Offensive lineman James Durand (63) started all 12 games for Western Illinois last season. (Photo by Barry Bottino, PrairieStatePigskin.com)
By Dan Verdun
If the football games truly are won in the trenches, then it makes sense that Western Illinois was represented by a pair of linemen at Friday’s Ohio Valley Conference media day.
And perhaps a welcome departure from the traditional “skill players” approach.
“The young men who are representing us here today are guys that I’m extremely proud of,” said head coach Joe Davis, set to begin his third year in Macomb.
Those “young men” were defensive lineman Keshawn Harrington-McKinney, beginning his fourth year at WIU, and offensive lineman James Durand, beginning his second season for the Leathernecks.
From day one of his time in Macomb, Davis set a goal of getting bigger along both lines.
“I say this somewhat sarcastically, big people beat up little people in this game. We rebuilt this program from the inside out with the trenches,” Davis said.
Interior defensive linemen the likes of Rockford native Harrington-McKinney have been important anchors in that transition.
“I’m honored,” Harrington-McKinney said of representing WIU at media day. “Never in a million years did I think that I’d play such an impactful role for the Leathernecks.”
Listed at 6-foot-2 and 300 pounds, Harrington-McKinney was chosen by his teammates as one of the defensive captains.
“Keshawn has played a lot of football here on the defensive side,” Davis said. “When we made the shift to more of a three-down front late in the season, that really paid dividends for us. It allowed us to get some of our longer, more athletic players on the edges.”
That shift helped Western win three of its last four games a year ago.
Harrington-McKinney sees that momentum carrying over into this fall.
“It was a big confidence boost, seeing the team going out fighting,” he said. “A lot of teams just roll over and just die. For us, it meant something more. We wanted to go out with positives. We wanted to go out there and win.”
Meanwhile, players such as the versatile Durand have transformed the Leatherneck offensive line.
“I said this to our team at our family dinner on Wednesday night, ‘We look the part,’” Davis said. “We’re going to be very big on the offensive line as we have been in my first two seasons. We’re an average of the 6-4 to 6-6, 315- to 325-pound range among our top eight or nine offensive linemen.”
Durand, an Arizona native who began his career at FBS Wisconsin, not only started all 12 games last season but also earned All-OVC honors.
As Durand pointed out, offensive linemen aren’t often noticed “until something goes wrong.”
“We’re striving for perfection every day. To let that bleed out into the team is really crucial,” Durand said.
As WIU prepares to begin its preseason practices July 29, Davis is itching to see his team on full display.
“We have recruited for length. We have recruited with a very significant focus on multi-sport athletes. Our high school recruiting classes are very reflective of that. We have a lot of really good shot putters, wrestlers, basketball players, baseball players. Typically, those guys are the most coachable, but they’re also the most competitive,” Davis said. “Collectively, those attributes get me really excited about this team.”
Davis is also excited about the high number of quality players now in purple and gold.
“There are position groups going into this fall that we’re probably going to be as deep as we’ve been going into my third season,” he said.
News and notes: Western was picked to finish sixth in the preseason OVC poll, which was announced Thursday. . . . The Leathernecks kick off their season hosting Northwestern College, an NAIA school from Orange, Iowa, Aug. 27 at Hanson Field. . . . The remainder of WIU’s non-conference schedule includes: hosting Illinois State (Sept. 5), at FBS Wisconsin (Sept. 12), hosting Morehead State (Sept. 19) and at North Alabama (Sept. 26). . . . The Leathernecks begin their OVC schedule Oct. 3 entertaining Tennessee State in Macomb.
Dan Verdun is a co-founder of Prairie State Pigskin. He has written four books: NIU Huskies Football, EIU Panthers Football, ISU Redbirds Football and SIU Salukis Football.
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