Roger Brown
nhfootballreport.com

During his previous 10 years as the University of New Hampshire football program's head coach you may not have heard Sean McDonnell call defense the best part of his football team, but he made that statement Tuesday.

"I gotta say right now the strength of the team is on the defensive side of the football," McDonnell said at the team's annual media day. "And it's not any one position. We have kids that have played a lot there."

The Wildcats return eight defensive starters from their 2008 team, including the entire defensive line: tackle Jordan Long, tackle Steve Young, end Kevin Peters and end Brian McNally.

McNally was named the Colonial Athletic Association's Defensive Rookie of the Year following the 2008 season.

"I am cautiously -- as always -- optimistic about what's going on over there," McDonnell said. "The difference is there are some kids in that lineup that have started for three years now and played a lot of football -- some guys for four years. There's nothing that gives you a better opportunity to be good than experience.

"Defensively I feel we gotta do well and do the things we do well: cause turnovers, run to the football, stop the run like we did last year and get better in a couple other situations."

The other returning starters are defensive back Dino Vasso, linebacker Hugo Souza, defensive back Ryan Hinds and linebacker Sean Ware.

"We have a lot of experience on that side of the ball," Ware said. 'We have big expectations for our defense this year.

"(Defense) is a big factor in winning football games. Last year we had a better defense than we did in 2007. Anytime you have progress you want to build off of that."

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UNH was picked to finish first in the North Division of the CAA preseason coaches' and media poll, but McDonnell made it clear Tuesday that he has as much use for preseason polls as he does missed field goals.

"As I told the guys, you can forget all about the hype," he said. "I asked them what team was picked to win the North last year, and it was UMass. I asked them what team was picked to win it all last year in the CAA. I think a couple of them said JMU and they weren't really sure.

"I told them we have 17 practices before our first scrimmage. I told them let's take care of those and do what we gotta do. There's a lot of things these guys have to do before Sept. 5 for us to be good."

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Junior running back Sean Jellison was among the UNH players peppered with questions Tuesday, but many of them were about his younger brother Steve.

Steve Jellison will be a senior running back/linebacker at Souhegan High School this season, and is among the top high school players in New Hampshire. Steve Jellison helped Souhegan cap an undefeated season by beating Portsmouth in last year's Division III championship game.

Sean Jellison said UNH and Harvard are among the schools that his brother has a strong interest in attending.

"He has UNH in mind," Sean Jellison said. "He's also focused on Williams, Harvard and Amherst. Those are the schools I know he went to visit over the summer on junior days.

"He wants to play offense (in college). That's why he likes those schools. They've told him he can play running back."