Central Michigan University Athletics
Offensive Line Front and Center for Chippewas
4/12/2014 12:00:00 AM | Football
During spring practice, each assistant coach will be "Mic'd Up" for a practice and do an exculsive interview with CMUChippewas.com. Today's featured coach is Butch Barry.
MOUNT PLEASANT, Mich. – Forget, for a minute, the battle at quarterback, the to-be-determined pecking order at running back, the deep and talented receiving corps led by one of the nation’s best in Titus Davis.
If the five guys up front fail, none of it means anything.
“You get into it to be in the pressure,” Central Michigan University offensive line coach Butch Barry said Wednesday as spring practice continued at Kelly/Shorts Stadium. “That’s what you want. I enjoy it and I thrive on it.”
That’s life on the line: They are the most anonymous players on the field, yet on a down-to-down basis, they are perhaps the most critical position group.
A breakdown in the offensive line, and the play is dead before it even has a chance to begin.
“They know it, they understand it,” said Barry, a former Chippewa offensive lineman who is in his fifth year as an aide to head coach Dan Enos. “It’s about your discipline, your toughness, and your work ethic.
“You’ve just got to keep bringing it every day and if you do that and you have a mentality that you want to get better, then you’ve got a chance to be successful.”
The vibe in and around the CMU program is that the Chippewas have a very good chance to be successful in 2014 after finishing 6-6 last fall.
Fueling that optimism is the shear number of returning starters across the board, including all five on the offensive line.
The center is Nick Beamish, the guards are Andy Phillips and Connor Collins, and Ramadan Ahmeti and Kevin Henry are the tackles.
Phillips, the left guard, was a year ago a team co-captain, an All-Mid-American Conference Second Team selection, and the Chippewas’ Upfront Player of the Year Award winner. He enters the 2014 season having started 30 consecutive games. Henry, the right tackle, started all 12 games in 2013.
Phillips and Henry are the seniors among the quintet, and the duo that Barry said he looks to for leadership.
“Those are the guys that I always look to and say, ‘Hey, we’ve gotta pick this up, we’ve gotta get this going,’” said Barry, who is in his first season as the line coach after four as the tight ends coach. “When things aren’t right, and the mentality’s not right, they step up to communicate to the rest of the group that this isn’t right and we’ve got to take ownership of it.”
Beamish is a junior who has logged 25 consecutive starts and in 2012 earned the Chippewas’ Offensive Rookie of the Year Award.
Ahmeti, the left tackle, made 10 starts last season after replacing injured senior Jake Olson, while Collins started nine games at right guard and earned the team Offensive Rookie of the Year Award.
Junior Kenny Rogers, who saw increased playing time as the 2013 season progressed, is pushing for a starting spot at guard.
A slew of underclassmen are also in the mix, providing Barry with not only good numbers from which to choose, but a talent pool that helps foster a competitive environment.
“We’ve got 14 offensive linemen in spring camp, so we’re a full two-deep at every position, plus we’re rotating four other guys in there so you’ve almost got three-deep,” Barry said. “That doesn’t happen a lot. There’s been years where I’ve coached and you’ve only got seven or eight offensive linemen here for spring ball.
“When you have certain spots where you’re three guys deep, that competition is intense so every day they have to perform at a high level or we can put a new guy in there. That’s been a big thing, that and development. If you want to compete for a spot, you’d better develop quickly. So these guys are showing some really good progress in a short amount of time, which is encouraging.”
Several ingredients – size, strength, quickness, smarts among them -- factor into the success of the line. But as a group, perhaps no other factor weighs more heavily in the equation – and, by extension, to the success of the team overall – than cohesiveness.
“You’ve got to have five guys working together at all times, and they have to be working in unison,” Barry said. “If we’ve got one guy who’s not on the same page, we’re going to have problems.
“One missed block by one guy ruins the whole play. They’ve got to watch film, they’ve got to communicate together, they’ve got to do walk-throughs together. We really want them to get to a point where they don’t have to have a ton of verbal communication, where they just know by looking each other in the eyes and knowing what we’re doing.
“It takes a lot of time, but that’s what’s encouraging now. We’ve got a lot of guys back who have played together and we’re in a good place. We have to keep coming along, keep developing. There are a lot of good things happening with this group, and they’re progressing at a great rate. I’m pleased with that.”
