For the Record: The Sun Belt has a 600-game streak, a special teams passport, and a missing ‘g’

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The Sun Belt’s best streak this week belongs to somebody who doesn’t take a snap. Arkansas State’s Ron Carroll just worked his 600th consecutive game on the sideline, a run that began in 1976. Elsewhere in the packets, Coastal Carolina’s special teams room could use a passport organizer, Louisiana’s nickname comes with an editing history and Louisiana Tech has a defensive back who took the scenic route out of Tiger Stadium’s end zone. Welcome back to For the Record, where we keep reading after the depth chart. Shoutout to the SIDs and communications staffs who gather these stories and preserve the details. This one’s for you.

1. Arkansas State has a 600-game ironman on the sideline.

Players graduate. Coaches move. Conferences rearrange the furniture. Ron Carroll keeps showing up.

Arkansas State’s game against Kennesaw State marked Carroll’s 600th consecutive game on the sideline. He has served the school since 1976, working as head athletic trainer through 2021 and now as an Athletics Health Care Administrator.

According to research cited in the Red Wolves’ notes, it’s the second-longest known streak in FBS history, behind Auburn’s Buddy Davidson at 700 consecutive games.

Fifty years. Six hundred games. Somewhere in there are generations of players whose Saturdays were made possible by somebody else’s steady work. Carroll deserves considerably more than a footnote.

2. Coastal Carolina’s specialists brought the world to Conway.

Coastal’s special teams room has representatives from Spain, Brazil, Austria, and Australia. That is a lot of geography for a group whose job involves getting a ball between two uprights or over somebody’s head.

Kickers Nico Cavanillas Alti, from Madrid; Daniel Porto, from Recife, Brazil; and Leo Liptak, from Graz, Austria, join Australian punter Roland Podesta.

Cavanillas Alti brought some useful credentials with him: he went 51-for-51 on extra points at South Carolina State last season and connected on a 48-yard overtime field goal in the Celebration Bowl.

The Chants host Georgia Southern on Saturday.

3. Louisiana’s nickname got its start with an SID. Naturally.

Before they were Ragin’ Cajuns, they were Bulldogs. Then they were “Raging Cajuns,” with a little more spelling involved.

Louisiana’s notes credit then-SID Bob Henderson and head coach Russ Faulkinberry with dubbing the football team the Raging Cajuns in 1963. More than 90 percent of Faulkinberry’s teams came from Louisiana high schools, many with French-speaking Acadian backgrounds.

In 1967, the second “g” disappeared. Other sports adopted the name in the early 1970s, and the university’s full switch came during the 1974-75 school year as part of “Operation Turnaround.”

A coach, a communications guy, and one deleted letter helped create one of college sports’ most recognizable names. Never underestimate an SID with a good idea and access to the backspace key.

4. JMU and Marshall have been terrible hosts to each other.

The road team has won all four meetings between James Madison and Marshall since the Dukes joined the Sun Belt.

Marshall won in Harrisonburg in 2022 and 2024. JMU won in Huntington in 2023 and 2025. The Herd returns to Bridgeforth Stadium on Saturday, where JMU will try to make home-field advantage mean something in this particular relationship.

The Dukes enter 4-0 after beating Old Dominion 46-20. Their defense recorded nine sacks, tying the program’s FBS record, and held the Monarchs to minus-14 rushing yards.

That’s a fairly persuasive opening argument for breaking the pattern.

5. Louisiana Tech’s Jordan McRae went the whole way at LSU.

Intercepting a pass at the goal line is a good play. Returning it 100 yards for a touchdown in Tiger Stadium is a story you get to tell forever.

Jordan McRae did exactly that against LSU, setting Louisiana Tech’s record for the longest interception or fumble return. He also made a career-high 13 tackles.

It wasn’t his first extended trip with somebody else’s pass. McRae had an 83-yard pick-six as a freshman at Georgia Military College.

Tech’s notes say the Bulldogs have returned 24 interceptions for touchdowns since October 1, 2017, the most in FBS over that span. As Army visits Ruston on Saturday, consider that a standing reminder: completing a pass to the other team can get very expensive here.

6. Georgia State answered a tie game with 100 yards of separation.

Northern Illinois had just tied Georgia State 14-14 when Isaiah Stone took the ensuing kickoff 100 yards for a touchdown early in the second quarter.

The return tied the Panthers’ program record for longest kickoff return, earned Stone Sun Belt Special Teams Player of the Week honors and helped Georgia State to a 35-14 win.

The Panthers also recorded six sacks in the victory and enter Saturday’s homecoming game against Old Dominion at 3-1. They’ve scored at least 30 points in every game this season.

More from around the conference

• Georgia Southern has a family reunion in the quarterback room: Turner Helton transferred from Western Kentucky, where he played for his uncle, Tyson, to Georgia Southern, where his father, Clay, is head coach. Eagles linebacker Colton Veltkamp’s brother, Caden, also played at WKU and is now FAU’s quarterback. Their father, Jason, directs football strength and conditioning at WKU.
• South Alabama is sharing the carries and keeping the clock: Keenan Phillips, PJ Martin, and Trae’von Dunbar have combined for 653 rushing yards and eight touchdowns through four games. All three scored against Ohio, with Dunbar reaching the end zone twice. The Jaguars rank fifth nationally in time of possession at 34:40 per game. Three backs, one ball, plenty of time to take turns.
• ULM has a reason to welcome the reset: The Warhawks enter conference play 0-4, but Bryant Vincent is 2-0 in Sun Belt openers at ULM, beating Troy in 2024 and Arkansas State in 2025. Kicker Abram Murray also supplied a bright spot in the opener at Mississippi State with a career-long 52-yard field goal, ULM’s first from at least 50 yards since 2022.
• Marshall’s Lester name appears on both sides of the ball: Running back T.J. Lester’s younger brother, Tristan, is a defensive back for the Herd. Their late father, Tim, played eight NFL seasons with the Rams, Steelers and Cowboys. T.J. caught a 39-yard touchdown pass at Missouri State this season, adding his own chapter to the family’s football story.
• Old Dominion has history on its side in Atlanta: Georgia State is 3-1, but the Monarchs have won six of the programs’ seven meetings, including last season’s 27-10 victory. ODU enters 1-3 after the JMU loss. One team has the better September; the other has the better history in this matchup.

App State, Southern Miss, and Troy are on bye this week. Everybody else gets another Saturday to add something to the record book. Or, in Carroll’s case, another Saturday to a streak that started before most of the people on the field were born.

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