What We Learned: Bobby Kennedy
IOWA CITY, Iowa – Entering his third season as Iowa’s wide receivers coach, Bobby Kennedy is asking more of his group. It extends beyond running routes and catching passes.
Kennedy expects his guys to understand the schemes better. If they know what others are doing, it will better help them understand their position.
"It’s good for the other players to understand that there is more to this game than just your spot, and how you respond to things," he said.
Kennedy met with the media here at the Iowa Football Complex Wednesday. He hit on quite a few areas as it pertained to his position. Here’s "What We Learned":
-Jay Scheel’s name was raised a few times as someone with a bright future. He didn’t get into full practice until December bowl prep because of injury, so this spring and summer will be huge for him in climbing up the depth chart.
-Kennedy said that Adrian Falconer might be the most college ready of the incoming receiver crop. The Floridian will be joined by fellow ’15 wideouts Jerminic Smith and Emmanuel Ogwo. Kennedy said that Ogwo ran a 10.61-second, 100-meters at a recent Texas high school track meet.
-Kennedy was not pleased with his unit’s contributions in the running game last year. He said they’re spending a lot of time this spring on that aspect of the game.
-Kennedy talked a lot about his receivers needing to take a step forward in Year 3 of his tenure at Iowa and his 10th season, overall, with offensive coordinator Greg Davis. He’s right. If this team is going to be a consistently productive offense, the passing game needs to click.
-Kennedy heaped a lot of praise on senior Tevaun Smith, expected to be the No. 1 option this season. The coach each time qualified his comments with the suggestion that the Canadian needs to get better and be more consistent. I had a feeling he was referring to blocking.
-Kennedy said he still speaks with former pupil, Derrick Willies, who left the team last year during his red shirt freshman season.
"Part of my job as a coach, and I can always get better at this, is kind of trying to help guys through understanding when their time is, because if you ask a kid, their time is always right now. And that’s the tough thing about this business because they’re really talented guys who don’t necessarily understand the process sometimes. To be quite frank, like I’ve said, and I’ve said this before, not only with him, but my challenge and my charge as a coach is to try to do a good job with all my players," Kennedy said.
If you’d like to read all of Kennedy’s transcript, please click on the link below:
