Friday, April 15, 2011

Primer for the Spring Game and other links

Saturday is BC's annual Jay McGillis Memorial Spring. In addition to football, there is a variety of "family fun" events. If you haven't gone and have kids, give it a shot. If you are hardcore football fan, get to the game and then share reports with all of us who cannot be there. The game will be available on bceagles.com. I don't think we can glean too much out of it, but it will be our first look at Kevin Rogers' offense. I'll have my thoughts after I've watched the game.


The staff at College Football News doesn't think much of our current coach, or our former one.


Baseball lost to Clemson Friday night. During the football game you can walk over and catch an inning or two of Saturday's double header.

6 comments:

Greg said...

It is a bit unfair to say they don't think much of him, merely that you wouldn't want to grow a program with him because of his age. TOB review was definitely harsher (and amusing that he was the only guy below Spaz).

eagleboston said...

Spring game on now! BCeagles.com. This will hopefully tide me over until September.

Jeff said...

You asked for reports, so:

First team rosters. I didn't write any of this down, but this is my recollection, 12 hours later:

1st Team Offense (for spring game):
QB: #7 Chase Rettig
RB: #20 Tahj Kimble
LT: #73 John Wetzel
LG: #75 Nathan Richman
C: #62 Ian White
RG: #64 Harris Willams
RT: #77 Emmett Cleary
WR: #3 Ifeanyi Momah
WR: #86 Bobby Swigert
TE: #87 Lars Anderson

1st Team Defense (for spring game):
RDE: #56 Max Holloway
DT: #92 Dillon Quinn
DT: #97 Conor O'Neal
LDE: #91 Kasim Edebali
OLB: #32 Kevin Pierre-Louis
MLB: #40 Luke Kuechly
OLB: #49 Steele Divitto (IIRC)
SS: #26 Dominick LeGrande (partial time)
FS: #27 Okechukwu Okoroha
DB: #23 Jim Noel (moved around)
CB: #4 Donnie Fletcher
CB: #5 Al Louis-Jean Jr. (partial time)

Please post corrections if I got something wrong.

Jeff said...

Now, as for my impressions... Rettig looked good. The other QBs, not so much. Shinskie was a mixed bag. He had some two clutch plays in a row: the first a 3rd and 20, and the following was a bullet of a TD pass that was called back by the only penalty of the game (holding). He made some bad decisions, and his pocket awareness needed improvement. Still, I think he projects as the #2 QB at this point. Back to Rettig, he put a nice zip on the ball and moved around well. He threw a few poor balls, but the worst of those looked like the receiver ran the wrong route. His composure and decision-making put him head-and-shoulders above the competition.

The new offense, well it's still a "pro" offense. Very much so, in fact. We seemed to run a lot of play-action rollouts. I like that for inexperienced quarterbacks, because it gives them a better field of vision. Most of the snaps were from center, though we routinely used the shotgun on 3rd-and-long. Nothing fancy, like endarounds, but didn't expect that in a spring game. Our running game wasn't full-go (Harris only took snaps on the first series), but I liked that we ran right at the defense more. Last year, it seemed like all we knew how to do was "draw."

OL:
The O-line seemed to play well, especially the first team. Pass protection was good, with only a few free-runners (2nd team). We didn't generate any gaping holes in the running game, but the guys played tough. Spinney was not playing.

WR:
As a whole, the receivers played well. There weren't many drops. No one was jaw-dropping, but they had good hands. While the 1st-team WRs played well, I was also impressed by Shakim Philips, who was mostly playing with the 2nd team. He has a prototypical NFL build; If he has speed to go along with his size, he could be a playmaker. Larmond was out, of course - can't wait to see him again.

TE:
Lars Anderson played well. Where's Pantale? Didn't see much from the other TEs.

RB:
Really liked what I saw out of Tahj Kimble. He's the same size as Harris, and while he might not yet have his vision, he runs hard. Mike Javorsky played on the second team, and he reminds me of Eugene Jarvis - shockingly small, for D1A, but sometimes able to wiggle through for extra yardage. Harris started, but saw almost no snaps. Andre Williams was out of course, and would have added some needed size to the group.

QB:
I know I already talked about them, but I want to mention how #9 Shane Cranmore came out at the end of the game and ran a bootleg in for a TD. Just another threat that these rollouts give us... except for Josh, who on a previous play had an open field in front of him and declined to run it, despite the coach's emphatic gesturing on the sideline that he should have. ;)

DE:
Wetzel seemed to handle Holloway. I hope this reflects more on Wetzel than on Holloway, since he's been pretty good at getting sacks in Spring Games past. Edebali made some plays, and provided good coverage in zone blitzes. The true freshman, Mehdi Abdesmad has a prototypical frame at 6'6 260. I can't wait to see more of what this kid can do.

DT:
Dillon Quinn seemed to provide a good anchor, while Conor O'Neal got penetration on several plays and blew up at least one play emphatically.

OLB:
Kuechly was quieter than usual. The linebackers were solid, but unspectacular.

DB:
LeGrande make a massive hit early in the game, but I don't think he was with the 1st team full-time. They moved some guys around in the backfield. Oko stayed at safety though. There were definately some passes defended that should have been picks.

Special Teams:
Freese looked fine, though he clanked a 35-yarder off the left upright. Quigley shanked one punt, but most were nice (and fair-caught). Quigley kicked the final extra point. Didn't see many returns, but Swigert was fielding punts.

I feel good about this team. I hope we can pull it all together by September. Staying/getting healthy will be key.

mod34b said...

Great report , Jeff. Thanks

Crill said...

Yep, that was awesome. Thanks!