First Week of Practice Wraps Up
8/12/2007 4:15:00 AM | Football
STATESBORO, Ga. ? The first week of football practice is in the books for Georgia Southern and first-year head coach Chris Hatcher. The Eagles worked through a two hour session Sunday afternoon, and the conditions were much of the same as during the week... hot and humid.
Weather factored into Saturday's practice schedule, forcing three practices to get combined into two. Hatcher stated they had to improvise the schedule.
“We had a good day yesterday. We got rained out in the afternoon and just combined two practices into one last night. During both sessions we went full gear, we had a 60 play scrimmage in the morning and a 100 play scrimmage last night,” said Hatcher. “I thought things went well, we got some good work in. We toughened ourselves up a little bit and pretty much found out who will hit you when it's time to hit.”
On Sunday the team went through its normal routine: special teams work, position break down and finished at the end with 11-on-11 drills. After a full day in pads yesterday the team wore just helmets and shoulder pads Sunday.
With a bye week to start the season, Hatcher and the Eagles planned out the 28 allotted preseason practices to accommodate their needs. Part of this plan was to give the student-athletes the first day of classes off.
“We only get so many practices, 28 is all they'll let us have. Being the first day we want to make sure they get to class, plus coming out of this long first week we'll give them a day off and hopefully we'll have a little more pep in our step on Tuesday,” said Hatcher.
After the opening week Hatcher is very pleased with the squad's progress.
“I think we're to the point now where pretty much the base stuff is in. Now we have to put some wrinkles in to get ready for certain situations that arise during a course of a ball game. I think we carried over so much from spring ball. We actually remembered what we did in the spring which I was very concerned about,” admitted Hatcher. “Now we're just working mainly on fundamentals. It's very nice at this point of the game. We're sitting there watching tape and we are correcting steps as opposed to assignments. When you're able to do that you are going to do nothing but improve each and every day... We pretty much now know with a few exceptions who's going to be able to play for us this season.”
SIGN UP FOR TRYOUTS THIS WEEK: Georgia Southern Football will have a sign up sheet out this week for those interested in trying out for the team. The sign up sheet will be available from Monday until Friday at the Parrish Center. Upon signing up students will receive a checklist sheet to complete before they are eligible to try out. For more information contact Lisa Kingery in the football office at 681-5522.
