Boston College Athletics
Coach Forecasts Challenges, Opportunities
August 09, 2003 | Football
Aug. 9, 2003
With week one of preseason camp nearing an end and the season opener vs. Wake Forest exactly three weeks away, the Boston College football team took to the Alumni Stadium turf Saturday for an afternoon practice. Cloudy skies provided a break from the heat, but a soggy forecast threatened once again to muddy the grass practice fields adjacent to the stadium.
The Eagles will repeat Saturday's regimen on Sunday before beginning two-a-day drills on Monday. The team is adjusting to the NCAA's new practice guidelines that limit time on the field. Not only do two-a-day drills begin later in the camp, but each double-session day must be followed by a day with only one practice.
"It's an adjustment, but I don't mind," Head Coach Tom O'Brien says, "as long as it's the same for everybody, which it is."
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Goals, expectations and personnel changes were on the minds of reporters at the team's Media Day on Friday. The following is part two of excerpts from O'Brien's Media Day press conference:
Q: What do you expect for the beginning of this year?
TOB: "I look for consistency. I don't think you can necessarily go into a year saying we are going to have a thousand-yard rusher. Play consistent, play within the offense. (Derrick Knight) can't try to win a football game by himself. I hope he continues to improve the way he did last year. I made a mistake in the middle of last season, we wore him out. We need to give him some blows. He was playing too many plays. We started to alternate him a little more, toward the first part of the second half of the season, and he broke out a couple of long runs at the end of the season. I like to think he can do that if we have him rest a little bit. It was our first experience with a 12-game season last year, and in a longer season there are more hits involved, so you have to have more depth."
Q: Why have you made personnel changes in the offensive line?
TOB: "We've had to make changes because some of the fifth-year kids decided not to come back. We moved (Keith) Leavitt back from defense to offense in the spring and he got all spring practice. He's has to continue to improve to help us. You know (Chris) Snee and (Augie) Hoffmann are solid as guards. (Pat) Ross backed up last year at center and had a good spring. He has to keep moving forward. (Jeremy) Trueblood backed up last year, and he's just a truly talented young player. It's just time to step up. That's the case of a couple different positions now. We lost a lot of experience in a couple places. Kids have been back-ups. You look at the two safeties, (T.J.) Stancil and (Paul) Cook. They've been behind (Doug) Bessette and (Ralph) Parent, who started for three years for us. So now it's their turn to play and now they have to step up and make some plays for us. They're excited about their opportunity so it's going to be important for them."
Q: What about Sean Ryan?
TOB: "I think he improved tremendously last year, too. It was the first year we asked him to do a lot. He stepped up, and he got better as the year went on. He gets a little bit down on himself, he's too critical of himself. We always preach to them to forget the last play, play the next play. I mean, that's the great way to play this game. There isn't anything you can do about the last one. The next one's most important. Play each play like it's your last play. He'll be even better this year than he was last year."
Q: Could you assess your team's overall skills?
TOB: "I thought (Joel) Hazard and (Grant) Adams really played well in the bowl game. Sometimes injuries are a blessing in disguise. When (Jamal) Burke went down at Temple, it caused those two kids to get more in the rotation, just as when Antonio Garay and Doug Goodwin went down and Bulman and Mettling stepped up. It gave those kids an opportunity. When we were able to practice that time before the bowl, it was almost like a spring practice again, so they took advantage of that. I think our freshmen are really talented, the kids behind them. It's just that you don't know what they're going to do when the bullets start flying because they've never been in a game. That's the only things that scares us right now. We have talented kids, but when you're backing up with three redshirt freshmen, that's not a situation we want to be in, but that's the situation we're in. But they are talented, and that's better than not talented."
Q: What about your schedule?
TOB: "Well, you know last year I thought I had the best team I've had here and I thought we could be a pretty good team. When you look back at the end of the year, we played five teams that ended up in the top 25 and five bowl teams and that ends up being a pretty good schedule. Look at this year and you're playing five teams in the top 25 and seven bowl teams. So it's a huge challenge, but as I told the team, it's also a tremendous opportunity. We want to make a statement about our program, and this is a good year to do that."
Q: Do you expect any of your freshmen to make an impact?
TOB: "I don't think a true freshman will make an impact. I think with the (Nathanael) Hasselbeck move, there will be a freshman, I believe, playing somewhere on the secondary. But we backed up with freshmen in the secondary the last couple of years. Hopefully we won't be in a position to play a freshman on the offensive line, but we've got a couple of talented offensive line prospects we might want to put in a back-up position to get them coached up for the future of the program. We might look at the three tailbacks. One of those kids may end up being the number three tailback for us and playing this year and getting experience to look for the future. I think those are the spots where we have the most critical needs right now, and that doesn't discount anyone. If they're good enough to play, they will be on the football field for us."
