Considering the number of injuries this year in SEC play, both in the pre-season and during the first quarter of play, injuries seem to be the ideal place to start this quick overview of practice yesterday.
We only have one guy that was held out of contact work yesterday, Preston Dial. I don't know the extent of his injury or for that matter what it is. That said, I'd imagine Coach Saban will address it this afternoon in his press conference if Preston still can't play.
We have used Dial a lot this season. He's had very little work with the 1st string. Most of his work has been in short yardage situations, goal line work, etc. So, if he's in black today (no contact jersey color) I wouldn't expect him to play Saturday.
On the brighter side of injuries, our OL returns intact for the second straight week. I mention this because the running game we have is being spotlighted quite a bit this week, we'll undoubtedly look to run between the tackles like we have been, and this unit playing at full strength bodes well for BAMA considering the injuries that have plagued UGA's defensive front line.
Speaking of line play and UGA, while it isn't set in stone, all signs seem to point to the Bulldogs starting a true freshman at Center this weekend.
The linebackers have been getting quite a bit of work this week and that continued yesterday. After a poor display Saturday against Arkansas the staff have been putting a lot of emphasis on fundamentals with group, specifically tackling.
The second area the staff spent a lot of time on yesterday was two fold. One being the zone assignments with the linebackers again. That, along with tackling, was another area they struggled with against Arkansas.
On specific players...
Dont'a Hightower was getting a lot of attention from Coach Steele and Coach Thompson yesterday. One area has been getting him extra reps in preparation in defending screen attacks. Georgia attacked the middle a lot last year in middle screens and it's an easy assumption to think Coach Richt is going to do the same thing again with Hightower being a target of the Georgia offense.
We can also expect to see a lot of our nickel package this weekend and Dont'a was getting most of the reps with our first team nickel group. In our recognition drills Prince was getting most of the reps with our second group.
Our CB's are getting extra attention as well considering they are facing off against a great due on A.J. Green and Mohamed Massaquoi. Both are down-field threats so our 3 corners have been getting a lot of work on jamming them on the line of scrimmage to get their timing off and disrupt their reps.
That type of coverage requires a lot of help from the safeties "over the top." Both the 1's and 2's were worked with exclusively in their recognitions. Mark Barron and Robby Green were getting the most reps in these nickel situations.
By all indications, we are going to try to get as much pressure as possible with, at most, a 4 man rush. That idea, much like Clemson, is to stop the run first and foremost and it's the best way to defend the screen plays that UGA has used so successfully in the past.
The update on practice today will be posted here Weds night or Thursday morning...more than likely Thursday morning.
We only have one guy that was held out of contact work yesterday, Preston Dial. I don't know the extent of his injury or for that matter what it is. That said, I'd imagine Coach Saban will address it this afternoon in his press conference if Preston still can't play.
We have used Dial a lot this season. He's had very little work with the 1st string. Most of his work has been in short yardage situations, goal line work, etc. So, if he's in black today (no contact jersey color) I wouldn't expect him to play Saturday.
On the brighter side of injuries, our OL returns intact for the second straight week. I mention this because the running game we have is being spotlighted quite a bit this week, we'll undoubtedly look to run between the tackles like we have been, and this unit playing at full strength bodes well for BAMA considering the injuries that have plagued UGA's defensive front line.
Speaking of line play and UGA, while it isn't set in stone, all signs seem to point to the Bulldogs starting a true freshman at Center this weekend.
The linebackers have been getting quite a bit of work this week and that continued yesterday. After a poor display Saturday against Arkansas the staff have been putting a lot of emphasis on fundamentals with group, specifically tackling.
The second area the staff spent a lot of time on yesterday was two fold. One being the zone assignments with the linebackers again. That, along with tackling, was another area they struggled with against Arkansas.
On specific players...
Dont'a Hightower was getting a lot of attention from Coach Steele and Coach Thompson yesterday. One area has been getting him extra reps in preparation in defending screen attacks. Georgia attacked the middle a lot last year in middle screens and it's an easy assumption to think Coach Richt is going to do the same thing again with Hightower being a target of the Georgia offense.
We can also expect to see a lot of our nickel package this weekend and Dont'a was getting most of the reps with our first team nickel group. In our recognition drills Prince was getting most of the reps with our second group.
Our CB's are getting extra attention as well considering they are facing off against a great due on A.J. Green and Mohamed Massaquoi. Both are down-field threats so our 3 corners have been getting a lot of work on jamming them on the line of scrimmage to get their timing off and disrupt their reps.
That type of coverage requires a lot of help from the safeties "over the top." Both the 1's and 2's were worked with exclusively in their recognitions. Mark Barron and Robby Green were getting the most reps in these nickel situations.
By all indications, we are going to try to get as much pressure as possible with, at most, a 4 man rush. That idea, much like Clemson, is to stop the run first and foremost and it's the best way to defend the screen plays that UGA has used so successfully in the past.
The update on practice today will be posted here Weds night or Thursday morning...more than likely Thursday morning.
