Spring ’12 – Day 8 Video A Little Bit of Everything

We’ve reached the half way point in spring practice with just seven practices , including the Blue-Gold game, remaining. Today’s practice video is a little bit of a recap with a little bit of each position getting a focus.

Some observations with the video below.

• Jarrett Grace got the best of George Atkinson in one on one pass rushing drills.  Atkinson has looked really good running the football throughout the spring, but if he is going to have to show consistency blocking to see much time in the fall.  It looked like Atkinson was getting a lot of work in the drill though.
• Theo Riddick looked pretty good in one rep against Kendall Moore but got beat by Carloe Calabrese on another.
• Looked like it was a little tough sledding for the Irish running backs going up the middle of the line.  For as great as the Notre Dame backs have looked getting to the perimeter, running inside could be a problem without a “big” back on the roster until Will Mahone reports to campus.
• Atkinson is going to have a tough time earning playing time if he doesn’t protect the ball better than he did around the 3:25 mark when Calabrese ripped it out at the line.
• Nice hit by Carlo at the 4:14 mark.  Of all the linebackers in that drill, Calabrese looked like the surest tackler of the group.
• Alex Welch made a nice over the shoulder catch around 4:54.  Welch is really going to have to battle with Ben Koyack for that #2 TE spot this spring and fall.
• Daniel Smith made a nice over the shoulder catch with Josh Atkinson in coverage too around 5:00.
• Bad overthrow by Andrew Hendrix around 5:05.  Looked like Low Wood had an easy interception but couldn’t come down with it.
• Everett Golson unleashes a jump ball bomb to John Goodman that the 5th year senior comes down with.
• Couldn’t tell who the quarterback was, but nice play in coverage by Bennett Jackson covering John Goodman around 5:24.
• TJ Jones flew right by a corner around 5:38 for an easy deep pass for Tommy Rees.
• Kapron Lewis-Moore straight bull rushed Bruce Heggie around 5:53.  KLM looks HUGE in this footage – he could be in line for a really good 5th year.
• Prince Shembo, before he got hurt, showed why he is going to move over to the CAT position with his pass rushing skills against Jordan Prestwood before getting stood up dead in his tracks by Zach Martin.
• Nick Martin looked really good in drills.  Could Notre Dame’s offensive line be bookended by a pair of Martin brothers in 2012?
• Ben Councell showed why he was so highly thought of coming out of high school around 7:24 with a great play by keeping Robby Toma from getting to the perimeter.
• It’s easy to see why Goodman has gotten has much praise as he has this spring – he looked really good in these clips.  It’s just spring practice and this is very limited video, but if nothing else it’s encouraging that Goodman is looking strong.  What really stood out to me though was Brian Kelly chasing him down the field after a nice catch just to congratulate him.