MOBILE — South Alabama opens its 2026 football season Saturday at 6 p.m. against Southeastern Louisiana at Hancock Whitney Stadium, and the Jaguars will do it with a roster that looks almost nothing like the one that finished last November.
South Alabama returns just five starters among its top 22 players — and only one of those is on defense. More than 50 newcomers are on the roster, many of whom are expected to play significant roles immediately. Head coach Major Applewhite, entering his third season, is also calling the offense himself and working with a new defensive coordinator.
It is the second meeting between the programs. South Alabama won the first, 35-17, in the 2023 season opener.
An Opponent With a Game Already Played
One structural advantage belongs to the visitors: Southeastern Louisiana has already played. The Lions opened last Saturday with a 34-27 loss to Houston Christian, which means they arrive in Mobile at 0-1 but with a full game of live reps behind them.
That matters more in Week 1 than it does at any other point in a season. Opening-game execution problems — substitution errors, communication breakdowns, penalties on plays a team has only run in practice — tend to show up in the first quarter and get corrected by the second. South Alabama will be working through those in real time. Southeastern Louisiana already has.
The Lions compete at the Football Championship Subdivision level, one tier below South Alabama’s Football Bowl Subdivision membership, and they carry a playoff pedigree that separates them from the average FCS opponent scheduled for an early-season nonconference game.
The Key Matchup: SE Louisiana’s Run Game vs. a New Jaguars Front
Southeastern Louisiana ran for 267 yards against Houston Christian, averaging close to five yards a carry in a game it lost. Quarterback Kyle Lowe broke off a 54-yard run. Kyree Paul carried eight times for 70 yards.
That is the number to watch Saturday, because South Alabama’s defensive front features new starters at every position. Nose man Stephen Johnson and outside linebacker Tre’Mon Henry are probably the most experienced players in the group.
A defensive line breaking in an entirely new starting rotation is vulnerable to exactly the thing Southeastern Louisiana does well: gap-scheme runs and quarterback keepers that punish a front still learning to fit run lanes together. Run defense is less about individual talent than about eleven players agreeing on who has which gap, and agreement takes reps.
A New Defensive Coordinator and a New Scheme
Todd Orlando takes over as defensive coordinator. He has previously held coordinator roles at USC, Texas, South Florida and Florida Atlantic — a resume built largely at programs playing at a higher level of resources than South Alabama.
Orlando’s task is unusually difficult. Cornerback Jayvon Henderson is the only full-time starter back on defense from a year ago. Orlando is therefore installing a new system and assembling a starting lineup at the same time, without the benefit of a returning core that already knows how it wants to play.
Defenses in that situation typically simplify early in the season, calling fewer coverages and fewer pressures until players can execute the base package without hesitation. The trade-off is predictability. How much Orlando is willing to call in the opener will be a useful early read on how far along the group is.
The Offense Has More Continuity — and a Question
Compared with the defense, the Jaguars’ offense is stable. Quarterback Bishop Davenport returns as a starter, as do wide receiver Anthony Eager and offensive players Kenton Jerido and Ethan Hubbard. Running backs PJ Martin and Keenan Phillips, receivers Micah Woods and Brendan Jenkins, and tight end Rod Gibbs all have experience as rotation players.
The question is not personnel. It is philosophy.
Applewhite is serving as his own offensive coordinator this season after splitting play-calling duties with Paul Petrino, who has departed, in 2025. One of the most persistent criticisms of the Jaguars a year ago was an unwillingness — or an inability — to attack defenses down the field through the air.
Applewhite’s background does not obviously predict which way he will lean. He played quarterback at Texas in the late 1990s and early 2000s, in a conference known at the time for wide-open offense, but he has been conservative as a coach, generally preferring to control the clock with the running game rather than open up the passing attack.
Davenport is the variable that could change that. He has genuine escape ability and a strong arm. What was inconsistent in his first season as a starter was timing and accuracy on downfield throws from the pocket — the specific skill an offense needs before a coach will trust it with vertical concepts on early downs.
What an FCS Opener Is Meant to Do
Scheduling an FCS opponent in the first week is standard practice across the Football Bowl Subdivision. The games give a program a chance to work through its opening-week problems, get depth players on the field, and start the season with a result, all without traveling.
The risk is that not every FCS opponent is interchangeable. Programs with playoff histories — and Southeastern Louisiana is one — return experienced quarterbacks and offensive lines that can hold up for a half against FBS fronts. When those games go wrong for the home team, it is usually for a specific set of reasons: turnovers, an inability to run the ball, and a defense that cannot get off the field on third down while it is still learning its assignments.
Two of those three risk factors apply directly to South Alabama’s situation Saturday. The Jaguars are breaking in an entirely new defensive front under a first-year coordinator, and their quarterback is coming off a season in which his downfield accuracy was inconsistent.
Where South Alabama Is Coming From
The Jaguars finished 4-8 in 2025, Applewhite’s second season. A team that turns over most of its starting lineup after a losing season is doing so deliberately, and the volume of newcomers — more than 50 — indicates a roster reconstruction rather than ordinary attrition.
Rosters built that way take time to reach their ceiling. They also tend to produce uneven early results, with performance varying week to week as young players and transfers work out how to play together. Saturday is the first data point.
What to Expect Saturday
The expectation here is a South Alabama win that takes longer to secure than the talent gap suggests: South Alabama 34, Southeastern Louisiana 19.
The reasoning is straightforward. The Jaguars should be able to control the game with superior depth, particularly in the second half, when an FBS roster’s advantage in the two-deep typically begins to show. But Southeastern Louisiana is a capable FCS program with postseason experience, it has already played a game, and it runs the ball well enough to keep possessions long and the score close early.
Add the opening-game adjustment period that South Alabama will be going through and Southeastern Louisiana will not, and the first half is more likely to be competitive than comfortable.
Game Information
Who: Southeastern Louisiana at South Alabama
Where: Hancock Whitney Stadium, Mobile
When: Saturday, Sept. 5, 2026, 6 p.m. Central