For the first time in two years, the UMass football team held a proper practice.
The Minutemen’s 2020 spring session was canceled by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and UMass had a limited fall camp and regular season practice availability due to COVID-related restrictions and quarantines.
UMass opened spring practice Tuesday morning with a filled out roster for the first time in coach Walt Bell’s tenure.
“Great day, good transitions, good practice efficiency for it being our first real practice in about two years,” he said. “Full complement of bodies. More than anything else just excited about how far our roster has come.”
The beginning of practice was delayed a week from its originally scheduled window because a campus-wide athletics pause in February. UMass will have 15 practices throughout April, culminating in a spring game scrimmage May 1 at McGuirk Alumni Stadium.
One of Bell’s primary responsibilities during the spring will be to narrow its stable of seven potential starting quarterbacks to one or two before the summer. Five attempted passes during a truncated fall season led by freshmen Will Koch and Garrett Dzuro. Redshirt sophomore Tyler Lytle transferred from Colorado over the winter.
“As soon as we know somebody’s won the job, I have no problem letting everyone know he’s won the job. The number one rule of decision making is use all time allowed, so we’ve got right up until that first game,” Bell said. “Coming out of spring I’d like to have, ‘this is one, this is two,’ so when Brady Olson shows up he can dive headfirst into that competition.”
UMass will also have to hash out its depth chart at tight end, find its best combination of offensive linemen and allow the cream to rise to the top in the defensive backfield and along the defensive line.
“When you’ve got real depth that tends to make everybody better with great competition,” Bell said.
Six new coaches have been added to Bell’s staff: Savon Huggins (running backs), Frederick Walker (quarterbacks), Kyle Segler (tight ends), Dan Carrel (linebackers) Alex Miller (run game coordinator/offensive line coach), Jamey McClendon (defensive ends). A.T. Turnover took over as director of sports performance.
“I was so excited yesterday I could barely sleep,” said Miller, a former All-American lineman at UMass. “Not to be weird, but it was like Christmas.”
Bell will retain his dual role as head coach and offensive coordinator along with play calling duties.
“You gotta wear both hats a little bit. When the defensive kids do something right and great you’ve got to get excited which is great. There’s guys that do it and do it well,” Bell said. “I’ve got to be head football coach first, offensive coordinator second, and I’ve got to make sure I’m doing both jobs at a high level.”
Many of the same COVID protocols are in place as during the fall, but the Minutemen are able to have more meetings in person due to increased indoor capacity limits over the last few months.
“Not much has changed. We’ve been able to keep it going,” Bell said. “After the two week pause we haven’t had any other issues.”
UMass will open the fall season Sept. 4 at Pittsburgh. The Minutemen will host Boston College on Sept. 11 for their home opener.
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.