Offensive line showing improvement
USU’s new offensive coordinator Darrell Dickey had great success at North Texas with a strong running game.
While the names of Dickey’s NCAA-leading rushers – Jamario Thomas and Patrick Cobbs – are well-known, if any of the runners on USU’s roster are to duplicate those lofty numbers, it will have to start up front with the offensive line.
Offensive line coach Vance Vice played with Head Coach Brent Guy at Oklahoma State and came to USU with him. Vice said he is encouraged this spring by the performance of his blockers.
“Bringing back three starters, almost four with Derek Hoke who has some starting experience behind him, there’s a lot of carryover,” Vice said.
Besides the 6’9, 310-pound junior Hoke, who started four games at tackle last year before getting hurt, USU returns senior Shawn Murphy, junior Ryan Tonnemacher and senior Pace Jorgenson.
Jorgenson started every game at right guard last year. Tonnemacher will be moving from guard to center, and Murphy will be moving to guard from tackle.
“We’ve moved everyone down a spot,” Vice said.
“We’ve moved quite a few people around,” Tonnemacher said. “Murph played tackle last year and moved down. Everyone is kind of shifting around trying to find the best place on our line.”
Tonnemacher, who wears amber Nike contact lenses to shade his eyes while he plays, said he has been encouraging his teammates who have not been on the field when the bullets are flying in the WAC.
“I’ve been here for a couple of years and the biggest thing if you want to be a leader is to encourage them. Don’t get on them, you’ve got to bring them up. Everyone makes mistakes,” Tonnemacher said. “I have made mistakes. Let them know it’s okay and make their next play the best one.”
Travis Stott, a redshirt freshman from Moab, Seth Lamb, a redshirt frosh from Rexburg, Idaho, and Ty Rogers, a Redshirt frosh from Littleton, Colo. who has been limited by a knee injury this spring, are three other players competing for playing time at guard. Freshman Zac Zimmerman, a Californian, backs up Tonnemacher at center.
With the returning starters solidifying the center of the line, Vice said the competition for the two starting tackle positions has been fierce.
“We’ve got some great competition right now with Derek Hoke, who came in and had a great spring so far. Then we’ve got a kid we redshirted last year, Spencer Johnson. He’s at left tackle right now. Brennan McFadden is a guy that’s valuable to me because he can play all five [positions]. We’ve got him working at tackle right now,” Vice said.
Furthermore, five new offensive linemen are joining the program in August, and Vice said while he would prefer to redshirt all of them, some of them will have an opportunity to compete for a starting spot.
“Right now our weakness is still depth. I’d like to carry anywhere from 17 to 20 guys and we’ve got 11. Bringing in five guys that we signed this year will help tremendously,” Vice said.
Dickey has brought a raft of new terminology with him to USU, but Vice said some of the line’s calls will remain the same.
“We’re still trying to run the football. That’s our priority. That’s what we want to be first,” Vice said. “[Dickey] has had great success where he’s been running the football and we’re trying to build on that.”
Tonnemacher said this year’s group is more resilient.
“A big difference I’ve noticed is this year we bounce back. Last year we had a play go bad and it would snowball. This year the defense will make a good play and then we’ll make a good play. It’s a good battle back and forth. Today we were doing third-and-longs, a tough situation, and we pulled together real well,” Tonnemacher said.
Vice said the strength of the group is work ethic.
“We’ve got a group that works now. There’s some leadership capability in this group,” Vice said, “They have bought into the work ethic and I think they’re having fun.”
-graham@cc.usu.edu