The Florida Atlantic football team is nearing the conclusion of its fall camp, culminating in a closed scrimmage at Howard Schnellenberger Field on Saturday morning. Sunday marks the official end of camp sessions, as the squad engages in a light walk-through session aimed at emphasizing necessary corrections. During the media interaction on Saturday, head coach Tom Herman (pictured left alongside Chief of Staff Matt Smidebush) reflected on the second scrimmage and shared insights into the team’s forthcoming plans. Below are some of the highlights from the session. Overall thoughts on the team’s second scrimmage “I thought it was good. We had news of some possible lightning later in the morning so we had to move practice really early. We didn’t have any meetings or anything like that. We were on the field at 7:15 AM so that was a bit of a change of routine for the guys but I think they handled it well. We didn’t play guys that we know are going to be key contributors for 10-15 plays, but it was a good chance to see some of the other guys too and they were all having a bit more playing time so that they can get to show the coaches and teammates what they’re capable of too.” Improvements the team made from the first scrimmage “We were more assignment-sound. I think there was less chaos trying to get people lined up in the right place at the right time, so that was good. With two weeks left before game, obviously getting lined up is the first thing you got to do and I felt like we did that better. We had some explosive plays on offense and they wound up winning the scrimmage, but I thought our defense played well with their backs against the wall in the red zone too.” On the team’s mentality after today’s scrimmage “It’s probably a combination of things. One, they’re probably relieved that training camp is over and we can get into more of what our season routine is going to be. I think they’re really hungry and they’ve shown themselves over the last two and a half weeks what we’re capable of when we do things the right way and do things the way that they’re trained to do, then we got a chance to be pretty good too.” Decision on the starting QB job “We’ll talk about that tomorrow and Monday. Maybe by the first part of next week or the middle of next week, we’ll have a decision.” Takeaways on how far the team has come since the first day of fall camp “We’ve come light years even from the spring. We’re so much better defensively and not just because of the infusion of some transfers but the guys that were here in the spring had a really good summer and there’s continuity in the defense and our coaching staff so those guys got better too. I think we’re in a really good position on that side of the ball. And on offense, I think we’ve got to find some depth at wide receiver but I think our starting three or four are pretty good. And I think we’ve got three tailbacks that can all really help us win in their own way.” Describing the team’s overall execution throughout the scrimmage “It’s still sloppy. The good thing is we don’t play for two weeks so we’ve got time to clean up some of that sloppiness and get a little more crisper. But the key ingredient is we’re giving good effort, we’re playing physical, and we’ve got two weeks to kind of polish everything up.” What the team should work on before the season-opener against Monmouth “Just see consistency on both sides of the ball and that comes with repetition and polishing things up, but I’m confident we’ll get there. We’ve still got a lot of work to do in the small details, but we’re continuing on the right path in terms of going really hard and playing really physical.” Press conferences for the upcoming 2023 season, featuring Herman, offensive coordinator Charlie Frye, and defensive coordinator Roc Bellantoni, are scheduled to commence on August 21.
