It’s the offseason in Northwest Ohio. 

After a whirlwind offseason that saw not only more than 20 players leave, but also now-former head coach Scot Loeffler, who heads back to the NFL as the quarterbacks coach with the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. 

With an almost entirely new coaching staff, headlined by 1995 Heisman trophy winner Eddie George, change will need to be made. 

QUARTERBACKS 

QB Room: 

#3 Lucian Anderson III – Sophomore 

#8 Baron May – Senior 

#14 JT Kitna – Freshman 

#28 Jonny Sorensen – Redshirt Freshman 

Carsen Melvin – Freshman

Possibly the second biggest question of the offseason lies in who will be controlling Bowling Green’s offense in 2025. 

With Connor Bazelak in the NFL Draft and Camden Orth at Tennessee-Chattanooga, there’s no true successor lined up to take over the reins of the Falcons’ offense. 

BG’s leading returning passer is May, whose only completed pass was the fake punt in the 68 Ventures Bowl, a 43-yard touchdown strike to Malcolm Johnson Jr. 

Anderson, who is headed into his third season with Bowling Green, was mainly used as the designated running quarterback in Scot Loeffler’s offense. He’s only attempted 12 career passes, completing five of them for 32 yards with one touchdown and one interception.

As for the freshmen, odds are they will serve as nothing but reserve/scout quarterbacks for 2025. Only Anderson has seen playing time as a true freshman, only to hand the football off or to carry the rock himself in blowout victories and the bowl game.

While Kitna is expected to be the future at the position for Bowling Green, fans cannot let his last name cloud their judgment.

This brings us to the final option for Bowling Green’s 2025 starter: a transfer.

After Loeffler’s departure, Stanford transfer Justin Lamson left for Montana State, leaving the BGSU QB room without much experience.

There’s a possibility George could pull a quarterback from Nashville, as former four-star recruit Tevin Carter entered the portal some weeks after George left for Bowling Green.

Carter was the backup with Tennessee State, completing two of five passes for 14 yards. He was, however, brought in to run the rock. He carried the football 25 times for 109 yards (4.4 yards per carry) and five touchdowns.

There are still multiple other options out there, including former Akron quarterbacks Tahj Bullock and Zach Gibson, the latter of whom spent the 2022 and 2024 seasons in Georgia Tech and Georgia State, respectively.

BG fans might remember Gibson from the Falcons’ 35-20 loss to the Zips on Oct. 9, 2021, when he came in for an injured Kato Nelson (who was playing in relief of an injured DJ Irons) and completed 14 of 15 passes attempts for 177 yards and three touchdowns.

Patrykus’ Projection: Lucian Anderson III/Transfer QB

RUNNING BACKS 

RB Room: 

#4 Chris McMillian – Junior 

#20 Justin Pegues – Senior 

#22 Nakai Amachree – Redshirt Freshman 

#23 Chris Edmonds – Sophomore 

#24 Bryce DeFalco – Redshirt Sophomore 

#25 Mar’Kel Porter – Redshirt Freshman 

#26 Cameron Pettaway – Redshirt Freshman 

#30 Pa’Sean Wimberly – Senior

After losing Terion Stewart to the transfer portal and Jaison Patterson and Jamal Johnson to graduation, Bowling Green’s returning leading rusher is a wide receiver. 

At the 2024 Mid-American Conference (MAC) football kickoff in July, Loeffler had high praise for last year’s freshman backs.

Now, they get to learn under a former Heisman-winning running back. 

While many of them rarely saw playing time – Amachree missed the whole season with an injury – they will see an expanded role in the offense this upcoming season.

The only true freshman to carry the ball at all last season was Mar’Kel Porter, who had one carry for eight yards against Fordham, and three carries for three yards against Kent State.

The big returner is seventh-year senior PaSean Wimberly, who missed all of 2024 with an injury he suffered last spring. While he and Pegues look to be the two featured backs for 2025, how healthy exactly is Wimberly? 

How does the addition of JUCO transfer Chris McMillian into the fold shake things up? In two seasons at Northeast Mississippi Community College, McMillian carried the ball 148 times for 593 yards and three scores. Not eye-popping numbers by any means, however he has the most career collegiate rushing yards of anyone else in that room. 

Patrykus’ Projection: Committee of Wimberly, Pegues and Porter

WIDE RECEIVERS 

WR Room: 

#1 Allen Middleton – Sophomore 

#2 RJ Garcia II – Senior 

#5 Brennan Ridley – Sophomore 

#11 Finn Hogan – Senior 

#12 DeShaun Lanier – Freshman 

#13 Cynceir McNeal – Sophomore 

#15 Caleb Goodloe – Redshirt freshman 

#16 Rahkeem Smith – Senior 

#17 Trey Johnson – Junior 

#18 Winn Sharp – Sophomore 

#19 Shawn Thigpen – Sophomore 

#21 Dilon Tallie – Freshman 

#83 Pierce St Geme – Redshirt freshman 

#84 Dom Grguric – Senior 

#85 Reece Little – Freshman 

#87 Jared Merk – Sophomore 

The wide receiver room has been underproductive since 2022 and has lacked a true #1 since OJ Hiliare left in 2023.

The Falcons added the aforementioned Johnson Jr. and RJ Garcia in last year’s portal class. Garcia was inactive for all but one game and did not record any stats, while Johnson was productive in his first and only season truly seeing the ball, hauling in 49 passes for 569 yards and three touchdowns.  

Dating back to 2019, Loeffler’s first season in Bowling Green, the Falcons have only had one wide receiver go over 700 yards, which was Hiliare in 2022.

The biggest candidate for a 2025 breakout looks to be Rahkeem Smith, who really began to show out towards the end of 2024. 

Smith, who was a spring transfer from Delaware State, was quiet early in the season, but finally started seeing the ball through the last few weeks of the season.

He was named the Mid-American Conference (MAC) offensive player of the week after a three-touchdown performance against Ball State. In the 68 Ventures Bowl, hauling in seven passes for 97 yards, both career highs.   

While they likely won’t see a ton of playing time, this year’s true freshman class is incredibly talented.

The portal class brought in two dynamic playmakers, including a Jerry Rice Award nominee in Brennan Ridley, an award given out to the best freshman at the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) level, and Allen Middleton, who comes to Bowling Green from Southern Illinois University.  

The room is very deep, yet with little experience. Finn Hogan, Rahkeem Smith and Trey Johnson are the only three returning receivers that recorded statistics in 2024.

Patrykus’ Projection:  

WR1: Smith 

WR2: Garcia 

WR3: Ridley 

TIGHT ENDS 

TE Room:  

#7 Jyrin Johnson – Senior 

#9 Isaac Hill – Redshirt freshman 

#80 Ocean Brabbs – Redshirt freshman 

#81 Elijah Boyd – Senior 

#82 Eli Jacon-Duffy – Redshirt freshman 

#85 Caden Campbell – Redshirt freshman 

#86 Jeremiah Scoby – Freshman 

#88 Jacob Harris – Sophomore 

#89 Blane Cleaver – Senior 

Arlis Boardingham – Junior

The 100%-without-a-doubt biggest question heading into next season is how do you replace the once-in-a-lifetime performance we just witnessed from Harold Fannin Jr?

117 catches, 1,555 yards, 11 total touchdowns. Led the country in receptions and yards, broke the tight end record for yards and receptions in a season and he accounted for more than half of Bowling Green’s air yards in 2024. 

The Falcons added three new tight ends to this point in the offseason, two from the portal and one out of high school. 

Jyrin Johnson comes from Texas Southern and has had a relatively productive career – over 1,000 receiving yards across four seasons with the Tigers. 

Arlis Boardingham, a former four-star athlete coming from the University of Florida, hasn’t been extremely productive over his three seasons with the Gators but did earn Freshman All-American honors from the Football Writers Association of America. 

He announced on social media that he underwent surgery a couple of months ago for a nagging upper-body injury suffered last season and will likely be good to go for fall camp, however missing spring ball might set him back at least slightly. 

Patrykus’ Projection:  

TE1: Johnson 

TE2/FB: Cleaver

OFFENSIVE LINEMEN 

OL Room:  

#50 Vincent Giordano – Freshman 

#54 Brody Bolyn – Sophomore 

#55 Tunde Fatukasi – Senior 

#57 Alex Padgett – Senior 

#65 Jake Burns – Senior 

#69 Andrew Kilfoyl – Senior 

#70 Alex Harris – Redshirt Freshman 

#71 Rico Steele – Redshirt Freshman 

#72 Cade Zimmerly – Senior 

#75 Nate Pabst – Senior 

#77 James Thomas Jr. – Sophomore 

Similar to last season, the offensive line will be one of the biggest units seeing a return from the prior season.

The only big loss from last year’s most common starters is 2024 first-team all-MAC selection Alex Wollschlaeger, who started 37 games over the past three seasons. In the offseason, he was ranked as a top-20 offensive tackle when he entered the transfer portal and wound up with the University of Kentucky.

The only new faces in the room are Giordano, a freshman from Lakota West High School, and Andrew Kilfoyl, a senior transfer from the University of South Florida, playing in 11 games in 2024.  

Pabst, Padgett, Fatukasi, and Burns all return to start on the most experienced part of the roster.

Pabst has started every game since switching from a defensive end after the 2022 season, has seen playing time at both guard spots, and started a game at left tackle in 2024. Padgett is a two-year starter at center. Fatukasi started every game for Bowling Green in 2024, starting the first seven at right guard before being moved out to left tackle for the final six. Burns didn’t see any starts until the NIU game but started six of the next seven games after that between left and right guard.  

Patrykus’ Projection: 

LT: Fatukasi 

LG: Pabst 

C: Padgett 

RG: Kilfoyl 

RT: Thomas Jr.