By Thomas Corhern, TTU Sports Information
COOKEVILLE, Tenn. – If the first few sessions of Tennessee Tech's spring football practices were Golden Eagle 101, the last few days have almost been like an upper-level course as the team has started to introduce more advanced concepts as they continue work inside the Athletic Performance Center.
"it's been a lot of teaching, a lot of learning," said Tech head football coach Dewayne Alexander. "There's a lot of different things that we continue to put in, a lot of evaluation. We're going to get a scrimmage in (Friday), which we're excited about. We really need some 11-on-11 and see us in a little more game speed, so to speak. There's been a lot of things put in and the guys are handling it pretty well."
And with the weather and track resurfacing keeping working areas limited, the football team will load up the buses and head to Murfreesboro on Friday afternoon, hosting its first spring scrimmage of the year at Middle Tennessee's Floyd Stadium.
"We're excited, but I know there will be a bunch of old Tech football players who are going to be rolling over in their graves a little bit knowing that we'll be going over to MTSU, back when we used to have the battle for Shinny Ninny (or Harvey for the Blue Raider faithful) in the totem pole game," Alexander said. "But they were very gracious to let us come over there tomorrow afternoon. I talked to (Blue Raiders head coach Rick) Stockstill and he was super nice, everyone over there has been great and they understand the situation we're in. We can't control the weather and we're having some issues just getting where we have everybody together on a practice field to be able to scrimmage, so we're going to go over there and have a good practice session."
The tentative schedule for the scrimmage is to warm up at 5:45 p.m., hold individual drills from 6 to 6:30 p.m., then hold a 70-to-80-play down-and-distance scrimmage starting at approximately 6:40 p.m.
Tucker Stadium is still closed to the public during a track resurfacing project to prepare the facility to host the 2018 Ohio Valley Conference outdoor track and field championships in May, then weather – and the precipitation accumulation that followed -- has made Sherlock Park on campus tough to use for long-term practice.
That hasn't kept the Golden Eagles from getting work done in Tech's indoor Athletic Performance Center, however the outside practice will finally give Tech football the chance to break out and do more of the work they haven't been able to partake in.
"We haven't had a lot of competitive situations with our offensive line against our defensive line, our D-backs against our wide receivers," Alexander said, "so we're going to have some practice time and get after it a little bit, do some 7-on-7 then get right into the scrimmage."
The tough part is that the team has had nearly a week-and-a-half since it put together a 40-play scrimmage in its workout at Sherlock Park, so the team needs the evaluation time again.
"We absolutely need it," Alexander said. "Our guys need it because everything happens faster at game speed. Everything happens quicker, so they need to see some of that. We've gotten more stuff done on defense, more looks in on defense, more looks in on offense that we need to evaluate. We need to see these guys in a competitive situation. You can put them up against a hand shield or whatever, you're going to win that battle, but putting in an offensive guard against a defensive tackle, we're going to need to see that battle play out. We'll get it on film and have a chance to evaluate our team right now."
The week thus far has been trying to introduce the team to more advanced concepts as they continue their spring workshop.
"To me, spring football is a joy of coaching, because you are truly teaching and coaching," Alexander said. "You don't have a game plan every week where you're trying to get ready for an opponent or a game. It is truly a time where everyone goes out and gets a lot of reps. You're trying to teach your base fundamentals and schemes, then add some things to it. Tomorrow, you'll actually get to see those things happen in an environment where the unknown could happen, see these guys handle some adversity and how they'll handle it.
"I'm excited to get to watch these guys go after it. I think they're excited – I'm sure they've had enough of this and there's a point where they want to just go and play some 11-on-11 football."
Season tickets for the 2018 Tennessee Tech football season are now on sale. Call (931) 372-3940, visit the Hooper Eblen Center ticket office or visit TTUsports.com to order or for more information.
Photo by Thomas Corhern, TTU Sports Information
