Quotes Following First Day Of Preseason Football Practice
Aug 11, 2007 | Football
Aug. 11, 2007
HEAD COACH Bob Toledo
On the heat on Sunday, which exceeded 100 degrees
"We were a little concerned about the heat. We had a record-day of heat today, but what was impressive is that our kids fought through it. It was a hard practice and we kept things moving at a rapid pace. I thought our kids had a lot of carry-over from spring practice and there was a lot of good effort out there today."
On the up-tempo pace of practice
"That's part of what we're going to do. We're not going to stand around a do a lot of talking. We'll do our talking when we're in meetings or when we have to pull guys off to the side. But when guys are in there, we're going to move things along pretty fast. We'll even pick up the tempo a little bit more moving from drill to drill. Sometimes it lagged a little bit and I'll get on them about that a little bit tonight. But for the most part, I thought it went very well."
On the look of the team as a whole after day one of fall practice
"I'm not looking at individuals right now per say. I'm looking at who's finishing drills, who's giving me great effort, and I'm looking at the guys who are falling by the wayside at times as well. I'm looking at those guys, too."
On if he was pleased with how day one of fall practice went
"For the first day, we put in an awful lot of things - a lot of formations, a lot of shifting and motioning, a lot of plays and a lot of defensive looks. I thought there was a lot of carry-over (from the spring). The freshmen aren't in tuned to it yet because it's too much for them at this point, but what is encouraging is the veteran guys who were here in the spring are bringing a lot of carry-over."
On his goals going into the first practice of the preseason
"We wanted to go through linemen assignment and for them to play as fast as we can until you make first contact. Then we wanted them to pull off. We wanted to show them where to line up, what to do and to do it fast."
On the play of the quarterbacks, who made several nice plays throughout the afternoon
"I think that's a tribute to them because all of them spent quite a bit of time on their own over the summer working with the receivers. That group was probably ahead of some of the other people because they were here, they did work hard and they worked on timing."
