Spring practice moves forward for the Hogs, and the severe weather didn't hinder that.
“You're going to win some reps, you're going to lose some other ones,” Robb Smith, defensive coordinator said. “But, I like our attitude at this point and time, and I think we're able to go back on some things we've already installed and recall those things and now try to polish them up and get them to where they need to be.”
The Hogs will have an open scrimmage on Saturday, and the early portion of practice was geared toward preparing themselves for the weekend. So far the coaches like what they see, but come Saturday, they won't be expecting a perfect game out of their players, but looking for something else.
“Don't worry about the mistakes, don't worry about the bust, just worry about the hustle,” Randy Shannon, linebackers coach said. “What we call smarts for them. And that means we need to play hard every situation, every snap, and not have any lows. If we don't have any lows and play smarts for them for the whole entire scrimmage, we feel pretty good about what we're trying to get done.”
But what about a group of linebackers that are all relatively young? Sophomore linebacker, Brooks Ellis, is confident in his group of guys.
“We've got guys coming back obviously,” Ellis said. “But me, Spaight, and Braylon and other and a couple of other guys, so that will be good. We need leadership. But we're young so, we have some learning to do as well, but I think we know what we're doing and coming off the spring we're going to have a good linebacker core."
Working together is what is helping these youthful linebackers.
“Great chemistry going on right now. We have all these meetings and we're tight as a group.”
Spring practice is helping bring these linebackers together. Martrell Spaight missed last spring but is quickly adjusting.
“I've just been getting with the coaches and learning different terminology and different schemes and things like that,” Spaight said. “Just having this time right now is really benefiting me and the other linebackers as well.”