Behind the Scenes of Fall Camp

We all know what Fall Camp consists of: Meetings, practice, workout, food, more practices, meetings, and then sleep. However, there is a lot more that goes into building a team than what fans see and hear during camp. The start of camp is the first time Coaches have the full team together and practicing as one, helping create team bonding and brotherhood. But the coaches do so much more to help the team come together as one. One thing Stoops has continuously done during past camps - Pool Day. This is one of the best days of camp. You show up to Nutter exhausted from the days before, to see buses waiting to take you to the local pool. As a player, the first half of the pool day is stretching and cardio in the water. Afterwards, you get to show off your skills jumping off the diving board and relaxing in the sun. We have all seen the picture of Matt Elam gracefully sliding down the water slide. Besides the relaxing pool days and cookouts, they also receive a motivational talk almost every weeknight. The talk isn’t to get pumped up every night; however, the talk is about how to be a better person and teammate. It's important as a football team, and any team for that matter, to strive to be the best teammate possible. These talks are important because the players all need to be on the same wavelength. The talks center around getting the proper sleep, eating correctly, and holding each person accountable. One previous activity is the creation of mini-teams before summer camp starts. The teams each have a leader who is charged to make sure each player is doing what they are suppose to be doing: getting to meals on time, getting to workouts, making meetings. All of these activities are important to help hold each other accountable in the team building process. Lastly, something Stoops has done to help take the burden of camp off the players is simple - watching a movie. The movie that we were shown years past was Secretariat. Everyone and their mother from Kentucky knows the story of Secretariat, the horse that was said to be too small to win, but not everyone on the team is from Kentucky. That mentality was, and still is the attitude that this coaching staff is instilling in these players, ‘Don’t worry about what people and reporters say, just go out there and do it.' These activities are just a fraction of the extensive time spent turning these young players into a team.  Developing intangibles are important, creating a mental toughness that can sometimes only be revealed during a practice in the dark.