Spring Practice Report 3/22/21 – Tom Allen, Nick Sheridan & Charlton Warren

Below are partial transcriptions of Zoom press conferences with Indiana head football coach Tom Allen, offensive coordinator Nick Sheridan and defensive coordinator Charlton Warren on Monday, March 22.

Indiana Head Coach Tom Allen
Opening Statement…
ALLEN: Good afternoon everyone. I appreciate you joining us. First of all, I want to wish our women's basketball team the best today. Coach Teri Moren has done a great job and we are excited for them and their opportunity in the NCAA Tournament. We will be pulling for them this afternoon.

I am encouraged by the start to spring football. We had a pretty effective scrimmage on Saturday that wrapped up our first six days. It was not a full scrimmage, but it was a partial in terms of 40 minutes of live go's that I thought were really good for our team. It revealed a lot of things. It gave us a chance to see who could make plays in space and who could break those tackles. We are just trying to see where we are at. As a program, I feel that our energy has been really good. I love the focus that our guys have been able to bring. It does not mean that we are not making mistakes, obviously we are. But we are getting those things corrected each and every day. When you think about the goals you have for spring football, I think that we are definitely on the right path to improving our fundamentals and our technique. We are continuing to develop depth as a lot of young guys are getting a lot of good reps. They are doing some good thing. The process of continuing to build our football team continues day-by-day and step-by-step. We have been pretty physical by design to do the things that you cannot do outside of spring practices with blocking and tackling. We have had a few guys dinged up along the way. I do want to announce that Dexter Williams II has a torn ACL. That was a big blow to him and to us. It happened in a non-contact situation and is one of those things that's hard to explain. He will be out and having surgery in a couple of weeks. We have to be able to continue to develop the quarterback room and every other position as well.

Q. On the quarterback situation…
ALLEN: It definitely increases the need for Donaven McCulley to come in and be ready to go, which I have full confidence that he will. I am excited for him and his opportunity that this creates. At the same time, we have three walk-ons that are in our program right now that all do a really good job. All three were part of our scrimmage and are good, solid players that have a high care factor. They all got several reps on Saturday, quite a few reps, and did some good things. That is why we go out and recruit a room full of guys that are bought in and doing the little things right. Jack Tuttle has obviously taken a bunch of reps and has done a really good job this spring. That has to continue. It continues to be a position in which we need to take advantage of all of our guys in the room and be able to put them in a position to keep improving.

Q. On the offensive line…
ALLEN: I am very encouraged by their progress. It is a big group of guys. We have a lot of guys that have got a bunch of reps. The three new guys, and I include Randy Holtz in that group despite the fact that he has been here a year, have shown growth that we expected them to show. This is Holtz's first spring with us. He is a big man and he is learning how to play the position. Joshua Sales Jr. is another guy that came in brand new, right out of high school, and it has been huge for him to be able to get here early. Same with Vinny Fiacable. Those are two really good players that are strong, come from good programs, and know how to play the position. Obviously, that is a big jump from high school to college for anyone, but especially the offensive line. I have been really encouraged with the preparation that they brought with them. Those guys have been thrown in there and have got a lot of quality reps. I think that Luke Haggard has really grown and developed. He has gained quite a bit of good weight and looks really good physically. We have a lot of guys that we are rotating in there right now. That is by design to get a lot of guys reps and preparation. I have been encouraged by their growth so far. We are only six practices in with the seventh coming tomorrow. That is an area that continues to be a point of emphasis for us because we are only as good as we are up front.

Offensive Coordinator Nick Sheridan
Q. On what he's hoping to accomplish this spring season…
SHERIDAN: We are trying to improve our fundamentals. Trying to increase and build our depth. We are trying to expand on our offense. Things that you are trying build, grow, and look at. We try not to be in too much of an evaluation mindset when you are in the middle of it. You are trying to coach, teach, and improve every day, and I think the kids have had a great mindset. There are a lot of young guys that are getting a lot of reps at a lot of positions, which is great. I have been pleased with the effort. We have a really good group of kids and the staff has been phenomenal. We like to coach football, so it has been a blast. This is a great time of year to develop the team and to improve, so we have enjoyed it.

Q. On D.J. Matthews and the similarities to Whop Philyor…
SHERIDAN: I do not like to make player comparisons. Whop was an exceptional player for us and contributed greatly to our success here. We wish him the very best and thankful for his contributions. D.J. is looking to create that role for himself just like the rest of the players on this team. We try not to make comparisons and I think they are different players. They are not the same person. D.J. has had a great attitude about trying to learn what we do here and trying to improve and get better each and every day. We just want D.J. to be D.J. We are not going to try and make him be somebody he is not. We just want him to be the very best version of D.J. and we are looking forward to that. He has had a great mindset and great mentality. He has gotten along with the players on our team and has done a nice job. We are excited for him and thankful that he is here. We do not make comparisons. We want D.J. to be himself and know that will be enough to contribute to our team.

Q. On how Miles Marshall can grow into the opposite boundary role next fall with Ty Fryfogle on one side of the field…
SHERIDAN: I think Miles has had a lot of bright moments in his career here. Miles has definitely contributed and helped our team win. Just like all the rest of the players, we want him to improve, and to your point, to create a lot of different guys who become very difficult to defend. When you do that, the group collectively becomes better. It becomes more explosive, more efficient, and tougher to defend. We are excited for Miles and the opportunity that he has created, and the moments that he has produced and helped us. Certainly, just like a lot of players, everyone wants their role to continue to increase as they develop in our program. I think Miles is no different. We are pushing him and encouraging him to do that and trying to coach him as hard as we can so that he can improve to create the role that I know he wants to have. He has had a good attitude and has worked hard. He is an older player, not a young player in our program, and I think his growth has been steady since he has been here. His coach and himself deserve credit for that. He is not the only one. There are other receivers as well. That is kind of been, since we been here, a little bit of the natural progression for guys. Our first year here, Simmie (Cobbs Jr.) had a lot of production. Then you have Donavan (Hale) and Nick Westbrook. The Ty Fryfogle's were young players that were trying to grow into their role, and then they emerged. We certainly expect that across that room for some of the players to fill the roles and the voids from guys like Whop (Philyor), Nick Westbrook, Donavan Hale, Simmie Cobbs Jr., and Luke Timian. A lot of those guys have had moments and a lot of production. I know there are other guys, but I can't name them all. That is just the natural progression of a college football program. There is turnover each year and players have to step up and take advantage of those opportunities. We look forward to that and for all those guys in that room to continue to grow and develop.

Defensive Coordinator Charlton Warren
Q. On getting to know the Indiana defense…
WARREN: It's been really good. Through the spring conditioning and seeing guys move around in the weight room with Coach Wellman and through these first six practices, I've had a good chance at every level of the defense to see what guys can do, how they move, and how it best suits us going forward for our play calling.

Q. On new perspective looking at the defense…
WARREN: To me it is a blank canvas. If they were here last year and contributed and did a great job that is awesome. They have never really factored to me, because what I had returning is what I had my mindset on building this team going forward. I don't look at it as holes to fill. I just think of it as ways to develop depth at every level. We can't be a one-deep organization. We have to build depth at all three ranks and that is only going to happen through reps, fundamentals, technique, discipline, accountability to the system, and that is what our focus this spring has been so far. We have been focused on technique and fundamentals and building depth at every position.

Q. On the importance of the bull position…
WARREN: We're a 4-2-5 defense. The bull is the fourth guy all the time at the line of scrimmage. That position is very versatile because he's a guy that can rush, a guy that can cover, a guy that can blitz and it takes a special skillset to be that position, so I'm looking for that hybrid defensive end/outside linebacker, but he has to be athletic enough and quick enough to drop in coverage, to carry tight ends, to fold. There's a lot of things we ask that guy to do, which make him a very specialized player. For us, it's exciting because there is a lot of things you can do with that guy in the scheme in the course of a game, in the course of a drive, in the course of a series, to help keep an offense off balance.

Spring Practice Report 3/22/21 – Tom Allen, Nick Sheridan & Charlton Warren

Players Mentioned

Vince Fiacable

Ty Fryfogle

Luke Haggard

Donavan Hale

Randy Holtz

Miles Marshall

D.J. Matthews Jr.

Donaven McCulley

Whop Philyor

Joshua Sales Jr.

Luke Timian

Jack Tuttle

Nick Westbrook

Dexter Williams II

Indiana University Athletics