The biggest difference between the 2009 football season and the 2008 season has been margin of victory for the Georgia Southern Eagles.

In 2008, three of the five losses were by a combined four points, while this time around, the average margin of defeat has been 29.5 points.

On the flip side the wins have been more in hand, too.

Youth and inexperience have been cited as the root cause of most of the problems for the Eagles (4-4, 3-2 Southern Conference), and without a difference-maker like Jayson Foster on the field making plays, the recruiting turmoil between 2006 until now, according to GSU coach Chris Hatcher, has finally caught up.

Hatcher looks at it as a renewed building process.

“We’ve kind of started building up the forces,” he said. “You put all those things together – it’s not an excuse for how we’ve been playing – but the reality is that’s the reason you see the one-sidedness each week. It’s finally caught up with us this season. The reality is (the players) come out each and every week and work hard, and they’ve got tremendous confidence in where we’re heading. It’s just going to take a little bit of time.”

It isn’t the future that has the coaching staff concerned, it’s the present. Hatcher hopes the lopsided losses to Appalachian State, North Carolina and South Dakota State won’t cause the team to lose confidence in what it is striving for.

“Some of those guys, to be frank, they’re not quite ready for the prime time yet,” said Hatcher. “You worry about when you go out there and get manhandled a little bit you lose some confidence. On the other side, they’re all gaining valuable experience, and I think that’s big.”

Hatcher feels the team understands where they are in the building process.

“They know where we’re at,” he said. “They know that we’re trying to get better each and every week. It hasn’t always shown, but you look back and we won the games we should have won. Those games we lost, it was obvious that those teams were a little bit better than us that day.”

High hopes

Despite a .500 record at the break, the Eagles can still meet the playoff requirement of seven Division-I wins, a benchmark that kept them out of the playoffs in 2007.

The off chance of a playoff bid has the Eagles remaining focused.

“We look at it as you win out, you get a shot at the playoffs,” said sophomore quarterback Lee Chapple. “As crazy as this season’s gone, if you get hot at the end of the year, anything can happen. You gotta win out.”

Injury update

The Eagles lost defensive backs Hudson Presume and Darrell Pasco and defensive lineman Harland Bower to injury against Appalachian State.

The off week has given the Eagles some time to heal.

“Everybody’s going to be pretty close to full go except Bower – we’re not sure if he’s going to be ready to go Saturday, but everybody else looks to be ready,” said Hatcher.

The Eagles return to action Saturday at Samford at 3:30 p.m.

Matt Yogus can be reached at (912) 489-9408.