HARRISONBURG – The differences aren’t subtle.

“Change is always tough,” William & Mary senior cornerback Corey Parker said. “But change is always good and necessary at times.”

A drastic overhaul is just at its beginning stages through six games for the Tribe, who host James Madison on Saturday. They don’t play or look – aside from some of the same personnel like Parker – similar to the version of William & Mary the Dukes blanked 51-0 last year in Harrisonburg.

First-year coach Mike London installed new systems for the offense and defense, and he brought the philosophical approach he used during previous stops in the same role at Richmond, Virginia and Howard to cultivate as smooth of a transition as he could while taking over for former longtime Tribe coach Jimmye Laycock this offseason.

“You come in with your own brand of personality with how you want to come in and how you want to build a team,” London said. “But you’ve got to have players like Corey Parker, [defensive tackle] Bill Murray and [offensive lineman] Mark Williamson, the guys that have been around that buy into it.

“I’m a relationship-oriented coach and I believe in having relationships with players. They don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”

Parker said adapting from the defense he thrived in for the first four seasons of his career to the three-man front William & Mary uses now hasn’t been trouble-free even though he’s played well.

He leads his team with 43 tackles to go along with four pass breakups, an interception, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery.

“It’s been a massive year of transition with basically a whole new coaching staff,” Parker said. “But the coaches have made the transition as effortless as possible.

“They’ve been awesome with helping implement the defense and they’ve been awesome overall to make sure the transition has been easy on everyone, especially the older guys that have been here for so long.”

With upperclassmen and coaches in unison, the rest of the roster has conformed to follow along, according to London and Parker.

William & Mary is 2-4 overall, but its losses to Villanova, Albany and FBS East Carolina came by an average of nine points. Last year, the Tribe got beat by double digits on five occasions.

And through six games this season, they’ve already scored more points (151) than they did in all of 2018 (136).

London’s and offensive coordinator Brennan Marion’s go-go offense emphasizes speed and takes advantage of quickness on the perimeter to move the ball. It’s helped that both true freshman quarterback Hollis Mathis and Coastal Carolina transfer quarterback Kilton Anderson have performed effectively – they’ve combined for eight total touchdowns compared to only four interceptions.

“It’s difficult to emulate the offense,” JMU coach Curt Cignetti said, “because it’s up-tempo and they do a lot of different things. We’re reading the [scout-team] card and it’s a lot different than anything we’ve done. It’s like back in the day when you had to do the wishbone because you have the same challenges in terms of getting a great look from the scout team.”

London said: “The opportunities for guys to play and contribute is something that’s been consistent for us and particularly the explosive plays for ball-in-hand guys that help us. You look at James Madison and they’ve got several ball-in-hand guys and their team compliments everything that they do, but as a young team and a growing team, we’re looking to get our guys we have the ball in space and use their athleticism to gain some explosive plays.”

Parker said nearly knocking off Villanova before the Wildcats won in the last two minutes showed him that this year’s William & Mary team can stay competitive and have a chance to win against some of the better teams in the Colonial Athletic Association.

“It starts with the headman, Coach London,” Parker said. “And that’s the ideas and energy he’s bringing. It’s the never-quit attitude, so we’ve been one or two plays here or there from winning these games, so we’re just looking to finish strong to pull out some more victories.

“But I’m excited for the future for [William & Mary]. We have great coaches. We have great schemes and ideas for the future, so I think the future is very bright for this program.”