Idaho coach Paul Petrino was visibly unhappy with his offense’s effort near the end of the first half of the Vandals’ first football scrimmage of fall camp Saturday. His offense got the message.
On the first play of the second half, freshman quarterback Matt Linehan connected with sophomore wide receiver Jacob Shannon for a 50 yard touchdown reception.
“I think we did a lot of good things offensively,” Linehad said. “We came out firing really good early. Just hit a rough patch in the middle there but we finished off pretty well today.”
Petrino agrees with Linehan. He said the offense was the most impressive unit to begin the scrimmage scoring several touchdowns but then the defense picked it up near the middle. To end things, the offense was back on top again scoring a total of 15 touchdowns and a field goal on the day.
“Both sides of the ball played well at times,” Petrino said. “We just got to get more where it’s kind of 50-50 — not be front runners. Not be where things are going good we just start dominating on this side of the ball. There was a lot of things that were encouraging. Now we just got to keep improving.”
Petrino said neither quarterback found much separation in the quarterback battle after the first scrimmage. Both Linehan and sophomore Chad Chalich made a share of big plays as well as mistakes.
“It felt like there were times they both did some good things and times they just have to learn,” Petrino said. “Sometimes you saw I stopped the scrimmage and talked to them. They’re both young. Every day is a teaching day, every day is a learning day so sometimes we just slow things down and teach those two because the most important thing is developing those two.”
True freshman Jake Luton also showed impressive arm strength during the scrimmage but Petrino said, that although he has the physical talent, he isn’t considered a member of the quarterback battle at this time.
Overall, both Linehan and Chalich had similar completion percentages (50 percent for Chalich and 51 percent for Linehand) while Linehan had two interceptions to Chalich’s one. But Linehad through the ball more, had better runs and threw five touchdowns to Chalich’s zero. The quarterbacks were not live to be tackled during the scrimmage.
In addition to Shannon, several receivers showed promise on Saturday. Sophomore Deon Watson wasn’t flashy but showed consistency and great hands with six receptions for 86 yards. Converted quarterback to receiver Joshua McCain had maybe the highlight play of the day with a fully extended catch down the middle for a touchdown from Linehan.
“I just ran down the middle and Matt found me wide open,” McCain said. “There it is simple as that.”
The running back committee had its share of highlights on the day with veterans Jerrell Brown and Kris Olugbode scoring touchdowns but it was newcomers who were the most impressive. Junior college transfer Elijhaa Penny and true freshman Aaron Duckworth combined for 150 rushing yards and four touchdowns on the day.
“Penny did some good things,” Petrino said. “We just got to keep improving. We do a lot on offense so they just got to keep learning. (Duckworth) had some nice runs. He just needs to keep getting his pads a little bit lower and hitting it a little bit harder at times but it was nice. He had some really nice runs.”
Sophomore Richard Montgomery showed flashes at both running back and receiver. He finished with four receptions for 39 yards and a touchdown and seven rushes for 47 yards.
On the defensive side, the defensive line had good penetration at times, the linebackers stepped up to get the team rallied and the secondary showed improved speed.
“As a defense we had our ups and our downs but our whole motto this year is we can always get better at something so we’ll come back and improve more next week,” junior cornerback Jayshawn Jordan said. “The team speed improved a lot. We worked real hard over the summer on that. That was one of our biggest things. So as far as defense, offense, all around the team speed has been a lot better which we’re going to need especially this year and this season.”
On the defensive line, Petrino was impressed with household names like Quayshawne Buckley, Quinton Bradley and Max Forde but Ryan Edwards and Anthony Rice also impressed combining for five tackles for loss and five sacks.
The team hits the field again for practice on Monday while the second team scrimmage is scheduled for Saturday.