Deacon Football Scrimmages Saturday Morning
4/12/2008 12:00:00 AM | Football
April 12, 2008
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. - - Despite threatening skies and a persistent drizzle, Wake Forest managed to squeeze in a 90 minute scrimmage Saturday morning at BB&T Field. Shortly after the Demon Deacons had taken the field at 10:15 a.m., a brief hail storm chased them back into the locker room.
The first team offense, with quarterback Riley Skinner at the helm, drove nearly the length of the field on its first possession before settling for a 30-yard field goal from Sam Swank.
Brett Hodges then moved the No. 2 offense to the six-yard line before Shane Popham connected on a 23-yard field goal. Hodges and wide receiver Devon Brown connected on a 23-yard gain down the sideline to set up the field goal.
Redshirt freshman tailback Brandon Pendergrass replaced Josh Adams with the first team offense on the second series and ripped off 26 yards on his first four carries. Pendergrass finished with a scrimmage-high 67 yards on 15 carries. The series concluded with a 50-yard field goal from Swank.
Adams, the 2007 ACC Rookie of the Year, finished with 23 yards on six carries. Tailback C.J. Washington gained 12 yards on six carries in the scrimmage.
Skylar Jones and Ryan McManus also took turns quarterbacking on Saturday morning. Jones completed both of his pass attempts for 11 yards while McManus was 4-for-7 for 19 yards.
Skinner was 4-for-4 for 58 yards while Hodges completed six of nine attempts for 95 yards. Hodges threw a 40-yard scoring pass to D.J. Boldin for the lone offensive touchdown of the scrimmage.
Boldin led the receivers with three catches for 65 yards while tight end Ben Wooster had three catches for 45 yards and Devon Brown caught three for 37 yards. Boldin also rushed twice for 17 yards.
The Wake Forest defense contributed one touchdown as Michael Carter scooped up a fumbled snap and rumbled 38 yards for the score.
Wake Forest head coach Jim Grobe saw improvement in Saturday's scrimmage from last week's affair.
"We still had too many penalties but we ran the ball better today," said Grobe. "We had some botched assignments on defense and we gave up some big plays when we shouldn't have. But we were more physical than last week. I'm glad we called it off when we did because those guys were about to get lathered up."
Grobe was pleased with the play of his running backs in the scrimmage.
"I enjoyed watching Josh Adams and Brandon Pendergrass run the ball," said Grobe. "C.J. (Washington) had some good runs. I thought we ran the ball better today. We need to be able to run the ball both inside and outside. We have enough speed to get the ball to the perimeter. I also thought the offensive line was better today in the running game."
The increased offensive performance was due in part to a more standardized defense.
"We didn't blitz as much as last week," said Grobe. "We played a lot more base defense. The quarterbacks got flushed (out of the pocket) a few times but overall, I thought we had a pretty good scrimmage on both sides of the ball."
One of the Deacons' goals this spring is to find a receiver to fill the shoes of Kenny Moore who set an ACC record with 98 receptions last season.
"Devon (Brown) did some good things today," said Grobe. "He has Kenny Moore-type stuff."
The Deacons will practice Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of this coming week before closing drills with the annual spring game. That scrimmage is set for a 1 o'clock start on Saturday, April 19 at the Doc Martin Football Practice Complex on the Wake Forest campus. The scrimmage is free and open to the public.
