Spring Illusions
April 20, 2009 10:35 AM | General
(10:36 am)
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| Jarrett Brown |
There are always illusions during spring football games. Backups and base schemes have a way of creating them.
On Saturday, quarterback Jarrett Brown looked like Joe Namath standing tall in the pocket and firing laser beams all over the field. Ask yourself, though, how often is it that a quarterback can stand in the pocket and count to 10 Mississippi before throwing a touchdown pass?
It can be done in the backyard, but not on a college football field.
This is not to minimize what Brown accomplished Saturday afternoon. His 21 of 28 passing performance included 273 yards and four touchdowns. He showed Saturday what he displayed all spring: a very live arm that can cover the entire football field.
All observers are in agreement that Brown showed steady improvement during spring practice, especially his on-field leadership skills and having a better understanding of what offensive coordinator Jeff Mullen wants accomplished. With continued improvement this summer, Brown could make the West Virginia quarterback position once again an extreme area of strength. His physical gifts are enormous.
But some who only see Brown’s Saturday statistics also run the risk of misconstruing some of the circumstances behind them.
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| Donny Barclay |
Not much in the way of information was revealed about the extent of Donnie Barclay’s injury, which required him to be transported off the field in a cart during Saturday’s spring game.
Offensive line coach Dave Johnson would not speculate afterward, but he is encouraged that Barclay’s good work habits will expedite the recovery process – however long it may be.
“Donny is a hard worker and he will do everything he possibly can to get himself prepared and get ready, so I’m optimistic about Donny without knowing exactly what has happened yet,” Johnson said.
The O-line will be one of the most scrutinized areas of the offense this fall and having Barclay, one of only two experienced holdovers returning, will be vitally important to the development of this unit.
Overall, Scooter Berry thought the group showed steady progress during the spring.
“The thing I noticed is that they communicate, they talk and they’re making sure they do the right assignments,” he said. “Early in the spring they didn’t really talk that much. They were just playing by themselves but as the practices went on they began communicating more often and picking up blocks.”
Then Berry offered this interesting nugget: “I think they are the hardest working group of offensive linemen that I’ve gone up against since I’ve been here.”
That’s a very interesting statement, indeed.
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| Jordan Roberts |
You’ve heard of the October Surprise, well, in spring football there are always April surprises. Inquiring minds have tabbed Jordan Roberts one likely candidate after his spring-game performance Saturday.
It was only natural that among the first questions Bill Stewart answered after Saturday’s scrimmage concerned the Madison, W.Va., walk-on, listed as a defensive back at the beginning of the spring before moving to running back where he ripped off an impressive 65-yard touchdown run against the No. 1 defense.
Bill Stewart took the Roberts question head-on.
“He has great resolve,” Stewart said. “Jordan Roberts is a kid who doesn’t know he’s not supposed to play here. He’s a West Virginia kid … ‘OK, big stadium. That’s Reed Williams, that’s good. There’s Scooter Berry, OK.’ He slams it up in there and he slammed it up in there all spring.
“Now, that being said, I’ve got to find a place for that boy on our special teams and I am going to do that,” Stewart said. “I know this, he’s running at you downhill and he hurts you when you try and tackle him. He makes you feel him.”
Roberts is very tough, weighs more than 200 pounds and runs pretty well. To me, those are three important characteristics needed for being a wedge-buster on the kickoff team.
If you don’t consider wedge-busters important, I urge you to think back to a certain game-opening kickoff return for a touchdown by Cincinnati that wound up being the difference in not only the game, but the Bearcats winning the Big East title and going to the Orange Bowl.
Speaking of kicking, that is another area Stewart is meeting head-on. Stewart has not been happy with the performance of his kickers this spring and in an effort to rectify that, last week he signed Western Washington University kicker Josh Lider to bring more competition to the group. Forget about the four-stars and five-stars, if Lider can perform on the big stage this fall, he will be West Virginia’s most important signee of 2009 – bar none.
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| Josh Taylor |
Speaking of April surprises, the defensive coaches have been singing the praises of sophomore nose tackle Josh Taylor all spring. Taylor, who won the Tommy Nickolich Award presented each spring by the Blue & Gold News to the team’s most outstanding walk-on player, has likely done enough to warrant strong consideration for next fall’s travel squad as Chris Neild’s backup at nose.
Here is a little background on Taylor. He played for former Mountaineer linebacker Damon Cogdill at Miramar High School and was named to the Dade-Broward County all-star team as a senior. It’s easy for good players to sometimes get lost down there.
Bill Stewart said at the beginning of spring drills that he wanted his team to have a harder edge, particularly the offense in short yardage situations. On Saturday, Stewart said that is still a work in progress.
“We’ve got a long way to go and we’ve got to develop a short yardage game and inside the red zone on offense,” he said. “We can’t average 53 snaps on offense and be a championship football team. We have to get off the field on defense, so we’re blitzing more with more man coverage, and we have to maintain the ball on offense.”
Here is how Noel Devine stacks up against West Virginia’s other prolific running backs through the first two years of their careers:
As you can see, Cobourne, Zereoue and Slaton had nearly twice as many carries as Devine through the first two years of their careers.
Devine has a much better yards-per-carry average.
Those of us that have been around for all of the refurbishments performed to Milan Puskar Stadium during the last 10-15 years sometimes take them for granted. That’s why it is so nice to have former players return to remind us of how much things have changed.
“I thought the facilities were great when I played here, but this is like a completely different place now,” said former WVU running back Pat Randolph.
Randolph, you may recall, still has the longest touchdown run in stadium history and he also scored the go-ahead TD against Penn State in West Virginia’s 17-14 victory over the Nittany Lions in 1984.
Have a great week!
