Rain forces State football indoors

April 18, 2012

Rain forced football coach Dan Mullen, middle, and the Bulldogs inside for Tuesday's workout. (Photo by Kim Murrell, SDN)

Mother Nature forced a change in plans for the Bulldogs but as all good coaches do, Dan Mullen adjusted on the fly moving his team indoors for Tuesday afternoon’s practice session.

The shift into the Palmeiro Center turned Tuesday’s practice into Thursday’s practice.

“It changed our week around," Mullen said. "We were going to scrimmage (Tuesday) and then do situations on Thursday. Obviously it is a little easier to do situations here inside so we switched the week’s schedule around and had a situational day (Tuesday). The last two main practices this week being Tuesday and Thursday we are getting done what we need to get done.”


As has been the case of the past week, the Bulldogs continue to move players into new roles with new groups just to push their buttons.

“We are putting guys in a lot of adverse situations and hopefully get things that we need to get and just look at a couple of things so that it is in guys minds as we head into the summer,” said Mullen. “Guys are working hard and in this time in the spring and we are doing some moving around, you only get so many practices.

“We are going to mix things up and put guys in different situations and see how they respond with the ones, and how the ones respond when they go to twos. Do they raise the level of play of everybody around them or do they sink to their level? We got to move a lot of guys around (Tuesday).”

While players made moves, Mullen wasn’t exactly thrilled with the results.

“I thought (Tuesday) was pretty sloppy, but when you go situational and sometimes you do that, you’re not in (rhythm),” Mullen told reporters after practice. “That’s where inexperience really shows. Not being able to understand the game situations. There were a couple of times (Tuesday) where the guys were playing, but not understanding the situation we just put them in.

”
Last time out Mississippi State held its second full scrimmage of the spring, but Mullen wasn’t on hand due to the birth of his daughter.

After watching film of the action, he came away relatively happy with the outcome.

“I was very pleased with the second team defense and the first team offense,” he said. “Really the first team offense and the second team defense won that scrimmage. When you get to watch it, that’s what I saw on the film, a lot of good things to teach off of. 
“It was better than I thought it would be, which was good.”


State returns to the practice field on Thursday when it has the last meaningful practice session before the spring game on Saturday.