Mike Sanford enters his second year as Western Kentucky’s head football coach with the clearer picture of what the Hilltoppers can accomplish on the field and just what they face in trying to reclaim a top spot in Conference USA.

Experience brings wisdom, or at least the opportunity to gain some. And speaking with media members after Thursday’s first day of fall practice, Sanford certainly sounded like a man who has embraced the lessons – both positive and harsh – acquired from an up-and-down season last year in his debut as a college football head coach.

Sanford’s first year at WKU was at times as uneven as the Hilltoppers’ pass-heavy offense – shaking off a 1-2 start with four straight victories, then a three-game skid before a thrilling three-overtime win over C-USA East division rival Middle Tennessee followed by a thudding 41-17 road loss to Florida International. That left WKU still bowl eligible at 6-6, but still far off the lofty preseason expectations that had the Hilltoppers favored to again win the C-USA East.

The season-ending 27-17 loss to Georgia State in the Cure Bowl denied Sanford’s program a winning record and a jolt of positive energy heading into the offseason, but at least gave the coach and his staff that much more time to reshape the program into their image heading into this season.

That first season also gave Sanford an opportunity to evaluate his own performance and that of his staff, prompting a few changes in personnel and duties. Chief among those changes is Sanford’s more hands-on role in calling plays for the offense this season, along with a few other shifting assignments and hires for this year’s staff.

“Just learning from mistakes, to be honest,” Sanford said of the benefit of a year’s experience at WKU. “Putting the staff in the right seats, everybody in the right positions to make sure that we’re maximizing the talents that we have on the field.”

The comfort level of continuity extends to the players, as well. Redshirt senior defensive lineman Julien Lewis, who spent his first three years at WKU playing for former coach Jeff Brohm and his staff, said that greater familiarity translates on the practice field as the older players are now better able to help the underclassmen prepare to contribute on the field.

“It’s our second year in the system so we know it better, the players are more experienced,” Lewis said. “They’re able to teach players different things and make sure everybody knows what they’re supposed to be doing.”

With only 10 seniors on the roster this season, the Hilltoppers rank among the youngest squads at the FBS level. WKU has to break in a new starting quarterback with Mike White now playing for the Dallas Cowboys, and that new starting QB – redshirt senior Drew Eckels entered fall camp with the job – will have to find time behind an entirely rebuilt offensive line this season.

That could be bad – or not, considering the struggles of last year’s offensive line in pass protection and in opening holes for a non-existent run game.

WKU’s defense is in better shape in terms of experience, but will miss former star linebacker and current Chicago Bears rookie Joel Iyiegbuniwe along with a few others.

The Tops face challenges, and their preseason ranking of fifth among seven C-USA programs reflects that reality.

Another lesson learned by Sanford last season is just how little those preseason rankings can matter – as the Tops and Old Dominion slid down in 2017, first-year coaches Lane Kiffin and Butch Davis had Florida Atlantic and Florida International, respectively, turned around and bowl eligible within a year of their arrival. Kiffin’s Owls won the C-USA East and conference championship game and enter this season as the prohibitive favorite to repeat.

But it’s a slippery slope in C-USA, and Sanford’s team is now among the hunters instead of the hunted.

“There is a lot of parity … I think it’s really close, but what I do believe about it is it changes every single year,” Sanford said. “It’s not a conference of the haves and have-nots. Everybody’s fighting for similar players and have similar facilities. So that’s what I like about it going into this year is we’re picked to be fifth in the East division and we’ve got a pretty big chip on our shoulder about that preseason ranking.”

Sanford’s goals – the Pursuit – as he laid them out back during his introductory news conference in December 2016 – remain unchanged as he aims to build WKU into a a perennial power with designs on becoming an elite program among the Group of Five ranks.

One year in, and now Sanford has a greater clarity on just what it will take to make that happen.{&end}