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University of Minnesota Athletics
Blog: Gophers Hold Open Workout
4/11/2010 12:00:00 AM | Football
Beautiful blue skies and temperatures in the 60s greeted Gopher Nation Saturday afternoon. More than 2,000 Gopher fans took advantage of the great weather and the opportunity to get a look at their Golden Gopher football team, as the squad held an open workout and scrimmage at TCF Bank Stadium.
The scrimmage was mostly situational in nature. The Gophers worked on situations such as the offense being backed up to its own 1-yard line; third-down plays of varying distance, the two-minute drill, etc. For the most part throughout the scrimmage, the first-team offense worked against the first-team defense. The same was true for the second teams as well.
Minnesota head coach Tim Brewster wants to see competition this spring, as he has basically said every starting position on the football team is up for grabs coming into the 2010 season. The fourth-year Gopher mentor said he was pleased with what he saw at TCF Bank Stadium Saturday.
"I thought it was a good scrimmage," Brewster said. "I thought our guys were extremely competitive, trying to finish plays, finish the scrimmage on a strong note. (Finishing) is something we're emphasizing this spring and without looking at the tape, I saw some good things."
One of the most-publicized competitions on the Gopher football squad heading into next season is at the quarterback position. Brewster said both incumbent senior starter Adam Weber and sophomore MarQueis Gray played well Saturday. He also had praise for red-shirt freshman Moses Alipate.
"I wouldn't say anybody's got the edge," Brewster said. "I would say we've got a competitive situation at quarterback. All three quarterbacks are doing some really good things. I was pleased today with our quarterback play."
See more of Coach Brewster's comments about Saturday's scrimmage in the video below.
Another Gopher fighting to maintain and improve his amount of playing time heading into next season is junior running back Duane Bennett. He echoed Brewster's sentiments that there was some good work accomplished at The Bank Saturday.
"I thought the scrimmage went well," Bennett said. "I feel as an offense, we did some great things. We had a couple things we can (improve). Overall, I thought we had great competition on both sides of the ball and we really got after it today."
Saturday's workout was the ninth of 15 allowed by the NCAA during spring drills. The Gophers will resume their practices Tuesday afternoon at the Gibson-Nagurski Football Complex. Spring practices will wrap up with Minnesota's Annual Spring Game, which is slated for April 24 at 1:30 p.m. inside TCF Bank Stadium.
-Andy Seeley
