Coaches Carty, Santos are familiar rivals as Delaware-New Hampshire football game looms
A reunion of the ex-quarterback who launched his prolific career at Delaware Stadium and a former Blue Hen foe who then became a coaching colleague provides an interesting backdrop Saturday night.
As they always do, Delaware and New Hampshire will only be aiming to earn a valuable victory in their 6 p.m. Coastal Athletic Association showdown in Newark.
History shows that their football meetings can be quite unpredictable, dramatic and memorable. This one, like many of the previous, will play a key role in determining whether either can eventually land in its ultimate destination, the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision playoffs.
"This is a top-tier team and we gotta bring our 'A' game. It's really gonna be a showdown," said Delaware wide receiver Joshua Youngblood.
No. 19-ranked Delaware coach Ryan Carty and No. 11-ranked New Hampshire coach Ricky Santos will be trying to lead their teams to important victories, while also keenly knowing how determined the other will be.
In the 2004 season opener at Delaware Stadium, Santos, an unheralded redshirt freshman, came off the bench because of injuries and sparked New Hampshire to a 24-21 win over the No. 1-ranked, defending NCAA champion Blue Hens. Delaware backup quarterback Carty also left the sidelines to throw a 61-yard pass to David Boler to set up a Delaware touchdown that night.
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Two years later on the same field, Carty watched in awe. Delaware, with Joe Flacco at the helm, piled up 466 yards of total offense against UNH. But Santos was better, throwing for 281 and running for 110 of New Hampshire’s 516 total yards as the Wildcats prevailed 52-49. He won the Payton Award as the best player in FCS.
Carty was then in the first of his 11 years on the UNH coaching staff in 2007 when Santos and UNH beat eventual FCS runner-up Delaware 35-30 in Durham in his final season. Hens coach K.C. Keeler memorably accused Carty of reading and relaying Delaware’s sideline play-calling signals to his colleagues that afternoon.
Six years after that, Carty, having risen to offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach, welcomed new UNH receivers coach Santos to the staff, his Canadian Football League career having ended.
“Man was he fun to watch,” Carty, who became Delaware head coach after the 2021 season, said of the quarterback Santos. “I got a chance to realize how competitive he was, how talented he was and how good of a person he was.
“We got a chance to hire him back to be the receivers coach with us [at UNH in 2013] and he got a chance to kind of be around us as a coach on the other side of it, and that was fun as well. So no shock that the program is where it is right now.”
Santos spent three years on the UNH staff and three at Columbia before returning to be offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in 2019, a year after Carty left for Keeler’s Sam Houston State staff. Santos ended up being interim UNH head coach in 2019 while Sean McDonnell was beating treated for cancer. Delaware won a 16-10 thriller over the Wildcats at sold-out Delaware Stadium that year, their most recent meeting.
McDonnell returned as head coach for two years before retiring after the 2021 season with Santos stepping in. He guided UNH to a tie for the CAA title in 2022 and a 9-4 finish ending with an FCS quarterfinal loss at Holy Cross.
“I have the utmost respect for Ryan,” Santos said. “I learned a tremendous amount of football from him in the three years that we had together. Brilliant, brilliant coach all around, not just football mind, great leader, great motivator. He was a huge part of our success in all the time that he was here.”
Delaware (2-1) drubbed Saint Francis in its home opener Saturday night 42-14.
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New Hampshire (2-1) is playing its Coastal Athletic Association opener after beating Stonehill 51-17, losing 45-42 at FBS Central Michigan and beating in-state rival Dartmouth 24-7 in the Granite Bowl. Delaware downed Stony Brook 37-13 in a season-opening CAA game Aug. 31.
The head coaches matching wits Saturday had the same upbringing while operating the offense originally put in place at New Hampshire by Chip Kelly. Each has put his own stamp on it since while tinkering and modifying.
“Our offense has changed the last couple of years,” Santos said. “We were spread, up-tempo for numerous years, including when [Carty] was here, but the last year and a half, two years really, and then continuing to build upon it this year, we’re a little more pro-style, a little more 12 personnel [two tight ends] than we have been in the past.
“There’s definitely some similarities in the drop-back passing game and some things that we’ve kept because I just think, again, he’s so innovative and there’s some great things that I think have to stay in your offense. And then we’ve certainly changed in our own right so I’m just excited for this opportunity for our guys.”
UNH features sixth-year All-American running back Dylan Laube, the FCS leader in all-purpose yards (274.3 per game) and a player recruited to New Hampshire by Carty just prior to his departure.
“I think the great thing about what the UNH coaching train kinda was, it was more about culture and mentality than it was about X’s and O’s,” Carty said. “Do we come from the same place? Yes, but we’ve traveled around since then and our offense has morphed into different things. Coach Santos’ offense is kind of taken from different things.
“I’m gonna be honest with you, we’re not really that similar on tape.”
Hen scratch
True freshman safety K.T. Seay was CAA Rookie of the Week after intercepting a pass and making a team-high 7 tackles against Saint Francis. … After getting a career-high 139 yards rushing Saturday, Marcus Yarns is second in the CAA with 110.7 yards per game and is averaging a best-in-FCS 11.4 yards per carry. … Blue Hen Touchdown Club MVPs were wide receiver Kym Wimberly, who had a 48-yard catch-and-run for a TD, and linebacker Dillon Trainer, who scored Delaware’s last touchdown on a 56-yard interception return. … Delaware quarterbacks coach Sean Goldrich, a former New Hampshire quarterback, will speak at Friday’s TD club luncheon at noon at the Carpenter Center along with CAA commissioner Joe D’Antonio and former UD linebacker Ralph D’Angelo.
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This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: Ryan Carty and Ricky Santos eye Delaware vs. New Hampshire football
