BROOKINGS Caleb Francl has waited a long time to have the season hes having. Hes gone through a season-ending injury, playing on special teams and playing a reserve role at linebacker. But now, in his fifth season, hes one of the reasons South Dakota State has the best defense in the FCS.
Francl came to Brookings in summer 2020, but his first season in a Jackrabbit uniform was pushed back to that spring due to COVID. That season he played on special teams and was named the Scout Team Player of the Year on defense. In his sophomore season he played in all but one game and made his first start in the Hobo Day game, but played a reserve role in the other 13 games.
At the beginning of the 2022 season it looked like Francl was ready to make the jump to a starting role and the coaches agreed as he was named a starter for the Jackrabbits season opener against Iowa. In the second quarter of that game Francl intercepted Spencer Petras and returned it 17 yards. It was the highlight of his career so far, but on that same play his season ended as he tore his ACL.
Francl would miss the rest of the season and in 2023 he returned to his reserve role as a linebacker and key member of the special teams unit. Francl said going through the recovery of the injury and playing another season as a backup actually ended up being beneficial for him.
[That play] was the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. That was mentally one of the harder things Ive been through. Working getting back towards the field was huge and getting back out there last year, playing behind Stalbird was honestly good for me. I learned a lot from him. That whole experience led me to [how Ive played this season], Francl said.
This season hes started all 12 games. He has 64 total tackles, seven tackles for a loss and one sack. His two best games have come against SDSUs two best opponents in North Dakota State and Oklahoma State as he had eight tackles and one tackle for a loss in each of those games.
Tackling was a skill that head coach Jimmy Rogers and defensive coordinator Jesse Bobbit noticed right away when they were recruiting Francl. He came to a camp at SDSU and Bobbit, who was a grad assistant at the time, knew who Francl was because he coached at Bellevue South High School (Nebraska) the year before and they played Francls high school, Grand Island, in the playoffs.
Bobbit said Francl was in the second group of linebackers at the camp but since he knew who he was he told Rogers to move him to the first group and the rest is history. Rogers was Francls position coach for the first three seasons of his career and Bobbit moved into that role for the past two seasons.
Five years after he initially recruited Francl, Rogers said hes still that same guy and you can always count on him to bring it his all.
Ive never had any concern or worry that Caleb is going to show up and play as hard as he can and play physically. He was that type of player when we recruited him out of high school and hes delivered ever since hes been here, Rogers said.
Bobbit added that not only is he the same player but hes improved every season and its led to the production that has come in his final season in the yellow and blue.
You knew he had the natural abilities to tackle [when we were recruiting him], but from that point hes really honed in and has taken it to another level of not really missing tackles. There were a lot of times last year where when he was tackling, he would bounce off [the ball carrier] or take a bad angle. That hasnt really happened this year. I think its just him trusting in what hes been coached and his ability to make plays. Its been awesome, Bobbit said.
Coming into this final season Francl knew he would be a starter as Jason Freeman and Stalbird had graduated at the outside linebacker position. He said there wasnt a whole lot of adjustment to his game because had played so many snaps as a backup, but he still needed to make sure he was believing in himself.
The biggest thing for me was just trusting myself and having everyone else have trust in [me]. As a defense we all believe in each other and that goes a long way when youre starting in a new role. You could talk to a lot of guys and theyd say the same thing. Its about the belief in each other, Francl said.
That trust and belief has led to him flying around and playing free, which Bobbit says has been the biggest reason that Francl has had such a good season.
With blitzing, in coverage and top down tackles, he plays reckless. Its a good thing when you play reckless and youre playing with the correct technique because then you can play with that violent recklessness and make a lot of plays, Bobbit said.
Francl has made the most of his final season at SDSU, and as the Jackrabbits head into the FCS Playoffs on Saturday and are looking to win their third-straight national title, he says he couldnt be in a better place.
Its been great. This was my goal after that whole thing in 2022, to get back here and play to the highest level I can, Francl said.
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