MISSOULA – Camp is wrapping up at the University of Montana. Now it’s almost time to kick off a new season.
The Grizzlies held a second closed scrimmage on Friday, to get some more full-speed reps eight days before the opener.
Bobby Hauck wants to keep the game plan secret, because Northern Iowa has no film on what UM will look like this season. The head coach also has not released a depth chart, and won’t until next week.
“We’re still in camp mode. So we’ll go right through the weekend, and we’ll start narrowing it down,” explained Hauck. “I mean, we have a good idea, obviously. But we’ve still got some good competitions going on. Frankly, starting lineup isn’t huge, cause we play a lot of guys.”
“Really I’m just hoping everybody comes out of that healthy. Cause I think we’re ready,” said wide receiver Samori Toure when asked what he wanted to get out of the final scrimmage. “To this point, how we should be a week before game day, is we’re crisp and we’re ready to go. And everyone is doing the right thing. And that’s just what’s expected of us, cause game day is coming up.”
Dalton Sneed continues to take the first team snaps and will most likely be the starting quarterback next Saturday. The Griz also had a couple redshirt freshmen playing with the first unit on Thursday. Running back Adam Eastwood and defensive end RJ Nelson look like they’ll see plenty of playing time.
The Griz are also using defensive sets with three safeties and only two linebackers, to take advantage of their depth in the back and mask the lack of bodies in the middle. Star linebacker and Big Sky preseason defensive player of the year Josh Buss remains out of contact drills with an undisclosed injury.
