By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY — Catawba wraps up the football season on Saturday with a 1 p.m. kickoff at Shuford Stadium against Carson-Newman.

The season finale used to be a solemn, bittersweet occasion, with at least a dozen seniors finishing up five years in the program and four years on the field with emotional performances, giving their all for the Indians one last time.

That won’t be the case on Saturday. Catawba doesn’t have a single player who was recruited by the program, stayed the course, and is now finishing up.

There’s no shortage of players on the Catawba roster — 110 of them, to be exact — but only one of those 110 is listed as a senior.

That’s Noble Zuschlag, a linebacker who turned in a fine career at West Virginia State before joining the Indians for this train-wreck of a season. It’s not his fault. He’s continued to tackle people. He’s continued to fight. He’s got 29 stops to his credit. Maybe Saturday should be designated as Noble Zuschlag Day.

Catawba also has two graduate students on the roster.

Robert Braucht came from the The Citadel, so you know he’s an upstanding, service-minded guy. He’s listed as a tight end. While he has not been credited with any catches, he has made tackles, so he contributes on special teams.

Wide receiver Connor McCarthy came to the Indians after graduating from Coastal Carolina. He’s been one of Catawba’s best receiving options. He’s provided 19 catches, one for a touchdown.

There may be others, listed as juniors on the field, who will be able to graduate academically this spring and are playing their last Catawba game. There may also be some sophomores and freshmen who will walk away from football after this season.

Catawba, 1-9 overall (the win was against Livingstone on opening night) and 0-8 in the South Atlantic Conference, has just seven juniors on the roster, so the Indians will be young again in 2023.

There are 30 sophomores on the roster and 70 — yes, 70 — freshmen. Some of those “freshmen” may be third-year freshmen. That’s possible with a normal redshirt year plus a COVID redshirt year.

COVID was brutal and contributed to the dismal situation Catawba football finds itself in right now, although COVID can’t be blamed for all of it.

Every SAC program got punched in the mouth by COVID. Two of them — Mars Hill and Newberry — will be meeting to decide the league title on Saturday.

Looking back on February 2018, head coach Curtis Walker announced a recruiting class he and his Catawba staff were understandably proud of. Lots of standout athletes  signed up, eager to join a team that had just gone 9-2. Headliners included quarterback Jack Mangel,  linebackers Elijah Banks and Tylon Clawson and running back Nasjzae Bryant. Those are players who could be celebrating a Senior Day for the Indians this Saturday, but none of them are still around. Some of them never played a down at Shuford Stadium.

Mangel was player of the week in the Mountain East Conference the other day. He’s a star quarterback at Concord University in West Virginia. Banks plays for Winston-Salem State, while Clawson beefed up to 230 pounds and is a Charlotte 49er defensive end. Bryant gets carries for the Rainbow Warriors of Hawaii and has scored two touchdowns this season.

With only a handful of veterans and a staggering amount of injuries to the team in general and to quarterbacks in particular, maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise that Catawba is where it is right now.

Catawba and Catawba fans are suffering through a serious rough patch. Since late in the 2018 season, the Indians have lost 24 of 26 SAC games. That’s unbelievable.

Catawba has struggled offensively. Everyone knows that. The general perception is that Catawba’s defense has been OK, but that hasn’t been the case. The Indians have given up 39 points per game, 471 yards per game, 242 rushing yards per game. You can’t win with those numbers.

Still, Catawba has a chance to finish with a much-needed victory on what may be a wet, windy Saturday in Salisbury.

The Indians are 7-point underdogs according to the Massey Ratings, with a 28-21 Carson-Newman victory projected. Catawba is given a 32 percent win probability, which means it wouldn’t take a miracle. It would just mean Catawba playing really well and Carson-Newman not playing great.

Win the turnover battle and kick a 50-yard field goal — and it could happen.

WSAT will broadcast the action.

Catawba and Carson-Newman first tangled in 1932. Catawba beat Carson-Newman 33-27 in 2021 although the Eagles still lead the all-time series by an overwhelming 40-13-1.

While Catawba is way down,  Carson-Newman is not up. This is not the Carson-Newman of its glory days.

The Eagles are a modest 5-5. They’ve been whipped a few times this year, but they did win their last two outings. They beat two of the SAC’s newer additions — Emory & Henry and UVa Wise.

On the Carson-Newman roster are long snapper Andrew Bradshaw, who played at Jesse Carson High, and Josh Malloy a defensive lineman who lists Salisbury as his hometown. Malloy began his high school career at Carson and finished it at Eastside High in South Carolina.

They are seniors.