Everything Barry Odom said after Purdue spring practice No. 9

After Purdue conducted its ninth practice of the spring, coach Barry Odom met with the media to discuss the team’s progress, injury updates and more. Everything Odom had to say verbatim:

Odom’s opening statement:

“Our guys have done a great job, our our team, on taking positive steps from practice one to to today was practice nine, I believe. With the the walkthroughs on the days in between, the lifting, the meeting schedule, we made really good progress in every position group.

I think the group that has maybe made the biggest jump from day one to today is our running back room. And there’s a lot of things that go into that. Play call, blocking up front, o-line, tight ends, blocking on the perimeter with the wide receivers, but right now there’s probably four guys, if we were playing, they would they would actively be part of the game plan on finding ways to get them the ball. So that’s exciting to see. A couple guys have got breakaway speed, which is good.

So we got to continue. Talked for a long time, we got to be able to run the ball and that’s that’s such a huge emphasis on what we’re trying to get done offensively. We’re making progress in that.

I think on on the other side, I think the the growth of the linebackers in nine days is really starting to stand out. We’ve got a long ways to go, but guys are taking the coaching points and then able to retain it and then it shows up on film.

So, we had a lot of special teams work today. Good on good crossover. About as real as you can get to a game in our punt versus punt return, kickoff return versus kickoff, in condensed spaces. So, that will continue to to be a point of emphasis for us.

The challenge staff wise is let’s get everything in that we want to get work, get guys to cross train, because you’re going to turn around and spring ball’s going to be over. We are healthy coming out of the scrimmage which is really good to see, thankfully, and we’ll continue to make progress. We’ll go Thursday and then Saturday and then next week we’ve got Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and we’re trending in the right direction. Excited about what the coaching staff is doing. We’re a stronger football team right now. More explosive football team than we really showed at any point last year, which is good to see. We’re playing faster, playing more physical, and playing with more discipline. So all of those characteristics will will continue to carry us to to play winning football.”

Q: What do you need to accomplish in the next two weeks?

Odom: “Well, as I just mentioned, continue to pour into the game plan. If we want to try some things out schematically, then now’s the time to do it. Get it on, it may be ugly, but get it on tape and let’s be able to teach off of it in the offseason. And then cross training guys. So, maybe moving a corner to safety, a boundary safety to field safety, or to nickel. See if they can do that. Inside, up front, are you always playing a shade? Can you play the three, the five, the four? You know, how are we playing those guys up front? Then the day-to-day fundamentals and the details of the position. If we can get where we’re elite in those areas, this will be a really good football team.”

Q: What did you learn from the scrimmage?

Odom: “I thought we played on both sides. There were bright spots on both sides, but I thought overall we just played more consistently in the execution of the play call. I think we, without question, something that we struggled on last year and there’s lots of reasons for that, but the ability to play whistle to snap and then snap to whistle and those times in between the ability to refocus and snap into the moment of the right here right now. I thought our team did that for three and a half hours on Saturday at a level that we can sure build off of.”

Q: What’s your impression of the secondary?

Odom: “Don Saunders makes plays every day. Continues to show up and he’s learning our system, but also he’s got game experience. He’s got real life work. So, it’s starting to happen more natural for him just because he’s understanding and can relate after repetition. He gets it and he’s got he’s got good length. He’s got really good speed and quickness, change of direction, and I’m excited about his continual work on what he’s doing and I think he’s going to be a really good player for him.”

Q: Have any other transfer defensive backs stood out?

Odom: “All of them have really, man, I’m glad that we were able to get them because we got experience and some production and guys that have played. (John) Slaughter’s playing really well. (Justin) Denson’s playing really well. Ta’Vari Hampton continues to do some good things, moving those guys around. Mister Clark, playing at the nickel spot, both the high safety spots, and he’s a guy that really can play all five, the corner spots as well. So, where is his best spot? Then the ability of Smiley Bradford’s playing better than he did last year.

So there’s fun competition on what those guys are doing and the continual growth of that room on how important it is. I also learned years and years ago, the better pass rush we have, the better we’re going to play on the back end. So we’re focused on that, but also I think we’ve got some guys on the back end, coverage-wise, that we can do some things we weren’t able to last year.”

Q: Is Hudauri Hines emerging as a leader?

Odom: “He is. Yeah, without question he is. Starting to show a little more vocal leadership and I think he feels like he’s earned the right to do that and he’s in one of my leadership classes and and continues to grow in that area and excited about his future.”

Q: What does Charles Clark’s promotion entail?

Odom: “Well, there’s a lot of thing that Charles does. I think Charles is going to be a head coach, if he chooses to go that path. He’s got tremendous leadership skills. He’s a great mentor. He finds how his players learn. Some guys learn through walkthroughs, some guys video study, some guys have to draw it. He’s a great teacher. Then he’s helped us so much game planning structurally, but then also his ability to recruit, retain, was as valuable as anybody in the offseason on trying to find a way to get that back.”

Q: What’s the status of Jesse Watson?

Odom: “He’s good. He didn’t practice in the scrimmage. He’s got a foot sprain. I think we’ll get him back next week, but man, he had shown up and up until he sprained his foot, he was having a really good spring.”

Q: What does the tight end depth chart look like behind George?

A: “Luca would would be in there depending if we’re going 11, 21, 12, 13 personnel and kind of what that looks like. But Lucas had a good spring so far. Fox transferred in and and really was feeling it out early on. Practice one, two, three, but the last three days is really making a push. He made some plays the other day. He’s doing some things in the run game blocking, which we’re excited about. We’ll play multiple tight ends and George continues to make good progress and, always everybody says well can he stay healthy? You know we all understand that and hopefully we can move past that narrative. Hopefully he’ll continue. He’s working so hard. Such a wonderful young man. For a lot of reasons, for a team, but him personally, man, I want him to have a huge year. He’s been through a lot.”