “It’s way above my pay grade. I don’t know who came up with it. I’ve never heard of something like this. Maybe we’re starting a new trend here — although I doubt it.”
- Ohio’s most formidable opponent in the MAC’s East Division, Buffalo, consists of the duo quarterback Tyree Jackson and wide receiver Anthony Johnson. Johnson was recently selected to be a pre-season AP Honorable Mention All-American. The Bulls were held out of a bowl game last season after finishing the season 6-6, which still made them bowl eligible. Coach Lance Leipold said without being held out of a bowl game, he’s unsure if his team would be so ready to prove themselves in the 2018 season.
“I think that it’s been a good motivator for us,” he said. “Ending the season with three wins and hitting eligibility for only the third time in the program’s history was good. But it was kind of nice to come back in the spring knowing we needed to take matters into our own hands.”
