No, we cannot take anything away from what we see Saturday in the Carrier Dome.
Normally the spring game is a nice opportunity to see how the offense might look or which players might have larger roles than assumed. But this year that goes out the window
because of the decision made by SU and Scott Shafer.
Scott Shafer said on Tuesday that this year’s Spring Game would be more like a practice. No clock, no live game action, and coaches moving the ball around to set up situations.
So what will we watch when we go to the Dome on Saturday? We may see some tackling dummies. We may see 7-0 drills with Terrel Hunt leading the offense against nobody. Cole Murphy and Riley Dixon may even kick a few balls. But what we will not see is a live action scrimmage that really simulates game action.
We won’t see what we want to see and what we need to see to really wet our appetite for SU Football. The problem is that Scott Shafer and the Orange have a lot to prove after a 3-9 campaign last year. We need to be brought back into the Carrier Dome with some interest next August, and by not playing a game on Saturday, the Orange is making a mistake.
If Shafer had a scrimmage scheduled, fans would get a short glimpse of a double tight end set that might bring them back to the past. We could see Zaire Franklin running the field filling in for Cam Lynch. We would have an idea of how Terrel Hunt has progressed since breaking his fibula in October. We might even get an idea of how the backfield is set up with Prince-Tyson Gulley and Adonis Ameen-Moore have left a void.
It would have been a great opportunity to get fans excited after a down year and a less than exciting basketball season. But instead we will be left with what amounts to a glorified practice in the Carrier Dome open for all to see.
Posted: Seth Goldberg
