On Saturday morning, Anthony Brown was back under center at Alumni Stadium, but the defense won the day as the unit tallied more interceptions (4) than touchdowns allowed (3) in the first half of the scrimmage.
On the first third down of the game, graduate linebacker Connor Strachan dropped back into zone coverage, spotted the route Brown was eyeing, and jumped it for a leaping interception.
E.J. Perry had better luck moving the chains on the next drive, keeping it himself for a first down before finding Colton Cardinal in the flat past midfield. On 3rd-and-short, Mehdi El Attrach saw the play action coming and caused Perry to throw it away for an intentional grounding call. The penalty spoiled a drive during which the sophomore’s athleticism was on full display. Senior Colton Lichtenberg missed wide left the ensuing 39-yard field goal attempt.
Brown looked sharper on his second series, hitting Jeff Smith on a quick slant for a third-down conversion. Soon after, however, a false start penalty on 3rd-and-short killed the drive and forced a punt, which was muffed by Jeff Smith.
“I think we started slow and sluggish,” head coach Steve Addazio said. “We didn’t come out crisp. But it speaks to where we are—we’re gassed right now.”
Redshirt freshman Matt McDonald took his turn under center and opened with a perfect throw on the run to Christian McStravick. Freshman Javian Dayne kept the chains moving with a couple tough runs up the middle. But the drive eventually stalled after a pair of incompletions, forcing a punt back to Perry’s unit.
The “No Fly Zone” found another victim on the ensuing drive, courtesy of defensive back Brandon Sebastian. The redshirt freshman looks to be next in a growing line of lockdown corners to come out of Anthony Campanile’s squad.
Brown finally orchestrated the first scoring drive by linking up with tight end Jake Burt on a crossing route for a huge catch-and-run. David Bailey finished off the drive with a short touchdown run.
Matt Valecce had one of the highlights of the day when he kept it up the middle for a 47-yard touchdown run. But on his next series, the freshman tossed a pick six to classmate Jahmin Muse. McDonald wasn’t much better, either, as he followed with a pick six of his own to Taj-Amir Torres soon after.
Freshman defensive back Jahmin Muse returns an interception off of Matt Valecce down the sideline.
Addazio was disappointed in the quarterbacks given their progress this fall.
“I thought we played poorly as a quarterback group,” Addazio said. “And usually that’s the tip of that spear.”
Perry probably put together the best overall performance of the group, but he may have taken the most snaps, too. He ended the first half by marching the offense up the field with darts to Ray Marten and C.J. Lewis. Then, on 3rd-and-3 from the 6-yard line, Perry threw up a fade to Christian McStravick for the score. Starting the second half, Noah Jordan-Williams caught a short pass from Perry and took it 76 yards to the house.
But Addazio was reluctant to give his sophomore signal caller too much credit.
“I wouldn’t say anyone had a nice day, totally honest with you,” Addazio said. “I wasn’t real pleased. I know we can do better. We’ve had tremendous quarterback play all camp. I wouldn’t say today was one of them.”
Brown sat out the second half as the coaching staff continues to ease him back in preparation for Week One against UMass.
“He needs to get back into the flow,” Addazio said. “He has had a helluva week this week; really good. This is all part of that. For him, it's cumulative. We were having a lot of conversations about how many reps we wanted him to take today and he didn't take very many.”
One surprise was how much action linebacker Davon Jones saw on offense. During practice, he’s been primarily with the defense, but Addazio revealed that he’s been mixing in consistent work with the running backs, as well.
“We’re trying to invest some time into him in case we have any issues -- to increase our depth pool while we’re waiting for these young guys to develop,” Addazio said. “He’s a powerful back. Don’t be surprised to see him, game one, having the ability to have 10 plays on offense.”
Even though he hasn’t had a carry since he transitioned to linebacker after last year’s loss to Wake Forest, there’s a case to be made that Jones is BC’s second-best running back right now behind Dillon. With the current depth at linebacker, his hard-hitting services may be needed more in the backfield than in the box.
“Ever since I’ve been here, he’s been our first two-way player,” Addazio said. “To a degree.”
Last Saturday, the Eagles committed 10 penalties in the first scrimmage of camp, prompting Addazio to make it an emphasis in practice this week.
“On Tuesday and Thursday, we brought it back down to where we were a year ago. We were No. 2 in the country and averaged four penalties per game. On Tuesday and Thursday, based on ratios, that's what we did,” Addazio said. “And I was really excited about that.”
“Today, we bounced back up,” the sixth-year coach continued. “It was with the [first team]. With the ones, today, we increased our penalties to seven if it was a real game.”
The relapse is likely the result of fatigue. After 12 days of high-intensity workouts, the wear and tear of training camp showed on this damp Saturday morning in Alumni Stadium. After the scrimmage, Addazio’s first four adjectives to describe it were: “Tired. Lethargic. Mistake-ridden. Poor.”
It’s a fine line because heavy legs, of course, mean that the training is working.
“I’ll start to now look at bringing the legs back a little bit, because we didn’t have any today,” Addazio said. “You’re trying to create [fatigue]. I tried to create this. It’s the old adage of, okay, we’ve hit the wall, now we gotta find a way to get over the wall. We were doing some conditioning at the end here—game-like conditioning—because I wanted them to feel getting up there in the 90-play range, without having to expose them to 90 hits.”
As players enter their third week of camp, certain things are becoming all-too-familiar in the training cycle. The defense has the full scouting report on the offense and vice versa, creating a friendly rivalry between first-teamers.
“Especially at this point in camp, you’ve hit the same guy enough times that it starts to get on your nerves a bit,” Strachan laughed. “It’s definitely highly competitive.”
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McDonald outplayed Perry in the first scrimmage, and now Perry outdueled the freshman today. Barring a breakout performance from McDonald in the final scrimmage of the year, I'd guess Perry would be the first QB we'll see after Brown this season. What do you think?
On the first third down of the game, graduate linebacker Connor Strachan dropped back into zone coverage, spotted the route Brown was eyeing, and jumped it for a leaping interception.
E.J. Perry had better luck moving the chains on the next drive, keeping it himself for a first down before finding Colton Cardinal in the flat past midfield. On 3rd-and-short, Mehdi El Attrach saw the play action coming and caused Perry to throw it away for an intentional grounding call. The penalty spoiled a drive during which the sophomore’s athleticism was on full display. Senior Colton Lichtenberg missed wide left the ensuing 39-yard field goal attempt.
Brown looked sharper on his second series, hitting Jeff Smith on a quick slant for a third-down conversion. Soon after, however, a false start penalty on 3rd-and-short killed the drive and forced a punt, which was muffed by Jeff Smith.
“I think we started slow and sluggish,” head coach Steve Addazio said. “We didn’t come out crisp. But it speaks to where we are—we’re gassed right now.”
Redshirt freshman Matt McDonald took his turn under center and opened with a perfect throw on the run to Christian McStravick. Freshman Javian Dayne kept the chains moving with a couple tough runs up the middle. But the drive eventually stalled after a pair of incompletions, forcing a punt back to Perry’s unit.
The “No Fly Zone” found another victim on the ensuing drive, courtesy of defensive back Brandon Sebastian. The redshirt freshman looks to be next in a growing line of lockdown corners to come out of Anthony Campanile’s squad.
Brown finally orchestrated the first scoring drive by linking up with tight end Jake Burt on a crossing route for a huge catch-and-run. David Bailey finished off the drive with a short touchdown run.
Matt Valecce had one of the highlights of the day when he kept it up the middle for a 47-yard touchdown run. But on his next series, the freshman tossed a pick six to classmate Jahmin Muse. McDonald wasn’t much better, either, as he followed with a pick six of his own to Taj-Amir Torres soon after.
Freshman defensive back Jahmin Muse returns an interception off of Matt Valecce down the sideline.
Addazio was disappointed in the quarterbacks given their progress this fall.
“I thought we played poorly as a quarterback group,” Addazio said. “And usually that’s the tip of that spear.”
Perry probably put together the best overall performance of the group, but he may have taken the most snaps, too. He ended the first half by marching the offense up the field with darts to Ray Marten and C.J. Lewis. Then, on 3rd-and-3 from the 6-yard line, Perry threw up a fade to Christian McStravick for the score. Starting the second half, Noah Jordan-Williams caught a short pass from Perry and took it 76 yards to the house.
But Addazio was reluctant to give his sophomore signal caller too much credit.
“I wouldn’t say anyone had a nice day, totally honest with you,” Addazio said. “I wasn’t real pleased. I know we can do better. We’ve had tremendous quarterback play all camp. I wouldn’t say today was one of them.”
Brown sat out the second half as the coaching staff continues to ease him back in preparation for Week One against UMass.
“He needs to get back into the flow,” Addazio said. “He has had a helluva week this week; really good. This is all part of that. For him, it's cumulative. We were having a lot of conversations about how many reps we wanted him to take today and he didn't take very many.”
One surprise was how much action linebacker Davon Jones saw on offense. During practice, he’s been primarily with the defense, but Addazio revealed that he’s been mixing in consistent work with the running backs, as well.
“We’re trying to invest some time into him in case we have any issues -- to increase our depth pool while we’re waiting for these young guys to develop,” Addazio said. “He’s a powerful back. Don’t be surprised to see him, game one, having the ability to have 10 plays on offense.”
Even though he hasn’t had a carry since he transitioned to linebacker after last year’s loss to Wake Forest, there’s a case to be made that Jones is BC’s second-best running back right now behind Dillon. With the current depth at linebacker, his hard-hitting services may be needed more in the backfield than in the box.
“Ever since I’ve been here, he’s been our first two-way player,” Addazio said. “To a degree.”
Last Saturday, the Eagles committed 10 penalties in the first scrimmage of camp, prompting Addazio to make it an emphasis in practice this week.
“On Tuesday and Thursday, we brought it back down to where we were a year ago. We were No. 2 in the country and averaged four penalties per game. On Tuesday and Thursday, based on ratios, that's what we did,” Addazio said. “And I was really excited about that.”
“Today, we bounced back up,” the sixth-year coach continued. “It was with the [first team]. With the ones, today, we increased our penalties to seven if it was a real game.”
The relapse is likely the result of fatigue. After 12 days of high-intensity workouts, the wear and tear of training camp showed on this damp Saturday morning in Alumni Stadium. After the scrimmage, Addazio’s first four adjectives to describe it were: “Tired. Lethargic. Mistake-ridden. Poor.”
It’s a fine line because heavy legs, of course, mean that the training is working.
“I’ll start to now look at bringing the legs back a little bit, because we didn’t have any today,” Addazio said. “You’re trying to create [fatigue]. I tried to create this. It’s the old adage of, okay, we’ve hit the wall, now we gotta find a way to get over the wall. We were doing some conditioning at the end here—game-like conditioning—because I wanted them to feel getting up there in the 90-play range, without having to expose them to 90 hits.”
As players enter their third week of camp, certain things are becoming all-too-familiar in the training cycle. The defense has the full scouting report on the offense and vice versa, creating a friendly rivalry between first-teamers.
“Especially at this point in camp, you’ve hit the same guy enough times that it starts to get on your nerves a bit,” Strachan laughed. “It’s definitely highly competitive.”
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McDonald outplayed Perry in the first scrimmage, and now Perry outdueled the freshman today. Barring a breakout performance from McDonald in the final scrimmage of the year, I'd guess Perry would be the first QB we'll see after Brown this season. What do you think?
