Lights run more plays at spring ball

Wednesday afternoon at Tilleman Field, the Montana State University-Northern football team continued spring ball with another practice session. As the Lights continue to get themselves ready for the fall season, MSU-N head coach Jerome Souers believes they are on the right track.

"We're progressing according to plan," Souers said. "What I've really enjoyed watching is their attitude. They're having fun playing a game that they love and that's the kind of culture that we want."

The practice started with drills focusing on the fundamentals of football, such as blocking, passing and running routes. The Lights then moved on to conditioning drills to improve their speed. However, the Lights quickly transitioned to drills pitting the offense against the defense. While the Lights will continue to work on their conditioning and fundamentals, Souers believes it was time to add more drills into practice.

"We try to add as we're ready and spoon feed it each day that we go," Souers said.

The Lights started running plays with 7-on-7 drills between the offense and the defense. After doing several reps, they then moved on to 11-on-11 drills for the majority of the practice. As the Lights get more game-like reps in practice, Souers hopes to see them learn to control their emotions in order to execute the plays.

"We need to be able to process everything from the call to our alignment to the technique we're supposed to use, and putting that all together is always the challenge," Souers said.

Over the course of their 11-on-11 drills, the Lights ran many passing plays with a few running plays mixed in. The offense made some solid plays during the drills, but a fumble and interception here and there showed there was much still to work on. The Lights also split snaps between their young quarterbacks in order to see who can best execute the offense.

The Lights ran more conditioning drills to continue to get themselves in shape. The Lights special teams then practiced their field goal attempts to end practice. Before their next practice, the Lights plan to get some time in the weight room today. After spending most of their time in the weight room this past winter, Souers does not want that progress to be lost.

"We had huge jumps in personal records with every lift that we had so we don't want to lose what we gained by just leaving the weight room out," Souers said. "The format that we're using right now allows them to continue to train and continue to lift and continue to maintain the progress and the trajectory."

The Lights will continue to practice over the next few weeks. They aim to cap off spring ball with a scrimmage with live contact April 22. As that date soon approaches, Souers believes the Lights will be ready for that scrimmage.

"I see us making bigger strides. I see improvement as our new guys blend into our program," Souers said. "We're going to see some fun football this spring."