Taggart notes team’s growth, shape
Coach says he’s impressed with offseason gains but conditioning must still improve
TALLAHASSEE – The Florida State Seminoles have three weeks to tie up loose ends that head coach Willie Taggarts said very much still exist.
“You can tell those guys have been working this offseason. There’s a lot of mental mistakes and I think we can be so much better technically and how we do things,” Taggart said before practice Monday. “Each and every day we’re getting better and working on those things. We don’t have a lot of missed assignments. That’s good to see here early in camp.
“We still have to put a lot of things in — especially defensively. … As camp goes on, we’ll see how they retain a lot of things we’ve installed.”
Part of that offseason work for some players came in the form of sculpting their bodies. Quarterback James Blackman enters the season listed at 195 pounds, up from last year’s 181, while defensive back Jaiden Lars-Woodbey is listed at 235 after being 215 last season. Defensive lineman Malcolm Ray and linebacker Jaleel McRae, both freshmen, opened camp at 272 and 233 pounds, respectively.
Taggart said he likes the work the team put in to make those type of gains, but now it’s about getting ready to execute a rapidfire offense and bruising defense in time for the season opener against Boise State at the end of this month.
“I think we’re in shape, I don’t necessarily think we’re in football shape, he said. “I think there’s a little difference in that and you saw that in the first few days of practice, especially when we went to separate practices. … I think we’ll see our guys here in the next couple days start to see that they’re getting back into the flow of things. But they’ve gotten bigger and stronger and you can see it in a lot of guys in the way they play. Again, we’re not in the football shape that we want to be in yet.”
Conditioning will be key for the defense, which is switching to
a 3-4 scheme that means a lot of players will be called on to do more in coverage than before. Taggart said he’s pleased with how players have adjusted so far.
“Our guys are out flying around trying to make some plays,” he said. “We’re nowhere where we need to be yet, of course, but I see improvement each and every day. They’re getting after it, young guys, older guys, they’re competing. For the most part, we’re getting better.”
The eagerness to get to the ball has to be reined in just a bit, according to the second-year head coach, especially with players not wearing full pads until Tuesday.
“Still gotta teach our guys to practice like pros and stay off the ground when we’re not tackling,” Taggart said. “Sometimes we get competitive and want to get out there and we need to wait until we go to tackling, and sometimes that’s part of it.”
Injury report
Several players did not practice as a precaution, including defensive end Joshua Kaindoh, who strained his hamstring, and wide receiver D’Marcus Adams, who tweaked his ankle.
Taggart said wide receiver Tamorrion Terry’s recovery from knee surgery is going well before joking, “We heal a little differently around here.”