After working out with military personnel on Tuesday morning, Syracuse took to the Fort Drum fields for its first practice at the base. 

For the 30 minutes that were open to media, the offense and defense split onto two fields and mostly worked as individual units. Here are some notes on the offense. 

Offensive line

The offensive line worked on a basic blocking scheme after going through its usual start-of-practice hands routine.

With two offensive linemen acting as defensive linemen and the third as an inside linebacker, Joe Adam worked groups through blocking all three. The center picked up the makeshift defensive tackle, the offensive tackle worked on the end and the offensive guard shot to the second level to pick up the linebacker. 

After Adam told the players that they had to move faster and hit harder, the guard-linebacker clash made for some spirited individual battles. Junior guard Seamus Shanley laid a good hit on sophomore guard Alex Hayes, and sophomore tackle Jamar McGloster went tooth-and-nail with junior guard Omari Palmer on a few occasions. 

Shanley continued pushing his teammates for the rest of the drills, and Adam took notice. 

“That’s good Seamus,” the coach said. “That’s how you guys should be doing it.”

Wide receivers

The wide receiving corps was noticeably thin. 

Syracuse had 17 receivers at the start of training camp. But that number took another significant hit on Tuesday with a morning announcement that Adley Enoicy and Keenan Hale have lower-body injuries and will undergo surgery. After practice, Shafer said that Corey Cooper and Sean Avant are nursing upper-body injuries. 

“Down to 10,” junior receiver Alvin Cornelius yelled during a run-blocking drill. “We’re down to 10.”

After working on run blocking and coming out of breaks, the receivers did their best to fill three teams for an 11-on-0 drill. Jarrod West, Adrian Flemming, Ashton Broyld and Jamal Custis all saw time with Terrel Hunt and the first team, and Quinta Funderburk, Ben Lewis and Steve Ishmael shuffled in with Mitch Kimble and the second team. 

The third team was a little harder to piece together, and freshman quarterback A.J. Long and sophomore tight end Kendall Moore had to moonlight as receivers to keep the drill moving. 

Tight ends

Tight ends coach Bobby Acosta demanded both focus and perfection from his unit on Tuesday. 

“Don’t blow a route,” Acosta screamed after sophomore P.J. Batten seemingly cut a route short in the middle of the end zone. “Come on we have to be perfect out here.”

From there, the tight ends sharpened up outside of a drop by Josh Parris on a pass from Austin Wilson. With the receivers, the tight ends worked on red zone routes including button hooks, short slants and corner fades. They also ran quick out routs for what looked like a designed safety option for the quarterbacks. 

Published on August 12, 2014 at 9:59 pm

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