PonyFans.com spring practice report (March 17, 2015)

[PonyPride]

The first official practice of the Chad Morris era was held (in shorts and helmets — no pads) Tuesday afternoon at the Pettus practice field. Media was allowed limited access — to the pre-workout stretch session and about 30 minutes of practice.

• As Morris said in his interview before practice, and has said since he was hired, the tempo (there's that word...) is drastically different. Everything is done quickly. Players move from one area of the field to another quickly. When helping to set up blocking for placekicks, offensive line coach Dustin Fry was told "you've got two minutes, Coach Fry — plenty of time" .... and rather than shut it down and get on to the next drill, the group got in several more kicks.

• Other notable differences: the coaches have whistles, the equipment staff wearing referee jerseys and all players are doing something at virtually all times. No standing around and watching others do drills.

• Among those in attendance at practice: former NFL running back Herschel Walker, Highland Park head coach and former SMU player Randy Allen and a few incoming freshmen: WR James Proché and LB/DEs Delontae and Mike Scott, as well as a few recent football alums like WR Stephen Nelson, NT Darrian Wright and RB/LB Kevin Pope.

• Former WR/RB/DB Colin Lagasse was dressed in street clothes, and is not listed on the roster.

• As had been rumored, WR Arrius Holleman is back.

• Three players who reportedly moved to TE were working with their previous position groups: OLs Christian Holloway and Chad Pursley, and DE Justin Lawler. That doesn't mean they won't play TE — maybe it was just for initial drills — but for the moment, they were at their familiar positions.

• One of the more amusing sights was the fumble recovery drill for the offensive linemen. OL coach Dustin Fry and a graduate assistant stood side by side, about five yards apart from each other, and each rolled a ball forward, at which point a pair of linemen jumped on the ball and secured it. The star of the day, for lack of a better description, was OT Chewy Chamagua, who managed to recover BOTH loose footballs when they both bounced in his direction.

• Good to see two players who had neck/back injuries — RB Daniel Gresham and WR Cortland Sutton — taking part in drills. Players with medical issues wore different jerseys — yellow jerseys meant a player was out of drills, while a green jersey means limited participation — but Gresham and Sutton both wore normal red practice jerseys.

• QB Darrel Colbert has changed his jersey number, from 8 to 7 (his high school number) ... a move that allows incoming freshman QB Ben Hicks to wear the No. 8 that he wore in high school.

• Morris said before practice that returning starter Matt Davis would get the first snaps at quarterback during team drills, and he did ... in a lineup that also included RB K.C. Nlemchi and WRs Sutton, Jeremiah Gaines, Darius Joseph and Ryheem Malone. But he also said, understandably, that every position is open for competition, and not to read anything into who "started" Tuesday.

• Kicking drills appear to be different. In the past, kickers and punters would work on their own on the other field before joining their teammates for brief drills at the end of practice. The team ran field goal drills just minutes after the opening stretches.

[DanFreibergerForHeisman]

Nice report. Thanks!

[Junior]

Woohoo! Football is back for a while!

[HorsePower]

Great to see that Gresham is back. How did he look?

Above all, I hope he's healthy.

[PonyPride]

Great to see that Gresham is back. How did he look?

Above all, I hope he's healthy.

First of all, he looked strong. Again, we were limited in what we could watch, but in the time we were there, he (and Jeremiah Gaines and A.J. Buffini) did a lot of blocking drills with RBs coach Claude Mathis in what appeared to be some kind of H-back role.

[Stallion]

that's probably where Line will be by Fall too. I've studied Clemson's offense-that's where he might be useful. Clemson uses multiple TE/HB/FB formations-not unusual to see 2 extra blocking "backs" in short yardage

[Rebel10]

The building process starts.

[malonish]

"RB Daniel Greshman"

Gresham??

[hawaiistang14]

I also heard that quarterback deshaun Watson was in attendance as well

[JoeKidd]

Thanks for the practice review, can't wait for the Spring game.

[StangTime]

Thanks for the detailed report!

[SMU89]

FB...Tourney. great day

[Dairy Crampus]

Pretty cool but why was Herschel Walker at practice?

[smusic 00]

He thought Cavan was still here.

[PonyPride]

"RB Daniel Greshman"

Gresham??

Yup — you're right, of course. My mistake.
Thanks for catching that.