Day two is a wrap as the Cougs continue to sweat their way through Fall camp in some of the best weather the Palouse has to offer. Another sunny day with temps in the mid 80’s sent Grippi running for shade, while I was tempted to dunk my head in the water cooler. I haven’t seen the mist machines that you often see on football sidelines, or in places like Oklahoma where they are practicing in temps well over 100. If we had them, the players would have to fight me for a spot. Of course, there was also some football going on. Wanna know what I saw?
Read on for more…
First thing of note is that CJ Mizell was present and running with the 1’s and 2’s at middle backer. That is a good sign, as CJ is the type of talent that can almost single handedly overcome the kind of speed and athleticism disadvantages we sometimes find ourselves in vs. the Oregon’s and USC’s of the world. He looked to be doing fine and I’ll continue to keep an eye on the battle between him and Mike Ledgerwood that is certainly one of this camps most intriguing position battles.
This season, there are really only 2 positions on the entire team where I expect that we won’t be better than we were last year, punter and long snapper. Monday’s action went a long way to making me feel better about both. The long snapping is not consistent, but it is also not disastrous, and there is plenty of time left for coach Ungerer to sharpen up that aspect of the special teams. More encouraging was the work of punter Dan Wagner who takes over for Cougar legend Reid Forest. He was absolutely blasting his kicks today, sending a number of them deep, beyond the Rogers Field end zone. Everything looked good, including the hang time and even a few that had spirals like a Joe Montana touchdown bomb. No doubt the ideal weather, and lack of a rush contributed, but it was still exactly what you would want to see from your punter when he isn’t facing any pressure.
One thing that has really jumped out at me this year is the difference in the pace of practice. The last few years the coaches spent a lot of time prodding and imploring the team to run from drill to drill and to work at a fast pace, just like what was expected of them in games. This year, I see the players taking it on themselves a lot more to encourage a quick pace and hustle during and between drills. You will still hear coach Sears and others yelling “FINISH, FINISH THE &%$#ing PLAY!!”, but for the most part things are more brisk and sharp than I’ve seen the last 3 years. This isn’t just a “practice” thing either. The Cougs want to run a no huddle offense that creates momentum and keeps a defense on its heels and with Jeff Tuel under center, they seem to be doing just that. In one of Monday’s scrimmages, Tuel led the offense the length of the field (Rogers field has two 50, or 60 yard fields side by side) for a score so quickly that I literally missed most of it by briefly turning my head to look at the scout team action on the adjacent field. Tuel is very much in command of this offense.
One of my favorite drills to watch features some matchups that almost everybody agrees will determine the fate of this year’s Cougs… one on one battles between the O-line and D-line. The two groups stand about 10 yards apart and send one guy at a time to line up like they would for a pass rush and do battle, the O-line trying to keep the defender in front of them and the D-line trying to break past the blocker into the backfield. There is a lot of barking back and forth between the groups and this is the drill that is most likely to result in some heated extra curricular pushing and shoving. Some of the more interesting matchups I saw were:
David Gonzalez, stone cold shutting down Travis Long. Gonzo just shut the door on every move Long made, and he has a few. This matchup also featured a great collisions as two big, athletic guys collide with each other, each going full bore. I can’t wait til they put the pads on.
Dan Spitz, who has showed up for camp looking huge, had a great battle where he got the better of Jordan Pu’u Robinson. It was good to see, as we are really going to need Spitz to provide some depth for us this year. So far, the transition looks like it may work out. We shall see.
Elliot Bosche, like Spitz, is another convert to the interior O-line after originally being a tight end. He too looks to be coming along under Coach Morton’s tutelage and had a great stand up stop against Justin Clayton.
John Fullington went eyeball to eyeball with Anthony Laurenzi and didn’t blink, or yield so much as and inch. In fact, he even drove Laurenzi a bit off the line and showed some great lateral footwork to then keep him from finding any way around into the backfield. Once the whistle blew Fullington just raised his arms in the air and bellowed out a huge yell that was echoed by his fellow offensive linemen.
On the defensive side, Brandon Rankin is just hard to stop. His nickname could be “Beast Mode”. He stays low, drives hard and has a jab step that is like the football equivalent of a cross-over dribble. Lets hope it shows up on Saturdays this Fall.
The word that comes to mind to describe Toni Pole is… violent. He is just extremely violent at the point of attack. He uses his arms a lot all while driving low and hard into the defender. Its not unlike a 290 lb weed wacker mounted on a Dodge Charger. Four seasons of this guy is definitely something Coug fans should start getting excited about.
The practice ended on a nice exclamation point as the scrimmage clock counted down to zero and Jeff Tuel found Marques Wilson for a 55 yard TD strike that was a thing of beauty. There was decent coverage on the play, but Tuel put the ball where Marques could just do what he does and go up and get it. Those two are going to be tough to stop.
On a facilities note, You may have heard about the little construction/destruction project going on in the West end zone of Martin Stadium. The endzone bleachers, starting above the tunnel are being torn out and apparently being replaced by a “fan zone” type area that will be similar to the end zone beer garden at the Spring Game in Joe Albi. I am as curious as you all are about how this will turn out, so stay tuned for more on that as construction progresses.
Finally, I apologize for the lack of photos, but Amieable and I are in the process of moving to Logan for her to start grad school and almost everything we own is in storage, so, no camera. I hope to find a solution to this problem soon. Until next time…
GO Cougs!
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