By: Josh Stowers
On a chilly morning inside Joan C. Edwards Stadium, Head Coach Doc Holliday and his squad took the field for their second scrimmage of the spring. The temperatures weren’t the only thing stone-cold this morning as the offense struggled for the second scrimmage in a row. “It’s hard. You never really know until you watch film, but we can’t turn the ball over like we did today. That was really the only thing I was disappointed in today,” Holliday said when asked about effort from his offense. The offensive struggles weren’t necessarily self-imposed as the defense put forth a terrific effort. “Coming into the spring we had some concerns defensively, but that secondary and that front looks as athletic as a group as we’ve had since I’ve been here,” Holliday said of his defense. We’ll take a look at this and more in the Day 12: Scrimmage #2 Report.
MIA
Tony Pittman, Nate Devers, Jordan Dowrey, and Aaron Plantt all watched from the sidelines in street clothes. Jason Smith, Cody Collins, Sandley Jean-Felix, and Malik Thompson were all dressed, but worked out with the strength and conditioning coaches on the sidelines throughout the scrimmage. Deon-Tay McManus and Tiquan Lang both sported red (no-contact) jerseys.
McManus participated in the entire practice while Lang only went through position drills. Amoreto Curraj also sat out today, but Holliday said it was nothing major. The two biggest questions today were the absences of Justin Hunt and Gator Green. I didn’t see either one on the sidelines and supposedly Hunt was missing from practice on Thursday. There was no comment following the scrimmage on either so I’m assuming it’s not something to be concerned with.
Offense
Flat! That’s really the only word that comes to mind about today’s scrimmage regarding the offense. It started out that way when Michael Clark dropped a Chase Litton pass on the first play from scrimmage. “Whether it’s person A or person B in there, we have to execute. We didn’t look shook today, but we looked out of place. We just didn’t have the chemistry,” Litton said of his offense’s production. Litton completed only 11 of his 25 attempts for 88 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions.
Litton’s struggles, as well as Michael Birdsong’s, weren’t completely their fault as the offensive line has been decimated with injuries this spring. “It’s hard. The defensive line is just better than what we’re playing with on offense right now. Number one, they’re pretty good, but we’re missing about five or six pieces on that offensive line that will be there this fall,” Holliday said.
I mentioned Birdsong struggling as well, he completed 10 of his 22 attempts for 98 yards.
Honestly, it was the running game that carried the offense today (for the first time this spring). As a team, Marshall rushed for 175 yards on 57 attempts and also scored one touchdown. Red-shirt freshman Delvin Weems led the team today with 16 rushes for 69 yards and one touchdown (15 yards). “Weems is a guy I’ve been awful hard on, but he looked like a back today. He ran physical and that’s what he has to do at his size,” Holliday said of Weems’ performance.
Behind Weems, Hyleck Foster (13 rushes for 62 yards and one touchdown) and Keion Davis (10 rushes for 53 yards) both had solid days as well.
Through the air, the big plays were obviously limited by the defense. Nick Matthews led the team in receptions today with five catches for 29 yards. Raylen Elzy pulled down three catches for 33 yards and walk-on John Hathaway hauled in two catches for 36 yards including the biggest play of the day from the offense, a 29 yarder from Birdsong. McManus also pulled in a 15-yard score during “red-zone” play from Litton. Spring sensation Michael Clark finished the day with four catches for 25 yards.
Marshall just needs to get healthy up front and I think they’ll be fine. Like Doc said, being down five or six guys on the offensive line is brutal at any stage of the season, but especially when the guys having to play now are seeing some of their first real action. Chemistry is the life-blood of an offensive line and Levi Brown (red-shirted), Alex Locklear (red-shirted), Fred Binot(reserve in 2015) Michael Selby (moved back to guard) and Clint Van Horn (sat out the majority of 2015) are all trying to build that with the injuries I mentioned above. As long as these injuries don’t follow Marshall into the fall, I’ll stand my original comment that the offensive line will be the strength of the 2016 offense.
On a chilly morning inside Joan C. Edwards Stadium, Head Coach Doc Holliday and his squad took the field for their second scrimmage of the spring. The temperatures weren’t the only thing stone-cold this morning as the offense struggled for the second scrimmage in a row. “It’s hard. You never really know until you watch film, but we can’t turn the ball over like we did today. That was really the only thing I was disappointed in today,” Holliday said when asked about effort from his offense. The offensive struggles weren’t necessarily self-imposed as the defense put forth a terrific effort. “Coming into the spring we had some concerns defensively, but that secondary and that front looks as athletic as a group as we’ve had since I’ve been here,” Holliday said of his defense. We’ll take a look at this and more in the Day 12: Scrimmage #2 Report.
MIA
Tony Pittman, Nate Devers, Jordan Dowrey, and Aaron Plantt all watched from the sidelines in street clothes. Jason Smith, Cody Collins, Sandley Jean-Felix, and Malik Thompson were all dressed, but worked out with the strength and conditioning coaches on the sidelines throughout the scrimmage. Deon-Tay McManus and Tiquan Lang both sported red (no-contact) jerseys.
McManus participated in the entire practice while Lang only went through position drills. Amoreto Curraj also sat out today, but Holliday said it was nothing major. The two biggest questions today were the absences of Justin Hunt and Gator Green. I didn’t see either one on the sidelines and supposedly Hunt was missing from practice on Thursday. There was no comment following the scrimmage on either so I’m assuming it’s not something to be concerned with.
Offense
Flat! That’s really the only word that comes to mind about today’s scrimmage regarding the offense. It started out that way when Michael Clark dropped a Chase Litton pass on the first play from scrimmage. “Whether it’s person A or person B in there, we have to execute. We didn’t look shook today, but we looked out of place. We just didn’t have the chemistry,” Litton said of his offense’s production. Litton completed only 11 of his 25 attempts for 88 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions.
Litton’s struggles, as well as Michael Birdsong’s, weren’t completely their fault as the offensive line has been decimated with injuries this spring. “It’s hard. The defensive line is just better than what we’re playing with on offense right now. Number one, they’re pretty good, but we’re missing about five or six pieces on that offensive line that will be there this fall,” Holliday said.
I mentioned Birdsong struggling as well, he completed 10 of his 22 attempts for 98 yards.
Honestly, it was the running game that carried the offense today (for the first time this spring). As a team, Marshall rushed for 175 yards on 57 attempts and also scored one touchdown. Red-shirt freshman Delvin Weems led the team today with 16 rushes for 69 yards and one touchdown (15 yards). “Weems is a guy I’ve been awful hard on, but he looked like a back today. He ran physical and that’s what he has to do at his size,” Holliday said of Weems’ performance.
Behind Weems, Hyleck Foster (13 rushes for 62 yards and one touchdown) and Keion Davis (10 rushes for 53 yards) both had solid days as well.
Through the air, the big plays were obviously limited by the defense. Nick Matthews led the team in receptions today with five catches for 29 yards. Raylen Elzy pulled down three catches for 33 yards and walk-on John Hathaway hauled in two catches for 36 yards including the biggest play of the day from the offense, a 29 yarder from Birdsong. McManus also pulled in a 15-yard score during “red-zone” play from Litton. Spring sensation Michael Clark finished the day with four catches for 25 yards.
Marshall just needs to get healthy up front and I think they’ll be fine. Like Doc said, being down five or six guys on the offensive line is brutal at any stage of the season, but especially when the guys having to play now are seeing some of their first real action. Chemistry is the life-blood of an offensive line and Levi Brown (red-shirted), Alex Locklear (red-shirted), Fred Binot(reserve in 2015) Michael Selby (moved back to guard) and Clint Van Horn (sat out the majority of 2015) are all trying to build that with the injuries I mentioned above. As long as these injuries don’t follow Marshall into the fall, I’ll stand my original comment that the offensive line will be the strength of the 2016 offense.
