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.

DEFENSIVE LINE 

DL Room: 

#11 Collins Acheampong – Sophomore 

#17 Bam Booker – Senior 

#38 Dierre Kelly – Senior 

#43 Martreece Dillard – Redshirt freshman 

#55 Evan Branch-Haynes – Senior 

#56 Ian van der Merwe – Junior 

#57 Dayln White – Sophomore 

#58 Ashton Yeager – Freshman 

#95 Joe Shimko – Redshirt freshman 

#98 Malik Moses – Redshirt freshman

An extremely common trend with the rest of the defense, Bowling Green lost a lot of experience in the defensive trenches.

There are no returning starters from Bowling Green’s defensive line, with Dontrez Brown, Anthony Hawkins and Ali Saad all graduating and preparing for the NFL Draft. Depth-wise, they also lost multiple key pieces. 

Davonte Miles will be playing his football under Shane Beamer at the University of South Carolina this season. Jordan Porter ran out of eligibility and Chace Davis is in both the NFL Draft and the transfer portal following the new JUCO ruling.

There are just two players listed on last season’s depth chart as defensive linemen who are listed on the roster for this season: Evan Branch-Haynes and Dierre Kelly, the latter of whom was in the portal at the opening of the first window.

Branch-Haynes appeared in all 13 games as a rotational defensive tackle, recording 19 tackles and 1.5 tackles for loss. Kelly recorded just one tackle in 2024 across four games but had 53 in the three seasons prior.

It’ll be up to young blood and fresh faces to step up in a major way under new defensive coordinator Brandon Fisher and under different tutelage from new defensive line coach Clyde Simmons. 

Starting with the potentially the biggest acquisition of the winter portal window, Collins Acheampong came to Bowling Green after a year at the University of Miami and UCLA. In high school, he was ranked a four-star recruit by 247Sports, with other offers from schools like Michigan, LSU and Oregon. 

The 6-7, 275-pound Ghanaian-born Acheampong dealt with injuries to start his career, but should he make it through the 2025 campaign healthy, he can wreak havoc.

As a senior at Santa Margarita Catholic HS in California, he had 14 tackles, six tackles for loss, and three sacks in just four games. He also broke up four passes.

Other than that, it’ll be up to redshirt freshmen and guys with no experience to serve as the first layer of defense for a Bowling Green defense that ranked 32nd out of 134 Division I teams in total yards per game in 2024.

Between the rest of the names on that list, they share just four combined tackles, coming from only two players (Moses and White). 

Patrykus’ Projection: 

DE: Acheampong 

DT: Branch-Haynes 

DT: Moses 

DE: Kelly/Dillard 

LINEBACKERS 

LB Room: 

#3 Sefa Saipaia – Senior 

#4 Gideon Lampron – Junior 

#10 Donny Stephens – Senior 

#23 Myles Bradley – Junior 

#24 Justin Eklund – Junior 

#30 Dorian Pringle – Redshirt freshman 

#34 Elias Owens – Redshirt freshman 

#36 Jabari Mitchell – Sophomore 

#39 Henry Reifschneider – Redshirt freshman 

#42 Chris Williams – Senior 

#44 David Afogho – Sophomore 

#46 Devin Taborn – Junior

BG lost lots of experience in the offseason, losing Joseph Sipp Jr. to the transfer portal (Kansas) and Brock Horne to graduation. 

However, they replaced the production as well as they could have through the portal. 

Dayton transfer Gideon Lampron was one of, if not the best inside linebacker in the FCS in 2024. A first-team FCS all-American by the AP, he was statistically the best player on the best defense in the FCS. He had 99 tackles, 23.5 tackles for loss, and 6.5 sacks with two fumbles forced and recovered. 

Ferris State transfer Sefa Saipaia is a two-time Division II national champion, helping the Bulldogs win the title in 2022 and 24. He had 93 tackles in 2024, with eight of those for loss. According to his bio on BGSU’s website, he has played both inside and outside linebackers in the past. 

There are plenty of returners from last season, including those that line up at outside linebacker.

Justin Eklund transferred in from San Jose State after Brent Brennan took the Arizona job late in the 2024 coaching cycle. He played sparingly, recording 15 tackles in 12 games, but received high praise from former BGSU OLBs coach Sammy Lawanson after last year’s spring ball, recognizing his ceiling as “a valuable piece to a championship defense.” 

Myles Bradley comes in as one of the more seasoned players in the linebacker room. He played 13 games this past season, recording 21 tackles, two for loss, and a sack in relief for Demetrius Hardamon, who missed the entire 2024 season.

Dorian Pringle is an interesting name to watch – he played in 12 games in 2024, mostly on special teams, and recorded two tackles on the season. While Saipaia and Lampron are projected to get the lion’s share of the snaps, Pringle could be one of the younger names waiting in the wings to become the next great linebacker at Bowling Green.

Patrykus’ Projection: 

OLB: Bradley 

ILB: Saipaia 

ILB: Lampron 

OLB: Eklund

SECONDARY 

Defensive backs:  

#2 JoJo Johnson – Senior 

#7 Jordan Dunbar – Senior 

#8 Jay’Quan Bostic – Redshirt freshman 

#9 Darius Lorfils – Senior 

#12 Mayes Doggan – Senior 

#13 Tyron Steed – Freshman 

#15 Preston EstoEsta – Freshman 

#19 Jahai Johnson – Freshman 

#20 TJ Nelson – Redshirt freshman 

#21 Gavin Harris – Freshman 

#22 Kal-El Pascal – Sophomore 

#25 Jace Henry – Sophomore 

#27 Coleman Teasdale – Sophomore 

#28 Victor Vazquez – Senior 

#31 D’kyah Banks – Redshirt freshman 

#37 Garrison Blair – Redshirt freshman 

#41 Josira Andrews – Junior 

The secondary took potentially the largest hit this offseason cycle, losing nine of 11 members of the defensive backfield to record a stat in 2024.

The only returners are senior Darius Lorfils and sophomore Kal-El Pascal, the latter of whom was in the portal for less than a week before withdrawing.

Lorfils was the starting free safety for the first six games of the season before suffering an injury and giving up the starting role to Tracy Revels, who is still listed on BGSU’s roster but is in the transfer portal.

Before he left, Loeffler added some names from the portal, including Dunbar, who comes from Kansas State, Doggan, who transferred in from Northwest Missouri State, Johnson, a transfer from Indiana and Bostic, who came in from Toledo.

There’s lots of game experience in this group, especially from the incoming transfers, however, there is little experience in a BGSU uniform amongst these players. 

Dunbar started 21 games from 2020-23 at Rice before transferring to K-State, where he played in eight games.

Doggan played in 23 games across three seasons at Northwest Missouri. In 2024, he recorded career highs in tackles (24), pass breakups (5) and interceptions (1). 

Johnson, who started at Notre Dame, didn’t see the field until his sophomore season at Iowa Western Community College, putting up 16 tackles and three interceptions. In two years with the Hoosiers, he played in 16 games totaling 13 tackles and a pass breakup.

Patrykus’ Projection: 

CB1: Doggan 

CB2: Johnson 

Nickel: Pascal 

FS: Lorfils 

SS: Transfer/Bostic 

KICKERS AND PUNTERS 

Kickers: 

#14 Jackson Kleather – Junior 

#40 Ethan Warner – Junior 

#46 Zach Long – Senior 

#85 Travis Kenner – Sophomore

Punters: 

#19 John Henderson – Senior 

Long snappers:  

#41 Quillan Jimenez – Sophomore 

#47 George Carlson – Senior

The most continuity from this season to last comes on special teams. Every starter from last season is returning.

Carlson, who has been BG’s starting long snapper since James Carolan handed him the reins after the 2021 season, hasn’t missed a special teams snap in three seasons. He projects to keep his role for one final season before passing it over to Jimenez, who transferred in from Houston prior to 2024. 

Kleather started the first six games of 2024 as the team’s starting kicker but suffered a season-ending injury opening the door for Long to take over the job for the final seven games of the season. Long made 13 of his 19 field goal attempts, with a long from 50 yards, and connected on all 22 of his extra points and served as the primary kick-off specialist all year.

As for the punter, there’s only one true punter on the roster this season, Henderson who was BG’s punter last year. Kleather does have some punter experience, spending 2023 as BGSU’s primary punter in relief of Sami Sir.

Last season, BG’s return specialists got out to a flaming hot start, then cooled off exponentially. The very first play of the Falcons’ season last year was a 100-yard kick return touchdown from Justin Pegues. He had just 163 more return yards the rest of the season and was overtaken by Rahkeem Smith later in the season, who outgained him by 75 yards. 

Pegues stayed the Falcons’ primary punt returner, returning 21 punts for 88 yards with a long of 24.

Patrykus’ Projection: 

P: Henderson 

K: Kleather 

KOS: Long 

LS: Carlson 

Holder: Kenner 

PR: Pegues 

KR: Smith