• After not playing in 2020 due to the CoVID-19 pandemic, UWF begins its fifth season of intercollegiate football with a road game against Division I FCS member McNeese State on Saturday afternoon. Kickoff at Cowboy Stadium in Lake Charles, La. is set for at Noon CT. The Noon kick is tied for the earliest in program history. The Argos are 2-2 at that time with two home losses in 2016 and two NCAA Playoff wins at West Alabama and Indiana (Pa.) in 2017.

• This marks the fourth time in five years the Argonauts have started with a road game. UWF is 3-1 in season openers and 2-1 in openers on the road. 

• UWF is 21-9 (.700) all-time on the road and 13-9 (.591) in regular-season road games, but 11-5 (.688) in their last 16. The Argos are 7-3 in regular-season non-conference contests.

• UWF head coach Pete Shinnick is 13-5 in season-openers, going 5-2 at both Azusa Pacific from 1999-2005 and at UNC Pembroke from 2007-13.

SINCE OUR LAST GAME

• UWF's last official game came 623 days prior to Saturday in the form of a 48-40 win over Minnesota State in the 2019 NCAA Division II Football National Championship at McKinney ISD Stadium in McKinney, Texas.

• Since that time, UWF did not have Spring 2020 practice due to the pandemic, practiced 15 times last Fall and then went through around 30 Spring workouts, which included a traditional Blue-Green Spring Game and scrimmage practices against Albany State and at Florida A&M.

ABOUT UWF

• The Argos return 46 letterwinners and 13 starters from 2019. They also have 36 players with 4-year college experience prior to coming to UWF, 14 players with FBS experience and 13 with FCS stops.

• UWF averaged 36.5 points per game and 412.3 yards of total offense in 2019. The squad averaged 131.1 rushing yards per game - just 1.2 ypg shy of the school record - while passing for 281.1 ypg.

• UWF was picked to finish first in the GSC Preseason Coaches Poll and received five of seven possible first-place votes.

SHINNICK BITES

• Pete Shinnick was hired as the first head coach in program history on Feb. 2, 2014. The Colorado (1988) graduate is 35-17 in four seasons at UWF.

• He is 138-63 in his 19th season as a head coach, with previous stops at UNC Pembroke (50-24 from 2007-13) and Azusa Pacific (53-22 from 1999-2005).

• Shinnick was named the 2019 D2Football.com Division 2 National Coach of the Year and the 2017 AFCA & D2Football.com D2 National Coach of the Year. He was also the AFCA Region 2 Coach of the Year in 2017.

• He is 13-8 all-time in the postseason - 9-3 in the Division II Playoffs and 4-5 in the NAIA Playoffs while at Azusa Pacific from 1999-2005.

UWF MAKES NCAA HISTORY AGAIN... AND AGAIN

• By virtue of its bid to the 2019 NCAA Playoffs, UWF became the first football team in NCAA history to earn a postseason bid twice in the first four years of the program's existence.

• When the Argonauts won a national title in their fourth season, UWF joined Georgia Southern as the fastest teams to win nattys. Erk Russell's Eagles won the 1985 NCAA Division I-AA title - also with a 13-2 record - after four seasons of play (1982-83 as an NAIA/club team and 1984-85 at the I-AA level).

• In 2017, the Argonauts made history with their first-ever tourney appearance, becoming the fastest startup program to reach the postseason. They followed that up with four-consecutive wins - all on the road against Top 25 teams - to reach the NCAA D2 National Championship Game.

• With a 9-1 postseason record, UWF ranks first in NCAA history in a minimum of 10 games with a .900 winning percentage. That mark includes an 8-0 playoff road record and a 1-1 neutral-site mark in a pair of national title games.

SERIES & DIVISION I OPPONENT HISTORY

• UWF is playing McNeese State for the first time in program history. This is also the Argos' first game and opponent in the state of Louisiana.

• The game is just UWF's second against a Division I program. The Argonauts defeated North Alabama, 24-19, in Florence, Ala. in 2018. However, that was UNA's first season in its reclassification from Division II.

ARGOS HAVE FORCED TURNOVERS IN 48 OF 52 GAMES

• The UWF defense forced a school-record six turnovers twice last season at West Georgia and at Ferris State. Those big plays have been part of extending the streak of consecutive games with a turnover to 15 entering the McNeese State contest. The last time UWF didn't record a turnover was the finale at West Alabama in 2018.

• Further inspection shows the Argonauts have gotten at least one turnover in 48 of their 52 all-time games. UWF is 34-12 when getting a turnover and 1-5 when unable to force a sudden change.

• The turnover prize for UWF is a navy blue Turnover Shield and was created by Defensive Coordinator Darian Dulin prior to the 2018 campaign. The 3-inch round wooden disk has a large UWF logo on a navy blue background. The shield, which is a replica of what Jason and the Argonauts may have used in mythological times, is then signed in silver marker by the player(s) who had a hand in creating the turnover.

UWF AMONG THE BEST AT FORCING TURNOVERS

• UWF is one of the best teams in the country at forcing turnovers. In fact, the Argonauts are one of just three teams nationally to rank in the top 20 each of the last three seasons in turnovers gained, joining CSU Pueblo and Winona State.

• Since 2017, UWF has 92 turnovers gained in 41 contests, averaging 2.2 per game.

TURNOVERS GAINED SINCE 2017

School    2019    2018    2017    3-year total

CSU Pueblo    39    45    30    114

Winona State    29    28    37    94

UWF    37    25    30    92

Bowie State    35    23    28    86

Lenoir-Rhyne    31    38    16    85

Edinboro    22    31    30    83

REED READY TO BUILD ON MONSTER 2019 SEASON

• Sophomore Austin Reed took over as the starting quarterback in the second game of 2019 and led UWF to it's first national title, throwing for 4,000 yards and 40 TDs while amassing a 13-1 record as a starter. Those numbers earned the St. Augustine, Florida native National and Gulf South Conference Freshman of the Year.

• But the awards only tell part of the story. To say he got better as the season went along would be a huge understatement. In UWF's first nine games, he threw for 2,001 yards and 19 TD, before exploding for identical numbers of 2,088 yards and 21 TD in the final six games.

• In the national championship, he shattered both the UWF and NCAA Championship single-game records with 523 passing yards and tied both organization marks with six passing TD. He was 33-of-54 on the day with his completions tying the finals mark and his attempts setting a new top effort. He had 399 yards by halftime to break the previous yardage mark of 361 which had stood since 2002.

• As a senior at St. Augustine HS in 2017, Reed was the Florida Class 6A Player of the Year after throwing for 2,925 yards and 34 TD.

THE ORIGINAL ARGONAUTS

• Due to a variety of factors, UWF has two student-athletes that have been with the program since the practice season of 2015 - Trent Archie and Rodney Coates.

• Two additional Argos have been around since the inaugural season of 2016 - Ka'Ron Ashley and Marcus Clayton.

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