By Andy Walter

DOVER — Keeping a group of 100 players focused isn’t an easy job.

There’s a lot of distractions for a college football team, especially three months into the season.

But with so much on the line right now, Delaware State coach DeSean Jackson knows he needs his players to all be on the same page more than ever.

“At the end of the day, all I ask my guys to do is lock in for another month,” said the first-year coach. “You’ve got a month left to do something special and legendary that hasn’t been done here at Delaware State for a long time.”

Indeed, the Hornets’ three-game winning streak has made them one of the MEAC frontrunners heading into the stretch drive of the regular season.

At 2-0 in conference, 6-3 overall, DelState is tied with South Carolina State (2-0, 6-3) for first place in the conference standings with three games left. The Hornets and Bulldogs don’t square off until the final game of the season, Nov. 22 in Dover.

But more important to DelState right now is its trip to Baltimore on Friday to take on Morgan State (0-2 MEAC, 3-6 overall). The 7 p.m. contest is being televised on ESPN-U.

While the Bears have a losing record, they’ve also won the last six meetings with the Hornets. DelState hasn’t beaten Morgan State since 2017.

“It’s a one-game-at-a-time mentality that we’ve always had throughout the season,” said Jackson. “As tough as it is to get these young men to be focused on one game, that’s our only goal.

“We can’t get too caught up in talking about the Celebration Bowl. Yes, it’s a goal of ours. If we want to do that, we’ve got to prepare to make it there. At the end of the day, there’s a lot of football left. We’ve got three games (left) and we can’t disrespect the game.”

The Celebration Bowl is the game where the MEAC and SWAC champions square off in Atlanta. This year’s game is slated for Dec, 13 in Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

DelState has won only four MEAC championships since 1972. The last one was in 2007 with the three before that all coming in the 1980s.

Since 2018, the Hornets went only 7-28 in conference games before this season.

Jackson said he thought his team had a great practice on Sunday.

“Lately we’ve been practicing our butts off,” he said. “Last week I told my guys, I don’t think we had the best week of practice. It shows — in the game, it shows

“Hopefully they understand that the weeks we do have great practices, you see how it transitions on game days.”

Hornet quarterback Kaiden Bennett has been dealing with some injuries. SPECIAL TO THE DAILY STATE NEWS/GARY EMEIGH

After quarterback Kaiden Bennett had to sit out a few series in DelState’s win over Norfolk State last Thursday, Jackson said he expects him to start at Morgan State.

Jackson said the QB has been dealing with some injuries.

“I can’t talk enough about Kaiden Bennett, how much of a better team he makes us when he’s out on the field,” said Jackson. “When he came back out there, it just shows his grit.”

With the Spartans keeping the Hornets’ running game under control early in the contest, Bennett completed 16-of-18 passes for 158 yards and a touchdown. His 88.9-percent completion was his best of the season.

“Kaiden Bennett had some certain looks where he had to come through for us and he was able to come through,” said Jackson.

“We know what teams are going to do. Everybody in the world knows we’re going to run the ball and we don’t care what you do, you’ve got to stop it.

Sometimes a team’s going to be tough on us like Thursday night.

“We had to shift a little bit and Kaiden Bennett stepped up. In order for us to be the team we want to be, he’s going to have to step up and play that type of ball.”

Air traffic control

One thing the Hornets know they’ve got to get better at is pass defense.

DelState is ranked No. 125 out of 126 teams in FCS, allowing 301.3 passing yards per game. It has given up at least 311 yards in four of the past seven games, including 354 at North Carolina Central two weeks ago.

“Giving up 300 yards in the air is not acceptable,” said Jackson. “We understand that. The crazy thing is ... I don’t think they had over 100 yards running (45). We were able to stop something.

“It just feels like sometimes we can’t stop two things at once. .... To be a championship-culture defense, we’ve just got to get more stops.”

Jackson said the Hornets’ defense did make some big stops on Thursday. Defensive back Ryan Pellum had an interception in the end zone in the closing minutes.

“At the end of the day, as long as our offense scores more than their offense, we’re in good shape,” said Jackson. “It doesn’t matter how it looks or what the stats are, as long as we win, that’s all that matters.”