Football program goes back to the basics
The Aggies had their first day of spring practice, running through drills Wednesday in the Stan Laub Indoor Training Facility before moving outside on Thursday when the weather improved.
It was the first chance for new offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Darrell Dickey to see his team practice.
With the locker room complex in the north end zone of Romney Stadium under construction, the team’s training staff was operating on one end of the Laub Facility, and the players were dressing behind a chipboard partition on the other end.
“There’s a lot of work to be done before we can make a first down and score a touchdown,” Dickey said. “These kids are showing the willingness to put that work in, and if you do that, you give yourself a chance.”
The strength and conditioning of his new charges, as well as the overall level of athleticism, was encouraging to Dickey.
“I really have been impressed with the job that our strength and conditioning coaches do and the attitude that these kids come to work with,” Dickey said. “That’s the first thing to build a little confidence in themselves, getting a little bigger, a little stronger, a little faster. I’m quite pleased that the athletic ability here is probably a little better than I thought it might be when you come to a 1-11 team. They’re young. There’s better talent here than maybe I would have imagined.”
Dickey said he will be keeping some elements of last year’s offense in place that he felt the Aggies were beginning to feel confident executing.
“We are keeping some things that I thought they did well last year and building on them,” he said. “Some things I looked at that I thought, ‘These guys are getting some confidence in this,’ and we’re going to build on that. Plus there are some things that I’ve felt strongly about and had success with, and we’re implementing that also to see how these guys take to it.”
One of the things Dickey has had success with is the play-action pass. He said the Aggies will utilize a moving pocket more often next year.
“Probably the biggest difference is when we throw the ball we’re going to be a lot more on the move, play-action, things like that, as opposed to being a pocket team,” Dickey said. “Secondly, our quarterback will run the ball some, but we won’t rely as much on the quarterback-run game as they did.” That strategy should play to the strengths of USU’s most experienced quarterback, Leon Jackson III. The left-hander looked sharp making throws in a skeleton drill, especially rolling out and throwing on the move.
“I don’t want a guy that can only stand in the pocket – that’s just me,” Dickey said. “I want a guy that can move around, that can run the ball a little bit, throw on the run if the play breaks down, as they sometimes do, [that] can make somebody miss and go make something positive happen.”
Dickey said he was pleased with the football IQ of the quarterbacks he is coaching. “I like the athleticism. I like the fact that they know football. Each one of them understands coverages. Even though [Sean] Setzer was at a junior college last year and he’s new here, they all know football, so it’s not like we’re starting from square one. They all have athletic ability, which I like.”
If the pressure of running with the ball is going to be taken off of the quarterback, USU needs a runner to separate himself from the pack and step up to replace departed starter Marcus Cross. Former starter Chris Forbes is the most experienced Aggie at that position, but redshirt freshmen Dervin Speight and Jacob Actkinson are in the mix, as well as Aaron Lesue, who spent much of last year at wide receiver before moving to running back late in the season.
“We’re going to try and establish a runner, maybe two, but somebody that can handle things,” Dickey said. “Right now it’s kind of fun because we’re finding out what we have. We don’t have a lot of experience, but they have worked very hard.”
On Monday, the pads come out and the Aggies will begin contact drills. Dickey said the coaching staff will put the team in “some tough situations this spring and find out how we can work our way out of them. Saturdays are tough days and you’ve got to know what you’re doing and be capable of it.”
-graham@cc.usu.edu