BOZEMAN — Montana State broke out the pads Saturday morning to wrap up its first week of spring football practices.
Since taking the head coaching job back in February, this is the first week Brent Vigen has had an opportunity to get a first-hand look at his roster and start building his depth chart.
“I think the progress was steady," Vigen said. "I think we made that step you need to as far as just how you practice. I think defensively we understand leverage and what that means on a non-tackling day. I think offensively, this is just a birds-eye view, but I thought we completed the ball much better every day, and that probably was the best that we did (Saturday). I’m pleased with the progress. The energy and enthusiasm that we saw Day One that was going to be there Day One no matter what has continued, so I think the guys are in a good place after one week.”
As players get acclimated to Vigen’s newly implemented offensive and defensive schemes, one position group that really stood out to him Saturday was the quarterbacks.
“Quarterback-wise, I thought we completed the ball a lot better (Saturday)," Vigen said. "I think our understanding has grown in that room through the course of the week. I’m not going to single anybody out ... but I think we have plenty of competition that by no means is this job going to be handed to anybody, and I think they all understand that.”
Before any decision is made on a starter, Vigen said they need to apply some pressure situations to really get an idea on a possible depth chart.
“Until we tackle I think it’s hard to make a lot of progress as far as that goes," Vigen explained. "It’s harder to measure football obviously without tackling, but I think a week in, we can at least have some honest discussions about that depth chart and at least certainly more than we could have at the beginning of the week.”
As far as when the Bobcats might hit the gas at practice, it could come as soon as next week.
“The plan is next Saturday will be the first day we do anything from any kind of scrimmage perspective," Vigen said. "We might do some tackling drills on Thursday. We’ll move through that, and we have eight days where we can do some form of tackling through the course of spring, and we’ll utilize that as we head to this next week from a tackling perspective at the first.”
