are excited about the teaching aspects of spring ball.
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| Mike Emendorfer and the Pioneer Coaching Staff are excited about the teaching aspects of spring ball. |
Posted March 31, 2009
By Paul Erickson, Sports Information Director
The UW-Platteville football team has its first of 16 spring practices on Tuesday, April 7 at 4 p.m. Mike Emendorfer, entering his 11th year as the Pioneers' Head Coach, talks about upcoming spring sessions.
How much fun is it for you, as a coach, to get on the field again in the spring?
"I love it! It's just a nice break from the winter months of recruiting and lifting and those things to get back out there with the players and coaches. It's not as high in intensity because there is not a game to get ready for that Saturday. It's nice to focus on the game of football without the pressure of anyone worrying about a Saturday and how their performance will be. We can just work on the game of football and not be rushed trying to put in certain plays. I just love teaching and coaching. Obviously we have some holes to fill, but that's an exciting thing, to see who is going to be the next Joe Tinucci or who will replace Mike Genslinger, David Akey or Nick Grosso. We'll find out in spring ball if we have the players to step up and take on those responsibilities."
What to you hope to accomplish with the 2009 spring practices?
"Our first goal is to become fundamentally sound in every aspect, offense, defense, and special teams. Without pads (per NCAA regulations), we will focus on footwork and assignments, which will be beneficial. Our second goal, is that this allows us as coaches to experiment with new ideas and concepts that we've picked up in the off-season. The third goal as a program is we need to find a quarterback who can be consistent play after play. We're going battle that out. We're not going to determine a starter, but we want to go into camp feeling it's one or two guys who will be battling to be the starter."
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| QBs Wiederholt, Burkeland and Shadley |
You lost a big senior class last year. Are you excited to see who steps up in the leadership roles?
"We have 24 or 25 seniors, which is a great compliment to the program that we're able to keep seniors around each and every year. We've met with them throughout the off-season. Our off-season lifting program is by far the best it's been in 10 years. Coach (Jason) Wagner and Coach (Nolan) Krajco have done an excellent job with that. I think we have great senior leadership. One of the most important positions in football is the quarterback position, and we're all looking at that. Joe Burkeland is still going to play quarterback, but we're looking at him to be a running back / wide receiver and putting him in positions to give him the ball in open space. We're going to look at Mitch Shadley, Jake Wiederholt, and possibly a couple of other young men who are coming into our program who did not play last year."
Can you complete this sentence: Come the end of the spring practices, the Pioneers will be better at ...?
"Being a better team. Our philosophy is a pretty simple one: we want to be a team first. We want to take the core of our players, and I know we'll have some freshmen joining us in the fall on the 100-man roster, and have them believe in each other and believe in the coaches, and the coaches need to believe in them. At the end of spring ball, we need to have that confidence that we are a strong team, knowing we will face adversity, but knowing that if we face it together as a team we can overcome any bumps in the road."
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