CRETE — In a season where Hastings College football struggled to score the ball, its defense didn’t do much better on the side.

The Broncos, in last year’s 2-9 season, allowed over 35 points per game, which ranked ninth out of 11 teams in the Great Plains Athletic Conference.

During last week’s small school media session at Doane, HC head coach Matt Franzen felt that was partly due to his team’s offensive issues, with the Broncos not able to hold on to the ball for long drives.

With a new offensive coordinator this season, Franzen believes that will only benefit a Hastings defense which returns a lot of standouts from last year.

“It’s a group that there are some young players that really emerged in spring football,” Franzen said. “There are some upperclassmen that are returning with a lot of experience. It is not a group that has a couple guys that have standouts. It will be a group of committee that pull that rope together.”

While Franzen doesn’t believe there will be any immediate “All-GPAC first team-level guys” that come out of the gate, there are several that could play into that level throughout the course of the season, which opens Aug. 30 at Doane.

Franzen noted Jake Lambert, a senior linebacker who has been a multi-year starter for the Broncos, will be back as a leader on that side of the ball.

Next to him will be Justyce Hostetler, whose strong spring camp has positioned him to be a starting linebacker entering his second season.

“He is an electric player,” Franzen said. “We thought he was going to be really good coming out of high school and by his freshman spring he was showing that in a big way.”

Up front, HC returns EJ Hernandez on the defensive line, a senior who missed the second half of the season due to an injury.

“He had a good first half of the season,” Franzen said. “He is a big, solid dude in the middle.”

In the secondary, Sam Ahl, Marcus Dustin, Dion Tovar and Gio Mendoza will be counted to make plays in the back on the Broncos’ defense.

“There is enough depth and guys that can contribute (on that side of the ball),” Franzen said. “It will be a solid unit if our offense can control the ball a little bit better than we did last season.”