“One of the things we tried to stress with the players today was what kind of team do we want to be? We want to play with great effort, great toughness, guys have the discipline to execute, so they can do their job and play well together as a team. Obviously, you’ve got to be in condition, and there are some other things that go with that to play with good fundamental execution, and that’s what we were looking for today out there.”
“I think some of the players, especially the younger players, gotta understand that how you practice… practice execution becomes a reality for you. Whether you drop balls in practice, it becomes reality in the game. Because what you do in practice is what prepares you, and you don’t really rise up when the game comes. You really drop down to whatever your level of preparation has been because that’s what develops the habits and the confidence and the things that you need to do to go out and execute and be consistent. We have guys that play really, really well, and then we’ve got guys that need to learn how to play well on a consistent basis. I would say that that probably sums up where we are.”
“I don’t want to sound like I’m disappointed in any way. It’s just trying to get everybody to play to their full potential. Every coach is committed to try to do that, but every player has to be committed to it. Not just when we have competitive situations, but every day in practice, every rep, every meeting, every learning opportunity that they have, so that we can develop the kind of depth and consistency and performance on our team where we have the best chance to be successful. So I would say, you know, that sort of sums it up.”
“I don’t get into individual stats for the scrimmage. Sometimes it’s affected by who you play against and who plays against you. So, we had some good plays out there, and we obviously have some plays that need to get cleaned up. We still probably have too many penalties. We had probably too many turnovers on offense today and too many penalties on both sides of the ball. So we’ve got plenty to work on. So I think the focus needs to be on not enduring the rest of the spring, but actually focusing on what we need to do to continue to get better.”
Next…Jalen Milroe’s and Ty Simpson’s progression…