When the SIU football team travels to take on Eastern Michigan on Saturday in Ypsilanti, Mich., it will not only be Homecoming for the Eagles, but it will also be a homecoming for 10 Saluki players and coaches.

Michigan natives on the SIU roster include Jason Hollingshed, Jeff Jones and Bilal Rashid of Detroit, Calvin Sims of Flint, DeJuan Kea of Redford and Chris Sutherlin of Romulus.

Not only are the players returning to their home state, they are also coming very close to their hometowns, with Flint being the farthest at just 63 miles from Ypsilanti.

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Hollingshed didn’t want to say he had been “counting down the days” until this game, but said he has definitely been looking forward to it.

“I heard from a friend of mine that goes to Eastern and she told me, ‘We’re playing you at homecoming,'” Hollingshed said. “Since then it’s just been like I can’t wait.”

Sims, who almost transferred to Eastern Michigan after starting his career at Michigan State, said he looks forward to the opportunity to play in front of friends and family again.

“There’ll be some crazy Flint fans there,” Sims said.

Hollingshed said he’s also expecting quite a few people to show up and cheer him on in his first game back home.

“Well right now, a rough estimate, I’ve got like 40 people coming to watch me,” Hollingshed said. “But I don’t care if there’s 40 people or two people. As long as my mom’s there, I’m happy.”

In addition to the players, four of SIU’s coaches also have ties to the Wolverine State.

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Head coach Jerry Kill, defensive coordinator Tracy Claeys and strength and conditioning coach Eric Klein all coached at Saginaw Valley State in University Center, Mich.

The fourth coach with Michigan connections is Robert Reeves, a native of Saline, Mich. Reeves was an All-American quarterback on an offense at Saginaw Valley that broke more than 90 school and conference records throughout his career.

He coached quarterbacks at Saginaw Valley before following Kill to Emporia State and then on to SIU.

While he was at Saginaw Valley, which is about 100 miles away from Ypsilanti, Kill’s teams went 38-14 and were nationally ranked his final two seasons, when the team finished with identical 9-2 records.

While Kill said he looks forward to every game, this is one that has special meaning to him.

“It is a little extra special going back to a place that you coached for five years and know a lot of people,” Kill said. “The people were great to me in that area.”

Claeys said he has also looked forward to this game, since he has not been back to Michigan since he left Saginaw Valley.

However, he added it’s a good thing the game isn’t later in the year, because then the weather would make him want to stay in Carbondale.

“If it was any later, hell, I wouldn’t want to go,” Claeys said. “There’s too much snow up there.”

The coaches aren’t the only ones looking forward to seeing former co-workers again, as the players are looking forward to once again playing against former high school rivals.

“I get to see some of the guys I played with and see how they’re doing, you know, how their careers are going,” Sims said, “and just to be back in Michigan is a plus for me.”

Despite the fact that it’s a homecoming for so many members of the Salukis, getting a win is going to be harder than it seems.

Even though the Eagles’ record is a weak 1-3, they are a Division I-A team. The fact that SIU hasn’t beaten a Division I-A team since 1983 doesn’t bode well for the Salukis.

However, an upset isn’t impossible, as Southeast Missouri State came within three points of knocking off the Eagles earlier this season.

A win of that magnitude would not only be huge for the SIU program, but it would provide the Michigan natives with some extra ammunition when they go home and talk about their teams.

“It would mean a lot to know that the school I’m at beat a school that’s in Michigan,” Sims said. “I think it’d be good bragging right for when I go home.”

The irony of the fact that Eastern’s Homecoming turns out to be a homecoming for the Salukis isn’t lost on Hollingshed.

“They’re thinking, ‘Well they’re a D-IAA team so we’ll also get a win at Homecoming,’ but they don’t know how good we are,” Hollingshed said. “They’re going to be in for a rude awakening at Homecoming, talking about how they’re getting rolled up by a D-IAA school.

“It’s going to be our Homecoming; too bad for them.”

Reporter Jens Deju can be reached at [email protected]