Last season, UH's special teams unit showed drastic improvement from the previous year and those results should only improve in 2010 as the Warriors return most of their specialists..
“We've got all of our special teams back, our kicker, our punter, our long snapper,” said specila teams coach Chris Tormey said. “We've got a good core of the kids that were on the coverage and return teams back. We've got a better understanding of the schemes we're trying to run so we expect to see even more improvement this year.”
Placekicker Scott Enos passed his first test on the Division I level last season. He converted 12-of-19 field goal attempts and all 34 extra point chances. His longest field goal was 47 yards against UNLV and he converted 10-of-13 attempts inside 40 yards.
“He's worked hard on his consistency and gotten much better that way,” Tormey said. “His get off times and operation times are much quicker. We're hoping we can get through the season without any blocks this year,” Tormey said.
Enos will battle for the starting nod with incoming freshman
Tyler Hadden, who was rated the 10th best kicker nationally by Chris Sailer Kicking.
“Tyler is very fundamentally sound,” Tormey noted. “he's had some injury problems in fall camp, so he hasn't been able to kick a lot, but when he's been out there he's been solid. He should be able to challenge Scott for the job and if anything happens we should be in good position with a solid backup in line.”
Punter
Alex Dunnachie drew rave reviews for his booming punts last season, including two 60-yarders and a pair of 50-plus yard kicks against Wisconsin. More importantly, he helped UH rank second in the country in punt return defense, allowing only nine returns for 15 yards.
“Alex [Dunnachie] played American football for the first time last year and I thought he did remarkably well,” Tormey said. “He's got tremendous natural ability and he's worked hard on improving his skills and techniques. His flexibility's gotten better so he should be even more of a force this year than he was a year ago.”
As a freshman, long snapper Luke Ingram did not mishandle one snap last season.
“He's worked extremely hard and gotten bigger, stronger and faster,” Tormey said. “The long snapper is the key to not only us getting the ball back to the punter but also in our coverage schemes for punting. He's gotten a lot better at not only the long snapper part, but getting back down the field for coverage.”
The return game gets both its starters back from last year. Top punt returner
Ryan Henrybrings back his 5.2 yards per return average into the 2010 season.
Greg Salas could also see spot time as a punt returner, as he did last year. On kickoffs,
Royce Pollard begins his junior campaign after averaging 22.1 yards per return last season.
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