LU Notebook: A win at Youngstown could boost Flames image

Liberty football coach Danny Rocco is being careful with how much emphasis he puts on the Flames’ game Saturday at No. 23 Youngstown State.
Undeniably, it’s important, maybe as much so as any game in the school’s Division I history. Liberty, which is ranked No. 25 in this week’s Sports Network poll, has only twice won on the road against a ranked opponent — at Appalachian State in 1997 and at Central Florida in 1995.
Clearly, national voters still don’t know what to make of the Flames, who are 3-0 and have won eight straight games. Liberty dropped two spots in TSN’s poll and fell out of the Coaches poll, all without playing a game last week. That doesn’t bug Rocco, though.
“If I had a list of 100 things to do in a week to get our team ready, ‘impress the voters’ doesn’t make the list cutoff at 100,” Rocco said Tuesday.
Still, Liberty has aspirations of being a nationally recognized program, and Rocco recognizes Saturday’s game is the sort the Flames have to win to gain national respect.
“It certainly is huge, it’s monumental,” Rocco said. “I think that’s why we have as much enthusiasm and excitement as we do for this game.”
A win Saturday would satisfy one of the requirements for an automatic berth into the NCAA FCS playoffs. A team from a non-auto-bid league like the Big South must beat two teams from auto-bid leagues, and with a victory, Liberty would own wins over Western Carolina (Southern) and YSU (Missouri Valley).
A win would also likely give Liberty a surge in the polls and send a message to the nation that the Flames’ program is for real. That plays into the second requirement for an automatic playoff berth — a non-auto-bid league school must rank in the Top 16 of an aggregate of the TSN poll, Coaches poll and the GPI.
The third requirement? Winning your conference. Win or lose Saturday, the Flames will likely need to beat Coastal Carolina in Conway Oct. 4 to satisfy that final requirement. So Rocco is being careful not to put the entire season on this one game.
“We certainly understand the significance of this game and what a win would do for our program,” he said. “I think our 16 or 17 seniors are certainly committed to carrying the mission out here this week in Youngstown.”
Early success
Mike Larsson wasn’t recruited, so to speak. The Liberty freshman punter from Monroe, N.C., came to LU as a preferred walk-on. He was already getting academic money from the school. If Liberty had actively recruited Larsson, he would have been ineligible to receive that money and would have then counted against Liberty’s football scholarship numbers.
So no, Larsson wasn’t recruited, but he was somewhat of a known commodity to Liberty special teams coach Chad Wilt.
“His high school coach was an assistant coach on my dad’s staff at Wingate,” Wilt said. “So I tracked him. I knew what he’d be capable of. For him to step in and be calm and poised, it’s huge. From Day 1, when we stepped out here on the practice field, we realized the job was his.”
Larsson’s first big test came in Liberty’s 19-16 win at Western Carolina Sept. 13. He punted four times and averaged 39.5 yards per kick. His 42-yard boot late in the fourth quarter pinned the Catamounts inside their own 10. WCU was only able to drive to its 41 on its final drive before turning the ball over on downs.
Larsson earned Big South special teams player of the week honors after that performance.
“I’ve been working hard,” Larsson said. “But I never expected that during my freshman year.”
Wild card
After Liberty’s 44-27 win over Glenville State, Rocco had a pretty good idea of what he’d be able to get out of redshirt sophomore Danny Broggin — a little bit of everything.
Broggin, a former William Campbell standout, has done just about everything at LU that he did for the Generals, save for playing quarterback. Broggin moved to receiver in the offseason but was summoned to be a backup tailback against Glenville State because starter Rashad Jennings missed the game with a broken finger.
Broggin was able to call upon his experiences in Naruna for that role. Though he was the quarterback at WCHS, he spent much of his time running out of the spread.
“When Tank (Elam) went down and Stan Peerman was just a freshman, we needed someone to play tailback,” Broggin said. “I think I was the second quarterback under (Brad) Bradley to have that many carries. Running the ball is naturally to me now.”
Broggin carried the ball five times for 34 yards, including a 16-yarder.
With Jennings healthy for the Western Carolina game, Broggin was back to his normal duty as a receiver and a special teams player. Broggin said he’ll play wherever Rocco needs him to.
“If anybody goes down, I’m a wild card player,” Broggin said. “I can back up anybody, for the most part.”
Kicking change
Rocco said he has turned over all place-kicking duties to freshman Matt Bevins. Ben Shipps had handled short field goals and extra points with Paul Young (broken leg) out, but Shipps had trouble with the trajectory on his kicks at Western Carolina, and the Flames had a field goal and an extra point blocked.