Texas State notebook: Extra summer football workouts give Bobcats head start

SAN MARCOS — The first day of fall practice didn’t feel like it for Texas State coach Jake Spavital. With the NCAA now allowing more time for preseason football activities over the summer — eight hours per week in mid-July and 20 hours per week in late July and early August — Spavital has had more time to acclimate a team full of transfers.

“Really doesn’t feel like the first day for us,” Spavital said. The NCAA “changed the rules over the summertime, especially what we can do in fall camp, so we’ve been allowed to work with these kids this summer. A lot of it is just routes on air, working on continuity and timing with quarterbacks and receivers, and you can get some things going with the defensive side as well. You can get a lot of your base installs in over the summer. That has helped out tremendously.

“So this is day one, a helmet-to-helmet practice, but it’s probably the most in-depth install I’ve ever done in the history of my career. It’s because of how we are allowed to work with those kids over the summer. … Today was probably the most in-depth thing I’ve ever seen. We’re doing all sorts of new things on offense and defense.”

Now in fall camp, the Bobcats will have 25 practices, five per week, with eight full-padded practices before the first game week.

The most anticipated position battle is at quarterback. The two starters from last season have left, with Tyler Vitt graduating and Brady McBride transferring to Appalachian State. Now the Bobcats have a battle among a handful of quarterbacks who haven’t thrown a pass for Texas State.

The competition is primarily a two-man contest between Layne Hatcher, an Arkansas State transfer who joined the team before spring practice, and Ty Evans, a North Carolina State transfer who played sparingly his first season at Texas State. But Spavital had high praise for Baylor transfer CJ Rogers, a late addition this summer who still has four years left, and said there is possibility he will play this season.

“If you had told me — and I said this at media day — that our starting quarterback is at App State and then we take the Arkansas State quarterback, I would have been like, ‘What world are we living in right now?’ ” Spavital said. “That’s just kind of the nature of college football. Going into this season, you have a good competition between Ty and Layne. I wanted to increase it. We had these talks from roster management about if we’re comfortable having two developmental quarterbacks underneath those two.

“So we brought in CJ Rogers, too, who has been a great addition. He’s got a live arm; he’s smart. I’ve thrown the whole book at the kid already. Like I said, the installs are at an all-time high, and he can handle it. There’s some things he’s got to learn, but that’s because he’s only been out there for one day with us. I think he’s adding a whole other dimension to this QB battle. It’s going to be fun with those three. They all bring something different.”

Spavital said the biggest difference between the quarterbacks this year and last year is that this year they are “true pocket passers” instead of “QB-run guys, move-the-pocket guys.”

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Extra summer work puts Texas State ahead as fall practice begins