Camp Notebook
August 14, 2005 09:20 PM | General
August 14, 2005
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Despite being just a week into fall camp, West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez is already wishing he had more time to work with his young team. The Mountaineers have just three two-a-day practices and a pair of scrimmages remaining before the start of the fall semester on Monday, Aug. 22.
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| Junior Jason Colson catches a pass during a drill last week. Colson and sophomore Pernell Williams remaing the team's top two tailbacks, according to Coach Rich Rodriguez.
All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks |
“I’d like to have two more weeks of camp before school starts,” Rodriguez admitted Saturday. “Then you’re limited to four hours a week and they’ve got classes and all of the other distractions. I’m just really nervous that one week is not going to be enough but that’s all we’ve got so we’ll make it enough.”
Because his young team is under the gun somewhat getting prepared for a difficult season opener at Syracuse, Rodriguez says it’s extremely important that they remain focused and attentive.
“We’ve really got to do a good job of concentrating both mentally and physically and getting this team ready to go,” he said. “The good part about it is we ran this team after (Saturday’s) practice and even though we didn’t run the full amount of fifths – we only ran three instead of five – they made it around easily. I do think conditioning wise we’re in pretty good shape.”
Being in good physical condition permits Rodriguez and his staff to concentrate more on schemes, fundamentals and plays instead of working them into shape. Being in good shape in Rodriguez’ mind means both physically and mentally.
“We’ve got to prepare them so that they don’t pace themselves mentally and you’ve got to have camp practices to put that into their mindset,” he said.
West Virginia is scheduled to have a scrimmage on Wednesday and a big, full-scale scrimmage on Saturday, Aug. 20, to help sift through some of the personnel decisions Rodriguez and his coaches must make.
Briefly:
“I just hope he can come back,” said Rodriguez. “He’s still probably four or five weeks away from being fully released and even then is he going to be 100 percent to play? We hope he is because he can play if he’s healthy.
“In four or five weeks he’ll know if he can do it and if he can’t then his career will be over. We’re really hoping and praying that in four or five weeks Erick will be pain-free and will be able to help us out.”
“I probably came to this decision judging on can they pick up (the plays) at all?” he said. “Can they at least pick up a little bit? They’ve picked up enough so that at least we know that we can keep working with them on a limited basis.
“Plus the fact that they can help us on some special teams – Slaton on kick return and Jason has a big enough body that we can get him in some short yardage situations.”
Because both Slaton and Gwaltney were prolific ball carriers in high school, naturally there was some concern about whether both of them were going to be able to handling the blocking required of the tailback position. Rodriguez says Syracuse will try and take advantage of their inexperience by blitzing and so far he’s been pleased with their ability to recognize and pick up blitzes.
“We’ve got to be prepared for a lot of that because Syracuse is going to blitz a lot and we’ve got to work on all of the things involved in protection,” Rodriguez said. “(Blocking) is probably the thing that has given us the most confidence. Both of them have been pretty good in protection as far as seeing the guy they’re supposed to block.”
Rodriguez says the biggest hurdle for the two young tailbacks has been their patience with the ball, specifically pressing blocks and waiting for the seams to open up.
“They both ran different systems in high school but they’re both tough guys and were coached well before they got here so they understand about getting north-south,” he said. “You can see sometimes where Gwaltney is always running north and south and we told him to open his eyes a little bit and then he starts running too much sideways.
“You can tell when you’re confusing them when they’re going back and forth. It just takes reps and experience. They’re going to make mistakes in the games, too. Hopefully we’ll get those to a minimum.”
“He’s more than a fullback -- he’s got enough skills to play the tailback position in a one-back set,” Coach Rod mentioned. “He’s not as fast as the other guys but he’s a pretty physical player. He’s picked our schemes up well and he’s going to play a lot of football for us. He gives us a little bit different dimension when he’s back there.”
Rodriguez says Colson and Williams are still No. 1 and 1-A as far as the top two tailbacks go.
“Pernell didn’t do anything (Saturday) because he took a shot to the chest on Friday – he had a great practice Friday. He’s running well, Jason is doing okay – he had one fumble (Saturday) and you know how we feel about that,” he said. “The two freshmen are coming along. Every day is a new day to them. We’ve got to coach them up and get them ready for at least some limited plays for the first game.”
“We really need this – game-type situations,” he said.
“He’s making progress but he didn’t make any (Saturday),” said the coach. “He was lost and he’s still out of shape. It’s hard to evaluate a player when guys are like that.”
Rodriguez offered this analysis of Benoit’s play to this point: “He’s got a chance and he’s learning the defense,” he said. “He’s a guy that can run; he’s got good size and he’s making progress for a first-year player.”
