The energy in the room was palpable. Everyone was anxious to hear the news.

Faulkner faculty, board members and even some students, who worked for the Faulkner Sports Network, were crowded into the board room just up the spiral staircase in the lobby of Harris Hall, along with reporters from local media stations. The wall of windows on the far side of the room offers an almost panoramic view of the campus; when seen from this vantage point, it is no wonder why students and alumni sing in the Alma Mater, "In the heart of our fair southland, stands a school that we hold dear."

Looking north across campus from those windows, the stands and the press box atop Billy D. Hilyer Stadium are almost visible.  Along with the adjoining fieldhouse, the facility sits on the northeast corner of campus grounds. The announcement on this day, May 14, 2021, dealt with what would be taking place in that stadium in a few months' time.

About nine months before that moment, the 2020-2021 athletic schedule was thrown into question by a world in the throes of COVID-19. The football season moved to the ensuing spring due to the pandemic. What's more, home games were going to have to be played at Cramton Bowl in downtown Montgomery because of a sinkhole that opened in the spring just before students were sent home for the rest of the semester.

However, there were bright spots for the team on the gridiron. The spring season, the second for the Eagles under the leadership of Tommy Wasden, saw the squad turn the corner and go 6-2, a far cry from consecutive losing campaigns in 2018 and 2019. The only losses in the season came to an outstanding Reinhardt team, champions of the Mid-South Appalachian Division. It was the Eagles' first year in the division after three fruitless seasons in the Sun Division, which is completely comprised of teams in the peninsula of Florida. Road trips saw long distances for the team to travel, often with less-than-stellar showings on the field.

However, the 2020 record tied the best win percentage in program history, previously reached in 2013 and 2014. Those two years saw Faulkner make the national playoffs for the only visits in program history. The second of those years was the first Eagle campaign led by Charlie Boren following the departure of Brent Barker. The latter oversaw the team in 2012 and 2013, the program's first winning seasons. After records of 9-3, 7-3, 6-4 and 7-3, Boren stepped down following the 2017 season. Faulkner then hired long-time Troy assistant coach and former Auburn wide receiver Shayne Wasden, but the Eagles' results in 2018 were that of a rebuilding year. The team finished 4-6 after losing its starting quarterback for most of division play with an injury and being unable to get the upper hand in several one-score losses. Then, the following January, Wasden surprisingly left the program. His brother and associate head coach, Tommy, took over. After a 2019 campaign that saw Faulkner underachieve again, likely due to the team facing more turnover in its coaching ranks, the team with the Winged-F on its helmets found traction and great progress in the spring at Cramton Bowl.

With the new field about to be finished and newfound success, students and alumni were likely looking forward to an ordinary fall season in 2021 with some level of normalcy and consistency on campus and in the program. And why not? After all, the team was winning again. On top of the on-field wins, Faulkner got some victories off the field when some of the squad's main contributors who would have otherwise exhausted their eligibility were able to return as "super seniors" in the fall of 2021, thanks to NCAA and NAIA rulings related to the pandemic. However, just over a week after the spring season ended, the school found out it would be in the market for a new coach once again. The new hire would be the Eagles' seventh head coach and fourth in five seasons.

Faulkner needed a true leader, who the team would recognize as such and be willing to lay it all on the line for on fall Saturdays. Most of all, after so much uncertainty at the top, the team needed a man who was dedicated to the program and could help it reach new heights. The hire loomed momentous for the school, as it should have been, with the Eagles hosting a team ranked in the preseason Top 25, Southeastern, on campus to kick off 2021 on September 4.

With a modest crowd of stakeholders and media gathered in the conference room on this May morning, the question felt almost tangible. Who could it be?

In walked Rob Gray.

After President Mike Williams introduced him to the press, Gray walked up the mic. As he began to speak on his vision for Faulkner, the hire quickly began to make sense.

A native of Collinsville, Ala., and a standout linebacker at nearby Jacksonville State from 2009-2013, Gray's playing days were recent enough that he would be able to relate to his athletes. Additionally, he had spent time coaching on the bigger stages of college football, as well as high school, so he had a wealth of experiences and connections that he could build on in both leading a team and recruiting for it. His first coaching position after his time in college came as a graduate assistant at University of Alabama-Birmingham from 2015-2017. The Blazers were, and still are, led by Bill Clark, who coached Gray's Gamecocks to an FCS No. 10 final ranking in his one year in charge in 2013.

Needless to say, this is impressive company, as Clark is a well-known name around the state of Alabama. He is extremely accomplished, as he helped lead Prattville High School to two state championships and, after his time as South Alabama's defensive coordinator and JSU's head coach, took over at UAB just before the program shut down for two seasons. Clark effectively brought the Blazers back to life, continuing to lead and recruit during the dead period and navigating the team to unprecedented achievements from the time it began anew in 2017 to the present day. Naturally, Gray learned several lessons during his time under Clark, namely in the way in which he runs a team from an organizational standpoint to preparation in game-planning. He also credited several others that he played and coached under for teaching him more about player development and the importance of coaches investing in players' lives.  He specifically mentioned two of his position coaches. The first is former JSU and UAB assistant Duwan Walker, who is currently the CEO of Hi.Ed, a software company that deals with high schoolers' academic credits and athletic eligibility. As a father figure who introduced Gray to the family side of the profession, Walker took time to ask the current Faulkner head coach how he was doing and invested in his family. Gray also emphasized the roles played by current UAB defensive backs coach Blake Shrader and, appropriately, Tommy Wasden.

"It's a long list, man. There are people that did different things," Gray explained. "Even when I got this job here, Coach Shrader, who's also at UAB, just from a standpoint of being organized, like practice sheets, game-management stuff, he sent all those over to me. So, it's been cool to see how, you know, some of those guys I haven't talked to in a while, and the moment I got the job, it was just, 'What can I do to help you?', those type things, and telling me what things I will need that I didn't know I would need. So, I think those, the good Lord has blessed me with being at these different places and all these different people to have these different impacts on my life. It's been a journey, and Coach Wasden for sure. He was awesome for me when he was here."

After leaving Birmingham, Gray went back to JSU to coach outside linebackers for a season before departing to coach defensive backs and be the co-defensive coordinator at Mobile Christian School from 2018-2019, where Wasden served as head coach and president for several years before coming to Faulkner. When promoted to the head job, Wasden convinced Gray to come up to Montgomery to work with him again, this time as defensive backs coach and passing game coordinator. Gray came close to not staying long-term, though. In fall of 2020, he left to coach at Charles Henderson High School in Troy, Ala. Wasden got him to return for the spring season and be his associate head coach while taking the reins for defensive backs once again. When Wasden stepped down, the university's leadership, as Williams said in the press conference, kept coming back to Gray during the search process. Ultimately, they decided that he would be the next leader of the Eagles.

This move, beyond offering experience and leadership for the program, provided the players with something that had been lacking: familiarity. As an internal hire who had already been with the team for two seasons, he knew some of the inner workings and details involved in the job. The team thus had a natural respect for him already instilled, resulting in much excitement when he got the job. Several of those seniors eligible to come back for one more year stuck with their decision to return to Faulkner as a result.

Super senior defensive back Malik Meadows had a positive assessment of the first-year head man, and, as someone who was coached more individually by Gray, admitted that he was pleased with the news. "Coach Gray is a good man; everybody loves Coach Gray. He's a cool person," said the ball-hawking member of the secondary. "He's more of a chill coach. Coach Gray is just, he's just a good guy. Everybody bought in, wanted him to be the head coach. We actually had a little say-so in it, I'm not going to speak too much on that, but we really wanted Coach Gray to be the head coach."

Meadows mentions the different coaches, but especially Gray as a reason that he has become the player he is today.

"I played since my freshman year here, so, I mean, I've developed a lot. But going through all those coaches, I've had chances to learn a lot from different people," Meadows recalled. "So, that helped to develop my game a little bit. Coach Gray came in too, he kind of made it easier, just by the way he coaches. The game came slower, and, like I said, bought into what he was trying to do, and went along with it."

Redshirt senior offensive linemen Quan Stokes, a two-time First Team All Mid-South Conference selection and an unmistakable presence at 6-foot-5-inches and 400 pounds, didn't hold back in his glowing praise of Gray.

"He brought a lot of things to the table. Well, man, where do I start? He brought leadership, and he, overall, is just a great coach," Stokes said. "In my book, he's probably one of the best coaches I've ever been around, and despite all of the changes that we had to go through with coaches and stuff like that. But I feel like Faulkner made the right decision, putting him as head coach. He also showed us character, accountability. He always tells us, 'If you mess up this play, make the next play your best play.' So that's how he is as a person. And on the outside of football, he really is a good husband, a good father, and he's pretty down-to-earth. He's just a really good guy."

Kade Young, a Troy transfer and Faulkner's quarterback for the last two seasons under Wasden and now Gray, also came back to lead the offense for one more season.

"He attracts a lot of people. He's a guy that people like. He's a guy that people want to follow and learn from," Young said. "I'm just now getting to be a coach, and I'm learning from Coach Gray, and it's really nice to see what he sees and how he leads a program."
Another super senior defensive back, Alex Dawson, reflected those thoughts by discussing how Gray coached him.

"As an assistant, he was more laid-back a little, I can say. For position-wise, like, we did what we did, but he was kind of laid-back. He let us have more freedom and let us play and be comfortable," Dawson said. "As a head coach, he instilled more stuff into us, and he didn't really have to say as much to us, but you knew he meant business. On the field, he's a quiet guy, but when you see him behind closed doors, you can get the vibe that he really knows what he wants and what he's talking about."

 Charles Blackmon Jr., a running back who has been on the roster for the last four years under the three different head coaches and just finished his final year of collegiate competition, said the changes were difficult since he had one coach for all four years of high school. However, the explosive offensive cog discussed the ways in which he has grown during his time in college, and especially under Gray's leadership.

"I used to be a laid-back player, I would say. I would play out in the games, but I was more like, 'You ask me to do something, I'm going to do it.' I still do that now, but when Coach Gray came up, he was like, I had to play more aggressive than I would normally play," Blackmon explained. "Because, I would play the game to play it, but not be aggressive with it. But now, this year, I had to be more aggressive than passive, I would say. He brought a better version of me out of me on the field, because I didn't know being myself and being aggressive would get me to play like I was going to play this year."

Of course, Gray had help with tough adjustments to the job. His assistants all played a major role. Including Gray, three of the six coaching staff members who finished the season were already at Faulkner. Jordan Cagle was a graduate assistant in 2019. The next year, Wasden promoted him to coach the defensive line. Gray, in turn, placed him on the other side of the ball this year as co-offensive coordinator and offensive line coach. The other coordinator who shared offensive duties, as well as handling wide receivers, Payton Wasden, has been an assistant for the Eagles' football team for four years under three head coaches. The first of those came under the leadership of his uncle Shayne in 2018, and then his father Tommy.

"I think me and Coach Gray having a relationship over the last several years, and even when he took a brief stint at Charles Henderson High School, we kept in touch and talked pretty frequently," the younger Wasden said of what convinced him to remain on Gray's staff. "So, just knowing him and the kind of man that he is, and the kind of family man that he is, really aligns with my views on a lot of things. So, being able to work for somebody like that is really important to me."

To be sure, no one can say Gray does not give credit where it is due. Of course, coaching the game itself was the easiest adjustment for him to make, because, as he says, "Ball is ball." However, equipment, travel, budgeting and other operational areas all threw him for a loop.
"The travel one was something I really wasn't ready for. Thank goodness I had Coach Cagle, because he ended up taking over the football operations side for me, and relieving me of that headache," Gray said. "And he did a fantastic job with the itinerary and making sure everything was on time. So, the travel one was definitely the most difficult part, and probably the managing of 160 guys. Everything is me; you know, you get emailed, you get these SOAR emails, those were all things that were new to me. But we handled them, and now, it was another lesson learned going forward for me, so it was a good learning experience, Year One, for me…"

The new assistants all helped to advance the staff and the team. This year's new associate head coach, Randy Ragsdale, worked mostly with player development. He was the head coach for 28 years at Montgomery's Trinity Presbyterian School, so he was able to develop and relate well to young athletes. Defensive line coach Cadron Davis was an assistant at multiple NCAA schools, such as Southern Nazarene, Abilene Christian, Valdosta State and Eastern Michigan. The new defensive coordinator and linebackers coach, Blaine Miller, had an even more impressive resume, having worked as an assistant at multiple NCAA Division I schools: Colorado, Georgia, Alabama and UAB.

"I think, one of the good things that came out of the whole situation with the COVID was a lot of these guys that had been in the system for a year or two, or three, you know, they were able to stay. I think it was just kind of a culmination of getting all these guys together and on the same page. You know, even though we had some coaching changes and stuff like that, at least for us offensively, we ran a very similar system, so guys weren't having to learn anything new. And so, they were able to come in and just kind of continue the success that we've been trying to build the last several years, and obviously, I think, this spring and this fall, it was able to pay off," Payton Wasden said. "You know, some of those guys being familiar with myself, Coach Cagle, Coach Gray, and trusting that we have their best interests in mind when we went into practice and when we went into games, I think was big. But then also, buying from the staff and the players. I think the guys really respect Coach Gray, even though he's a younger guy. You know, he shows the guys that he cares, and those kinds of things off the field, being able to spend time one-on-one outside of football, and then, you know, I mentioned the family aspect. And when guys can see that and really see that you care, it translates onto the field."

"I mean, yeah, it was different," Young remembers in assessing the coaching staff. "Obviously, we had Coach Gray as a new head coach, which, we all looked up to him. He led us really well. He made us realize that it was our team and that we had to play for each other. We couldn't just play for ourselves. On the offensive side of the ball, both our line coach and quarterback coach were new to the position, Coach Wasden coming over to the quarterbacks and the receivers this year. He helped me see what the receivers see a lot of the time, so he helped me see the field better than I did last year."

As is the case when new coaches take over, some approaches and methods changed, but enough stayed constant that some of the areas where the team excelled in the spring continued to build. 

"I think, offensively, we stayed with the same scheme, but from an organizational standpoint, why we did this and why we did this changed, you know? It wasn't much over there, as far as, we ran the ball a little more than we did previously. I thought they did a good job identifying matchup problems within the opposing team's defense, so there, I think, as far as game planning, that whole thing changed," Gray reflected. "Offensively, I think we did a good job of attacking matchups, which I thought was awesome."

For Gray, a defensive guy by trade, the biggest changes came on that side of the ball where the base formation for Faulkner raised plenty of eyebrows.

"Defensively, on our side, I think we changed a good bit. It's always crazy, because each week we would get a call or a text from somebody. You know, we play with three safeties, which is very unconventional. We play in bear out of it, a bear front. So, defensively, I think the average spectator probably looked and was like, 'What's going on with all these safeties they got back here?'," Gray said. "We walk five linemen up and we play with one linebacker in the box. So then, we had three safeties back there and two corners. It looked very weird, but it worked for us. We had a ton of speed on defense, and that was a good way to utilize it. It worked out really well for us this year. You know, we got to clean up some things this offseason, but we enjoyed playing out of it this year."

And, of course, the results of this season justified Faulkner's faith in Gray to lead the team. While the team's success was likely a combination of Gray's and his staff's coaching acumen along with the leadership by the top-heavy senior and super senior classes, no one involved with the program was overanalyzing the fact that the team was winning! Of course, unfortunately, they did fall short of a national playoff bid, but much was proven nonetheless. The regular season record of 8-2 matched the best in program history, and the team also achieved a program-best winning percentage of .800.

"A lot of people look down on Faulkner, and we just have to keep going and competing, and showing them what Faulkner's made of. Because we're a good team, and people don't need to look down on us, saying that we're inferior to them," Young said with conviction. "I really think that Faulkner is just on its way up. We just got moved to a new division the last two years, and we competed for a championship both years. And then, we're getting moved again, and we're going to compete for the championship in the new division. We're going to find ways to win these football games."

All in all, the year provided plenty of reason for optimism moving forward for Gray's Eagles. And they're just getting started.

BY THE NUMBERS

• The Record:

• The Eagles found themselves ranked as high as No. 14 in the country before an emotional loss at perennial power Reinhardt preceded an uncharacteristic performance at Webber International to account for the only setbacks of the season. It is entirely possible the latter of those two results is the only thing that kept the Eagles out of the NAIA playoffs. However, the highs were incredible, as Faulkner rode its 6-0 start, the best in school history, to that ranking. Outside of a seven-point win at Thomas More, all of the team's victories were decided by double-digit margins. 
• The first game at Billy D. Hilyer Stadium in two years brought preseason Top 25 opponent and former division rival Southeastern to town. After ceding the opening score to the Fire, the Eagles thoroughly dominated on both sides of the ball the rest of the way to win 31-14 and open Gray's tenure with a bang, the team's first win over Southeastern in five years. Young threw for 317 yards on 16 completions, and Aaron Reynolds, previously a standout on blocking and returning punts, returned an interception for a touchdown to give his team a key 21-7 lead in the second quarter. 
• In the program's first matchup with Thomas More the next week, the team found itself in a much closer contest. However, the units delivered under pressure and Faulkner escaped with its first road win of the season by a score of 27-20. Blackmon provided the game-clinching touchdown via a 40-yard rush; he gained 79 yards on 15 carries.
• Back home the next week, possibly the toughest aspect of the matchup with second-year program Florida Memorial was a two-hour weather delay. The team survived an otherwise miscue-filled contest to comfortably win 34-10 due to its playmakers, as well as several freshmen in some of their first major opportunities for playing time, stepping up when called upon. Senior wide receiver Jalen Browder had a 75-yard catch-and-run score on Faulkner's third offensive play of the game and the Eagles never looked back.
• After the team's bye week, the defense faced its stiffest test to that point at Bluefield thanks to the Rams' potent passing game and some early turnovers and missed opportunities by the Faulkner offense. However, the team rebounded from the slow start, specifically because of Young producing 422 yards of total offense and logging the most pass and rush attempts in a game for his college career. He threw three touchdowns for the fourth time in as many games, two of them to Isaiah Scott, and had his lone season score on the ground, a second-quarter 36-yard scamper that brought life back into his team after falling behind 14-3. The Eagles won a wild shootout 52-42 to up their record to 4-0 for the first time since 2014.
• It was in the next week that Faulkner learned its October 16 game was forfeited by Union due to COVID-19 cases within the Bulldogs' program, meaning that, in order to achieve the program-best 6-0 record, all Faulkner had to do was take care of Point at home the next week. After taking a while to get going once again, the passing game took off once again with Young tying his personal highs of 355 yards and five touchdowns through the air. Chris Thompson took an interception 48 yards to the house on Point's first drive after halftime to break a 14-14 tie and put the Eagles up for good. Faulkner grounded the Skyhawks 45-14 to achieve that best program start.
• The Top 15 contest at No. 10 Reinhardt saw the Eagles' defense register what was very possibly their best showing of the year, holding a high-powered triple-option attack to its lowest point total of the regular season by far and just a single touchdown in the first 59 minutes of the defensive slugfest. However, the offense could not make headway, giving up five turnovers and four sacks in a 14-6 loss that essentially put Faulkner out of the running for the division title.
• The team then could not mentally move past the setback the next week against a motivated and hungry Webber International team. Before the Eagles knew what hit them, they were trailing 24-7 at halftime and had no answer for the Warriors' offense. Faulkner deserved great credit for its fourth-quarter response, scoring the last 22 points of the game to narrow a 38-13 score line to a three-point difference. The second onside kick attempt of the quarter failed, though, and Faulkner took a stunning 38-35 loss.  
• Another upset loss for the Eagles was simply not going to be allowed on Homecoming and Senior Day against Kentucky Christian. With the Knights largely shutting down the passing attack, holding it to just 104 yards, Faulkner gashed the opposing defense with 222 yards from the ground game. The defense bent but didn't break in a 38-20 win to retain the Stone-Campbell Cup, and Malik Meadows had a 20-yard pick-six on the second play of the game to set the tone. A very large contributing athletic class was recognized. In the spirit of Senior Day, backup QB Brock Snyder, recognized after the season as the team's 2021 Champion of Character, got his second start, taking the opening drive.
• Finally, at St. Andrews, the Eagles were called to run it back one more time, and they did so and more in a 52-18 romp. Receivers Jalen Browder and Scott, as well as converted running back Vashon Jackson Jr., combined for five touchdowns in their final Faulkner game. The quarterbacks had a great swan song as well, as Young had five scoring tosses with 219 yards passing and Snyder closed his time by throwing his first touchdown since his freshman year. Marvin Payton returned an onside kick 45 yards for another six points.  

• The Offense:

• It started and ended with passing for the Eagles. Young completed 158 of 282 pass attempts for 2,236 yards, 27 touchdowns and five interceptions, taking a huge step from his statistics in the spring season, where he had 1,802 yards, 17 scores and seven picks. His total passing yards in two seasons in Montgomery are good for third place in program history, behind three-year starters Josh Hollingsworth and Clayton Nicholas. In both the spring and fall, he was named the Appalachian Division Offensive Player of the Week in consecutive weeks. Young's 27 scores and Snyder's touchdown throw were out of a total of 38 offensive touchdowns on the year.
• The receiving corps were led by the same leaders of the spring season. Browder and Scott, both playing in their final year as Eagles, were the absolute backbone of the unit, as each of their total catches, yards and scores were more than double the next-leading receiver. On 55 receptions, Browder, a super senior, gained 936 yards and scored 10 touchdowns, and was named to the all-conference team for the second time in as many seasons played at Faulkner. He registered hat tricks against Point and St. Andrews and had a season high of nine catches and 167 yards versus Southeastern. When it was not Browder having a huge game or making an acrobatic catch, it was Scott. The latter caught 46 passes for 600 yards and seven touchdowns. One reason Scott had a decreased output from the spring was more involvement of younger receivers in the game plan that the two upperclassmen helped to develop and mentor. T.J. Hall, Satyler Wilson, Jaiveyon Tucker, Brandon Rudolph and tight end Ty Gray combined for 41 receptions, 616 yards and the team's other 11 scoring catches, as well as all of the scores in the comeback effort at Webber International.  
• Though it was not the focal point of the offense, the rushing game was not one to be overlooked. The squad's leading rushers, Blackmon and Hunter Gibson, scored seven of its ten touchdowns on the ground. Blackmon gained 392 yards and three touchdowns on 92 carries, as well as nine catches for 61 yards and 150 return yards on six kickoffs. With 1,609 yards on the ground over his four seasons in blue and white, Blackmon falls two yards shy of becoming third place in the program's all-time career rushing marks, which is currently held by Brandon Cheatham. Gibson, the other half of the tandem and 2020 second team all-conference running back, had 60 attempts for 386 yards and four touchdowns. Young pitched in 334 yards on the ground and Devon Murry registered 209, each with a score of their own.
• All of this might have been nothing, however, if not for the unsung offensive line corps, headed by forces such as Stokes, Cory Dates, Phil Jackson and First Team All Mid-South Conference lineman Tyler Pritchett. The unit of blockers suffered some attrition, as injuries early in the season to 2020 Second Team All Mid-South left tackle Jake Johnson and former starting tight end Travis Pate could have been detrimental. In the times upperclassmen could not go, though, things were handed to the next men up, guys like Sam Jackson and Garrett Orr in this case, and the younger athletes thrown into the fire early stepped in admirably.

• The Defense:   

• A discussion of the Eagles' defense this season, which held its opponents to 21.11 points per game and five yards per play, as well as 6.02 yards per pass and 3.7 yards per rush, cannot start anywhere but in the secondary. The defensive backs were the unquestioned leaders on that side of the ball. Meadows and Dawson, both playing in their fifth and final seasons in Faulkner, played alongside Thompson, a high-profile graduate transfer from Southeastern, who registered interceptions in wins over Faulkner in 2018 and 2019. Meadows garnered First Team all-conference votes in 2019 and 2020 and Second Team this year. He made 42 tackles, six for loss, four interceptions and three pass breakups. Dawson, meanwhile, earned First Team votes this season after being Second Team in 2020. He led the team in stops with a whopping 70, 45 of them solo, for which he is aptly known as "Hitman," along with three hits for loss, three picks, two breakups and two blocked field goal attempts. These two continued their tear from the spring after they combined for six of the team's eight interceptions in the 2020 season. Thompson made the 2019 First Team while a member of the Fire, and registered 32 tackles, four for loss, four picks and five breakups in his first season on campus. The two cornerbacks, Ovurton Gates and Reynolds, played just as pivotal a role in the defensive backfield; the former had 28 tackles, three for loss, two picks, seven pass breakups and a fumble recovery, and the latter 24 stops, three picks and eight breakups. This group of five claimed 17 out of a team total of 24 takeaways, 16 of the team's 17 interceptions and all five of Faulkner's defensive touchdowns on the year; Thompson had two pick-sixes.
• Additional defenders on the second team all-conference list were a pair of linebackers who also made first team in the spring, Phillip Russell and Antonio Gurley. Russell was second only to Dawson in tackles, tallying 55 of them with one and a half sacks. Gurley was in third place on the team with 46 stops, 6.5 for loss, two sacks and the team's other interception. Each of them also got a pass breakup and a fumble recovery.
• Other players with at least 10 stops were JaMichael Morgan, Shae Taylor, Terry Brown, Jerrell Williamson, Devin Owens, Samaj Washington, Tyrese Wells, Ke'Lontae Varner, Eddie Brown, Tre'Von Hines, Judson Hogeland and Kylan Wimbish. Williamson had three sacks to set offenses back 18 yards and Owens added 2.5 more sacks. Others with at least one solo sack were Dawson, Russell, Gurley, Meadows, Gates, Wells, Varner, Eddie Brown, Hines, Emmanuel Allen and Jakai Stephens. Freshman defensive back Johnny Blackmon tallied six pass breakups throughout the season, and he, Gurley, Morgan, Taylor, Reynolds, Williamson, Owens, Hines, Stephens, Devin Sampson and Chinconie Lewis all got quarterback hurries. Morgan and Washington both blocked a field goal.

• Special Teams:

• Punter Caden Davis averaged 37.64 yards on his 45 punts and a long of 50 yards, along with three touchbacks and 18 inside the 20-yard line. He was named the Appalachian Special Teams Player of the Week on three different occasions in the season and received second team all-conference votes.
• Super senior placekicker Alvin Renteria, who now ranks second in all-time scoring for the Eagles behind Joe Jones, was solid once again for his squad. The all-conference team member for three consecutive seasons missed only one extra point this fall, and, though he only made six of 12 field goal attempts, that number is deceiving since four of them came in the first three games, and they were all blocked. His longest make of the year was a 41-yarder against Point, which sits only behind his 44- and 46-yarders in 2019. He finishes his Faulkner career with a 72% field goal percentage, which is the second-highest in program history behind Hunter Kennamer.