March 18, 2008

First Practice Photo Gallery

EAST LANSING, Mich. - Second-year Michigan State head coach Mark Dantonio sent his team through a 2 1/2-hour workout on Tuesday, March 18, as the Spartans opened spring drills inside the Duffy Daugherty Football Building. The team - wearing shorts, jerseys and helmets - participated in the first of 15 allotted practices.

Coach Dantonio spoke to the media after practice and talked about the first day of spring ball.

On first day of spring practice...
I thought there was good recall from our players today. We really don't know what they can do in terms of filling in the gaps that we have through graduation until we put pads on, and we'll do that next week. But we had good recall, and our guys moved around well. I think bowl practice helped us. It helped us with our younger players...We had a lot in for our first day. I thought there was good attention.

On who stood out on the first day...
It's hard to tell in shorts, but I thought Greg Jones moved around well. (Brian) Hoyer looked crisp. But like I said, we're in shorts out here, so until we watch film and those types of things, then we'll see.

On the two incoming freshman...
Tyler (Hoover) looked all right out there for a freshman. We have two freshmen (Hoover, Johnny Adams) walking in here, and they moved around well. I think winter workouts really helped them in understanding the tempo.

On the seniors...
Otis Wiley had a great practice today. Justin Kershaw is taking some steps. All of our seniors are going to get a chance to lead. That's the great thing we had about last year, we had great leaders on this football team, and we have to look for that.

On the philosophy of spring ball...
The biggest thing we have to stress is fundamentals. Trying to master our concepts and the fundamentals allows you to be good and to prove yourself.

On incoming defensive end transfer Trevor Anderson...
Trevor has to get back into the swing of things. He has to prove himself here. He did it at Cincinnati. He's not taking anything for granted here, but he should be a player for us.

On the receiving corps...
We're going to have to spread it around. We'll have some incoming guys that are going to have an opportunity to play. We have some younger players like Mark (Dell) who will certainly improve. We had the same issues last year at this time, but we can get the ball to certain players.

On the defensive backs...
You (the defensive backs) have to understand things conceptually and I think sometimes in your first year, sometimes you don't. So from game to game, there's always changes. Hopefully in year two, year three, year four, you start to build a foundation and you start to learn all the little things it takes to be successful. We played nine players back there last year so we have some experience coming back, plus we'll add four more guys to the mix, and we'll see what happens.