HATCHER INTERVIEW

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The offense produced five touchdowns, and the defense caused two turnovers at the Samford football team's first scrimmage of spring practice Saturday morning at Seibert Stadium.
 
"I saw some good things out of both groups," Samford head coach Chris Hatcher said. "I thought, offensively, we had some good drives. We didn't finish a couple of drives, and we need to do a better job in the red zone-goal line area. Defensively, we gave up a couple of long drives, but we had some good stops down there in the red zone area."
 
The scrimmage marked the ninth of 15 workouts the team will go through this spring. Hatcher said he likes the attitude his team has shown so far this spring.
 
"All-in-all, it was a good day," Hatcher said. "More important than anything, our guys are being coachable, they're learning and they're having fun playing football."
 
All five quarterbacks saw time during the scrimmage, with returning starter Devlin Hodges and backup Drew Pederson seeing the most time. Hodges and Pederson threw two touchdown passes each. Hodges connected with All-SoCon receiver Karel Hamilton on touchdown passes of six and 10 yards. Pederson hit Hamilton for a five-yard touchdown, and he connected with running back Roland Adams for a touchdown.
 
"Devlin did some good things," Hatcher said. "I thought he threw the ball well today. He made one bad decision in the red zone, where he threw an interception. But other than that, I think he's doing a good job of leading the team"
 
Hamilton led the receivers with his three touchdown catches. In all, the Samford quarterbacks completed passes to 10 different receivers.
 
"Karel had a good day today," Hatcher said. "He's a playmaker. We have some good skill guys out wide, we just have to find a way to get them the ball and get them a bunch of touches throughout the course of a game."
 
Redshirt freshman running back Justin Curry scored the scrimmages lone rushing touchdown, scoring on a three-yard run. Hatcher said he was pleased with the way the team ran the football during the scrimmage.
 
"I thought we ran the ball extremely well today," Hatcher said. "But, being the head coach, on defense, I'm disappointed that we did run the ball so well."
 
Defensively, Christian Stark intercepted a pass and returned it 25 yards for a touchdown for the first turnover of the day. Later in the scrimmage, Chaz Claunch came up with another interception for the defense.
 
"We had a couple of nice turnovers, defensively," Hatcher said. "We have to tackle better. Today was the first day that we live tackled during the spring. We're very thin on the line, so if we have a guy go down, we have to cut the reps."
 
Samford will take Sunday off from practice. The team will return to spring practice Monday at 4:05 p.m. in Seibert Stadium.