Summer coaching buddies reacquainted in Jonesboro

JONESBORO -- Blake Anderson called Matt Wells earlier this week with an offer.

"I told him that if he's thinking about not showing up, it's OK," Arkansas State's first-year coach said.

Today’s game

ARKANSAS STATE VS. UTAH STATE

WHEN 6 p.m.

WHERE Centennial Bank Stadium, Jonesboro

RECORDS Arkansas State 1-2, Utah State 2-1

COACHES Arkansas State: Blake Anderson (1-2 in first season at ASU and overall); Utah State: Matt Wells (11-6 in second season at Utah State and overall)

SERIES Utah State leads 3-2

INTERNET ESPN3, astateredwolves.com

RADIOKFIN-FM, 107.9, in Jonesboro; KKSP-FM, 93.3, in Bryant/Little Rock

Wells declined the offer from his old friend, so the two will face off against each other for just the second time in their careers at 6 tonight at Centennial Bank Stadium.

Anderson and ASU (1-2) will try to break a two-game losing streak while Wells, in his second year at Utah State (2-1), will try to win without Chuckie Keeton, the Aggies' quarterback who was being touted as a Heisman Trophy candidate before suffering a knee injury last week.

The friendship between Anderson and Wells began almost 20 years ago and has been maintained through occasional meetings during the summer to discuss offensive philosophies and the correct methods of developing quarterbacks.

"He's just one of the guys out there that does it right," Anderson said. "I hope he wins them all except for one. That's I told him in the beginning. He's a good guy and a good coach."

The connection was sparked almost two decades ago on the sweltering football fields in Texas. Anderson and Wells were breaking into full-time coaching and during the summers would work as many camps as they could to get exposure, make connections and earning a little extra cash. Both worked with quarterbacks and receivers, so they were paired together often at camps.

"If you did a good job, you got invited back," said Wells, who was a quarterback at Utah State in 1993-1996. "I think we got 25 bucks or a little bit more the next summer."

The relationships they developed turned out to be more valuable than the money.

At the time, Anderson was an assistant coach at Trinity Valley College and Wells was an assistant at Navy along with Scotty Conley, who was Anderson's head coach at Trinity Valley for a couple of seasons.

The summer connections continued as their coaching careers picked up steam. They'd play golf in the mornings -- "We had some great matches," Wells said -- and work with quarterbacks and receivers at camps in the Dallas area in the afternoons. During down time, they'd trade offensive ideas and philosophies.

"We have similar thoughts on how to coach and train quarterbacks and what to do on offense," Wells said. "We're very similar. We're different in some ways, our offenses, but we are a lot more alike than we are different."

The camp meetings eventually slowed, but the offenses that eventually developed shared similarities. Both coaches use Spread elements and like to utilize dual-threat quarterbacks. But while the key factor in Anderson's offense is tempo, Wells likes to use different formations to disguise and confuse defenses.

"That's just what Matt likes to do, and it's what seems to work for them," said Anderson, who last met up with Wells in the spring at a coaches clinic in Phoenix.

Wells has had tonight's game in the back of his mind since he was promoted from offensive coordinator to head coach in December 2012. Two weeks before that, Wells' good friend Bryan Harsin had been named ASU coach.

The friendship Wells developed with Harsin was similar to his relationship with Anderson, and the connection helped ASU land former Utah State quarterback Adam Kennedy last year.

"When Blake got the job, I knew that Arkansas State was on the schedule," Wells said. "It was just against another friend."

It's a friendship that has been hard to maintain at times because of the nature of their business, but the two are looking forward to renewing it tonight during the pregame chat before squaring off as head coaches for the first time.

"It's really difficult," Anderson said. "It's a call, it's a text, it's a congratulations.

"There's a bunch of great people in the profession, so when you have a chance to go head-to-head with a good friend of yours, it's really neat."

Sports on 09/20/2014

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