Date: 3/20
Time: 3:30-5:15 p.m. (CDT)
Place: James A. and Frances H. Yance Football Practice Facility
Practice attire: Shells (helmets and shoulder pads)
Offensive Players of the Day: Tra Minter, So., RB, Ellaville, Ga. and Maaseiah Francis, Jr., TE, Lithonia, Ga.
-Offensive coordinator Kenny Edenfield on Minter and Francis: "We've talked long and hard with Tra about being patient and then running through the zone play, and he did that today. He worked hard in ball security drills and did everything we asked this afternoon, I thought he got a lot better. Maaseiah has struggled a little bit with some technique stuff that he is not used to, but he got better at that today and made a couple of plays in team and skelly periods that I was pretty fired up about."
Defensive Players of the Day: pass rushers
-Defensive coordinator Greg Stewart on South's pass rushers: "They did a good job of getting off the ball and making the quarterback uncomfortable, which is something that we've been working on."
Play of the Day: At the end of the day's 7-on-7 skeleton passing drills, it appeared the Jaguar offense had completed a touchdown pass in the back corner of the end zone until DJ Daniels stripped the ball free from the receiver's hands while falling to the ground.
Team period highlights: Three of the afternoon's four 10-minute team periods had the offense mixing run and pass calls, with the other segment dedicated to passes on first and second downs.
Miscellaneous Notes
-This marked the first time this spring the Jaguars worked out in shells.
-Junior CB Darian Mills paced South's defense with three passes broken up the second half of practice.
-The unit also recorded a pair of sacks during the first team period of the day, with Jordon Beaton and Taji Stewart combining for the first and Chason Milner and Chris Henderson credited with the second.
-Dallas Davis was 12-of-18 passing to lead Jaguar quarterbacks, while Cole Garvin had a double-digit completion total as well after connecting on 10-of-17 attempts.
-Davis had one of the team's two touchdown throws during skeleton passing drills when he found Cade Sutherland for a score, with Cephus Johnson adding the other after hitting Malik Stanley in the end zone.
-Stanley and Jalen Wayne each had four receptions, most on the team, the second half of the day.
-Seven other individuals had multiple catches, with Davyn Flenord, Maurice Mayo and Jordan McCray finishing with three apiece.
Head coach Steve Campbell
-On the focus of Tuesday's practice: "Practicing in shells is not a whole lot different than full gear for us because we don't do a lot of to-the-ground stuff unless we are scrimmaging, but any time we practice back-to-back in the spring I like to give the guys a chance to go out in shells. We're getting ready for our first scrimmage on Thursday, I wanted to make sure that mentally we had all of our assignments locked down so that we know what we are doing and can get our execution in a little bit better shape. We're not real deep at certain spots, I think this gave the guys a chance to focus and work on assignments and execution as opposed to surviving and battling the heat. Today I wanted to make sure we focused on attention to detail, and I thought they did a good job for the most part."
-On practicing three times in the last four days: "I thought the guys attacked the day well, which is good. One of the things we've said we need to do is to develop a lot of mental toughness. I don't like practicing back-to-back and three times in four days but things aren't always going to be ideal — we have a stretch where we play three games in a row on the road — so you take this, use it to your advantage and turn it into a positive. I think today was one of our better practices of the three."
-On how far along the team is going into the first full scrimmage of the spring: "We're seven practices in now, we're going to watch film tomorrow which will give us a good indicator of where we are at halfway through the spring. We've got 75-80 percent of our offense in — there are some situations on the goal line, in the two-minute drill and special plays that still need to be installed — and it is the same thing defensively, we have a couple more blitz packages, third-down packages and goal-line plays that we don't have in yet. But with the base offense and defense in, it [watching film] will give us a chance to see exactly where we are at."
Up next: In their final workout prior to the school's annual Spring Break, the Jags will conduct a full scrimmage on Thursday beginning at 3:30 p.m. on campus.
For more information about South Alabama athletics, check back with www.usajaguars.com, and follow the Jaguars at www.twitter.com/USAJaguarSports. Season tickets for all Jaguar athletic events can be purchased by calling (251) 461-1USA (1872).
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