The big news today is that quarterback Jake Locker was back in pads and practicing this morning for the first time since injuring his hamstring 11 days ago. While he was still limited in what he could do, just knowing he is back at all has to be a big relief for the Huskies.
Tyrone Willingham met with reporters a little while ago (no players today, so we won’t be able to hear from Locker). Here’s what he had to say:
Is Locker back to 100 percent?
“No, he’s not expected to be probably for some time. Again it’s going to be day-to-day when he reaches that point, but again, no concerns there.”
Did he do all the work in practice?
“No, he’ll be like all of the guys, Juan (Garcia), Casey (Bulyca), Alameda (Ta’amu). We have a number of guys that fit into that category of what we do we’ll be very cautious with them and limit what they can do. They will do some things, and other things they will not do. That will be the process the entire time.”
How much more involved was Locker today than he has been?
“I guess I could say 100 percent, but that would be referencing where he’s been at, which is zero. That’s pretty good.”
Willingham was asked what he saw out of Locker to put him back on the field.
“Jake,” he said. “That’s what we saw, Jake. Jake is eager, anxious, and ready to get involved.”
“There’s no question what we have to do is definitely put limits on him. Because he wants to be back and he wants to be going, and we have to be very careful, because he’s an instinctive player, so his instincts take over and he just goes. It’s just something that’s going to happen, so the best way to do that is to put him in situations that would protect him from using his instincts, then we can kind of limit what will take place with him.”
As for Saturday’s scrimmage, which Willingham said lasted nearly two hours, the running backs were apparently the highlight of the afternoon.
“If there was a highlight group, and I thought we had some good groups all across the field, I’d probably say our running backs were the highlight group,” he said. “They showed pretty deep that they can run the football.”
“They all showed that they can run the football. Had a lot of broken tackles, and that’s what you look for, how can you gain the extra yardage, and they did a wonderful job of that, the entire group did. I was very impressed.”
Willingham said that if the team were to play today, two freshmen could factor into the rotation. He did not name the two, but based on what we’ve been seeing in practice and what other coaches have been saying, it seems that Chris Polk is one of the two, and the other would be either Johri Fogerson or David Freeman
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