Quote Originally Posted by PaladinFan View Post
Samford's an interesting case.

In 2017, with perhaps the best team perhaps they've ever had, the Bulldogs were still were bounced in the first round (by a team they had already beaten). With a senior QB looking to set NCAA passing records in 2018, I can imagine the expectations are sky high.

With Samford, I am still interested to see if they suffer from Elon's fate after Scott Riddle graduated. The current Samford team reminds me a lot of the Elon team from 10 years ago. Both were mediocre SoCon teams before riding a transcendent long-term starter at QB running virtually identical offenses. Both teams elevated themselves to playoff contender, but developed a reputation of being soft late in the season and the post season. Elon fell off a cliff after Riddle graduated. Hopefully Samford has a better go of it.
It is fair to ask that question, and I am biased, of course, but I will try to answer. In Elon's case, Riddle's senior year(6-5) was a stepdown from the previous high watermarks. Sure hope this isn't the case for Devlin this year. As for having 4 straight years of losing afterwards, like Elon, I seriously doubt it. Samford has far too much talent and fertile recruiting grounds for that. Also, Samford couldn't be considered soft late this past season, winning their last 3 SoCon games. A Devlin Hodges doesn't come along very often, and he will be missed, but NO, there will be no scenario equivalent to the Elon plunge.