Vandeven, Hosket provide healthy battle for No. 1 QB spot for Southeast Missouri State football

There's two players that have Southeast Missouri State football coach Tom Matukewicz feeling more confident and more comfortable in the offense than he did at this time a year ago.

Quarterbacks Dante Vandeven and Jesse Hosket have brought a sense of security to the third-year coach as his team began its fifth and final week of spring practices at the Rosengarten Athletic Complex on Monday evening.

"They just command the offense better," Matukewicz said. "Not near as many mental errors. Each of them has things they can improve, but you feel like you can have success with both of them."

Vandeven, who started the final eight games of last season en route to being named the Ohio Valley Conference's Freshman of the Year, has maintained the No. 1 quarterback jersey throughout the first 13 practices. Hosket, the East Central Community College transfer, has worn No. 2.

Southeast Missouri State quarterback Jesse Hosket practices with the team Monday. Hosket is transfer from East Central Community College in Decatur, Mississippi.

There's been some level of adaptation for each of them as the Redhawks have tweaked the offense under first-year offensive coordinator Jon Wiemers.

"We're a little bit different on offense, but he knows his personnel. He's been through a year of experience in this league, so he's probably got the experience factor," Wiemers said about Vandeven. "But Jesse's done a great job. When you've played at junior college for a couple years he's kind of got that experience, just with different people."

For now, the race for the starting job when Southeast takes the field at Memphis on Sept. 3 is between the two.

Anthony Cooper, who will be a sophomore next season, remains out after surgery on his throwing arm. Matukewicz is hopeful he'll be able to throw during the summer and be fully cleared by fall camp in August.

Tay Bender, who won the starting job heading into his first season at Southeast last year, isn't expected to take another snap as a Redhawk. He had surgery to repair his left knee before the start of spring practices.

The senior started the first three games last season and played in seven, throwing for 311 yards and a touchdown and rushing for 220 yards and two touchdowns.

"He's going to cash it in," Matukewicz said. "He's got nine hours to graduate and just with his injury and all that [he's done]."

While Vandeven and Hosket have made strides leading the offense this spring, each has a bit more work to do to be a complete quarterback.

For Vandeven that's focusing on his anticipation in the passing game.

"He kind of waits for the guy to get open and then throws it, and so that's his kryptonite right now," Matukewicz said.

Hosket, who stands at 6-foot-4 and weighs 220 pounds, completed 117 of 191 passes for 1,504 yards and 16 touchdowns during his sophomore season at ECCC in Mississippi.

He excels in the pocket, but Matukewicz wants him to improve in the run game.

"We run the quarterback a little bit more here," Hosket said. "I was more of a pocket passer in junior college. That's the main difference."

Hosket stuck around after Monday's practice to throw to a few of his wideouts.

"I just feel like I'm getting more chemistry with the receivers," Hosket said. "I've just been throwing with them more so I know them better. Starting to jell a little bit more with those guys."

Wiemers doesn't mind having two quarterbacks with different strengths and weaknesses, and knows that each can learn something from the other while driving each other in competition for the starter job.

One of the strengths of Vandeven, who threw for 1,568 yards and 11 touchdowns and rushed for 292 yards and six touchdowns last year, is his ability to scramble.

"Dante's escapability is really good and he creates a lot of plays, but we're also trying to train him to sit in the pocket a little bit," Wiemers said. "And I think vice-versa with the other one. We're trying to teach him, 'Hey, it's OK to get out and develop some plays.'"

An emphasis was placed on the passing game heading into spring ball and will continue to be stressed throughout the summer.

The Redhawks took another step forward in that aspect during their final scrimmage Friday as Wiemers felt they were more efficient.

"We protected better. I thought our O-Line did a much better job from Friday to the two weeks before," Wiemers said. "We were having some protection issues [two weeks ago], and our defense is a real pressure unit, so we kind of feel like if we can protect against them, we can protect against anybody. We got to sit back there a little bit and we converted some third-and-longs. You can't do that if you don't execute your timing and your rhythm in the pass game and if you don't protect. We saw that come together a bit on Friday."

Southeast practices Wednesday afternoon and will have a kickball game in place of its spring game, which was canceled due to injuries and a lack of depth.

The Redhawks will host a free youth clinic at 10 a.m. Saturday at Houck Stadium.