Practice Report: Oregon opens its doors to the general public for first open practice in years

Gus Morris

April 7, 2017

The scene at the Ducks’ spring practice on Saturday afternoon was somewhat historic. Spectators lined the sidelines of Oregon open practice as the program opened its doors to the general public for the first time in years as part of a new policy spearheaded by new head coach Willie Taggart. …

The scene at the Ducks’ spring practice on Saturday afternoon was somewhat historic.
Spectators lined the sidelines of Oregon open practice as the program opened its doors to the general public for the first time in years as part of a new policy spearheaded by new head coach Willie Taggart.

Nice little crowd gathering for Oregon’s first open practice of the spring pic.twitter.com/RCCVWtj6oZ
— Gus Morris (@JustGusMorris) April 8, 2017

Saturday was originally scheduled to be Oregon’s second practice open to the public, but the bad weather on Friday forced practice to be held inside the Moshofsky Center, which doesn’t have adequate space to handle the expected crowds.
Before practice on Saturday, Taggart answered questions from the media and explained why he chose to have several open practices this spring.
“We always ask our fans to pay their money and come out watch us during the season, so I think it’s fair to allow them to come out and watch their football team a little bit,” Taggart said. “Especially with a new staff and wanting to see what’s going on, I think it would be pretty cool to have them come out.”
For the handful of die-hard fans that braved the wind and hail on Saturday, they were rewarded with an inside look at Oregon football that has been private since the Chip Kelly era.
After players completed warm-ups, the offense and defense split to work on position drills. Quarterbacks Justin Herbert, Terry Wilson Jr., Travis Jonsen, Taylor Alie and freshman early enrollee Braxton Burmeister worked with receivers and tight-ends on one of the Hatfield-Dowlin outdoor practice fields. Troy Dye and Brenden Schooler worked on defensive drills with their teammates on the neighboring field.
On top of switching their defense from a 4-3 back to a 3-4 scheme, Oregon is working to adopt a new offense as well.
At this point in the spring, though, Taggart is more worried about his players competing with his intensity than learning the new systems.
“We’re taking it slow and easy,” Taggart said about implementing the new offense and defense. “It’s new, so we don’t want to put too much on them and not get anything out of it. But we’re going to put it in slowly and make sure our guys understand what they’re doing the right way and coach it before we move on to the next thing.”
Taggart said earlier this spring that the Ducks will have a rotating depth chart to foster more competition. So far, players have noticed a change in intensity and have said that Taggart’s approach has worked.
Oregon will reschedule the open practice that was cancelled on Friday, but it has not released a replacement date yet. It does have another open practice schedule for next Saturday at Jesuit high school in Portland.
Here are some video highlights from Saturday’s practice.

Ball security drill, missed Freeman in the video but he almost flipped the punching bag pic.twitter.com/8XcxGBbVZt
— Gus Morris (@JustGusMorris) April 8, 2017