Courtesy University of Central Arkansas Athletics Department
Stats and comments from head coach Clint Conque after reviewing film from last Saturday’s scrimmage – the first of three major scrimmages for the Central Arkansas football team this spring. The Bears will scrimmage again on Saturday, April 6 and then end their spring drills with the annual Purple-Gray Game on April 13 at 6 p.m.
STATS
QUARTERBACK
Wynrick Smothers: 19 of 24, 266 yards, 2 TD, 1 INT
Ryan Howard: 12 of 20, 164 yards, 1 TD
RUNNING BACK
Willie Matthews: 56 yards, 3 TD, long rush of 16 yards
Jacoby Walker (WR): 1 rush TD in goal-line play
WIDE RECEIVER
Damien Watts: 6 rec., 125 yards, 1 TD, long reception of 40 yards
Dezmin Lewis: 4 rec., 118 yards, 2 TD, long receptions of 70 & 41 yards
Blake Gardner: 6 rec., 58 yards
Justin Burdette: 4 rec., 42 yards
Desmond Smith: 3 rec., 45 yards
Courtney Whitehead: 3 rec., 25 yards
Chase Dixon (TE): 1 rec., 26 yards
DEFENSIVE LINE
TJ Randall: 4 tackles for loss, 3 sacks
Jonathan Woodward: 3 TFL, 2 sacks
Matthew Hornbuckle: 3 TFL
Dawson Hadnot: 2 sacks
Bailey McIver: 4 tackles
LINEBACKER
Zach Bush: Graded 82 percent, 3 tackles, 1 sack
Jazz Mason: 9 tackles
Aum’Arie Wallace: 6 tackles
Ricky Wyatt: 5 tackles
Kamane Thomas: 1 interception
KICKING
Eddie Camara: 4 of 5 field goals, long of 41 yards, miss of 37
Jace Denker: 1 of 2 field goals, long of 37 yards
Jonathan Harrison: 8 punts, 41-yard average
OFFENSIVE LINE:
“Cole Caruthers, Dominique Allen, Alec Willis, Kyle Stouffer and DJ Appe graded well and played well.”
SECONDARY:
“Josh Jones, Jestin Love, Marcus Peters, Karl Brady, Haywood Jefferies played well. Marvin Mitchell played very well before he was injured. Derek Floyd (DE) also played very well up front before he was injured.”
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS
“Willie Matthews, we thought he played well from the naked eye during the scrimmage, and after watching the film you see that – even though the numbers don’t bear it out as much – that he played very well and was extremely physical. Half of his carries were in goal line work, so that had some impact on his yardage totals, but there on the goal line he ran very physical and played over his pads very well. He’s got a good plant of quickness and speed and really showed some toughness in picking up the blitz in the pass game. He was really impressive, and ran hard. He’s got some fundamental things to clean up, but he ran well and ran hard – there was a couple times where he carried people into the end zone.”
“After reviewing the film, I was impressed with how active our linebackers were – whether they were right or wrong. We held out Justin Heard, Blake Childress and Radarius Winston, who moved up to the nickel spot. Those three guys didn’t go. Everybody – Zach Bush, Ricky Wyatt, DJ Holland, Aum’Arie Wallace, Jazz Mason, Kamane Thomas, all those guys are either redshirt freshmen or young players in our program who haven’t started. Everybody got 50 snaps, and that will do a world of good for those kids to see themselves on film whether it’s good, bad or ugly. They were very active, and I thought that was really good. We tackled pretty well, too. The missed tackles came mostly out of the secondary, and we’ve got to get that fixed.”
“The disappointing things were the penalties, the three fumbles and the interception. We hope to clean a lot of that up, along with some assignment issues, this week.”
“We’ll go fewer plays in next Saturday’s scrimmage, try to streamline parts of our scheme and focus more on execution and efficiency. We’ll do red zone work and some open-field sessions, and get some two-minute work in.”
