Facing tremendous heat for most of the afternoon, the University of Kentucky football team, clad in full pads, held its first joint practice session of fall camp at the Nutter Training Facility practice fields Tuesday."Every coach would say, ‘In my day, we had practice in 2,000 degree weather and we had to walk 100 miles to practice and we didn’t have shoes," head coach Joker Phillips said to a laughing media contingent. "It was a hot one, but we had no complaining. The guys practiced hard and there was a lot of enthusiasm."
The practice was one of many firsts for Kentucky, as the Wildcats held their first joint practice after four days of split-squad workouts and went with full pads on for the first time this fall. With all the changes coming together in one day, Phillips said that the players had to practice smarter in order to make sure that no one got hurt.
"As we practice faster, we have guys that tend to lose their feet and not run through tackles and we are not trying to do that now," Phillips said. "We are trying to practice smarter and staying off the ground to try to get nobody hurt."
Phillips was especially pleased Tuesday with the practice intensity of senior wide receiver Chris Matthews. Matthews had a good season as a junior-college transfer last year. He was the team’s No. 2 receiver, making 32 receptions for 354 yards and three touchdowns.
"He does all that he is supposed to do in the blocking area, his routes had intensity in them and he attacks the football," Phillips said.
No comments:
Post a Comment