Rutgers football held what appeared to be its final training camp practice on Monday. Head coach Greg Schiano said the Scarlet Knights are now gearing up for their matchup against Temple on Sept. 2.
“There was a lot of good stuff,” Schiano said. “I think we are locked in on Temple now. We’ve done a lot things scheme wise, now this is it. I think the whole team is excited.”
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Rutgers has yet to name captains yet for the season, but they are upcoming.
“Soon,” Schiano revealed. “We’ve done it where we've had multiple captains during the year. I like our leadership. I think we have leaders and older guys who have played a lot of football.”
The Scarlet Knights held its second and last scrimmage this past Saturday, and there are no notable new injuries.
“I think we got out of it pretty clean, which is positive,” Schiano said. “Certainly you go through a hard training camp guys have bumps and bruises, but we’re pretty clean.”
Freshman wide receiver Carnell Davis was spotted by TKR down on the field. Davis was out until today with an injury suffered prior to camp in an incident.
“He was out there today. I did not get a report yet if he was able to do everything,” Schiano said. “We didn't send him right from zero to nothing. So today was a get-back into it day and then we're going to go piece by piece. And every day he's good we’ll add little bit more. So there's not a real timetable on that. This is not a common injury that he had. So I think our trainers and doctors are all over it.”
The success of the offense this season and always depends on the play of the offensive line. No set starting five has been determined just yet as there is still some mixing and matching going on.
“Not sure we're 100% set on who the first five are going to be. There’s some back and forth right now,” Schiano said. “We have to sure that up here pretty soon.”
Speaking of the offensive line, left guard Cedrice Paillant was asked about specifically and he is improving. Paillant started seven games a year ago after transfer in from the junior college ranks
“He’s actually performed pretty well. At times consistency is the issue,” Schiano said. “But I think he's more consistent than he's ever been. So that's a positive build on that.”
Monday, the Big Ten Conference announced that teams that cannot play due to COVID will have to forfeit. If both teams are unable to play, the game will not count.
“That contest shall be considered a loss for the team impacted by COVID-19 and a win for its opponent in the conference standings,” the Big Ten said in a statement. “If both of the two competing teams are unable to participate in a scheduled Conference competition due to COVID-19 and as a result the competition is unable to occur on the calendar day on which it is scheduled, the competition shall be considered a ‘no contest’.”
Schiano said the team will of course be diligent in doing everything it can to keep the virus away and play. If the situation presented itself, walk-ons will play
“I don’t know. If last year taught us anything its we don't know yet. We think we know. You better have is contingencies,” Schiano said. “I thought the coaching staff and training staff did a very good job of having contingencies. You hardly give up a game without trying to fight to win, so if you have healthy players, you want to try to win the game. It’s nice to stay ahead of it. We’ll certainly do our best.”
Follow Chris Nalwasky on Twitter @ChrisNalwasky.
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