Spring Has Sprung . . . Sort Of

BGA photo

Big Green Kicks Off Prep For 2025

HANOVER – Almost three weeks after the putative change of seasons, with snow falling and the mercury Tuesday struggling mightily to get over 32 degrees, Dartmouth moved indoors for its first football practice.

Make that, its first spring football practice.

Head coach Sammy McCorkle made the decision to hold the first of the dozen offseason sessions allowed by the Ivy League out of the elements, and it turned out to be the right one.

“Good call on my part, right?” he said with a grin after the brisk two-hour practice that kicked off well before its official 6 a.m. start.

A lot of coaches – perhaps most coaches – would have been disappointed after just shy of three months of winter conditioning and almost five months after its last game to be inside instead of in the fresh air. But McCorkle isn’t one of them.

“One of the reasons I love being inside is because of the noise and how loud it gets in here,” he said amid the cacophony of sound his team made as it exited the Indoor Practice Facility, and the women’s soccer team made while taking its place. “It can be hard sometimes to hear when we are in here, and especially at the pace we go in practice. It’s kind of frantic. What that does is put our guys in a situation where they’ve got to really focus, lock in, and communicate.

“I love being in here from the get-go because for a lot of the guys, it’s their first time getting a lot of reps and signals, and having to hear and see things. Because it’s tighter than it is outside, everything feels like it happens much faster and it’s much louder. There’s so much energy, and the guys fly around. It puts them in the toughest situation they could be in right at the start. And that’s going to help us down the road.”

If Tuesday’s opening practice was any indication, the two-time defending Ivy League champions seem to have picked up right where they left off after closing out an 8-2 season (5-2 overall) with a 56-28 thrashing of Brown five days before Thanksgiving. The practice looked like a midseason session, and it finished on time, despite having a new offensive coordinator/quarterback coach (Shane Montgomery), a new secondary coach (Kevin Bracken), a new cornerbacks coach (Mike Johnson), an offensive quality coach (Grayson Kline) filling in with the wide receivers, and with the former offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach (Kevin Daft) now coaching tight ends.

“It was a good day,” McCorkle said. “I thought the coaches did a real good job. The effort was good. I didn’t see anybody loafing. Guys were running around. We had some guys that, due to injury were in different positions, and they did a great job of stepping up, and filling in. We had too many mental mistakes, but that’s going to happen when you move guys around. I thought the coaches did a good job with that.

“We have our core values and today we had the sense of urgency you want. If you make a mistake, make the mistake at full speed, and make it just once.”

ABOUT THE COACHING TURNOVER

Gone from last year’s championship coaching staff are secondary coach Aashon Larkins (to Appalachian State), corners coach Joe Castellitto (UMass), tight ends coach Wendy Laurent (Ohio State), and wide receivers coach Dan Hebert (offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach at Stonehill). Longtime strength and conditioning coach Spencer Brown, meanwhile, is now at Rutgers.

“Obviously, it stinks,” McCorkle said of the turnover. “But it’s something (former coach Buddy) Teevens always talked about. We want to bring in coaches who are hungry. It shows the type of coaches we have here that they do the kind of job that gives them the opportunity to go on to bigger places and have more opportunities.

“We talk about it all the time. We want to help our coaches the way we help our players. We want them to be able to develop here and have more opportunities. You can never fault those guys for the moves they made.”

ABOUT THE NEW OC

Tuesday marked the on-field debut of Montgomery as Dartmouth’s new offensive coordinator, but hardly his debut in that kind of role. Most recently OC and then interim head coach at UMass, the 58-year-old Montgomery has made 10 previous stops at the college level, including four years as head coach at Miami University. At Miami in 2003, he was a finalist for the Broyles Award, presented to the nation’s top college assistant.

“You talk about a seasoned guy,” said McCorkle. “This isn’t his first rodeo. You could hear it in the way he talks in the meeting and see it in the way he coaches out here. He’s very composed, but has a fire in him. He's got the expectation high for everybody on that offensive side of the ball.”

To make room for a coach with the wealth of experience Montgomery boasts, Daft was shifted over to tight ends, where he replaces assistant head coach Wendy Laurent, now on staff as an analyst at Ohio State.

ONE MORE TO GO

Grayson Kline is filling in as wide receiver coach while McCorkle narrows in on a replacement for Hebert.

“We had over 100 applicants for the position,” the head coach said. “We’ve had three guys already on campus and have another one coming in.

“It’s insane, and shows you that coaches know what Dartmouth football is all about and want to be a part of it. So we’re in the process, but we’re not in a hurry. We want to make sure we get the right guy, and it's the right fit. We're not on a timeline. I'm not concerned about that.”

HOW DID THE GUYS RETURN?

While first Brown and then new S&C coach Conor McNally had the opportunity to work with the players on campus for the winter, those players who were away also put their work in.

“Not bad,” McCorkle said of the off-campus work they did. “Some guys can always do a little more, but I thought mat drills last week showed the guys were prepared and ready to go.

“Coach McNally, in his first week of having the entire group back, had a heck of a plan ready. He was organized and the guys responded great.”

COMINGS AND GOINGS

Dartmouth has two fifth-year seniors in offensive tackle Konstantin Spörk and wide receiver Remington Gall. While Spörk has been a three-year starter, Gall has been a tantalizing prospect – when he’s healthy.

“He’s done a great job getting himself physically ready to go,” McCorkle said of the oft-injured 6-foot-5, 220-pound wideout. “We’re excited to have him back and he’s excited to get out there and have a chance to play.”

On the other side of the equation, senior linebacker Yomi Babaloa, listed as a biomedical engineering major, has retired to concentrate on academics, after making one tackle in two appearances last year. Also missing this spring is defensive lineman Zachary Lytle.

TWO QUESTIONS

Asked the most pressing offensive concern as practice starts, McCorkle said: “We have a couple new guys on the offensive line, and we need to have communication across the board. Those five working together. That's the big thing.

“We've got guys who have been waiting their turn, who've got great talent, who we have high expectations for. Individually, they do a great job, and now it’s learning how to work as a unit, as a fist.”

Asked the most pressing defensive question, the coach said: “Same thing. We've got a lot of new faces up front and at the second level. We've got a couple injuries, which you hate to have. But that allows the younger guys, some guys who normally wouldn't get as many reps in the spring, to get a lot of reps. That's going to pay off in the long run.”

ALWAYS THE QUARTERBACKS

With the QB who started and finished last season graduating, McCorkle probably could have predicted he’d be asked about the quarterback situation on Day One. As expected, he pointed out that Grayson Saunier gained a lot of experience and had success filling in when Jackson Proctor was injured last fall, but he came up short of calling him the presumptive starter. Among others, junior classmate Woods Ray, who started against Yale, figures to push Saunier.

“Obviously, Grayson has proven was he can do in game situations, but there are no guarantees at any position,” McCorkle said. “Guys in our program are hungry and want to play. That’s why they came here. That’s why they’ve worked their butts off, to prepare for the spring.

“It’s the same for Grayson that it is for Sean Ward, for Daniel Haughton, for Spörk. They all know you have to show up every day, and do your best.”

Look for a few more notes on Thursday. BGA OT will follow also a mid-spring roundup and a story out of the spring game. And be sure to check out the BGA (almost) daily site for notes from around Dartmouth, Ivy League and FCS football. (LINK)

Football helmet and slippers together at 6 a.m. – like bacon and eggs.     BGA photo