Spring Football Work Now Underway

Photo by: WVU Athletic Communications

March 25, 2024 02:26 PM | Football

By: John Antonik

IOWA CITY, Iowa – Spring football practice began outside for the West Virginia Mountaineers Monday morning and will continue with practices Wednesday and Friday this week.

Coach Neal Brown's team will have 14 uninterrupted practices through April 25 before playing the annual Gold-Blue Spring Game inside Milan Puskar Stadium on Saturday, April 27.

Last Thursday, Brown said he has purposely done limited media interviews and no social media since his team defeated North Carolina 30-10 in the Duke's Mayo Bowl in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Wednesday, Dec. 27.

"It's been a while, and it's kind of been that way on purpose," he said. "I know I did one podcast and maybe one radio deal, but I think head coach fatigue is real for (the media). I know it is for our team sometimes, so I don't get up and preach to our guys much during the winter either."

Brown said his team had a productive winter and used that time to change body compositions and get his guys prepared for the various phases of the offseason before preseason practice begins in August.

There are three different phases of player development in the offseason before preseason camp, beginning with winter conditioning, continuing with spring practice and concluding with summer conditioning.

"I really give a lot of credit to our support areas," he said. "As we've progressed as a program, I think one of our real strengths of what we've been able to do is in our support – strength conditioning, nutrition, sports science, recovery, athletic training and sports psych – those have become real strengths of ours.

"Over the last nine weeks, that group has really led what we've been able to do," he added. "When you see our guys when you get out here, you are going to see some significant differences in some body compositions and body weights."

Brown said spring practice is one of his favorite times of the year.

"It's a great opportunity to teach because you don't have the pressure to prepare and get ready for a game," he noted. "Practices are not going back-to-back and so it's always been one of my favorite times."

Spring workouts are beginning a week later than usual this year because Brown wanted to give the players a week off to recover from the winter conditioning program.

He referred to last week as the team's "buffer week."

"The two previous years we've had some soft-tissue injuries, so we noted that we really needed to do a buffer week and that's why everything is slid back a week," he explained.

"This is a teaching time for us," Brown continued. "We really haven't done a ton of football leading into spring, and we want to teach guys how to meet, walk through and then practice as we prepare for the season. There will be a lot of competitions, really on the special teams side, where we divide the entire team into four groups and we'll do special teams competitions. There will be a lot of competitions positionally and offense versus defense."

As usual, there will be a big focus on individual fundamental work.

"We made strides last year, and we've got to continue to grow," Brown said. "One area that we've got to do that is from a fundamental perspective.

"We are preparing for our season, so we are going to install our base offense, base defense and base special teams schemes and then try and rep it, not only a look for our defense that our offense presents, but things that they are going to see down the road into the season. It's the same on offense," he said.

As for personnel evaluations, Brown said the coaching staff needs to figure out who can play where leading into summer workouts and then into fall training camp.

"We need to find out who we can count on and if we need to move guys around," he explained. "On defense, we need to know what some of our sub packages are going to look like. Finally, we need to stay healthy. We had a couple of injuries last spring, and we need to avoid those at all costs.

"This is by far the most productive depth that we've returned," Brown said. "For us, it started in January, and that's why we've pushed to do hard stuff better. We've intentionally made this offseason extremely hard. We've got to coach these guys harder, and we've got to put harder stuff in front of them."

Brown said quarterback Garrett Greene has been excused from today's practice to attend his grandfather's funeral.

Coordinators Jordan Lesley and Chad Scott met with media today, select players and Brown will be made available after Wednesday's practice and new assistant coaches Vic Cabral and Tyler Allen will visit with the media following Friday's workout.

Spring Practice Notes:

Among the newcomers, Brown indicated Israel Boyce will play safety, Nate Gabriel is slotted for nose, Zae Jennings will dual train at the spear and safety positions, Elijah Kinsler will start out at defensive tackle, Obinna Onwuka will see time at spur and bandit, Jack Sammarco will get work at tight end, Xavier Bausley will play offensive tackle, Jaden Bray will play multiple wide receiver positions but his primary position is outside receiver, Reid Carrico is at middle linebacker and TJ Crandall will play cornerback.
Additionally, Ty French will see time at spur and bandit, Ayden Garnes will train at all three defensive back positions but will begin at corner, Garnett Hollis Jr. is on campus and will play corner, T.J. Jackson will get looks at the field and boundary defensive end positions and Jaheem Joseph will dual train the deep safety and spear positions.
Players who are limited or out for spring ball include offensive linemen Bryce Biggs and Tomas Rimac, tight end Kole Taylor, running back CJ Donaldson Jr., defensive linemen Asani Redwood and Oryend Fisher and linebacker Jairo Faverus.
Injured players cleared to practice this spring include linebacker Trey Lathan, cornerback Montre Miller and touted freshman linebacker Josiah Trotter, whom Brown calls "one of the most heavily recruited players" they've managed to sign while at West Virginia.
Brown indicated his belief that the overall secondary is the deepest it has been since he's been here, which is going to allow him to use senior Aubrey Burks as spear a little bit more this spring. Linebacker is another area with more capable performers than in recent years.
Brown indicated the team is "in a good place" and he likes the group, calling them "fun to be around."
Brown said they want bigger bodies at the nose position and is excited to see what legacy player Corey McIntyre Jr. can do there. The coaching staff is really high on the Port St. Lucie, Florida, resident.
Defensive coordinator Jordan Lesley will not have an individual position to coach but will be involved with all of the position groups. "I think that will help him from a relationship standpoint," Brown said.
Brown is hopeful new outside linebackers coach Vic Cabral can improve West Virginia's outside pass rush. Cabral worked in a similar scheme at Appalachian State and is known as a high-energy guy. "We need to win more one-on-one situations," Brown noted.
Brown said ShaDon Brown will now oversee the entire secondary with Lesley providing assistance. His reasoning is for communication purposes. "We've got some analysts and some GAs that are really qualified to help there as well," Brown said.
Ryan Nehlen has returned to the Mountaineer program after spending the last two years at McNeese State as its tight ends coach. Nehlen will assume Tyler Allen's old role as special assistant to the head coach.