For the first time in two years, Clark Atlanta University head football coach Tim Bowens woke up this morning about to lead his team on the field to play an official football game.

Today they are in Salisbury, N.C., where they open the 2021 season by facing Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association foe Livingstone College at 1:30 p.m., in the West End Classic at Alumni Memorial Stadium.

The game will be broadcast live via webstream at https://vcloud.blueframetech.com/broadcast/embed/295183?autoplay=1  and on Livingstone's radio station, WLJZ 107.1 FM.

Covid-19 led to the cancellation of the 2020 football season, so the only action Bowens Panthers have seen since 2019 has been a limited spring practice earlier this year and fall camp this past August.   So his team is raring to go.

"We're ready to play football since we haven't played in some time now," said Bowens, who is in his third year at CAU. "I think health-wise, we're okay from that standpoint. We have to just go out and execute and do it at a high level."

The Panthers are a much more experienced team that took the field in 2019 and finished 0-10 in Bowens' first season.  But they are also a squad that learned a lot from a season where his team lost six games by seven points or less.

"We're not looking in the rearview mirror, but we remember what was back there," he said. "We know that if we focus on the process and not the end result, we'll have a chance to finish the games we didn't finish in 2019.  So focusing on those things, the little details, everything matters and we're in the hunt to win week in and week out."

Fall camp saw competition at quarterback where CAU is replacing All-Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference quarterback Charles Stafford. As a senior in 2019, Stafford led the SIAC in passing yardage, completions and touchdown passes. 

This year, junior Elijah Odom takes control of the Panther offense after a stiff quarterback competition during fall camp.  Odom threw for 85 yards and a touchdown and rushed for 58 and another score in spot duty for CAU in 2018 but missed the 2019 season with an injury.

"The good thing is he's been in the system," Bowens said.  "He has some experience in the offense, but this will be his first time pulling the trigger for us, for our staff, offensive coordinator Richard Moncrief.  We're looking forward to him making great decisions this weekend."

Bowens feels good about an offensive line that has more experience and size from 2019, a season when inexperience and injuries took a toll on the unit that still managed to protect for one of the SIAC's top passing offenses that year.

On defense, Bowens is excited about a squad that has a mix of experience and newcomers.  Defensive lineman Breante Glover is a second-team preseason All-SIAC pick who will anchor the defensive front while newcomers in linebacker Zion Nwokocha and defensive back Charles Crawford are expected to make a big impact.

On the other side of the field, Livingstone is looking to make a splash in their first game under new head coach Sean Gilbert.  Gilbert played 11 season in the NFL, five for the Carolina Panthers.  He retired in 2003.
 
He inherits a team that finished 4-6 in 2019, but had jumped out to a strong start, winning their first four games. That included a season-opening 24-13 defeat of CAU at CAU Panther Stadium in Panther head coach Tim Bowens' debut. 
In that game, CAU jumped out to a 13-0 lead, but Livingstone's Miles Hayes threw two second-quarter TD passes and another in the third to lead the Blue Bears to the come-from-behind victory.

Hayes is back after throwing for 1,330 yards, eight touchdowns and eight interceptions in 2019.  His top three receiving targets – all three were in the top 25 in reception yardage per game in the CIAA – are gone. But his leading rusher from 2019, Darrell Bethune is also back.  Bethune rushed 78 times for 320 yards and a touchdown in 2019.

On defense, Livingstone was in the top half of the CIAA in yardage per game – 284.6 – making them the conference's fourth stingiest defensive unit. Safety Walter Watkins returns after picking off three passes in 2019, along with 27 tackles. 

CIAA coaches picked Livingstone to finish fifth in the six-team CIAA South Division.  But Bowens and his hard are hardly under-estimating the Blue Bears.

"I think their club will be ready to go," he said.  "We are ready to hit the ground running as well.  We are looking forward to the challenge."