Rich Rodriguez alleges Stephen F. Austin sent spies to Jacksonville State spring game

Week 0 will bleed into the FCS this weekend, with Jacksonville State having a huge nonconference game against Stephen F. Austin on Saturday. It will be the debut of new head coach Rich Rodriguez, who is a head coach again for the first time since 2017. Early on in Jacksonville and Rodriguez is already having some difficulties.

According to Rodriguez, Stephen F. Austin has been spying on the program over the past few months to prepare for their matchup. The head coach says it goes back to the spring game, where the Lumberjacks had a few staff members in attendance. Since then, Rodriguez has changed the signals and even plays up.

“Pretty good sources true that they had a couple staff members at our spring game,” Rodriguez said. “Which is not really supposed to happen but we’re making plans accordingly. So if they’re over there, thinking they have our plays, signals, or something like that, we changed them since the spring.”

CLICK HERE to subscribe for FREE to the On3 YouTube channel

Rodriguez says the spring game was not Stephen F. Austin’s only spying endeavor in town. He thinks they were at a recent practice, having to send an assistant coach to confront somebody with a camera.

“Then, we caught somebody trying to film something the other day,” said Rodriguez. “First, my daughter saw them. Then, we caught them again. Saw them peering through with his camera and I sent the biggest guy in our program, Cru (Birdyshaw), one of our assistant strength coaches. He’s about 6’7, 350. Probably benches like 1,000 pounds or something. Sent him up to the bleachers to run them out and that guy disappeared again pretty quick.”

While Rodriguez claims Stephen F. Austin has been the ones traveling to Jacksonville, his team will turn around and head to Nacogdoches this weekend. Kickoff is scheduled for 2:30 CT on Saturday, with Jacksonville State having an extra chip on their shoulder.