USF Football Wednesday Morning Practice Report

The USF Bulls held a morning practice today at the Frank Morsani Football Complex. With no game this week, USF is able to recover from a grueling win against a very physical Navy team and start their preparations for next week’s game at Memphis.

The team hasn’t had back-to-back days off since fall practice started on August 4, and the way they have played so far this year, they deserved it. The players will have Friday and Saturday off before resuming their regular game week schedule.

“It was good to finally have a bye week. It was tough on our guys,” head coach Willie Taggart said. “They had to fight through a lot of pain and that’s kinda where we’re at in the season, it happens. We were so beat up going into [the Navy game] it was just, ‘Man, if we can just get through this game, things will be a little better for us.’”

Taggart realizes that they won’t be 100% healthy even with a break, but a little time off from hitting will help.

• The second and third team have gotten a lot more playing time this week as they don’t have to prepare for a game on Saturday.

“We’re practicing a lot more of our younger guys and our two’s,” Taggart said. “Our two’s gotta get better than what they’ve shown to go in and continue to play at a high level [like the one’s].

• Freshman quarterback Chris Oladokun has carried over his great fall camp into the season.

“He’s been good. He sat in there and took a hit and threw a touchdown pass today,” Taggart said.

• Taggart was able to spend quality time with his family over the weekend. He took his wife on a date to Capital Grille and had a “nice steak,” then watched his son play baseball.
• Safety Nate Godwin said that Navy wasn’t sure how to block their defensive alignment on Friday and by the time the Midshipmen made the proper adjustments, the Bulls were just too far ahead of them. He added that his hamstring injury from fall camp still bothers him, and although he can play football he isn’t at 100% in a 40-yard dash.
• Defensive coordinator Raymond Woodie came down from the press box to the sidelines Friday night, and Godwin didn’t see that much of a difference.

“[Safeties coach John] Jancek was up top giving some of the calls and Woodie was relaying the message, they were both working together,” Godwin said. “It kinda felt the same.”

Injury Update:

Taggart seemed optimistic about Nadelman being healthy and able to return at Memphis. Pretty good timing for a bye week if you ask me. If Nadelman can’t go, Jacksonville transfer Brandon Behr would take over.

Defensive tackle Danny Awoleke took a hard hit in the game Friday, but Taggart said he is fine now.

With only one day of media availability this week, it’s tough to get a good read on things at the moment. We will know more next week when we return to regularly scheduled programming.