Spring Notebook No. 5 – Specializing The Little Things
March 22, 2019 | Football
Video Highlights
GREENVILLE, N.C. – Roy Tesh's familiarity with head coach Mike Houston is so thorough that it's almost a given that ECU's special teams play will be a reflection of how Houston wants the Pirates to perform.
Tesh, who was a four-time all-conference offensive lineman at Greensboro College before graduating in 2004, also served on Houston's staffs at James Madison, The Citadel, Lenoir-Rhyne and Brevard. He spent the last two seasons at JMU, where he helped develop seven All-Colonial Athletic Association performers on special teams.
"I'm very familiar with what coach Houston wants and how he wants to play the game from being around him so long," said Tesh, who also coaches the bandit position for the Pirates. "He wants to play a complementary game. Each phase has to match the others. We've got three good coordinators here that try to mesh that together.
"I know what he expects out of us — control the field position in the game. But we've got a complementary defense and offensive guys who can run the football and want to run the football, and that's how he models the program. We just try to hold up our end of the bargain."
JMU was second in FCS in punt return average and third in kickoff return defense last fall. The year before, the Dukes were fourth in punt return defense, ninth in net punting and 10th in punt return average.
At ECU, Tesh inherits a very capable group of specialists. Placekicker Jake Verity is back for his senior season after hitting 19-of-21 field-goal attempts and 27 PATs last fall to earn First-Team All-American Athletic Conference honors. Jonn Young, a junior, returns for his second season as punter. In 2018, he averaged 40.5 yards per punt, landing 13 of his 71 attempts inside the 20.
East Carolina also welcomes freshman Patrick Nations, a left-footed kicker who reportedly made a 68-yard field goal during a practice session in high school.
But the Pirates also have areas in which they can improve on special teams. Last year they were 96th nationally in net punting (36.1 yards), 115th in kickoff return average (17.4 yards) and 82nd in punt return average (7.4).
Tesh's plans to improve those stats hinge on continuing what he's always done.
"Coach Houston has always been about doing the little things better than anyone else, so we really focus on coaching the little things within each aspect of the special teams," he said. "And I'm blessed, I've got a great group of coaches here around me who are very, very involved. Some of those guys played special teams in the NFL, which is a great tool to have. But we try to focus on the little stuff within each scheme and make sure we're doing that better than the guy across from us."
ECU ended its fifth practice of the spring Friday morning at the Cliff Moore Practice Facility with a period of live field goal and field-goal block competition. Houston was pleased with what he saw, especially coming on the heels of what he termed a disappointing showing two days earlier when the players didn't go at each other as hard as he would've liked.
"What we're trying to teach them is, if they don't test each other, if that defense doesn't come after that kick hard, then our protection is not being tested," Houston said. "We've got to stress each other. We have to push each other as hard as we can. Otherwise, we're getting false evaluations. We're thinking we're doing a great job in protection, but the first time we get a real live rush in a ballgame we break down because we haven't seen it in practice."
"We've spent a considerable amount of time installing the punt coverage units and operations, which can really help us control the field position within the game," Tesh added. "We've got a good punter. We're getting the guys around him on the units moving in the right direction to make sure we can take care of him, and when he does get the ball away we can get down there and we can cover that thing.
"We've had a lot of faces in different places, but we know how vital that aspect of the kicking game is. Sometimes folks forget that we see the punter standing back there, but the 10 guys around him are making it go, too, so we really put a lot of emphasis on the holistic approach to it."
The Pirates will return in the morning with a change of pace, practicing on Bagwell Field inside Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium for the first time.
"Tomorrow morning's going to be a big evaluation for our players and for our program," Houston said. "We'll be in the stadium, we'll have officials, we'll have some live competitions, and so I want to see progress. We have not done inside run since Monday. We've been focused on a lot of fundamental work in tackling and blocking Wednesday and today. Tomorrow we'll get a chance to evaluate ourselves again. I'm excited to see what we do tomorrow morning. Hopefully we'll see drastic improvement from what we saw on Monday."
- Joe Corley
NOTES:
Junior OLB Warren Saba opened the 20-minute team segment with an interception return for a TD on the first snap from scrimmage before senior CB Michael Witherspoon later netted the defense's second pick of the period … Offensively, sophomore QB Holton Ahlers connected with junior WR Jonathan Johnson on a 49-yard scoring strike … As Houston indicated, the Pirates' scheduled Saturday morning workout at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium will feature conference officials … The completion of Friday's session marked the one-third point of ECU's spring practice schedule.
ECU'S 2019 SPRING PRACTICE SCHEDULE
Next Workout: Saturday, March 23 (9:30-11:30 a.m.)
Remaining Workouts: March 27, March 29, March 30 (scrimmage), April 1, April 3, April 6 (scrimmage), April 8, April 10, April 13 (Purple-Gold Game, 1:30 p.m.)
Tesh, who was a four-time all-conference offensive lineman at Greensboro College before graduating in 2004, also served on Houston's staffs at James Madison, The Citadel, Lenoir-Rhyne and Brevard. He spent the last two seasons at JMU, where he helped develop seven All-Colonial Athletic Association performers on special teams.
"I'm very familiar with what coach Houston wants and how he wants to play the game from being around him so long," said Tesh, who also coaches the bandit position for the Pirates. "He wants to play a complementary game. Each phase has to match the others. We've got three good coordinators here that try to mesh that together.
"I know what he expects out of us — control the field position in the game. But we've got a complementary defense and offensive guys who can run the football and want to run the football, and that's how he models the program. We just try to hold up our end of the bargain."
JMU was second in FCS in punt return average and third in kickoff return defense last fall. The year before, the Dukes were fourth in punt return defense, ninth in net punting and 10th in punt return average.
At ECU, Tesh inherits a very capable group of specialists. Placekicker Jake Verity is back for his senior season after hitting 19-of-21 field-goal attempts and 27 PATs last fall to earn First-Team All-American Athletic Conference honors. Jonn Young, a junior, returns for his second season as punter. In 2018, he averaged 40.5 yards per punt, landing 13 of his 71 attempts inside the 20.
East Carolina also welcomes freshman Patrick Nations, a left-footed kicker who reportedly made a 68-yard field goal during a practice session in high school.
But the Pirates also have areas in which they can improve on special teams. Last year they were 96th nationally in net punting (36.1 yards), 115th in kickoff return average (17.4 yards) and 82nd in punt return average (7.4).
Tesh's plans to improve those stats hinge on continuing what he's always done.
"Coach Houston has always been about doing the little things better than anyone else, so we really focus on coaching the little things within each aspect of the special teams," he said. "And I'm blessed, I've got a great group of coaches here around me who are very, very involved. Some of those guys played special teams in the NFL, which is a great tool to have. But we try to focus on the little stuff within each scheme and make sure we're doing that better than the guy across from us."
ECU ended its fifth practice of the spring Friday morning at the Cliff Moore Practice Facility with a period of live field goal and field-goal block competition. Houston was pleased with what he saw, especially coming on the heels of what he termed a disappointing showing two days earlier when the players didn't go at each other as hard as he would've liked.
"What we're trying to teach them is, if they don't test each other, if that defense doesn't come after that kick hard, then our protection is not being tested," Houston said. "We've got to stress each other. We have to push each other as hard as we can. Otherwise, we're getting false evaluations. We're thinking we're doing a great job in protection, but the first time we get a real live rush in a ballgame we break down because we haven't seen it in practice."
"We've spent a considerable amount of time installing the punt coverage units and operations, which can really help us control the field position within the game," Tesh added. "We've got a good punter. We're getting the guys around him on the units moving in the right direction to make sure we can take care of him, and when he does get the ball away we can get down there and we can cover that thing.
"We've had a lot of faces in different places, but we know how vital that aspect of the kicking game is. Sometimes folks forget that we see the punter standing back there, but the 10 guys around him are making it go, too, so we really put a lot of emphasis on the holistic approach to it."
The Pirates will return in the morning with a change of pace, practicing on Bagwell Field inside Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium for the first time.
"Tomorrow morning's going to be a big evaluation for our players and for our program," Houston said. "We'll be in the stadium, we'll have officials, we'll have some live competitions, and so I want to see progress. We have not done inside run since Monday. We've been focused on a lot of fundamental work in tackling and blocking Wednesday and today. Tomorrow we'll get a chance to evaluate ourselves again. I'm excited to see what we do tomorrow morning. Hopefully we'll see drastic improvement from what we saw on Monday."
- Joe Corley
NOTES:
Junior OLB Warren Saba opened the 20-minute team segment with an interception return for a TD on the first snap from scrimmage before senior CB Michael Witherspoon later netted the defense's second pick of the period … Offensively, sophomore QB Holton Ahlers connected with junior WR Jonathan Johnson on a 49-yard scoring strike … As Houston indicated, the Pirates' scheduled Saturday morning workout at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium will feature conference officials … The completion of Friday's session marked the one-third point of ECU's spring practice schedule.
ECU'S 2019 SPRING PRACTICE SCHEDULE
Next Workout: Saturday, March 23 (9:30-11:30 a.m.)
Remaining Workouts: March 27, March 29, March 30 (scrimmage), April 1, April 3, April 6 (scrimmage), April 8, April 10, April 13 (Purple-Gold Game, 1:30 p.m.)
Players Mentioned
Quarterback
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Outside Receiver
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Placekicker
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Outside Linebacker
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Placekicker/Punter
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Defensive Back
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Punter
/ FootballMonday, September 14
Saturday, September 12
Thursday, September 10
Monday, September 07
