College Football Coach Admits Nearly 50% of Team's Starters Unavailable for Week 1

Injuries are par for the course of a long and grueling season. However, it can be unusual when half the team's starters are unavailable to begin the campaign.

The Charlotte 49ers find themselves in this predicament, approaching their season opener against James Madison.

Charlotte looks to make major improvements following a disappointing 2023 season where they went 3-9, losing four of their last five games to end the year.

The American Athletic Conference projects them to finish second-to-last in their preseason poll, only above Temple.

Charlotte hoped to enter the new season at full strength and show that they can subvert expectations by having great performances, but injuries flipped the table on them.

In Charlotte's weekly press conference for their game week preparation against James Madison, head coach Biff Poggi made a shocking opening statement regarding his team's health.

"We have come out of camp, unfortunately, pretty banged up. We have definitely eight, probably nine, starters that are injured, which is, I'm not great in math, but it's getting close to 50%," Poggi said, not disclosing the players who are hurt.

"I feel very bad for those kids, but I know that the young people that will get an opportunity to play will play hard, and I take responsibility for that, as they have. When you open with JMU, a program that went 19-4 over the last couple years, you can get a little overzealous, and you have to balance between that callous that you want the players to have, and then getting them healthy. And I think I get an F-minus on that for this camp."

It is indeed unfortunate for the players to be unable against a strong James Madison side who has been successful over the last two seasons, especially in 2023 where they went 11-2 (7-1 SBC) despite ending the year with a 31-21 loss to Air Force in the Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl.

Regardless, there is a game for Charlotte to play despite the injuries, and they'll have to give the Dukes their best shot on Aug. 31 at 8 p.m. ET.

Related: Florida Atlantic Football Finally Breaks Silence on Michigan State QB Aidan Chiles' Comments