With the countdown started to its Aug. 31 season opener against Colorado State, the Texas football team resumed practicing on Tuesday.
This may be the most anticipated season at Texas in some time. Coming off a 12-2 year that included the Big 12 championship and its first-ever appearance in the College Football Playoff, UT was picked to finish second in the SEC preseason poll and fourth nationally in the coaches poll.
On Tuesday afternoon, the media was allowed to watch around 15 minutes of UT’s practice. It was the first practice in full pads for the Longhorns this season. Here are three things the American-Statesman observed at Denius Fields:
Quick notes from a quick viewing period
To steal a line from Godfather of Soul James Brown, the media contingent ‘hit it and quit’ at a sweltering Frank Denius Fields Tuesday.
It was my summer practice after a couple of weeks of vacation and an East Texas family reunion so a glimpse at football practice was a welcome sight for some well-rested eyes. Aside from athletic director Chris Del Conte clad in a wool jacket and slacks in Austin’s version of the Sahara — “The jacket is light because I took the lining out,” he said — the 15 minutes we spent in attendance confirmed what I already suspected: 18-to-22-year-old kids can do jumping jacks and touch their toes as a group.
Besides that bit of enlightenment, it was all pretty uneventful. From first glance, Arch Manning towers over the other quarterbacks and defensive end Ethan Burke has the build of a young Jared Allen. Let’s hope he builds on those 5 ½ sacks he registered his freshman season.
By the time I jotted down those two tidbits, it was time to head for the exits. Hopefully more later.
— Cedric Golden
Quarterbacks work on feet, not arms
While most of the practice window opened to the media on Tuesday featured special teams repetitions and tackling drills, the Texas quarterbacks quietly went to the far end of Denius Fields and worked on some fundamentals.
Specifically, Quinn Ewers, Trey Owens and Manning seemed to work on their footwork. They repeatedly went through three- and five-step drops while throwing the ball to some graduate assistants stationed at specific spots on the practice field.
Boring? Maybe. But footwork from his team’s quarterbacks has always been a focus for Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian, himself a former quarterback at BYU and in the Canadian Football League. And what better time to practice such fundamentals than away from all the havoc during the first day of full pads?
Media members not the only spectators
Del Conte wasn’t the only notable visitor to Tuesday’s practice. As he often is, Ted Koy was also at Denius Field.
Koy attends nearly every UT practice so to see him walking the sidelines and observing drills wasn’t a surprise. A co-captain on UT’s 1969 national championship team, Koy’s 1,397 rushing yards from 1967-69 currently rank 37th on the school’s all-time rushing chart. Koy was inducted in the Texas Hall of Honor in 1995.
− Danny Davis
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: 3 observations as Texas Longhorns hold Tuesday football practice
