OPENING STATEMENT:
Our thoughts and prayers are with a bad man and one of our defensive linemen, Thad Mangum. Unfortunately he got some tough news. This past weekend, his father passed away unexpectedly. So it's really been a tough week for all of us down here thinking about that and his family. And I also want to send our thoughts and prayers to the family.
I saw that this morning on the way in, Howard Schnellenberger passed away. He was obviously a legend in our game, especially in this state, winning the national championship in Miami and starting the program there at FAU.
I also want to thank all of our fans, I thought we had a great atmosphere. Today, I thought it was a beautiful day right here in Tampa and right Jay, I just stood out there really learned a lot of the game thinking about man, this, this has the potential to be a very special place. And so really appreciate all the fans that showed up today. And I look forward to having you back this fall, you know, really proud of our players. It's been a tough year. You know, I showed our team this morning during our team meeting before we came over here a picture from our one and only practice on March the 10th 2020. Right there at the end of that practice. And really, from that point, until now, there's been a lot of changes a lot of challenges across the world, not just in football, but also trying to play football and work through that time. You know, it's been a lot of adversity, no question about it. But you know, our guys really have stuck together and in my message to our players this morning, is that we're in a lot better place right now than we were a year ago, when we left that field after our first spring practice, because the way that those guys have responded. So today was fine.
I appreciate Michael Kelly and the leadership, working it out and everybody here at RayJay that allowed us to come over. And I mean, this was a blast for our players to come over here and finish a spring practice. So you know, really pleased overall, you'd see a lot of young guys getting there at the end, and it made some plays. And you know, I told our guys, hey, now after this game, we get to go get back together on one team. And and whenever you split up your teams, you'll see some plays here and there. But when you put everybody together, back on the same team, same sideline, Oh, we got a chance to be a lot stronger. So I think we have about 190 days before we kick it off up in Raleigh. So really proud of the way these guys finished spring. And now we'll look forward to the summer ahead.
ON HIS THOUGHTS ON THE QB PLAY TODAY
"It went just about like I thought that it would, I felt like all those guys would have an opportunity to make plays, you look at Cade (Fortin) coming right out the gate, first play, usually you start off with the first play, and there's some jitters or whatever. And guys, you know, don't quite make the throw or the pitch. But to be able to come down and lead us on a touchdown. First drive that really set the set the standard, I think for the day, you know, we were made to nice play there. So I thought they did well.
I felt like Jarren (Williams) really settled in right there that last drive before halftime, you know, that was a two minute drive. I mean, that's another reason you know that you play these spring games is to put guys in situations like that. And I felt like Jarren was really at his best when he had to right there in that two minute drive and be able to go down and get a touchdown right before the half and then, you know, to see both Katravis Marsh and Timmy McClain come in, you know, I think hopefully that just made everybody smile a little bit thinking about the future of our program here because both of those young men are very talented freshmen. They played like that all spring. And, you know, Katravis has a big league arm, I think he was able to show that I think you threw for 125 yards and four pass completions, six attempts. And then it was great to see Timmy get in there a he did not look like your typical freshman, usually a guy that's been here for three months trying to figure out where guys are lining up. And you know, Timmy look very smooth and lead some nice drives there. So there's no doubt overall, really pleased.
Obviously, Cade, it's been around a little bit longer than the other guys. But you know what I've told those guys at the beginning of spring ball, you know, there's no advantage in trying to name a starter right now. We're gonna let those guys continue to compete. We got four months before we get back here in August in fall camp is really a big win. kind of be the fourth quarter probably that quarterback competition. But right now I'm very pleased with our quarterback situation.
ON THE RELIEF OF GETTING AN ENTIRE SPRING IN
I think obviously last year, you know, last year whenever they canceled spring ball, we weren't even thinking about that right because your mind was immediately trying to figure out what was going on with the Coronavirus and all the the new things that are going on with that so we just kind of move past that in our mind and then you know this brain getting out there and going through those 15 spring practices there were several times I get back in the coach's locker room and I'm like how did we not do this last year? How do you prepare a team without going through these situations and practice? I mean there's so much that you're able to get accomplished it's not just 15 practices it's the day before and the day after that you meet i mean it's over 30 days that you're out there with those guys but yeah there's no doubt it feels a lot different I know we're not quite completely out of the woods yet but you know we feel like we can see the light at the end of the tunnel and you know at the end of the day everybody went through adversity not just us a first year staff every team in the country I believe some teams will come out stronger than when they started some may not enough i feel confident saying that our team is definitely coming out stronger after everything this group went through last year.
ON SEEING SOME DEEP BALLS TODAY THAT WERE MISSING LAST YEAR IN THE OFFENSE
it really we did that in practice for the last 14 days i know you guys don't get an opportunity to see all that but we throw the deep ball today about as much as we did every day in practice i mean there's no doubt I mean our offense is built on making big chunk plays because if a defense is not worried about you throw the ball down the field then it makes it extremely hard to run the ball because you get a lot of guys around the box and just stop the run but if you always have that threat to stretch the field then they have to you know keep those safeties back and open up some run game and you get a chance to kind of keep them guessing a little bit but you know that's probably one of the things I'm most pleased with the offense overall is probably our completion percentage and to be honest we i thought we had maybe two or three that we should have connected on today to really kind of keep it the way it's looked all spring in practice but we were able to make some nice plays down the field and that'll be something we'll continue to stress going into the fall.
Our thoughts and prayers are with a bad man and one of our defensive linemen, Thad Mangum. Unfortunately he got some tough news. This past weekend, his father passed away unexpectedly. So it's really been a tough week for all of us down here thinking about that and his family. And I also want to send our thoughts and prayers to the family.
I saw that this morning on the way in, Howard Schnellenberger passed away. He was obviously a legend in our game, especially in this state, winning the national championship in Miami and starting the program there at FAU.
I also want to thank all of our fans, I thought we had a great atmosphere. Today, I thought it was a beautiful day right here in Tampa and right Jay, I just stood out there really learned a lot of the game thinking about man, this, this has the potential to be a very special place. And so really appreciate all the fans that showed up today. And I look forward to having you back this fall, you know, really proud of our players. It's been a tough year. You know, I showed our team this morning during our team meeting before we came over here a picture from our one and only practice on March the 10th 2020. Right there at the end of that practice. And really, from that point, until now, there's been a lot of changes a lot of challenges across the world, not just in football, but also trying to play football and work through that time. You know, it's been a lot of adversity, no question about it. But you know, our guys really have stuck together and in my message to our players this morning, is that we're in a lot better place right now than we were a year ago, when we left that field after our first spring practice, because the way that those guys have responded. So today was fine.
I appreciate Michael Kelly and the leadership, working it out and everybody here at RayJay that allowed us to come over. And I mean, this was a blast for our players to come over here and finish a spring practice. So you know, really pleased overall, you'd see a lot of young guys getting there at the end, and it made some plays. And you know, I told our guys, hey, now after this game, we get to go get back together on one team. And and whenever you split up your teams, you'll see some plays here and there. But when you put everybody together, back on the same team, same sideline, Oh, we got a chance to be a lot stronger. So I think we have about 190 days before we kick it off up in Raleigh. So really proud of the way these guys finished spring. And now we'll look forward to the summer ahead.
ON HIS THOUGHTS ON THE QB PLAY TODAY
"It went just about like I thought that it would, I felt like all those guys would have an opportunity to make plays, you look at Cade (Fortin) coming right out the gate, first play, usually you start off with the first play, and there's some jitters or whatever. And guys, you know, don't quite make the throw or the pitch. But to be able to come down and lead us on a touchdown. First drive that really set the set the standard, I think for the day, you know, we were made to nice play there. So I thought they did well.
I felt like Jarren (Williams) really settled in right there that last drive before halftime, you know, that was a two minute drive. I mean, that's another reason you know that you play these spring games is to put guys in situations like that. And I felt like Jarren was really at his best when he had to right there in that two minute drive and be able to go down and get a touchdown right before the half and then, you know, to see both Katravis Marsh and Timmy McClain come in, you know, I think hopefully that just made everybody smile a little bit thinking about the future of our program here because both of those young men are very talented freshmen. They played like that all spring. And, you know, Katravis has a big league arm, I think he was able to show that I think you threw for 125 yards and four pass completions, six attempts. And then it was great to see Timmy get in there a he did not look like your typical freshman, usually a guy that's been here for three months trying to figure out where guys are lining up. And you know, Timmy look very smooth and lead some nice drives there. So there's no doubt overall, really pleased.
Obviously, Cade, it's been around a little bit longer than the other guys. But you know what I've told those guys at the beginning of spring ball, you know, there's no advantage in trying to name a starter right now. We're gonna let those guys continue to compete. We got four months before we get back here in August in fall camp is really a big win. kind of be the fourth quarter probably that quarterback competition. But right now I'm very pleased with our quarterback situation.
ON THE RELIEF OF GETTING AN ENTIRE SPRING IN
I think obviously last year, you know, last year whenever they canceled spring ball, we weren't even thinking about that right because your mind was immediately trying to figure out what was going on with the Coronavirus and all the the new things that are going on with that so we just kind of move past that in our mind and then you know this brain getting out there and going through those 15 spring practices there were several times I get back in the coach's locker room and I'm like how did we not do this last year? How do you prepare a team without going through these situations and practice? I mean there's so much that you're able to get accomplished it's not just 15 practices it's the day before and the day after that you meet i mean it's over 30 days that you're out there with those guys but yeah there's no doubt it feels a lot different I know we're not quite completely out of the woods yet but you know we feel like we can see the light at the end of the tunnel and you know at the end of the day everybody went through adversity not just us a first year staff every team in the country I believe some teams will come out stronger than when they started some may not enough i feel confident saying that our team is definitely coming out stronger after everything this group went through last year.
ON SEEING SOME DEEP BALLS TODAY THAT WERE MISSING LAST YEAR IN THE OFFENSE
it really we did that in practice for the last 14 days i know you guys don't get an opportunity to see all that but we throw the deep ball today about as much as we did every day in practice i mean there's no doubt I mean our offense is built on making big chunk plays because if a defense is not worried about you throw the ball down the field then it makes it extremely hard to run the ball because you get a lot of guys around the box and just stop the run but if you always have that threat to stretch the field then they have to you know keep those safeties back and open up some run game and you get a chance to kind of keep them guessing a little bit but you know that's probably one of the things I'm most pleased with the offense overall is probably our completion percentage and to be honest we i thought we had maybe two or three that we should have connected on today to really kind of keep it the way it's looked all spring in practice but we were able to make some nice plays down the field and that'll be something we'll continue to stress going into the fall.
