FYI, realized my last post may have sounded sarcastic. It was genuine as I do not get print Vindy copies. 22 days
From today's Vindy:
Montgomery’s
crew improving
By Charles Grove
cgrove@vindy.com
youngstown
As the Youngstown State offense gets more and more of the playbook implemented, you could be reminded of the saying, “Slow and steady wins the race.”
The offense is beginning to hold its own a bit more each time they go up against the talented YSU defense as roster positions continue to be evaluated.
“This is my fourth college now and I’ve never been a part of a team where the defense didn’t win early on in camp,” YSU quarterback Trent Hosick said. “That’s just kind of how it goes.”
While the YSU passing attack is still leaving something to be desired, the rushing attack was able to do some damage against what, on paper at least, should be one of the top defenses in the Missouri Valley Football Conference. Draw plays and dives with pulling linemen were noticeably more effective than they were the first few practices.
“Our running game has been nice,” Hosick said. “We’ve improved from the spring. A lot of that has to do with the offensive line. We got some big first downs in our third-down drill today and we won that the other day. Any day we come out and beat this defense, we’re doing something right.”
The rushing attack does have the experience when compared to the wide receivers. Martin Ruiz and Jody Webb will be one and two as far as running backs go, but things are still very much up in the air as far as the receivers are concerned.
“We’ve got guys within the [first string], especially at receiver, that haven’t played a lot of football,” YSU offensive coordinator Shane Montgomery said. “They’re still learning the offense. I think their effort is really good, but it’s all about consistency.”
The young receivers are also still catching passes from all four quarterbacks at about the same rate. It doesn’t appear any quarterback is getting significantly more reps than any of the others vying for the starting job.
“This is my 26th year coaching and this is probably the most quarterbacks I’ve been trying to get an equal number of reps,” Montgomery said. “Traditionally you have one or two that get the majority of the reps and the third and fourth guys don’t get as many. But we have a lot of guys that we feel are capable of playing so we’re trying to get them as equal reps as possible.”
The idea that the offense is beginning to move the ball more consistently despite only having a portion of the playbook installed could be a sign of good things to come. Montgomery believes the real growth of the team will occur more as players more fully understand the playbook.
“I think we’re physically talented enough that if we put ourselves in position to make a play we’ll be able to do it,” Montgomery said. “Just the mental part of the game has to keep coming through each day.”
As far as depth is concerned, things appear in good shape with the running backs and offensive linemen.
“We’re trying to figure out who’s going to be three, four and five on the depth chart at running back,” Montgomery said. “Most teams don’t have a lot of people that deep but we’ve got some guys we think can help us there.
“Coach [Carmen] Bricillo and I have been here seven years and we think this offensive line is probably as good and deep as we’ve ever had. We can probably go to seven, eight and nine where we haven’t in the past. We’re going to lean on those guys. We’ve been able to run the ball a lot in years past and we’ve got to continue to do that. It’ll take a lot of the pressure off of the passing game.”
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http://www.vindy.com/news/2016/aug/10/college-football-ysus-offense-makes-soli/?newswatch#sthash.m5Veixtv.dpuf