With Training Camp Over, Road To Rutgers Starts "Now"

The severe drought impacting eastern New England broke on Monday when downpouring rains drenched the Greater Boston area for the first time in months. Winds swept off the coast, and a more traditional atmosphere turned unbearable heat into a more manageable-but-still-sticky humidity customary to a late August day in Massachusetts. It was a sign of normalcy after the preceding month burned city sidewalks and felt like summer broke clear away from its dog days.

In Chestnut Hill, the super soaker banged the roof of Fish Field House and sent an echo through the end of Boston College's preseason training camp. The Eagles moved inside Alumni Stadium one day earlier for their final scrimmage, and the annual Media Day exercises on Monday represented the last respite and a clean break as they transitioned into a more traditional run-up to September 3's season-opening game against Rutgers.

"We're starting now," said head coach Jeff Hafley. "It's time, and I feel comfortable with that. It's not going to be a full practice, but we still need to go good-on-good. We still need to get better. My fear is if you just turn to doing what we'll call 'scout work,' and you do that for the next however much practice we have, the speed of the game won't be as fast. So you have to go [fast with] ones-on-ones, good-on-good. That's no disrespect to the scout players at all, but I want ones-versus-ones for at least portions of practice, and there are practices where it's started."

Having that sense of urgency showed on Sunday when the Eagles built on their changes previously installed during the first scrimmage earlier in August. The coaches who initially moved to the sidelines were now stationed in the press box, and the precursor to the game-like atmosphere found players working through competitive periods without the same acclimations designed to ease into more situational drill work.

It built a more natural game flow that allowed both units to produce big plays on both sides of the ball. The offense opened by using big plays to work into the defensive red zone before a sack situation forced a field goal, and a first down scramble by Phil Jurkovec was later negated in short yardage situations by a fourth-down turnover stop by Kam Arnold.

"We moved the ball well," Hafley said on Sunday morning. "We moved the ball better. We hit some more explosives, but the defense did a good job against the run. There were some turnovers, and we did more situational work towards the middle and end of the game. But I thought the quarterbacks did a really good job, and I thought the coaches came out [strong] for the first time [in the stadium]. We had the real game headsets and guys in the booth, which with new coaches, we're trying to get guys where they'll be on game day."

The whole concept simulated situations that college football teams can't otherwise replicate prior to their first game of the season, and while BC had scrimmaged before Sunday, the first date was on the outdoor practice field attached to Fish Field House. Coaches were still on the field, and the entire session felt like a step-up from the first couple weeks of practice. Sunday was a further step from that, and it brought the Eagles as close to next week's opener against Rutgers as possible.

"Camp is a unique thing," said running back Pat Garwo. "It was definitely long, but I treated it as a time that you can really understand how long and hard a season becomes. You just work on your routines in camp, and then when the season comes, you know what to expect. Obviously, you want to play another opponent, but I loved competing against [teammates]. At the end of the day, I want to see someone else, so I'm ready to play."

"All of our players have open lines of communication with all of our coaches," Hafley said. "That's how I want it. Our players are constantly on our floor and offices because we need to know how they're doing, not just football-wise but outside of football. That's the world we live in, and I want these guys comfortable knowing that they can come and talk to us about anything. As far as football goes, we ask questions, and they have something to tell us, then they have to let us know. That's the relationship with all of them are like, and [all the coaches] are doing a great job."

By employing those methods, BC now has a team primed to begin its full preparation for the game against Rutgers. No team fully knows its identity before the plays count for real, but this team, like its opponent, is starting to formulate exactly what it wants to employ. That will kick into earnest over this week as the coaches finish their last improvements, all while a game plan specifically geared to the Scarlet Knights continues creeping into the conversation.

"We have a lot of packages for some downs," defensive lineman Marcus Valdez said. "There's so much more speed in the game and we're trying to mask personnel, so we might bring in an extra nickel or take out a linebacker on some packages. We may even make a deal where an extra linebacker is in the game, but that's really the biggest change. The mentality is always the same that we need to attack the quarterback because if a quarterback breaks [containment], you're putting your secondary at risk, and where we struggled a little bit in the past, we're getting in sync to stopping the run and playing passes. [Offenses] will attack you on both fronts, but it's up to [the defense] to [adjust] to the speed of the game by caging that quarterback in there."

"We met [on Monday]," Hafley said. "We have Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday practice, and then Sunday practice. Then we have Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday practice. I know what we're going to do to accomplish in each one of those practices."

The 2022 Boston College football season begins next Saturday, September 3, when Rutgers visits Alumni Stadium for a matchup of former Big East rivals. The game is set to kick off at noon with television coverage on the ACC Network and online streaming available via the ESPN platform for cable subscribers with access to the network. Radio broadcast will also be available through the Boston College Sports Network presented by Learfield.

With Training Camp Over, Road To Rutgers Starts "Now"

Players Mentioned

Kam Arnold

Phil Jurkovec

Marcus Valdez

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