Syracuse Football Practice: First Blood

WE GOT A BLEEDER!

Three fights interrupted approximately 45 minutes of scrimmaging. One of them left Marrone, who jumped in to break up one fight, with a cut on his right little finger. He sported a bandage on the digit when he met with reporters after the session.

"Right now we’re going after each other pretty good," Marrone said. "When the head coach comes back and his finger’s bleeding, that’s a pretty spirited practice."

Intensity is high in spring ball and everyone seems to be just fine with that.  To his credit though, Coach Marrone did draw the line between competition and combat.  All class, this guy.

So enough of this lineman/linebacker/cornerback/wide receiver nonsense...is Ryan Nassib the starting quarterback or what?  It's what we're all wondering, right?  Nassib and "RGL" Charley Loeb have both been getting tons of snaps in spring ball and while Nassib appears to be maintaining his hold on the top spot, nothing's set in stone. 

Monday was a big session for passing and, according to the D.O.'s Tony Olivero, Nassib won the day. Kinda.

All in all, Nassib definitely looked better than Loeb Monday. But with that he took many more snaps than the redshirt freshman — especially towards the conclusion of 11-on-11 drills  at the end of practice. Also, during the middle of practice Nassib and Loeb split up with the first and second team respectively on each field. Both the 1st team offense and defense on Nassib’s field seemed to progress through the drill faster as they started hitting at full force a good fifteen minuted before the Marrone-overseen 2nd team offense and defense on the other field. Take from that what you want.

Marrone has also been vocal about installing more option attack in the offense this year.  With a backfield that gives you a lot of "multiple," it could work extremely well.  And if that's the case, it would seem that Nassib is the go-to guy for that:

With regards to the option, Nassib was the QB almost entirely working out of it. Marrone was pleased with what he saw out of Nassib with his option reads Monday. Linebacker Derrell Smith was impressed as well with Nassib and Carter — who reeled off successful runs out of it. Here’s what Smith had to say:

"(The option) was very hard to read (Monday) because we rarely see option unless we play West Virginia or Pittsburgh. But other than that the offense did a good job. They installed it today."

This isn't to say RGLCL isn't playing well. By all accounts he's acquitting himself quite well. He's just a year behind Nassib in game management and experience.  Long way to go.  But so far...so good.