Setting A Lineup in Stone
Jim Grobe saw his team today and what he saw really didn’t surprise him.
My story in tomorrow’s Journal will go into more detail, but Grobe said had a pretty good idea of what he was going to see in today’s final scrimmage. His decision to stop scrimmage after barely an hour was confirmation. Grobe, as head coach, can obviously be swayed by what a position coach is telling him, but the team he saw even before the scrimmage began was:
DE—Kyle Wilber, Tristan Dorty.
DT—Frank Souza, Nikita Whitlock.
LB—Hunter Haynes, Riley Haynes, Joey Ehrmann.
S— Cyhl Quarles and Daniel Mack.
CB—Josh Bush and Kenny Okoro.
LT—Dennis Godfrey.
LG—Joe Looney.
C—Russ Nenon.
RG—Michael Hoag.
RT—Doug Weaver.
TE—Andrew Parker.
QB—Ted Stachitas.
I didn’t really get into the starters in the backfield or at wideout with him because I know that often is dependent on formations and situations, and that a rotation is far more indicative of a team’s strength or weakness than a set starting designation. But I’d be surprised if Marshall Williams is not starting at one wide out and Devon Brown the other, with Josh Adams at tailback and Tommy Bohanon at fullback.
The positions that I took to be most up in the air are at safety, where Alex Frye could still end up starting instead of Mack, and maybe at linebacker where Grobe is really enthusiastic about his depth and talent. And though Whitlock started today’s practice, and has been running first team for at least a few days now, he’s probably going to have to nail it down as the week plays out. But he’ll certainly play. What was envisioned as a six-man rotation has been whittled, at least temporarily, to four. Redshirt freshman John Gallagher is out with what is thought to be mononucleosis, and Daniel Vogelsang had surgery today for a hand he broke earlier this week. Regardless of the starting pair, Souza, Whitlock, Ramon Booi and Kris Redding will all get their chance to shine in next week’s opener.
The real story at quarterback is not that Ted Stachitas has been penciled in as starter. He has great high school credentials. He’s had two full years in the program. He’s a versatile quarterback who can run and pass. In hindsight, he should have been the next guy up after Riley Skinner departed. It’s just that until now, none of us had any idea of what to expect because he had never been injury-free long enough to show us.
The juicier development, though, is that as we sit here a week before the first game, Tanner Price, a freshman who at this time last year was just starting his senior season at Westlake High School in Austin, is still in the picture. Price looked good again today, and Grobe was paying attention. Unless I misread Grobe, whatever heat Stachitas is getting is coming from a first-year freshman. Obviously no one is measuring Price for a redshirt just yet.