Texas Tech Practice Report: Red Raiders Scrimmage Again

Today’s Texas Tech Football practice report is filed by 1340 The Fan’s Rob Brennan

Lubbock, TX (1340TheFan.com) — Texas Tech held its second scrimmage of the preseason Wednesday morning.  Here is a recap position by position.

Quarterbacks: Nothing out the ordinary.  Both Seth Doege and Michael Brewer looked pretty good.  Not as many deep balls thrown today as there were on Saturday.  Most passes by both QB's were on target, a few more pass break-ups compared to Saturday's scrimmage as the secondary stepped up its play.

Running Backs: Kenny Williams continues to get first team reps.  Williams, SaDale Foster, and Bradley Marquez took turns operating from shotgun in "Wildcat Packages."  Foster continues to improve his running game as the regular season gets closer.  He shows great cutting and good bursts of speed out of the backfield.  Foster's size and speed reminds me of Darren Sproles of the New Orleans Saints.

Receivers: Nobody really stood out since today's scrimmage was more focused on the running game.  A few deep balls were mostly broken up by the Tech secondary.  Jace Amaro had a few nice receptions in redzone situations.  Senior inside receiver Austin Zouzalik got attention from the training staff during the second half of the scrimmage.  Zouzalik wears a no-contact red jersey during practice.

Offensive Line: It's evident the offense is still missing La'Raven Clark and Beau Carpenter.  The interior line got shredded today.  A few more procedure penalties and a lack of execution seemed to be the reason why head coach Tommy Tuberville tossed his clip board to the ground during the redzone portion of the scrimmage.

Overall the offense had a hard time finding the endzone this morning, most of the scoring chances came from the foot of Ryan Bustin.  At one point he missed as many as three field goals in a row, but got back on track with a 41-yarder from the right hash mark.

Defensive Line: The right side of the defensive line seems to be redshirt freshman Pete Robertson's job to lose.  He was all over the field (in a good way) this morning.  Robertson rotated with redshirt freshman Kindred Evans and junior Dartwan Bush.  Robertson looked to have the most success on the right side, got off the line well, and continued to put pressure on the quarterbacks.  As for the left side, Tommy Tuberville said on Tuesday it's a battle between sophomore Jackson Richards and redshirt freshman Brendan Jackson.  Both had some minor set-backs as Jackson and Richards seemed to have a hard time getting off blocks.  On one play, Jackson got off the line unblocked, but froze in the backfield as he watched the running back run right by him.  Defensive tackles as a unit played pretty strong.  However, it's hard to tell how well they are due to the fact the unit was taking advantage of a depleted interior offensive line during the scrimmage.

Linebackers: The run defense is getting stronger as the preseason continues.  One area concern is short yardage pass defense.  On one play, all three linebackers on the first team sailed to the left side of the field in what looked like a zone coverage, that gave the offense a wide open middle of the field to dump it off over the line to the running back and a gain of about 8-12 yards.  It looked like it was just a missed assignment.

Defensive Backs: An unexpected bright spot in today's scrimmage.  The secondary defended most routes very well.  Not as many deep balls were thrown today, but when that was the case, the secondary stepped up and broke up the passes including a 30-plus yard deep route from Brewer to Marquez.  Junior Tre Porter, who is also wearing a no-contact red jersey, got a few reps with the first team defense at safety along side with Cody Davis.  Eugene Neboh was injured early on in the scrimmage with a lower body injury.  He appeared to be okay and most likely won't miss much time if any at all.  True freshman safety Michael Awe appears to have the most energy in the secondary.  He works mostly with the third team, but when he is on the field he finds a way to the ball and hits very hard.