The ever-changing Zips are once again navigating difficult waters in an effort to reach relevancy.
The Akron Zips are one of the MAC’s most fascinating programs from an outside perspective.
Despite being centrally located in a fertile recruiting area, investing a lot of cash into their athletic facilities as part of a larger plan for campus and having great brand recognition, Akron has also struggled to have much— if any success— on the football field since the sundowning of the Terry Bowden era.
Bowden’s over-reliance on the community college side of recruiting gave way to Tom Arth’s fairly local style, which specifically focused on developing local prospects years after that fell out of fashion.
Joe Moorhead, a former SEC head coach who had also coordinated in both the Big Ten and PAC-12, was next on the list to try and bring the Zips back to football relevancy. It was a heady move in the dawning of the transfer portal, as his connections would feasibly mean he could instantly put life in a moribund program.
Through two seasons, this has yet to be the case. A lack of results in the win column, however, doesn’t mean there hasn’t been signs here and there. Injury luck largely derailed both the 2022 and 2023 campaigns, but the Zips notably got better on both sides of the ball, going from bottom-feeders to adequate in the major categories.
A roller-coaster, back-and-forth game on the road against Indiana last season which went to four overtimes was an indication of what the Zips could be at their maximum. Alas, your record says what you are, and the Zips have gone 2-10 in both seasons under Moorhead.
This makes 2024 a key year for Akron. With the MAC getting rid of divisions in favor of pod scheduling, there is no longer a division rank to play for. They’ll have to prove they can at least reach the middle of the table to give fans optimism the team is moving in the right direction.
They’ll have to do so despite a sea change of the roster after several productive members of the team graduated or transferred in the offseason.
Shuffling the coaching staff once again
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With the new NCAA rules regarding on-field coaches, staffs at schools with lesser resources will have to be careful in how they organize their staffs.
Akron is no stranger to this idea, as former offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Billy Fessler left late in the offseason become an analyst at Ohio State. Last year’s pass game coordinator and wide receivers coach David Gilbertson also left this offseason to take the quarterbacks coach at Nevada, indicating a potential offensive reset in the works.
It could have been a lot worse; head coach Joe Moorhead was linked to multiple NFL jobs in the offseason as either an offensive coordinator or position coach but opted to stay in Akron.
As of publication, Akron has no offensive or special teams coordinator. Instead, they seem to have taken an alternate route, doubling their count of “assistant coaches” from three to six over the offseason.
New coaches added in the offseason include JD Brookhart to replace Gilbertson at WR coach, Michael Schuster to replace Fessler as QB coach and Kresean Reed to replace Tre’ Bell as cornerbacks coach. Ryan Mativo has also been brought in as an assistant coach on special teams after special teams coordinator Allen Tucker left in the offseason to take the same job at Troy.
Brookhart, Matkivo, Schuster and Reed join safeties coach Neal Renna and defensive line coach Nyeem Wartman-White as “assistant” coaches.
Moorhead has coordinator experience himself from previous stops, so it could be up to him to call plays and form the plans, but it would certainly eat into his other weekly duties to take on the responsibility. Offensive line coach Joel Rodriguez is also the team’s run game coordinator and could factor in to the Zips’ gameplan as well. Other than that, it’s hard to know what the offense will look like exactly, especially with the amount of turnover on the roster.
Skill position battles as far as the eye can see!
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Just when you started to get settled into what the Zips attack could look like, it’s now changed dramatically.
DJ Irons departs after a promising— but injury-filled— tenure as the team’s starting quarterback, while leading receivers Daniel George and Jasiah Gathings (who both had 50+ catches and 500+ yards) and last year’s starting running back duo of Lorenzo Lingard (143 rushes, 641 yards; 38 rec., 367 yards, six total scores) and Drake Anderson are also off the roster.
That’s a lot of production to replace, and Akron was once again aggressive in filling those needs up via the transfer portal.
The most notable addition is former NC State quarterback Ben Finley, who is expected to be the favorite to win the job in camps. Finley, who arrives on campus via Cal-Berkley, has started 13 games over his career, completing 57 percent of his passes for 1,484 yards, five touchdowns and nine interceptions.
He’ll take on incumbent QB Tahj Bullock, who was the third-string QB last season behind Irons and Jeff Undercuffler Jr. (who has also departed the roster.) Bullock finished 2024 with 62 rushes, 165 yards and four touchdowns on the ground, completing just 39.6 percent of his passes for 271 yards, three touchdowns and three interceptions.
In an ideal situation, Finley would be a steadying presence at the position while Bullock takes more time to learn the game after being pressed into service last season, but there will at the least be a battle to see who takes the reins to start the year.
The running back room does a complete turnover, with only Charles Kellom (four rushes for five yards) logging carries for the Zips last season. The Zips brought in a pair of Big Ten rushers to try and bring in competition to a room which is filled with freshmen, with Minnesota’s Marquese Williams (five-foot-nine, 175 lbs.) and Michigan State’s Jordon Simmons (five-foot-11, 195 lbs.) expected to compete for the starting role.
The receiver room does return a handful of familiar faces in deep threat Alex Adams and depth receiver Bobby Golden, but six transfers brought in over the offseason indicate the staff expects the room to figure itself out in camps.
There’s no clear favorites either at present; Ahmarian Grander has the most starting experience of the transfers, with seven starts over two seasons at Old Dominion and gaining 30 catches for 387 yards and a touchdown. Israel Polk has pedigree from both Pittsburgh and St. John Bosco [CA] HS, while Phaizon Wilson was a contributor at HBCU power Grambling State. Former Ball Stater Justin Campbell led Jones [MS] CC led his team in receiving yards last season.
Open season for defensive depth
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Good news: four of Akron’s top five tacklers from last season, as well as some other notable starters will return to provide a foundation for the defense to build from!
Bad news: the rest of the defense is going to be fairly unrecognizable.
Devontae Golden-Nelson and Darrian Lewis return to the secondary, while Antavious Fish (team-leading 95 tackles in 2023) and Shammond Cooper (seventh in tackles in 2023) returns to man the linebacker position and CJ Nunnally Jr. (15 tackles-for-loss, 7.5 sackls) anchors the defensive line.
Other than that, it’s basically open season as far as finding places to contribute. The Zips identified secondary as their major weakness, bringing in four defensive backs from Power schools to shore up depth in both the corner and safety rooms.
The defensive transfer which most stands out is former four-star safety Daymon David, who was previously at Oregon. Despite his pedigree, David was primarily a special teamer in Eugene and now moves to Akron to prove he’s still got the ability to contribute as a starting player.
Aman Greenwood is in a similar position, transferring to Akron after four years at Syracuse. Greenwood earned early starts at defensive back in 2020 before falling down the chart and comes to Akron with seven starts and 27 appearances in his time with the Orange, primarily on special teams.
Elijah Reed, formerly of Kentucky, will also be in the mix for cornerback after parts of two seasons in Lexington.
Along the defensive line, there will be battles to back up Nunnelly, Bennett Adler and Lama Lavea with a lot of younger prospects.
Of interest are the Frazier brothers (Jahvon and Dahvon), true freshman EDGE prospects who were both Top-100 caliber players in the state of Kentucky. They’ll join Kabbash Richards as the only players listed as “defensive ends” on the roster.
Memphis transfer Zy Brockington (21 tackles in 23 appearances) and Lewisham, England’s Dimitri Madden (48 tackles, five TFLs, one sack over two seasons at New Mexico Miliary Institute prior to last season’s stop at UTEP) should bring some experienced competition to what is otherwise a very young and inexperienced DL corps.