Flames Conclude Spring Practices, Gear Up For 2021 Season

Liberty Football concluded its spring practice in early April, leaving Coach Hugh Freeze in an optimistic mood as the fall season approaches and Liberty prepares for its first games since the historic Cure Bowl win in December. 

“I was very pleased,” Freeze said in relation to spring practice. “I thought with 15 days – obviously three of those are in non-padded practices – if you take those out, I really thought we had 11 or 12 really, really good practices. I think that’s a high percentage, it’s a high mark for it, I think that speaks to some of the maturity on our team.” 

Getting refocused for the upcoming season is important for the Flames. They will seek to outdo last season, the best in program history, where the Flames finished No. 17 nationally in the AP Poll. 

With much of his team’s core remaining consistent from last year, Freeze said establishing a sense of the options he had at various positions was a primary goal of the month of practices. 

“Generally, I would always say about practice (the goal) is to produce quality depth at positions through spring ball,” Freeze said. “That would be the one thing I would say spring ball (provides).”

Liberty’s recruiting has improved immensely since Freeze’s arrival to the program in 2019, with 2020’s recruiting class being the first top-100 class in Liberty history. Defensive end Khristian Zachary is the highest-ranked recruit in Flames history, with 247sports putting him No. 487 nationally, and No. 32 in his position. Kaci Seegars is another notable recruit who can fill a much-needed hole at linebacker. 

Freeze spoke about Seegar’s versatility and where he projects he will end up. 

“Kaci is more of a hybrid for us right now,” Freeze said. “Think he’s going to grow into one of those Jesse Lemonier-like defensive ends for us.”

Liberty also has been active in the transfer portal. Liberty was able to secure Skylar Thomas, a standout safety at Washington State. The team addressed a lack of wide receivers with the transfer of Austin Ogunmakin, who previously played for North Texas. With C.J. Yarbrough’s announcement before spring practice that he would no longer be playing football for Liberty, Ogunmakin’s arrival could be crucial as Liberty continues to establish a receiver core in the wake of Antonio Gandy-Golden’s graduation in 2020.  

But the Flames have an unusual source to draw on to maintain roster depth this year. Due to the fall 2020 season not having any effect on eligibility, 16 seniors have decided to return for one final season with the Flames. 

With Liberty coming off its strongest season in program history, including its first national ranking, its first win over an ACC team and a second bowl win in two years, expectations for this Liberty roster will be higher than ever. Freeze discussed those expectations as he looked toward the beginning of the season. 

“It’s good that they have those expectations, it means we’ve done something right for them to feel that way, but I would also say be guarded on expectations in particular because we’re an Independent,” Freeze said. “Every year’s schedule has a little different flavor, a little different variety and certainly you can’t predict how injuries will occur…  I’m very careful not to put quantitative values on what success looks like for a given season. I said it before, I’ll say it again, I believe a reasonable expectation for our program is for us to be competing week in, week out with whoever is on our schedule and for us to end up hopefully going to bowl games almost every year. To me, that is really where we should keep our focus and that’s being ultra-competitive, no matter who is on the schedule. That doesn’t mean you win them all.”

Liberty’s season includes trips to ACC member Syracuse and SEC member Ole Miss, where Freeze coached from 2011 to 2017. Notable home games include Louisiana and Army, two schools that have beaten the Flames in their previous meetings.

The Flames kick off against FCS opponent Campbell, Sept. 4, at Williams Stadium. 

Luke Randle is the Asst. Sports Editor. Follow him on Twitter at @lukerandle02.