Blogs › Buffzone Blog

Spring football: Defensive line

Posted March 10, 2008

The beginning of spring practices for the Colorado football program is less than a week away. Today we take a look at where the defensive line stands heading into a month of work.

Let's get right to the point.

While defensive tackles Brandon Nicolas and George Hypolite are a savage combination for offensive lines to deal with, this entire unit needs to make serious improvement in 2008 when it comes to rushing the passer. It also struggled to stop the run at times in 2007.

CU produced a meager 19 sacks in 12 regular season games last fall, and didn't get much production at all from its defensive ends. One of the two starters at end is back and Maurice Lucas seemed to be coming around a bit last season. But he still never has materialized into the four-star prospect fans were frothing at the mouth to get from Rangeview High School back in 2004. Maybe his senior year will be his time.

One good thing for this unit is there will be enough offensive lineman in practices this spring to get some serious work done. It's easy to forget that having just six offensive linemen last spring really affected every part of the team, but probably none more so than the defensive line.

Competition at end should improve with redshirt freshman Marquez Herrod entering his second spring and true freshman Conrad Obi entering his first. Both made strides in 2007. Herrod played well on special teams and saw some limited action at times on defense. Obi is among the hardest working players in the program (even though he was redshirting) and coaches are excited to get him in the mix instead of playing scout team.

Drew Hudgins was expected to help the pass rush considerably when he joined the program last year after three years in junior college. Bad luck hit hard in summer workouts when Hudgins blew his achilles tendon. He is nearing a full recovery but he won't be 100 percent in spring and could be held out as a precaution from some contact work.

Sophomore Jason Brace also should be back to full strength after a variety of ailments caused him to be limited through much of last season. Brace is listed as a defensive tackle, but played at both tackle and end as a freshman in 2006. Maybe he can earn some time at end again.

Don't count out walk-ons Kevin Cooney and Tony Poremba. This staff has a knack for building walk-ons into surprise contributors. These two have potential.

Hypolite and Nicolas are going to get most of the snaps during the season at tackle, but they don't have anything to prove in the spring. (I know Dan Hawkins would cringe at that, but facts are facts). Neither one of these guys is in danger of losing his job. Period.

There is a pretty big group vying for time behind them. It includes Taj Kaynor, who will be a senior in the fall and hasn't done much so far with the limited playing time he has earned. Brace and sophomore-to-be Eric Lawson also have something to prove with two years in the program under their belts.

Two young guys coming off redshirt seasons will be interesting to watch. They are Eugene Goree and Lagrone Shields. Both have enormous potential if they work hard and adopt the tenacious attitude Nicolas and Hypolite have used so well.

Daniel Madrovsky is the only walk-on in this group of defensive tackles. He joined the program during training camp last summer.

Defensive line coach Romeo Bandison talks about wanting to get to the point where he is two-deep across his line and regularly rotating eight to 10 defensive linemen. He's not going to be there in 2008, but with a good spring, he will be much closer than his first two years.