Hurricanes Begin Spring Football Practice
March 8, 2005
Coral GAbles, Fla. (www.hurricanessports.com) – The Miami Hurricanes began their spring practice this afternoon on the Greentree Practice Fields, going through the first of 15 scheduled sessions. The team worked in shorts without pads.
“It was a good first day, just like we had hoped,” said head coach Larry Coker. “I like the way the guys ran around. They showed a lot of speed. We have a lot of work to do, obviously, but it was a good start. Offensively, we were pretty efficient. We ran the ball pretty well, and threw and caught the ball pretty well when we had the opportunity.”
With 17 seniors having departed, there were a lot of new faces on the field, especially at quarterback, where sophomore Kyle Wright and redshirt freshman Kirby Freeman are competing for the starting job. “I think they looked pretty good,” said Coker. “We’re going to be pretty good there; I really like the talent there. They need a lot of work and they need to play, but we’re going to be good at quarterback. I’m not concerned about the position from talent, only because of the lack of experience. We’ll work to get that between now and Labor Day. Both players are active and mobile, and we haven’t had that in the past with Brock Berlin and Ken Dorsey – the ability to run and beat people running the football.”
The two quarterbacks have switched jersey numbers, with Wright now wearing No. 3 and Freeman wearing No. 7. For today’s practice, Wright worked mostly with the first team; on Wednesday, Freeman will practice with the first-teamers.
Of the competition with Freeman, Wright said, “There’s no resentment. It was good to finally get on the field, go out against the defense. I’m ready. The competition for me is with myself, competing against myself every day.”
Freeman added, “We’re keeping the competition on the field. We both know it’s competitive, and we’ll handle it the most mature way we can.”
The Hurricanes will practice again on Wednesday, with a 3:20 practice session that is open to the public.
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