By Harry Minium
East Carolina will always be David Blackwell’s university. He’s never rooted against the Pirates and as ECU head coach Mike Houston said this week, “coach Blackwell bleeds purple.”
But Saturday night, for the first time since he began his college career two decades ago as a player and a coach at ECU, Blackwell will be rooting against his alma mater.
Blackwell is the defensive coordinator for Old Dominion University, which hosts the Pirates Saturday night.
“It’s my first time coaching against my alma mater,” he said. “You want to say it’s just another game, but at the end of the day, you do care. It’s your university.
“It’s sort of like playing backyard football with your brother. You love each other and yet you want to kick each other’s (read ends).
“I love my university, but I’m an ODU Monarch, and we’re going to compete as hard as we can to win this game.”
Defensive coordinator David Blackwell has turned ODU's defense into one of the best in Conference USA.
Blackwell, linebackers coach Daric Riley and defensive backs coach and co-defensive coordinator Grady Brown all coached at ECU last season. For a time, Blackwell as ECU's interim head coach.
They were fired, along with most of the rest of the staff, when Houston took over the program.
ECU’s loss, it turned out, was ODU’s gain. The transformation of ODU’s defense has been remarkable, and quieted the Monarch fans who previously took to social media to complain about the defense.
Three games into the season, this likely is ODU’s best defense ever.
Last season ODU ranked last or second to last in Conference USA in virtually every defensive category. This season the Monarchs are first in rushing defense, 5th in passing defense and second in overall defense.
And Blackwell’s D has racked up those numbers while playing two of its three games on the road against ACC schools Virginia and Virginia Tech. U.Va. scored 28 points, but that’s misleading. One touchdown came on a pick six and another when the defense was left with a short field.
The most remarkable change has been in the defensive backfield. A year ago, wide receivers sometimes found themselves wide open, without a defender within 20 yards.
Against Norfolk State, Virginia and Virginia Tech, every receiver who’s gone deep has been covered and no deep passes have been completed.
“Coach Brown has got them in such a good position that people aren’t getting the 50 of 60 yard passes we used to give up,” Wilder. “We’re playing so much better in the back end.”
When Blackwell and Wilder met last winter at a coaches meeting, Blackwell asked Wilder if he needed to give him a resume.
Wilder responded that his resume was ODU’s game last year at ECU, when the Pirates sacked quarterback Blake LaRussa nine times and limited the Monarchs to 271 offensive yards, including just 21 yards rushing.
Outside linebackers coach Daric Riley with Blackwell at Virginia Tech.
That was just a week after ODU rang up 49 points and 632 yards against Virginia Tech, the most yards ever allowed by defensive coordinator Bud Foster.
“He made adjustments throughout the game that really hurt us,” Wilder said. “His defense was unpredictable. I liked everything I saw.”
Blackwell’s system is focused on fooling opponents with different looks, surprising opponents when you blitz and having a “bandit” player basically as the quarterback of the defense. The bandit back is the best tackler on the team and generally follows the ball wherever it goes.
His system is unique, but so, Wilder says, so is the man.
“David Blackwell had our players’ respect from the first time he met with them,” Wilder said.
That meeting occurred in January and Blackwell made a startling statement.
“I’m not going to watch any film from last season,” he said.
He says he wanted to judge players with no preconceived notions.
“When you choose to become a coach at a university, you inherit the players who are there,” he said. “I didn’t want to ask about players and I didn’t want to see any film. I wanted them to show me what they can do.
“One of the things I try not to do is talk about the people who were here. They were good coaches and good people and good men.”
Wilder said Blackwell’s on-the-field coaching style is much like the man. He is demanding and insists on accountability, but is upbeat and doesn’t dwell on the negative.
“Our defense is playing with a lot of confidence,” Wilder said. “And that confidence comes from their belief in the system and the defensive coordinator and the other assistant coaches.
ODU was deep at linebacker, where Lawrence Garner and Jordan Young have been outstanding, but short on depth up front. So ODU went to a 3-4 formation, with a linebacker or two also lining up on the line scrimmage.
ODU also recruited a lot of help in the defensive backfield from junior colleges and transfers from other schools.
Calvin Brewton, a senior from Miami who transferred from Florida State, starts at free safety. Tobias Moss, who transferred from South Alabama, starts at cornerback.
Four other players in the two-deep are junior college transfers – cornerbacks Kaleb Ford-Dement and Will Brocchini, and safeties R'Tarriun Johnson and Harrell Blackmon.
ODU’s new offense has also helped. The Monarchs ran a spread, pass-happy offense for most if its first ten years. This season, ODU is huddling for the first time ever and focusing on grinding up yardage and minutes at the same time.
Last week, ODU took a 3-0 lead on U.Va. on a drive that ate up half of the first quarter.
“Our offense has helped the defense now that they’re huddling and slowing down the game,” Blackwell said.
Blackwell came to ODU with a stellar reputation as a defensive coach.
Bandit back Keion White has emerged as a defensive star for ODU.
He was hired last season at ECU after an amazing four-year run at Jacksonville State, in which the Gamecocks ranked a collective third in defense among Football Championship Subdivision schools. The Gamecocks had a 32-0 record in the Ohio Valley Conference.
In six of his last seven seasons, he coached a league defensive MVP, including last season, when former fifth-string running back Nate Harvey earned Defensive Player of the Year in the American Athletic Conference. Moved to defensive end, Harvey was the national leader in tackles for a loss.
Blackwell was a finalist for FCS Defensive Coach of the Year in 2015 and 2016.
He coached at Fordham two seasons, and the Rams forced 40 turnovers in 2013, the most in FCS. He’s also had coaching stops at Illinois State, Clemson, Pittsburgh and South Florida.
This year’s defensive MVP could be Keion White, a tight end turned defensive end who Blackwell moved to bandit last week. White was so dominant that the Cavs doubled teamed him in the second half. Yet he still finished with six tackles, a sack and 3 ½ tackles for a loss.
Wilder said that White was the best player on the field that night. Even though the Monarchs lost, he was named Conference USA’s Defensive Player of the Week.
Blackwell fantasized about being an MVP as a kid growing up in Greenville – the other one located in South Carolina. As a freshman, he was on ECU’s second team and his dream of becoming a star at ECU appeared to be coming true.
But then his playing career was quickly ended with a neck injury.
“It was the worst thing that ever happened to me in football,” he said. “But it was also the best thing.”
Blackwell was an exercise science major and worked in the weight room with players. But he quickly realized that if he couldn't play football, he wanted to coach.
He went to head coach Steve Logan and asked if he could become a student assistant coach. Logan agreed, and Blackwell was so good that he was named the outside linebackers coach while he was in school.
When he left ECU in 1995, he’d coached linebackers for three years.
“Being injured was tough to deal with,” he said. “But the fact that it happened gave me a big head start in coaching. I had a leg up on everyone else.”
When he was hired at Pitt, he was the youngest coach in the Big East. When he moved on to Clemson, where he spent six seasons, he was the youngest coach in the ACC.
He’s moved around quite a bit in the years since.
“But I’ve ever been a job jumper,” he said. “I stayed at Jacksonville State for four years even though I had offers. The two times I’ve done one-hitters they made me leave.”
Blackwell says he hopes to remain at ODU for years to come.
“Coach Wilder has done a tremendous job starting the program and building it,” he said. “And the best is yet to come.
“With the new stadium, the facilities and the vision our administrators, including President John Broderick has for the future, I think this can be a big-time place.”
Contact Minium: hminium@odu.edu