Ready for some football: Charlie Weis Q & A opens KU’s fall camp

By Staff     Aug 7, 2014

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KU Football coach Charlie Weis held his 2014 presser on Thursday August 7, 2014, giving the media his thoughts on this year's team.

With the first day of Kansas University football practice a day away, head coach Charlie Weis opened up fall camp Thursday morning by speaking with the media.

Entering his third season at KU, Weis hit on the program’s progress, key players, a late addition to the roster and much more.

Here are some of the highlights:

• **The new NCAA rules** that allow two hours of football work a week during the summer were invaluable. The only guys that are behind for KU are the ones who are walking in the past couple of days. The Jayhawks spent six hours a week this summer on strength and conditioning. The other two of the allotted hours went toward football meetings. The KU coach’s vacations got cut short so players could get prepared mentally. That also helped the new guys play catch-up.

• **The only guys not physically here yet** who are on the KU roster are 6-foot-3 junior “buck” Damani Mosby and 6-3 freshman linebacker Josh Ehambe. Mosby is finishing up final juice requirements and Ehambe is waiting for NCAA clearance after attending Prime Prep Academy.

• **Junior linebacker Schyler Miles** had a knee scoped a couple weeks ago with a two to three week recovery window; he is not gone for the year. He could be ready tomorrow.

• **Sophomore quarterback Montell Cozart won the starting job** in the spring and then the summertime was his to step up and be a leader. He won’t take over for senior receiver Nick Harwell in that role, but he put himself in a position where he can handle and manage the team. … Cozart has become more accurate. Key for him will be not being nervous. Inaccuracy didn’t show up in practices, when he wasn’t getting hit.

• **Coaches and this year’s seniors had a conversation** about senior leadership at the end of spring football. KU has a lot of older guys who have played. They’re in a bit of a different position now.

• **Now that senior receiver Tony Pierson isn’t a running back,** he should be in good shape to stay healthy. But they will also be cautious with him because of his history of concussions. There will be just enough contact to have him ready for the season-opener.

• **In the spring, Rodriguez Coleman was ahead of Justin McCay** at wide receiver. But that has changed since.

• **Junior receiver Nigel King is the new member of the KU football team.** The 6-3 former Maryland player graduated last Friday and asked for a release from his scholarship. His high school coach had a relationship with KU receivers coach Eric Kiesau. The Jayhawks have six receivers now that coaches feel like can all play. This all happened fast with King. As of Thursday morning, Weis had only seen him on video. King adds experience and production — has made plays and scored touchdowns. “It’d be nice to have some receivers scoring some touchdowns,” Weis said.

• **As far as Cozart’s backup,** junior Michael Cummings probably starts camp ahead of sophomore T.J. Millweard. Both of them will battle it out, and red-shirt freshman Jordan Darling is in that mix. But the close race is between Cummings and Milweard. They have plenty of time to settle that.

• **Senior CB JaCorey Shepherd and junior CB Kevin Short** are close in competition. It isn’t fair to list Short ahead of Shepherd when Short has never played a down for KU.

• **Now that Weis is just the head coach and not the O-coordinator,** he will spend some time in offensive and defensive rooms, but he will spend a lot more time with special teams. He wants to create a level of importance for the special teams. On game days he will be more involved with special teams, too. … Some of the terminology remains the same from Weis’ offense. … He lets the coordinators determine the depth chart.

• **In Weis’ opinion, the quarterback is more important than the scheme.** You also have to look at all of your personnel before you get to the QB. Part of the reason Kansas hasn’t had productive QBs is because the players around them weren’t strong, either. Cozart has athleticism and that makes it tougher to defend, with an extra runner. In offensive coordinator John Reagan’s scheme, Cozart is another guy the defense has to account for.

• **KU will be “very big” on the offensive line.** Weis looked in the hallway and saw juniors Larry Mayzck and Devon Williams both pushing about 370 and there was no room to walk down the hallway. In past years, opponents looked a lot bigger than Kansas.

• **With the offensive change, the main concern is getting the system in** and developing during fall camp. On defense, there is far more self-scouting and there are just tweaks to what they were doing in 2013.

• **”Im pretty happy with our running back situation now,”** Weis said. Seniors Brandon Bourbon and Taylor Cox have been waiting for their turn and junior DeAndre Mann didn’t come here to play behind them. That’s without even mentioning freshman Corey Avery.

• **Avery is a natural running back.** He might evolve to be like Tony Pierson, but he has “giddy-up.” Avery arrives fourth on the depth chart without including Pierson. He has a ways to go to get in that mix.

• **In the Big 12, it didn’t take long to figure out if you don’t have athleticism on defense** you don’t have much of a chance. And that includes defensive linemen. You need a middle linebacker like Ben Heeney who can run sideline to sideline. This is the best Weis has felt about the talent at KU by a wide margin. But they’ve done very little to back it up.

• **Pierson gives KU the chance to get into different formations** and force defenses to decide if they want to defend him as a RB or WR.

• **Junior defensive lineman T.J. Semke is someone who very few people know about** here. In the summer he works in the bail bonds business. He is tough and he works so hard that he makes his teammates better. All he did was push, and he has the respect of both coaches and players. … Semke was the strongest defensive lineman tracked this summer by the strength staff.

• **Freshman safety Joe Dineen from Free State High, in Lawrence,** has to decide if he wants to be a defensive back or a linebacker. Weis liked him as a QB in high school as well. Dineen would be an emergency QB if it ever got to that point. He makes plays all over the field… Cassius Sendish is clearly the leader of the secondary. You could see Dineen turning into that guy, having that glow. Weis loves the fact that he’s local and gets to play in his hometown.

• **After Weis arrived and gutted the program, they knew there would be a high risk-reward situation.** Now they have upperclassmen with experience on the roster. They have athletes who can play. That’s why the Jayhawks have expectations to be a lot better than most people think.

• **What KU is doing on offense gives it a better chance to win.** Bringing in Reagan and Kiesau have helped invaluably. … Reagan likes to run first. There might be a misconception that he likes to throw more because it is a spread formation. They have a chance now because they have a QB who can run it, too. Weis likes that run-first mentality. There are other schools that KU plays that you know they’ll throw it 70 times. If KU is throwing it 70 times, it means the Jayhawks are getting blown out.

• **Cummings has a powerful arm** and they wouldn’t be afraid to play him. Cozart has just proven to be better “at everything.”

• **On KU’s kickers:** sophomore Matthew Wyman has a “pro leg.” His whole summer was spent on being more dependable and accurate. With freshman John Duvic coming in, Wyman will have to work for the job because the new kicker is accurate. It’s clearly between those two for field goal kicks.

• **On the three non-conference games:** Weis loves opening at home, and he thinks playing at Duke is a great opportunity. People might say the Jayhawks have no chance, but no one in the locker room will be thinking that way.

• **Sophomore offensive lineman Brian Beckmann** played both guard and tackle in the spring. He’ll know both positions. He is clearly big enough to be in the two-deep.

• **Based off of senior O-lineman Pat Lewandowski’s mannerisms** and what he picked up in the summertime, he hasn’t expected for someone to come in and replace him. Someone will have to work hard to move past him.

• **Backup CB Ronnie Davis, a junior, doesn’t look like the same guy** after a summer of strength training. Probably added 20 pounds. … Strength coach Scott Holsopple molds the players in the offseason and can spot in the high school ranks which players are capable of putting on that kind of weight.

• **Weis would like to red-shirt freshman offensive lineman Jacob Bragg.** But Bragg looked so good in the summer, it seemed like he might be capable of playing this fall.

• **By the end of his first year at KU, Weis could tell Heeney was a frontline player.** He has grown as a person, too. Heeney has turned himself into a leader. There are a bunch of guys on defense who want to be like Heeney. A couple of years ago that might’ve been a bad thing. … Heeney reminds Weis of former pro LB Zach Thomas because people said he was too small, not big enough. “He might be as good as any defensive player in the league. Period,” Weis said of Heeney.

• **Weis has been “very encouraged” with freshman LB Kyron Watson.** Heeney has taken him under his wing. Watson would like to be Heeney when Heeney is gone.

• **The field at Memorial Stadium really looks good** now after the summer project of removing the track. They could practice there every day, once it starts getting dark early. There is so much more space with the expanded turf.

• **RB Cox has had some injury issues in the past.** So he is on a big stretching program to minimize those things. He is so muscular that he gets really tight.

*- Listen to the complete audio: [Charlie Weis talks new addition, depth chart, offensive changes and more][1]*

[1]: http://www2.kusports.com/podcasts/press_conferences_postgame_interviews/2014/aug/07/charlie-weis-talks-new-addition-depth-chart-offens/

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