Clarion Golden Eagles (1-3, 0-1 PSAC West) vs. California (PA) Vulcans (2-2, 1-0 PSAC West)
Saturday, October 1 // 2 p.m. // Clarion, Pa. // Memorial Stadium

MEDIA COVERAGE

Radio: Mike Kalinowski will have the radio call for Golden Eagle home games on the Golden Eagle Radio Network:

• AM 1120 WKQW
• WKQW Fox Sports 104.1
• WWCH The G.O.A.T. 94.1 FM

Streaming Video: All PSAC member institutions stream football games free of charge on the PSAC Sports Digital Network. Games are available on the web, and fans can download the PSAC Sports Digital Network App on the following: 

• Mobile: App Store (iOS), Google Play (Android), Amazon Fire
• Streaming: Amazon Fire, Android TV, Apple TV, Roku

Live Stats: Fans can follow along with live stats from all home Golden Eagle football contests through SIDEARM live stats at clariongoldeneagles.com/sidearmstats/football. Road game links will be available on the schedule.

The Kickoff    
The Golden Eagles will help cap the 69th Annual Autumn Leaf Festival with a Homecoming contest against PSAC West division foe California (PA) on Saturday, October 1 at Memorial Stadium. Kickoff between the longtime rivals is scheduled for 2 p.m. 

Series History

• This will be the 91st meeting between the Golden Eagles and the Vulcans, making it one of the oldest rivalries in the Clarion record books. California owns an advantage of 49-38-3 in the all-time series, including wins in 14 straight meetings.
• The Vulcans have not played at Memorial Stadium since Oct. 6, 2018, as the teams did not play in 2021 or 2020. The last overall meeting was on Oct. 12, 2019, when the Vulcans won by a 35-20 score at Adamson Stadium. Jake Whitenight and Kahliq Muhammad both caught touchdown passes while James Metzgar booted a pair of field goals. 
• The most recent meeting Memorial Stadium was also in Clarion's Homecoming game, as the Golden Eagles tried to mount a second-half comeback but ultimately lost by a 41-27 score on Oct. 6, 2018. Mylique McGriff rushed for 128 yards and two touchdowns.
• The last time the Golden Eagles won in the series was on Nov. 3, 2002, a 31-6 victory at Memorial Stadium. Robert Walker rushed for 169 yards and two touchdowns while Clarion held the Vulcans to just 55 rushing yards themselves, with the Golden Eagles leading the time of possession battle with 39:06 of clock. Troy Bowers was the defensive leader for the Golden Eagles, recording seven tackles, one forced fumble, one sack and one tackle for loss.  That victory capped a four-year stretch of victories for Clarion, who won every meeting with California from 1999-2002.

About the Opponent

• California (PA) was predicted to finish third in the PSAC West division by the league's coaches, but were one of three teams to receive two or more first-place votes in the preseason poll. They finished one vote behind Slippery Rock and IUP, who were both tied for the lead. 
• The Vulcans enter this weekend's match-up with a 2-2 overall record. To say the PSAC East crossover portion of their schedule was daunting would be an understatement, as California played on the road at Kutztown (L 19-24) and at Shepherd (L 23-26, in overtime). The Golden Bears and the Rams both received four first-place votes in the preseason coaches poll, with Kutztown the reigning overall PSAC champion and Shepherd one of the most explosive teams in the nation.
• California opened conference play last week with a dominating win over Edinboro, defeating the Fighting Scots by a 49-7 score at Adamson Stadium. The Vulcans combined for 357 rushing yards on 44 attempts, giving them an 8.1 yards per rush average. Davonte Williams led the team with 162 yards on the ground while Eric McKan III rushed for 117 yards and three touchdowns.
• Two weeks ago, quarterback Noah Mitchell became California's all-time leading passer, passing a record that Sam Mannery held for more than three decades.  Last week he became just the 18th quarterback in PSAC history to surpass 9,000 career passing yards, and his 78 career touchdown passes rank 17th in conference history.

Last Week

• Big plays kept the Golden Eagle football team close in the first half, but Clarion ultimately fell in a war of attrition with Gannon, dropping a 47-24 result at Memorial Stadium on Sept. 24.
• Corahn Alleyne had one of his best days in a Golden Eagle uniform to date, devastating the Golden Knights with big plays on offense as well as special teams. Alleyne finished with 291 all-purpose yards including career-highs of 118 receiving yards and 93 rushing yards, scoring a touchdown of each. He also recorded 80 kick return yards, including a pair of more than 25 yards. 
• Alleyne scored on two long plays in the first quarter, including a 74-yard touchdown pass on a screen and a 65-yard touchdown run on a sweep play.
• Zach Benedek added a touchdown run of his own late in the second quarter, running the two-minute drill to get Clarion within 27-21 at the halftime break. Benedek bullied his way into the end zone for a 14-yard touchdown run.
• Clarion rushed the ball well in generally, carrying 27 times for 150 yards as a team, while Benedek finished 11-of-21 passing for 188 yards and a touchdown. Griffin Buzzell was a force defensively with 10 total tackles and a quarterback hurry, while Alex Huzicka blocked an extra-point attempt in the fourth quarter. Robert Lachmann had 1.5 tackles for loss. 

Meet the New Boss

• Raymond Monica, a two-time American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) Region 1 Coach of the Year and two-time Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) East Coach of the Year with more than 30 years of experience at the college level, became the 14th coach in Golden Eagle history on Feb. 17, 2022.
• Before coming to Clarion, Monica was an assistant coach at Southeastern Louisiana from 2019-21, including a one-year stint as the defensive coordinator in 2021. The Lions made the Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) playoffs in 2019 and 2021, winning their first round game in both of those seasons. In 2021, the Lions finished 15th in the final FCS rankings of the year.
• Where Golden Eagle fans may best recognize Monica, though, would be his tenure as Kutztown's head football coach from 2006-12. He turned the Golden Bears into one of the leading programs in the conference, culminating with back-to-back appearances in the NCAA Division II Super Region One playoffs in 2010-11.

PSAC Announces Preseason Coaches Poll
The Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) announced the results of their preseason coaches poll on August 4. The Golden Eagles were predicted to finish eighth in the PSAC West division in 2022.

PSAC West Division (First Place Votes)
T1.    Slippery Rock (3)
T1.    IUP (3)
3.    Cal U (2)
4.    Gannon
T5.    Edinboro
T5.    Seton Hill
7.    Mercyhurst
8.    Clarion

PSAC East Division (First Place Votes)

1. Shepherd (4)
2. Kutztown (4)
3. West Chester
4. Shippensburg
5. East Stroudsburg
6. Bloomsburg
7. Millersville
8. Lock Haven

Hager Brings Experience, Championship Lineage to Clarion

• Defensive coordinator Josh Hager enters his first season on the Golden Eagle staff in 2022, one year after service as the defensive coordinator at NCAA Division III Alvernia. Prior to that, he ran the defense at Missouri Southern from 2019-20, where he tutored the top two tacklers in the MIAA.
• As the defensive coordinator for Garden City Community College from 2016-18, Hager produced one of the top defensive units in the nation, and helped the Broncbusters win the 2016 NJCAA national championship.
• Among those players coached by Hager at GCCC were one national Defensive Player of the Year, two conference Defensive Players of the Year, two conference Defensive Linemen of the Year, 11 All-Americans, 41 First Team All-Conference players, and one first round draft pick in Mike Hughes (Minnesota Vikings - 2018).
• Hager is the son of legendary football coach Rocky Hager, whose career highlights include leading North Dakota State to seven NCAA Tournament appearances and two NCAA Division II championships (1988, 90).

Pioneer of "The Fly" Comes to Clarion 

• The Golden Eagle offense will be under the tutelage of veteran coach Mark Speckman, who brings more than 40 years of coaching experience to the program.
• The pioneer of the Fly offense that is widely used across high school, collegiate and professional ranks, Speckman spent the previous five seasons as the assistant head coach and running backs coach at UC Davis. He was part of the Aggies' 2018 Big Sky conference championship season.
• Speckman spent 15 seasons as a collegiate head coach, including 14 years at Willamette. He guided the team to an 82-59 record from 1997-2011, including two Northwest Conference championships, eight league title games and three NCAA Division III postseason appearances. Speckman's 2008 team finished 11-1 and ranked fourth nationally, earning him his second Northwest Conference Coach of the Year award and AFCA Division III West Region Coach of the Year acclaim.
• In addition to coaching football, Speckman has also become well-known for his motivational speaking engagements. Born without hands, he avoided drawing attention to himself as a younger athlete but has since embraced his own story to the point of earning numerous speaking appearances, including bookings at Boeing, Nike, Northwest Mutual, Patterson Dental, the Million Dollar Roundtable and other organizations.

Alleyne and Hungry Look...

• Through the first half of the schedule, Corahn Alleyne has shown himself to be one of the Golden Eagles' most dangerous weapons, threatening opponents in the pass game, the run game and special teams. 
• Against Gannon on Sept. 24, Alleyne finished with 118 receiving yards, 93 rushing yards and 80 kick return yards for 291 all-purpose yards.
• His combined 211 rushing and receiving yards made him the first Golden Eagle to go over that figure in the span of 11 games.
• The last Golden Eagle to go over 100 receiving yards in a game was Terrell Ford, who did it against Mercyhurst in 2021.
• Alleyne enters this weekend's game ranked third in the PSAC and seventh in the nation in all-purpose yardage, with an average of 185.0 yards per game.

Going Long

• With a long touchdown reception and another touchdown run in the first quarter, Corahn Alleyne authored two of Clarion's longest plays from scrimmage in the last several years in the span of just a few minutes.
• His 74-yard touchdown reception was the longest Golden Eagle pass play since Dana Jackson, Jr. caught an 81-yard pass against East Stroudsburg in the 2018 season finale, on Nov. 10 at Memorial Stadium.
• Alleyne's 65-yard rushing touchdown was the longest run for a Golden Eagle since Mylique McGriff rambled for a 79-yard gain  on Nov. 4, 2017 against Gannon. 
• To find longer scoring plays from scrimmage, you have to go back even further. The last touchdown run of more than 65 yards came on Oct. 22, 2016, when Kyle Evans rushed for a 68-yard score against IUP.
• Clarion's last receiving touchdown of more than 74 yards came  in the 2016 season finale, when Connor Simmons connected with Kevin Genevro for a 78-yard scroe on Nov. 12.

Lachmann Named PSAC West Defensive AOTW for Sept. 19

• Defensive lineman Robert Lachmann earned PSAC West Defensive Athlete of the Week honors after helping the Golden Eagles stymie Lock Haven in a 44-7 win on Sept. 17.
• In a game where the Golden Eagle defense harassed Lock Haven quarterbacks for four quarters, Lachmann was as disruptive as they come in Clarion's win over the Bald Eagles. Lachmann finished with three sacks and two quarterback hurries.
• That pushed him over teammate Jake Tarburton for the team lead in sacks. Through four games, Lachmann leads the PSAC with 4.5 total sacks. 
• Oddly, those 4.5 sacks already represent the most for a Golden Eagle defensive player in a season since Saif Khan and Vaughn Wallace each had five in 2019... though Lachmann has seven more games remaining on the schedule!

1,078 Days...But Who's Counting?

• With their 44-7 win over Lock Haven on Sept. 17, the Golden Eagles halted a losing streak that dated back to the 2019 season.
• Clarion last win before that date was Oct. 5, 2019, when they defeated Seton Hill on Homecoming at Memorial Stadium. 

Commitment to the Ground Game

• Through four weeks of action, the Golden Eagle offense has shown a commitment to the ground game that has put them among the leaders in the nation in rushing offense.
• Clarion enters this weekend's matchup ranked second in the PSAC and 34th in NCAA Division II with an average of 199.2 rushing yards per game.
• The Golden Eagles rushed for 270 yards on 51 attempts against Lock Haven on Sept. 17, their best single-game rushing total since going off for 341 yards against Shippensburg on Sept. 7, 2019.
• Khalil Owens ranks seventh in the PSAC with an average of 75.8 rushing yards per game, but he has already broken the century mark in rushing twice this year. 

Owens and the Ground Game

• Now in his second full season with the Golden Eagles, running back Khalil Owens will try to build on the end of last year's campaign, when he became a major force toting the rock.
• Including the last four games of the 2021 season and the first four games of the 2022 season, Owens has totaled 768 rushing and receiving yards -- an average of 96.0 yards per game -- and has scored four touchdowns. 

Zach Breaks the Bald Eagles

• In his second start of the season, quarterback Zach Benedek got it done with his arm as well as his legs against Lock Haven, accounting for three total touchdowns against the Bald Eagles.
• Benedek completed 14-of-19 passes for 228 yards and two touchdowns, connecting with Andy Martin and Zach Kindel for scores.
• He also rushed nine times for 39 yards and a touchdown, scoring the Golden Eagles' first of the game to give them the lead.
• In three starts at quarterback, Benedek is 38-of-64 (.594) for 481 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions. 
• In that same span, Benedek has rushed 20 times for 122 yards and two touchdowns, a 6.1 yards per carry average.

Long Time Coming

• For Andy Martin, the Golden Eagles' Sept. 17 game at Lock Haven was a long time coming.
• Martin would have made his Clarion debut in 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic halted those plans. In 2021 he was felled by a season-ending injury in training camp, and he missed the first two games of the 2022 season as well.
• He finally made his Golden Eagle debut against the Bald Eagles and made an immediate impact, catching a 53-yard touchdown pass from Zach Benedek in the first quarter that gave Clarion a 13-0 lead.

Winning the Turnover Battle

• Through four games, the Golden Eagles have shown the ability to take care of the football while conversely snatching it away from their opponents.
• Clarion is tied for first in the PSAC with just four lost turnovers so far this year, with only two interceptions thrown and two fumbles lost.
• With a +3 turnover margin, Clarion enters this weekend ranked fourth in the PSAC in that category.
• This week's opponent, California, is +1 in turnover margin on the season, having gained five turnovers and lost just four. 

Ground to a Halt

• The Clarion defense clamped down on West Liberty in Week 1, holding the Hilltoppers to just 284 total yards and one scoring drive longer than three yards.
• It was the first time the Golden Eagles held an opponent under 300 total yards of offense since restricting Lock Haven to just 264 yards on Sept. 14, 2019 in a game played at Memorial Stadium, a span of 18 games. 
• The team was exceptional in limiting damage on the ground (3.0 yards per carry) and through the air (6.8 yards per attempt), shutting down the Hilltoppers.
• Statistically, it was Clarion's best defensive effort since their 2021 effort against Millersville, when the Golden Eagles held the Marauders to 2.1 yards per rush (34 att / 70 yds), 6.25 yards per pass (10-of-20 for 125 yds) and 4.2 yards per play (54 plays, 195 yards).

Another Trip Around the Block

• Deuce Lyons blocked an extra point attempt by Bloomsburg on Sept. 10, getting a hand on a kick to prevent the Huskies from putting the ball through the uprights.
• In doing so, Lyons extended a streak of seasons where the Golden Eagles have blocked a kick to four straight seasons.  The last time they blocked an extra point was on Oct. 5, 2019, when Saif Khan blocked a PAT by Seton Hill.
• Alex Huzicka blocked an extra point against Gannon on Sept. 24, giving the team two blocked kicks on the year.
• That same game also featured Clarion's last blocked punt, when Rayonte Campbell blocked an attempt by the Griffins.
• The last Golden Eagle blocked field goal was also against - you guessed it - Seton Hill. Shane Kemper blocked an attempt in their meeting on Oct. 23, 2021.

Golden Eagles by the Numbers - Week 5 Edition

• Clarion quarterbacks have thrown only two interceptions all year and none in each of the last three games. That total number ranks second in the PSAC behind only Gannon.
• The Golden Eagles have two players rank in the top-10 in the conference in sacks: Robert Lachmann (1st - 4.5) and Jake Tarburton (8th - 3.0). The team ranks fourth in the PSAC in sacks.
• For a team that runs the football as much as the Golden Eagles do, they rank third in the conference and 22nd in the nation in tackles for loss allowed, with an average of 4.25 per game.
• Khalil Owens has already scored as many touchdowns in four games in 2022 (3) as he did in 10 games in 2021.

Hamdan Takes Control

• Linebacker Kareem Hamdan has established himself as a sure tackler, and is one of the stars of the PSAC in terms of bringing down the ball carrier.
• In 2021, Hamdan earned Don Hansen Football All-America Honorable Mention honors after leading the conference in tackles, averaging 10.0 per game for exactly 100 on the season. He is the first Golden Eagle to hit the 100-tackle mark in a single-season since Layne Skundrich in 2017.
• Hamdan is one of two returning all-conference players from 2021, having earned Second Team All-PSAC West laurels at the conclusion of the season.

Cracking the Books

• Senior defensive back Drew Blon showed his ability to excel in the classroom as well as on the field in 2021, earning CoSIDA Academic All-District honors last year.
• Blon, who finished his Bachelor's degree in Sport Management in December 2021, posted a 3.64 GPA while also starting every game on the back end of the Golden Eagle defense.
• Blon finished second on the team in total tackles with 71 stops in 2021. He also finished second on the team in interceptions with three picks and led the team in both fumbles forced and fumble recoveries with two each. 
• Blon enters this weekend ranked second on the team with 21total tackles, as well as one sack and one interception.

Legend in the Making?

• Defensive back Legend Davis got his career off on the right foot in 2021, showing a knack for taking away the football.
• Davis led the Golden Eagles with four interceptions last season, tying him with five other players for second in the PSAC.
• With that total, Davis became the first Golden Eagle to record four picks in a year since Dorian Johnson and Sam Fareri each notched four interceptions in the 2018 season. That year the Golden Eagles held opponents to just a 49.7 complete percentage.
• Davis picked off his fifth career pass in the season-opener against West Liberty on Sept. 1.

No Jake Brakes

• Jake Tarburton has taken on an elevated role in the Golden Eagle defense, and has to date shown an ability to push the pocket and pressure the quarterback.
• Tarburton ranks second on Clarion with three sacks in three games, accounting for 34 yards of lost yardage for Golden Eagle opponents.

Next Week

• The Golden Eagles get back on the bus and head on the road for a PSAC West game when they take on Seton Hill in Greensburg on Saturday, October 8. Kickoff is scheduled for 4 p.m. at Offutt Field.
• Clarion will look to get back on the right foot against the Griffins after falling in last year's meeting at Memorial Stadium. The Golden Eagles had won the previous three meetings with the Griffins.
• Despite leading the all-time series 5-3, Clarion is 1-2 against Seton Hill in games played in Greensburg.