COLLEGE STATION — The Texas A&M football team opened its 2012 spring drills under first-year Aggie head coach Kevin Sumlin with a crisp two-hour practice at the Coolidge Grass Practice Fields on Saturday.
“It feels good (to get started), and my voice isn’t completely gone so the practice didn’t go that bad,” joked Sumlin, who was hired in December after four seasons at the University of Houston. “There were some good things. I thought the tempo of the things we did is something that we’ve got to learn. I thought the players handled it pretty well. The tempo, how we do things, getting on and off the field…we’ve got a lot of things we need to work on, but now they know what we’re expecting and I look for us to get better.”
Texas A&M is coming off a 7-6 season that ended with a victory over Northwestern in the Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas. The Aggies return 54 lettermen from the 2011 squad, including 15 starters (9 offense, 5 defense).
“I expect a pretty good (positional) battle just about everywhere on the field,” Sumlin said. “We got two offensive tackles that are pretty good. Our line is pretty good. We’ve got to develop some depth there. Other than than, we got pretty good competition all over the field. C-Mike (Christine Michael) ran some balls today, which is way ahead of where I thought he would be. I have to tell him to go sit down and then I look back up and he’s back in there. I’ve got to have a meeting with him – but it’s a good meeting…he wants to play. We’re going to have battles at running back, we’ve go to develop some depth there. Wide receiver, same deal there. Ryan Swope caught some deep balls, looked pretty good, but we’ve got to have some guys step to the forefront and be playmakers. Same thing on defense. Same thing in the secondary, same thing at linebacker, same at d-line. It’s a battle all over the place.”
Sumlin’s first priority for the Aggies this spring is fundamentals.
“Getting lined up,” said Sumlin of what he wanted to get accomplished in the first few days of practice. “Getting lined up and knowing what you’re doing. (They need to) Learn it real fast. That seems pretty easy, but we try to stress these guys out as much as possible from a tempo standpoint and from a confusion standpoint because that’s the way the game is played. You’ve got to be comfortable playing that way and we’ll get there. There are two stages: the ‘what to do’ stage and then ‘how to do it’. Right now we’re still in the ‘what to do’ stage.
Senior-to-be wide receiver Ryan Swope, who led the team with a school-record 89 catches for 1,207 yards, was excited to get started.
“It was a good day,” Swope said. “It was hot, but we had fun with it. Guys were working and competing. We came out with the music on and there was a lot of energy. There’s so much character on this team and it showed today. We’re just working hard and making each other better and competing. It was a good day.”
Swope referenced the tempo of Sumlin’s offense, which led the nation in passing yards and total offense at UH last year.
“The tempo is something we’re all adjusting to,” Swope said. “It’s, for sure, a lot quicker than what we’re used to, but at the same time you look up and the defense is still trying to get back in position. It’s huge to emphasize that tempo and get things rolling because we need that edge. We have to work like that so we get in condition, and it just comes natural.”