It's year two of the Aaron Best regime, and familiarity is no longer an issue. In fact, in 2017 it's entrenched.
 
The Eastern Washington University football program won seven of its last nine games a year ago and will hope to ride momentum and experience into the 2018 season and beyond.
 
In Best's first year as head coach, enough was the same to put the Eagles on the cusp of a postseason playoff berth and the league championship. But this year, with his coaching staff returning intact and 28 seniors leading the way, the sky is the limit.
 
"In the second year of anything, you try to find the kinks in the hose and you work those kinks out," Best explained. "We want to continue to build the base off our first year when we had a new coaching staff and the landscape was different for the players we were coaching. Because '17 was '17 and it's a whole different team in '18.
 
A total of 56 returning letterwinners will be on hand this fall. Getting denied a 13th NCAA Football Championship Playoff berth by the selection committee has only added fuel to the fire, and the team's motto for the season is "Leave No Doubt."
 
 "We are working our tails off in the off-season and leadership is already ahead of where it was last year just based on the sheer numbers of veterans we have coming back," he continued. "There are more voices and guys listening. Hopefully it's the details and work in the off-season and pre-season that will help us be successful when we get to our opener in September."
 
There is no shortage of returning experience, with a dozen Eagles back who have earned All-Big Sky Conference honors in the last two seasons. Nine starters are back on offense and eight are back on defense, but a total of 15 defensive players and 17 on offense return with starting experience. Each side of the ball has 182 starts back.
 
"I do know we will be older, but it doesn't necessarily mean we are going to be better," said Best. "We're not going to be better or stronger just because we're a year older. But once you apply another year of experience through this coming September, October and November, then we'll have the entire amount of data to see where we go from there. We're older, and hopefully that makes us wiser, tougher, stronger and hungry based on our outcome last year."
 
The Eagles overcame a rash of injuries to win seven games, and, in some ways, that made the year extremely special for Best. His debut season was even better than those of previous Eagle head coaches Beau Baldwin (6-5), Paul Wulff (6-5) and Mike Kramer (4-7).
 
 Eastern secured a school-record 11th-straight winning season and had yet another outstanding Big Sky Conference campaign in 2017. After finishing 6-2, the Eagles have won 46 of their last 54 league games.
 
 "We have experience coming back and the entire coaching staff is intact. So change won't be a factor in why things are the way they are," said Best. "We're also a little salty from finishing 7-4 and having to watch the playoffs from home. I'll be honest, we felt like we earned the opportunity to be in the field of 24. Like our motto says, 'leave no doubt' is a small reminder that in 11 weeks of work if you finish 7-4 you could be watching on TV. That's a taste we don't want in our mouth and aren't used to, so we are out to earn the eighth win and beyond."
 
The Eagles finished in a tie for third in the Big Sky and have finished 5-3 or better in the last 11 seasons. Overall, Eastern has had 20 winning campaigns in the last 22 years. But with nine league titles and a national championship on their resume, the bar is set high for the Eagles. Best will lean on 28 seniors to help get Eastern over that hump.
 
"It's a combination of scholarship players and non-scholarship players, and players we added the past couple of seasons," he explained of EWU's latest senior class that totaled just 14 in 2017 and 12 the year before that. "It's kind of an eclectic bunch with a nucleus of players from our 2014 recruiting class. But that's a lot of seniors and a lot of bodies. When you travel 60, that's conceivably half our team."
 
Nevertheless, Best looks to the rest of the squad to push the seniors and experienced players for repetitions. Eastern has more than a dozen redshirt freshmen hungry for playing time, plus a talented group of incoming first-year Eagles.
 
"The challenge for any team laden with juniors and seniors is trying to let the young players know that if they play well enough we'll find them reps," he said. "Whether it's on special teams or at a position – or a combination of both – we want them to compete to be a starter even though there is a returning player at their position. Last time I checked, competitors compete. If they are waiting for their turn, they have the wrong mindset. Now that we have a ton of seniors this year, it's not going to play out any differently."
 
 

DEFENSE . . . Improved turnover margin includes increasing the 13 takeaways registered in 2017

The credit and blame for turnover margin can go both ways. Regardless, Best wants his team to improve that on both sides of the ball. Eastern is 41-0 since 2010 when winning the turnover battle.
 
"If we get the ball out and take care of it, it's been proven here at this institution that we win," Best said. "We were better late in the season than we were earlier in the year. We started holding onto the ball a little better and we got it out a few more times on defense and special teams. We will continue to drive that home."
 
Eastern finished the 2017 season ranked 105th out of 123 FCS schools in both turnover margin (-0.91 per game) and turnovers gained (13 with six interceptions and seven fumble recoveries). Eastern's 23 giveaways (14 interceptions and nine fumbles) ranked 90th.
 
 "On defense we have to be more stout and get the ball out," Best said. "We only had six interceptions last year, and we're too long in the tooth, savvy and experienced in the back-end not to be able to get more. We need to read routes better, get tips and read the quarterback in order for us to make more plays. We don't want to be just average, we want to be great. We need to be more ball-hawking while the ball is in the air, and we need to tie that into getting more pressures on quarterbacks."
 
Led by senior safety and team co-captain Mitch Fettig, the Eagles feel their secondary is ready for a big year. Starting senior cornerback Josh Lewis and starting senior rover Cole Karstetter are among the total of 11 returning letterwinners at defensive back – four with starting experience. Fettig was a third-team All-Big Sky selection as a junior after earning honorable mention as a sophomore, and Lewis earned honorable mention honors in 2017.
 
Fettig has started a team-best 33 times in his 34-game career, with 231 tackles, five interceptions and 12 passes broken up. In 2017 he averaged 8.4 tackles per game (team-leading total of 92) to rank 61st nationally and ninth in the Big Sky. Lewis has started 21 career games, and has 89 tackles, five interceptions and 11 passes broken up in 36 games as an Eagle. A year ago he had 52 tackles, a team-leading three interceptions and five other PBUs. Karstetter missed most of the 2016 season with a Achilles injury, but has started 14 of the 24 games he's played in his career, with 31 tackles a year ago to give him 80 in his career.
 
At cornerback, senior Nzuzi Webster has 25 games of starting experience, and sixth-year senior D'londo Tucker has nine starts. Tucker received a sixth-year from the NCAA after having most of one season and all of another wiped out because of injuries. Junior Brandon Montgomery also returns at that position.
 
Webster earned third team All-Big Sky honors in 2016, and has 22 career passes broken up to rank eighth in school history. He has 133 total tackles and a pair of interceptions in 38 career games, with 31 tackles and seven passes broken up in 2017. Tucker was injured in September of 2017 and missed the rest of the year, but has 57 total tackles, three interceptions, a sack and 12 passes broken up in his 35-game career. Montgomery chipped in 15 tackles and four passes broken up in 2017.
 
At safety, junior Tysen Prunty has four games of starting experience and sophomore Anfernee Gurley started one during a magnificent season as a true freshman. Sophomore Calin Criner and junior Dehonta Hayes are also back.
 
In 2017, Prunty ranked fifth on the team in tackles with 52, and also broke-up a pair of passes. Gurley finished with 37 tackles, three PBUs and two forced fumbles while doing much of his damage on special teams en route to earning third team All-Big Sky honors and first team Freshman All-America accolades. Criner chipped in 22 tackles and Hayes had six. Sophomore Kedrick Johnson is the 11th returning letterwinner in the secondary, and played in five games in 2017.
 
Six linebackers also return, including senior starters Ketner Kupp and Kurt Calhoun. Kupp, one of five senior co-captains, has started 13 of the 33 career games he's played. He has 152 career tackles with 2 1/2 sacks after finishing with 66 stops in eight games as a junior. Calhoun has played in 26 career games and has started 11, and has 121 tackles with 3 1/2 sacks in his career. He finished the 2017 season with 73 tackles to rank second on the team, and had 1 1/2 sacks, three passes broken up and two forced fumbles.
 
Juniors Jack Sendelbach and Andrew Katzenberger also return with experience, with Sendelbach owning four starts. Also back is sophomore Chris Ojoh, who played significantly on defense and special teams as a true freshman in 2017, and junior Trevor Davis Jr.
 
Sendelbach has 65 tackles in his 24-game career, and in a victory over North Dakota in 2017 he earned Big Sky Defensive Player of the Week honors as a replacement for Calhoun. Sendelbach had 11 tackles in that game and 49 on the season with a pair of sacks, and also had three fumble recoveries in 2017 to rank ninth in FCS.
 
Katzenberger finished with 13 tackles in 2017, and Ojoh had 18. Davis was injured and didn't play in 2017, but lettered in 2016 when he played in 11 games and had 13 tackles.
 
A trio of starters are back on the defensive line, as well as one from 2016. Senior Jay-Tee Tiuli was an injury redshirt in 2017 after starting at nose guard in 2016 and earning first team All-Big Sky honors. He has played in 36 career games (11 as a starter), and has had 77 total tackles with 8 1/2 sacks, three quarterback hurries and two passes deflected. Prior to the 2017 season he earned third team preseason All-America honors from STATS, and first team all-league accolades from College Sports Madness.
 
Tiuli's position was filled in 2017 by Dylan Ledbetter, with senior Jonah Jordan starting six games as an injury replacement at defensive tackle. Now a junior, Ledbetter had eight tackles and a pair of sacks in his starting debut in 2017, and finished the year with 45 tackles and 4 1/2 sacks. Jordan had 24 tackles and 3 1/2 sacks as a junior, giving him a total 42 tackles and 5 1/2 sacks in 28 career games (seven as a starter).
 
Senior Keenan Williams started the entire season at defensive end, and is among the total of 10 returning letterwinners along the line. He finished the 2017 season with 55 tackles to rank fourth on the team and first among EWU defensive linemen. He also had four sacks and a pair of quarterback hurries to go along a fumble recovery. In his 33-game career (19 as a starter), he has 116 tackles with seven sacks.
 
Senior ends Conner Baumann and Nick Foerstel are back, as well as junior Darnell Hogan. Junior Jim Townsend was redshirted in 2017 after playing in 2016 as a sophomore and 2015 as a true freshman. Baumann has 54 tackles in 35 career games with a pair of sacks, and Foerstel has 20 stops and two sacks in 23 games as an Eagle. Hogan had eight tackles in 2017 and Townsend had 13 with a sack in 2016.
 
Inside, sophomores Keith Moore and Rudolph Mataia Jr. return. Moore, an imposing 6-foot-4, 290 pounds, had seven tackles in his debut season as an Eagle, and Mataia had 16.
 
Eastern had 28 sacks a year ago in 11 games after finishing with 35 in 14 games in 2016. In both seasons the Eagles averaged 2.5 sacks per game, but the 2016 squad featured Samson Ebukam, who is now with the Los Angeles Rams after having 24 career sacks as an Eagle.
 
"We were solid in the sack department even with the loss of Samson, but we can be better," said Best. "And that will help us in the back-end in getting a quarterback uneasy in the pocket and off his mark. We want him to make mistakes so our secondary can feast."
 
Besides turnovers, Eastern also wants to improve upon a defense which ranked 115th overall out of 123 FCS schools with an average of 464.9 yards per game. However, Eastern's red zone defense ranked 34th nationally.
 
"On defense we want to be more consistent," Best said. "Part of that is getting the ball out, but also holding teams in the red zone and between the 20's. We were pretty good in the red zone last year and we need to build on that. But we need to tighten the screws a little bit between the 20 and 20. We can't just rely on our red zone defense – we're all in for stopping teams at the 50."
 
 

OFFENSE . . . Maintaining top five position in FCS in productivity and limiting turnovers the goal in 2018

The Eagles were once again potent on offense, ranking fifth in FCS with an average of 476.7 yards per game. Eastern's third down conversion percentage was 11th at 46.1 percent, and Best hopes his offense can maintain – if not improve – that mark in 2018.
 
"The challenge to me is to always get a little better at things you weren't good at, but just because you are good at something doesn't mean you are going to replicate that again," he explained. "Our third down percentage was off the charts, and when you have a percentage that high you are going to give yourself a chance to win because you are going to move the sticks."
 
Eastern had 14 interceptions on offense, which is more than Best cared for the Eagles to have.
 
"We threw the ball to the other team too many times," he explained. "When you are talking about being in the mid-teens, that's more than one a game and that's too many. We want to go about improving that in a positive way because we want to stay aggressive with our approach on offense. We want to learn from it and help make our players make plays. We want to applaud the other team's defense for getting the ball out, not because it was hand-wrapped and gifted to them by us."
 
Senior preseason All-America quarterback Gage Gubrud followed a record-breaking, honor-filled sophomore season with a solid junior season. The two-time team co-captain is backed up by strong-armed sophomore Eric Barriere, who saw action in five games as a redshirt freshman – including one as a starter.
 
A second team All-Big Sky selection in 2017 after winning MVP honors as a sophomore, Gubrud is a two-time finalist for the Walter Payton Award presented by STATS to the top offensive player in FCS. He was second in FCS in total offense per game (357.8) and fourth in passing yards per game (334.2) as a junior, after leading in both passing and total offense (368.6 and 411.0, respectively) in 2016.
 
Most importantly, Gubrud is 17-6 in 23 games as a starter, and in 27 total games as an Eagle he has 9,441 yards of total offense and 8,568 passing yards. A duplication of last year's totals (3,578 total offense and 3,342 passing) and he'll challenge Big Sky records owned by former Eagle Matt Nichols (13,308 total offense and 12,616 passing).
 
Barriere saw action in five games as a freshman, and led EWU to a victory at North Dakota in his only start. He completed 13-of-23 passes for 130 yards and a touchdown, and rushed 15 times for 55 yards in that game, while getting sacked only once and committing no turnovers.
 
At running back, the Eagles return junior Antoine Custer Jr. He started 10 Eastern games, and senior Sam McPherson started the other. Juniors Tamarick Pierce and Dennis Merritt are also returning letterwinners.
 
Custer has started 16 career games in two seasons as an Eagle, and has 1,192 yards on the ground, 463 receiving and 499 on kickoff returns for a total of 2,154 all-purpose yards (89.8 per game) in 24 games. He earned second team All-Big Sky honors in 2017 when he finished with 776 yards and 10 TDs on the ground.
 
One of five team co-captains in 2018, McPherson added 477 rushing yards in 2017 and has career totals of 649 on the ground, 448 receiving and 1,259 all-purpose yards in 30 games. He earned honorable mention All-Big Sky honors as a junior. Pierce has 287 rushing yards in 21 career games, and Merritt has 126 in 13 outings.
 
Eastern's running game has made strides, but Best – a former offensive lineman – still wants that phase of Eastern's game to improve. Eastern averaged 156.3 rushing yards per game and 4.4 per carry a year ago.
 
 "We upped our yardage per game and per carry, but it needs to be and will be better," he said. "Anywhere between 175 and 180 per game would be a good number, but we're still trying to hit that 4.5 per carry mark. When you add in quarterbacks, running backs and tackles for loss, you have a pretty productive run offense if you are averaging 4.5. So it's not necessarily yards per game which is most important, it's yards per carry."
 
The Eagles return plenty of targets for Gubrud to throw to, including 2017 starters Nsimba Webster and Zach Eagle. They are seniors, as well as Terence Grady, who also has starting experience.
 
Webster has started 12 of the 29 games he's played in his career, and was a third team All-Big Sky selection in 2017. He was 36th in FCS in receptions (5.4 per game, total of 59) and 68th in yards (63.0, total of 693) in 2017, giving him 72 receptions for 854 yards and seven scores as an Eagle.
 
Junior Jayson Williams also has starting experience, and junior Dre' Sonte Dorton and sophomore Johnny Edwards IV also are back as returning letterwinners. Williams caught 20 passes for 252 yards and a touchdown in 2017, while Dorton finished with 10 catches for 164 yards and two scores. Edwards had six grabs for 72 yards as a true freshman.
 
In addition, sophomore Talolo Limu-Jones has been converted from tight end to wide receiver. He proved to be a big target for the Eagles with four touchdown catches among his 11 catches for 148 yards in 2017.
 
A pair of tight ends are back, including junior starter Jayce Gilder. Senior Henderson Belk also has significant experience as a returning letterwinner. Gilder caught six passes for 74 yards and two scores in 2017, and Belk had two for nine yards and a TD.
 
After losing seven senior offensive linemen in 2015, the Eagles rebuilt their line in 2016 and 2017 around center Spencer Blackburn. Now a senior team co-captain, he has been a second team All-Big Sky selection in each of the past two seasons. A year ago, Eastern was fifth in FCS in total offense (476.7 per game), and was also eighth in passing (320.5), 14th in scoring (34.5) and 11th in third down conversions (46.1 percent).
 
Juniors Tristen Taylor and Chris Schlichting both return with 25 career starts on their resumes. Both can play either guard or tackle, with Taylor – an All-Big Sky honorable mention selection in both 2016 and 2017 -- starting at guard last year while Schlichting started at tackle. Senior guard Matt Meyer missed much of the 2017 season with an injury, but has 16 games of starting experience to his credit. Guard Jack Hunter is also a senior and has 12 career starts.
 
Other returning letterwinners back along the offense line are senior Kaleb Levao, junior Will Gram and sophomores Nicholas Blair and Conner Crist. Sophomore D.J. Dyer is also back after redshirting in 2017 and playing as a true freshman in 2016. A former tight end, senior Beau Byus is expected to play on the offensive line exclusively in 2018, giving EWU a total of 11 letterwinners back at that position.
 
 

SPECIAL TEAMS . . . Eagles feature returning kickers and long snapper, but punter a question

The return of Roldan Alcobendas as a sixth-year senior should add some consistency to Eastern's kicking game, as well as the availability of senior Brandyn Bangsund. Senior long snapper Curtis Billen is back for his fourth and final year as EWU's snapper.
 
In his 29-game career, Alcobendas has scored 201 points to rank third in school history in points kicking. He made 20-of-31 field goals and 141-of-146 extra points in his career, including a school-record string of consecutive career extra points made at 85. In the 2017 season, he made 46-of-47 extra point attempts and 10-of-14 field goals. He also handled kickoff duties much of the season, and averaged 59.8 yards on 39 kicks in 2017 with seven touchbacks. In his career, he has 107 kickoffs for a 57.4 average (6,143 total yards) with 17 touchbacks.
 
Bangsund has played in 17 games, and has made 22 extra points and a 29-yard field goal. He and Alcobendas could also punt if needed, but newcomer Trevor Bowens could also be the replacement for departed first team All-Big Sky Conference punter Jordan Dascalo.
 
The Eagles also have back a quartet of players with considerable experience returning kicks. Most notable is junior Dre' Sonte Dorton, who averaged 27.4 yards on 22 returns to finish ranked ninth in the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision and ninth in school history. A second team All-Big Sky selection as a return specialist, he had returns of 96 (touchdown), 51, 51, 49 and 38 in 2017. Dorton will enter 2018 with the fourth-best career average all-time at EWU (26.7).
 
The team was ninth in FCS at 24.3 per return in 2017, but also has back two other top-notch kickoff returners from the 2016 season. As a true freshman, Antoine Custer Jr. averaged 26.7 yards on 14 kickoff returns with a touchdown, with long returns of 93, 55 and 35 yards. Teammate Nsimba Webster had a 65-yard return against UC Davis, but broke his clavicle in the process. Webster had a 25.3 average per return in 2016, and EWU's 21.7 average as a team that season ranked fourth in the Big Sky and 25th nationally.
 
Senior Zach Eagle returns in 2018 to handle punt returner chores again. Thanks to a career-long 33-yard return in EWU's final game of the season against Portland State, he ranked 31st in FCS with an average of 6.8 yards per punt return.
 
 

SCHEDULE . . . Eagles will play Idaho in Cheney for the first time since 1994

There will be plenty of interest on the Palouse this fall as EWU's schedule is highlighted by a Sept. 15 non-conference game at Washington State and an Oct. 27 Big Sky Conference home match-up with Idaho.
 
The game versus the Cougars is a rematch of a 45-42 Eagle upset to open the 2016 season on Sept. 3, 2016. In the first start of his Eagle career, Gage Gubrud had what was then a school-record 551 yards of total offense, passing for 474 yards and five touchdowns, and rushing for another 77 and a game-clinching score.
 
The University of Idaho will join the Big Sky in football in 2018, and EWU will play the Vandals on Oct. 27, in the first meeting between the two schools since 2012 when Eastern won in Moscow 20-3. The last time the former league rivals met in a Big Sky game was in 1995 when the Vandals prevailed 37-10 and the last time they met in Cheney was 1994.
 
After finishing 5-3 in league play a year ago en route to an overall 7-4 finish, Eastern's eight Big Sky Conference foes this coming season combined for a 45-59 record overall and, including Idaho in the Sun Belt, were 34-48 in league play in 2017. Eastern will play back-to-back games in October versus the 2017 Big Sky co-champions, Southern Utah and Weber State, who were a collective 20-6 overall and 14-2 in the Big Sky.
 
The Eagles will actually play a ninth Big Sky foe when EWU starts a home-and-home series with Northern Arizona. The first meeting will be in Flagstaff, Ariz., on Sept. 8, and the return game will come two years later in Cheney, Wash., on Sept. 19, 2020. The two teams didn't play in 2017, and NAU finished 7-5 overall and 6-2 in the league.
 
The Eagles open the 2018 season on Sept. 1 versus regional rival Central Washington in the 69th all-time meeting between the two schools, with kickoff scheduled for 1:05 p.m. Pacific time at Roos Field. Eastern is 34-30-4 against Central, which is an NCAA Division II school located in Ellensburg, Wash. Once fierce NAIA rivals in the Evergreen Conference, the Eagles and Wildcats have not played each other since 2010, and have met just seven times since EWU moved to the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision (then I-AA) in 1984.
 
Eastern has won eight of the last nine meetings in a series which started in 1921. Central's current quarterback is former Eagle Reilly Hennessey, who directed CWU to an 11-1 record and perfect 8-0 mark in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference in 2017. He completed 67 percent of his passes for 2,551 yards and 28 touchdowns as CWU lost its lone game in the first round of the NCAA Division I Playoffs.
 
On Sept. 8, Eastern will take a 20-12 all-time series into its game against NAU, with Eastern winning 50-35 in Flagstaff on Sept. 24, 2016, in a meeting between the fourth-ranked Eagles and the 26th-ranked Lumberjacks. Eastern was also ranked fourth when the two teams met on Nov. 7, 2015, in Cheney, but EWU was defeated 52-30 to end its six-game winning streak. The last time EWU and NAU played in a non-conference game came in 1986 – the year before the Eagles joined the league.
 
When Eastern visits Washington State on Sept. 15 at 5 p.m. on the Pac-12 Networks, Eastern will play a WSU team coming off a 9-4 finish in 2017. The Cougars were 6-3 in the Pac-12 Conference and ended the season with a 42-17 loss to Michigan State in the Holiday Bowl. Eastern lost the previous three meetings versus WSU dating back to 1907, but between 1921 and 1946 had an 8-10 record versus Washington State freshman or junior varsity squads.
 
Eastern opens league play Sept. 22 at home versus Cal Poly (1-10/1-7 Big Sky) on Hall of Fame Day at EWU. The Eagles then go on the road to play at Montana State (5-6/5-3) in Bozeman in a game televised live regionally by ROOT Sports. Eastern has won the last five meetings versus Cal Poly with a 7-2 all-time record, and are 31-10 all-time versus the Bobcats with a six-game winning streak.
 
The schedule gets significantly tougher when EWU hosts Southern Utah (9-3/7-1) on Oct. 6 on ROOT Sports and then travels to Ogden, Utah, to play FCS Playoffs semifinalist Weber State (11-3/7-1) on Oct. 13. The Eagles are 6-3 all-time versus the Thunderbirds, but lost 46-28 a year ago in Cedar City, Utah. Weber State defeated EWU the week after that 28-20 in Cheney, to snap EWU's five-game winning streak in the series. Eastern is 19-15 all-time versus the Wildcats.
 
After an open date in the schedule on Oct. 20, Eastern will once again be on ROOT Sports on Sept. 27 in the renewal of a regional rivalry. Idaho (4-8/3-5 Sun Belt) visits Cheney. Eastern hosted Idaho at Albi Stadium in Spokane six times (1999, 1997, 1990, 1988, 1986, 1984) with a pair of wins, and have played in Cheney just three times (1994, 1992, 1942) with no wins versus the Vandals. The Eagles trail in the all-time series 15-6, but have won three of the last five.
 
The Eagles close the regular season with two of their last three on the road – Nov. 3 at Northern Colorado (3-7/2-6) and Nov. 16 at Portland State (0-11/0-8) – sandwiched around Senior Day at home against UC Davis (5-6/3-5). The Eagles are 11-1 all-time versus the Bears with a 10-game winning streak, and are a perfect 6-0 versus UC Davis. Eastern is 19-20-1 against Portland State, but have won the last two, five of the last six and seven of the last nine versus the Vikings.