UMass Football 2009 ----- Running Backs

I've been doing a series of posts on the state of the 2008 UMass football team. This Friday I covered Quarterbacks. Today we finish the offensive backfield by considering the returning running backs and try to guess what the coaching staff has in store for us in 2008.

Remember I have no special inside information.

Freshman are green.
Sophomores are orange
Juniors are blue
Senior are red

I'm working out of the UMass depth chart for the Hofstra game. Teams are only allowed to dress 60 players for the playoffs, so the depth chart for the playoffs may have been different. Note that the class of the player is for fall of 2008 not their current status.

According to the last regular season depth chart:

TB Open
---- Tony Nelson Junior

FB Open
---- Chris Zardas (injured) Junior

According to the last roster list we will have only two fullbacks on the squad Chris Zardas and Chris Cefalo.

As tailbacks we will have in addition to Nelson are : Alphonsus Aquh, Emil Iqwenaqu and Jonathan Hernandez.

Discusssion: Tony Nelson will be an instant starter. The question is who will be his backup and next in line to be the featured back in one of the top FCS programs in the nation.

I have not seen either Hernandez or Iqwenaqu in action. It will be interesting to see them in the spring game. Chris Cefalo appeared in 10 games as a special teams player and had four tackles. I believe both Hernandez and Iqwenaqu had Redshirts.

This would appear to be a priority recruiting area for UMass this year. UMass does not have a lot of bodies at either position. We need fullbacks as Chris Zardas will be a Junior and will be coming off an injury. Nelson will be a Junior. I would not be surprised to see some BCS transfers at both TB and FB.