Rutgers Football Notebook from Big Ten Media Days
Jul 28 | Football
By Tom Luicci
ScarletKnights.com
CHICAGO (July 28, 2014) – Rutgers will be short one veteran player and three expected freshmen when the team reports to the Hale Center on Thursday, with pre-season camp set to begin a day later, head coach Kyle Flood said during Big Ten football media day today.
Tejay Johnson (Egg Harbor Twp., N.J.), a secondary player last season who converted to wide receiver in the spring, has been forced to give up football for medical reasons. Johnson, who would have been a fourth-year junior this season, appeared in 12 games last year, starting three, and totaled 35 tackles.
In addition, Flood said that incoming freshman linebacker Sidney Gopre (Newark, N.J.) will prep this fall at Milford (N.Y.) Academy, that incoming freshman defensive end Justin Nelson (Irvington, N.J.) will attend Nassau (N.Y.) Community College and that incoming walk-on freshman quarterback JR Reese II (Jefferson, N.J.) will attend prep school.
Flood said he expected Gopre to return to the program in January.
The absence of Johnson, one of the team’s fastest players, creates more uncertainty in a wide receiving group that is largely untested beyond Leonte Carroo and Ruhann Peele.
“What his role with the program will be (as a non-player) we’ll decide as we get into training camp,” Flood said of Johnson. “Some of those guys become student-coaches. Some of those guys have worked with us in recruiting and operations. It’s really more of what we can do to best fit him.”
Though Johnson was only recently moved to offense his absence will be felt.
“It’s just one more part of the depth chart you’ve got to fill,” Flood said. “Having (Kansas post-graduate transfer) Andrew Turzilli with us is certainly going to help that a little bit, to have a guy with that kind of experience.”
***Running back Savon Huggins (Jackson, N.J.) will be sidelined for the start of pre-season camp and may wind up as a redshirt candidate as he continues his recovery from a shoulder injury, Flood said.
“Savon will not be available to us at the start of training camp and we’ll have to make a decision as we get into the season how fast he’s 100 percent and then what his role will be,” Flood added. “He still does have a redshirt year that we can utilize if we need to.”
***Though there is no designated quarterback starter on the current depth chart, Flood said it would be senior Gary Nova (Elmwood Park, N.J.) if the season started today.
“I think we’re going to have to make a decision pretty quickly,” Flood said. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to go two weeks into training camp. It’s really for a couple of reasons. One, I’ve always felt this way, you have to give the starter the opportunity to be successful. He needs reps to do that. But also we have to get the backup whatever reps we can. You can’t give three quarterbacks reps. So we’re going to have to make a decision pretty quickly.”
***After all of the pomp and circumstance – and anticipation – leading up to Rutgers officially joining the Big Ten on July 1, Flood said it felt “more real” being part of the league’s official football media day today.
“When you finally get here with everybody … there are the (pre) events that go on, the Jim Delany sightings and meetings, we’ve had probably four or five different coaches meetings out here at the Big Ten offices … but when you walk in this building and all of the coaches are here and all of the players are here and all of the administrators are here and all of the media is here and knowing that training camp is four days away there’s no doubt it feels more real than it ever has,” he said.
