Georgia Tech Football Practice Notes and Quotes 8/1
ATLANTA- Georgia Tech football kicked off the drive toward the 2023 season opener with a two-plus hour practice on Tuesday afternoon. First-year head coach Brent Key also celebrated his 45th birthday with his wife and daughter after practice and the team sang "Happy Birthday" to him to wrap up the first day of action.
"Now it's good to be back out here and really kind of start to put together all the work we've been doing in the summer and really what the first day does is it gives you a baseline of where you are at in relation to the last practice of spring," Key said. "So we have a chance to come out here and really get this evaluated, be critical. It's like I told the team I said, 'Really our number one goal for this camp is to establish our identity and establish who we are as a football team.' That's what we've got to come out of this camp with a true identity. What we hang our hat on not play-wise, not scheme-wise, really just our mentality as a football team."
Key spoke with the media after practice and gave some injury updates and his thoughts on day one of camp. He credits both the hard work of his players and the new strength staff led by A.J. Artis for how healthy his team was to open camp.
Of note, Key gave several injury updates. The team enters camp relatively healthy with wide receiver James BlackStrain back in action after missing much of spring ball. Two other receivers, Leo Blackburn and JuJu Lewis are out for all of camp. Freshman defensive tackle Bryston Dixon is also out for fall camp.
"It speaks to A.J. and his staff and what they've done but also credit to the players and the way they've come out in the summer and attacked it because you could kind of slop through and go half in the summer and you're not gonna have that baseline of health that you need. So we've got a couple of guys that are out are gonna be out as well, Leo, Juju, and Bryston Dixon, It was good to see James BlackStrain back out there today and starting to move around a little bit, but he is still no contact, but getting back moving in the group. It's good to see him out there. We're relatively healthy and hopefully, stay that way going forward."
The Tech staff had plenty of new receivers in camp to help fill the injury void at that position with a pair of SEC transfers Chase Lane (Texas A&M) and Dominick Blaylock (UGA) both making their Tech practice debut on Tuesday as well as speedy freshman Eric Singleton who drew praise from Key and his players for his work in summer workouts and the highly rated Zion Taylor.
"We've got some older guys who haven't played a lot and then we have an influx of new guys both transfers and young guys. That's a position of durability. When you are practicing in the summer and running the way you do, the high school kids run track and do all those things, that doesn't prepare you for the amount of reps and the wear and tear on your body. They will learn pretty quickly how to take care of themselves and be ready for the next day. We've got some guys who can run and some speed. I want to see when we get the pads on, who can break someone down one-on-one and turn a short play into a big play," Key said of the receiving room."
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