After last season's kicking woes, head coach Al Bagnoli came up with a simple plan. If the Quakers brought in enough kickers in the offseason, he figured, at least one was bound to succeed.
So, instead of recruiting one standout talent, Bagnoli added three freshmen to a potential kicking corps that already included Derek Zoch, whose ineffectiveness last season cost him the starting role; A.J. Nobile, returning from an injury; and senior wideout Braden Lepisto, who hit three of four field goals filling in last season.
Zoch was not going to get his job back, Bagnoli indicated, and Lepisto was seen as a last resort. But the door was open for any of the other four to step up.
"We thought we'd let them fight it out in the preseason and give everybody ample opportunity," Bagnoli said.
Andrew Samson, a 6-foot-1 Whartonite from Michigan who's listed as a punter, took advantage of his chances. He emerged from the competition as the Quakers' starting kicker.
Samson played well throughout camp. But he was also helped out by the fact that he was the only kicker to remain healthy.
Bagnoli declined to speculate on who would have won the job if the rest of the kicking corps was not plagued by the injury bug.
"You can only go by what you see," Bagnoli said. Samson's "been consistent and steady and healthy."
He did not entirely rule out the possibility of another option overtaking Samson, but said that anybody else would "have to go a long way to beat him."
Bagnoli refused to make Samson -- or any other kicker - available for comment in the days before Penn's season opener tomorrow.
Meanwhile, Bagnoli praised his newly acquired fourth-down weapon.
"He's still a work in progress and he's raw, but he's got a lot of ability," Bagnoli said. "He's got pretty good mechanics, a tremendous leg, and he's got unlimited potential."
Samson kicks the ball high, which makes it harder to block, and has the power to hit 50-yard field goals "without too much effort," Bagnoli said.
But kicking 50-yarders in practice is very different from doing the same with the game on the line, as the Quakers learned the hard way last year.
Indeed, distance was not the problem last year. Between 30 and 39 yards, Penn was a respectable five for seven. But as the distance got shorter, the kicks became more difficult for the Quakers. They made just two of eight from 20 to 29 yards en route to their Ivy League-worst 46.67 percent overall field-goal percentage. And only lowly Columbia had more troubles converting point-after attempts.
These failed conversions loomed large as the Quakers set NCAA records for most overtimes in a season, most consecutive overtime games and most overtime losses in a season. All of the year's five losses were decided by one possession, four by one field goal or less.
This offseason, Bagnoli ran more "live" drills to subject the kicking candidates to game-like duress. He believes that Samson can handle the pressure of kicking in the clutch, though he's not positive.
"He's only a freshman," Bagnoli said. "I have confidence that he can -- he certainly has that kind of ability- - but until you put him in that situation obviously none of us will know."
