Spring football opens; what to watch for

2/29/2016 12:00:00 AM | Football

Feb. 29, 2016

By Jason Clay
jaclay@csufresno.edu
GoBulldogs.com

FRESNO, Calif. - Fresno State opened up spring football Monday morning, holding the first of its 15 allotted practices over the span of the next month.

With six new assistant coaches into the fold and the team coming off a 3-9 season, the Bulldogs came out on day one in just helmets eager to get to work and install the new schemes on both sides of the ball.

"I thought we had great enthusiasm, a good buzz and guys running around," said head coach Tim DeRuyter, who enters his fifth spring at the helm of the program. "I think our new coaches are setting a real good direction with their energy and positive mojo."

Monday's start opens an important offseason for the Bulldogs as they look to get back to competing for championships like they did in the first three years under DeRuyter, when the team won the 2012 and 2013 Mountain West championships and took the West Division title in 2014.

"I want both sides of the ball playing very, very fast," DeRuyter said is what he hopes to see out of his team by the end of spring practices. "Guys playing fast because they understand and we don't over complicate things from a coaching standpoint. I thought we had a great start today, but we got 14 more practices to clean a lot of things up."

With the start of spring ball, we take a look into five focus areas for the team.

Competition along the offensive and defensive lines
Through its recruiting efforts, the Bulldogs have worked hard to improve its size, numbers and fitting into the various positions along its offensive and defensive lines. The defensive side of the ball will be greener than on offense, but competition on both sides will be key in developing the schemes that coordinators Lorenzo Ward (defense) and Eric Kiesau (offense) will install.

The offensive line returns 10 players including Aaron Mitchell, Micah St. Andrew and Jacob Vazquez, who all started games last year. That group is joined by junior college transfers Christian Cronk, Ryan Popolizio and Shane Gama who will compete up front to solidify the foundation of Kiesau's up-tempo, multiple, spread offense that will feature a good balance with more focus on the run that what Fresno State has seen recently.

On defense, Nathan Madsen is the lone returning starter. Nine others return, including other letterwinners Ryan Steele, Kyle Hendrickson and Tyler Puccio. Insert junior college transfer Malik Forrester into the group and it is time for all to come together.

"I think we are going to see much better depth in both units," DeRuyter said. "We redshirted a bunch of guys last year that we felt probably could have been in our two-deep, but for the long-term health of the program we wanted to redshirt. They are going to get a chance this spring to establish themselves in the two-deep. I really like the direction in what we are doing with our offense being able to stress defenses not only with tempo, but a more balanced attack and approach.

"Defensively, being able to redshirt as many guys as we did and sign Malik Forrester, put him at nose guard and give Nathan Madsen a chance to get back to his more natural position at end I think really helps us going forward."

New running backs in the fold
The Bulldogs lost three senior running backs due to graduation, including Marteze Waller who finished his career ranked No. 4 on Fresno State's all-time rushing list. Redshirt freshmen Marcus Chambers, Wesley Hill and Bryson Oglesby are joined by Dontel James, who returned to Fresno State after one season at Riverside Community College. That group is relatively unknown at this point, but no doubt an individual or multiple individuals will have the opportunity in this offense to become the next great tailback at a school with rich history at that position.

"I think our running backs are encouraged that [the run game] is going to be an emphasis area," DeRuyter said. "I think you set an edge, you set a mindset when you decide to run the ball and decide that we are going to run the ball no matter what the defense does. We may not block them all, the running back is going to have to make guys miss or run through to get what we need to get. That's been the Fresno State brand for years and we are going to get back closer to that."

The secondary under defensive coordinator Lorenzo Ward
Ward comes to Fresno State with a reputable background in the secondary, as he has coached 16 defensive backs who went on to be drafted into the NFL. He now takes over the Bulldog defense and surely will have an impact in the secondary, which has great experience and talent at cornerback but wide-open competition at safety.

Jamal Ellis and Tyquwan Glass are returning starters at cornerback from last year. The year prior in 2014, Malcolm Washington saw starting time at corner. Tank Kelly played as a redshirt freshman last year and after sitting out 2015 in accordance with NCAA transfer regulations, Daquawn Brown the Washington State transfer will be in the fold this year.

At safety, DeShawn Potts came on strong to end 2015. Dalen Jones is the most experienced of the group, but Stratton Brown and Alan Wright have also played a high number of snaps. It will be fun to watch that group compete for playing time all spring and into fall camp.

Coaching chemistry
Spring is a crucial time in the development of chemistry between players, but this year it will as equally important for DeRuyter's coaching staff with the new assistants on board. That development has already begun.

"The thing that I really liked about bringing these guys on to our staff and vetting so many different guys as we were trying to find the right fit," DeRuyter said. "Coach Kiesau has had relationships with many of the coaches already on offense, which obviously helps that. Then you bring guys who maybe he didn't have a relationship with – a Joe Bernardi and Mark Weber that he knew from a far, but that had connections with Bulldog football in the past, so that dynamic has been really positive so far and as you go through Red Dawns, go through spring ball it all will be enhanced.

"Coach Ward has such gravitas with his experience. He is a great guy, phenomenal recruiter. He's come in and fit like a glove in everything we are doing from a defensive perspective and then adding some wrinkles a just a little bit different perspective on how we want to do things."

The quarterback battle
Ths is one area that gets the most focus, but you can say this spring the quarterback battle will feel different than in years past. Last year the Bulldogs started four different QBs - the most in any season going all the way back through 1979. The three quarterbacks that return – Kilton Anderson, Ford Childress and Chason Virgil – will now split the reps as they learn the new offense.

Things that can be expected out of this group in the eyes of Kiesau:

"Through spring the obviously thing is the tempo with the speed, but also getting the base concepts down," he said. "Just getting the core and the base concepts of what we want to do, be really fast and we can build off that as we move through the summer and in to fall camp.

"And really understanding why tempo is so important. It's really easy for coaches to say, ‘hey this is what you are going to do and how you are going to do it.' But to really understand the 'why' in how we do things, I think that is really important."

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