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Rice Football Burning Questions: Will the 2021 defense be good or elite?

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The Rice football defense took another step in 2020, but what is its ceiling? We explore that question in this installment of Burning Questions.

The improvements exhibited by the Rice football defense over the past three seasons might be the most encouraging signs of progress seen on South Main over that timeframe. The offense has been up and down. Quarterbacks have rotated through the roster from year to year. But the defense? The defense has steadily gotten better, bit by bit.

The offense picked up a blue-chip quarterback, a new offensive coordinator and has a healthy wide receiving corps at its disposal, so there’s some reason for optimism on that front. Which brings us to the second installment in our Burning Questions series this offseason. Has the defense plateaued or can they make the jump from above average to truly elite?

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Rice Football Recruiting: 2022 Safety Tyson Flowers commits to Owls

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The 2022 Rice Football recruiting class continues to heat up as the summer marches on. They started off their holiday weekend with a commitment from safety Tyson Flowers.

Things are going well for the 2022 Rice Football recruiting class. After picking up a pair of commitments prior to the June 1 relaxation of COVID-19 recruiting restrictions, Rice has added three news additions to the class over the month or so that have followed.

Quarterback AJ Padgett got things rolling with his commitment on June 21. Three days later, wideout Braylen Walker added his pledge, bringing the class size to four. Roughly a week later, that tally has risen to five with the commitment of Fort Worth safety Tyson Flowers.

Unlike the previous pair of recent commits, Flowers was offered during the spring with his recruitment picking up some steam after the Owls officially entered the mix. When Flowers felt ready to make the decision, he’d also received offers from Liberty, Buffalo, Ball State and several Ivy League schools. He’s third defensive player in the Owls’ 2022 class and the first member of the secondary.

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A two-way player in high school, Flowers’ experience as a quarterback will only aid his impact on the defensive side of the ball. He looks extremely comfortable in the open field, showing incredible awareness and using that to make plays.

He’s a true dual threat athlete, showcasing that intelligence and speed as he weaved through defenders. On defense, he reads, reacts, and makes plays. He’ll be a tremendous asset for the Owls on the back end of the defense.

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The Roost Podcast | Ep 80 – Previewing Louisiana Tech Football with Ben Carlisle

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Ben Carlisle of Bleed Tech Blue joins us this week to preview the 2021 Louisiana Tech football season as we continue in our Conference USA previews.

The summer months march onward and we continue previewing the 2021 Rice football season this week with another look at one of the Owls’ future opponents. Joining us this time around is Ben Carlisle of Bleed Tech Blue to talk Louisiana Tech football and preview their 2021 season. The Bulldogs had an up and down 2020. How will that bleed into 2021?

Be sure to stick around for the lightning round and check out his answers to a selection of Louisiana Tech and Conference USA related topics. You can always find previous episodes on the podcast page. For now, give a listen to Episode 80.

Episode Notes

  • Housekeeping
    • Don’t forget to rate, review and subscribe to the podcast on your platform of choice. Every little bit helps.
    • Please support us on Patreon. Be the first to get the inside scoop on what’s going on with Rice football and stick around for even further analysis. That includes our debriefing series on spring football, recruiting news and more.
      Become a Patron!
    • Stay tuned… the 2021 Rice Football Season Preview and the 2021 Conference USA Season Previews go on sale July 7!
  • Ben Carlisle joins the show — Ben shares his insight on Louisiana Tech football’s disjointed 2020 season and the outlook for the Bulldogs in 2021, including:
    • What to make of the Bulldogs’ stop-and-start 2020 season
    • The influx of transfers at Louisiana Tech
    • The emergence of Tyler Grubbs
    • Expectations for the 2021 campaign
    • The Lightning Round

Where can you find us?

Download and subscribe to The Roost Podcast on any of your favorite podcast providers. The show is available on iTunes, GooglePlay, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn and PodBean. Please consider leaving a review wherever you listen.

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2021 Rice Football Season Preview Promo and Patreon Updates

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Happy July! We’ve been working overtime at The Roost this summer to make sure you’ll have access to the best coverage of Rice Football and Rice Athletics that we can bring. To that end, we’re excited to announce a few improvements we’ll be rolling out for our subscribers.

FREE PREVIEW FOR FIRST TIME SUBSCRIBERS

We did this last year and received tremendous amounts of positive feedback so we’re bringing it back. Anyone who begins a subscription on the Starting Lineup tier or higher for their first time in the month of July will get a copy of our 2021 Rice Football Season Preview absolutely free.

Take a test drive of our exclusive insights into media days and stick around for fall camp and more.

Become a Patron!

Still have questions? Check out our FAQ below or contact us.

UPGRADED TIERS

We’re also modifying the existing tiers to add more value for our patrons. Beginning today, the Starting Lineup Tier will now include a monthly Q&A feature. Have a question about Rice Athletics, Conference USA, tacos, etc? I’ll compile responses once a month and answer your questions.

We’ve also added some additional perks for the All-American Tier (get a Roost mug and periodic behind-the-scenes microcasts) and free season previews and everything else we offer for our Booster Tier patrons.

WHAT NOW?

If you’re not a patron yet, now is the perfect time to jump on board. Get access to recruiting updates, practice reports and more. Sign up here. Want to upgrade your subscription to a higher tier, you can do that here. Check out this how-to for more info

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Which Rice football position group is the best? worst? All-American Q&A

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All-American Level subscribers on Patreon get access to a monthly Q&A with me. This update we’ll rank the Rice football position groups for 2021.

Q. Which Rice football position group are you the most confident in for this year? And if they have a weakness, what is it? How would you rank the positions?

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A. This exercise was really, really hard. A couple of weeks ago it would have been pretty easy to slide quarterback down to the bottom of the list, but with Luke McCaffrey on board, they’re definitely not the position group I’m most worried about? But how far should they climb?

Here’s where I ended up in my best attempt to rank positions in terms of confidence level.

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