Early this afternoon, Nicholls’ football team played their final scrimmage in preparation for their first game against an FBS team, Kansas. I have to say that I was impressed by the Nicholls QBs in the scrimmage which was definitely not the impression I had expected to get. The video above is a throw by one of the backups. Although the play was called back because the quarterback was touched before the play (in practice, teams normally make it so that the defenders only need to touch the quarterback instead of tackling him, thus making quarterback injuries less likely) you can still see that that quarterback, Charles Brooks, has a great arm and he knows how to use it. Personally, although Chase Fourcade, Nicholls’ starting quarterback, played well, I thought Charles Brooks played the best. Nick Conley, another backup quarterback, played ok, but not overly great.
QB Chase Fourcade Grade: A-
Fourcade was the main reason I came in excepting the practice to be horrible. I mean, he threw 3 interceptions in Nicholls’ playoff game. Anyway, my point is that he did good. Much better than I had expected. Then again, if Jalen Hurts had played like that I wouldn’t be half as happy. I guess it just depends on how high you set your expectations.
QB Charles Brooks Grade: A
I don’t care that his great throw was called back. In a real game that would have been a remarkable touchdown. I had noticed that at the beginning of the practice he was throwing well, much better than the other 2 quarterbacks in fact. I also liked the way ran. He is a very mobile quarterback and will be a pain to stop for the other defenses if Coach Rebow, Nicholls’ head coach, would decide to put him on the field.
QB Nick Conley Grade: C
I didn’t really pay much attention to him, however, it didn’t seem like his drives got much of anywhere.
Offense Overall Grade: B-
The offense was mostly good, however, except for a few good runs and a touchdown, the running game didn’t get anywhere. The passing was usually good except for a few mishaps such as dropped passes here and there, an interception, and a few sacks. As for the offensive line, let’s face it, they need a lot of work. The center kept snapping the ball too high and eventually ended up snapping the ball so high that QB Chase Fourcade couldn’t catch it. Anyway, Fourcade did run after the ball and he did recover it. Still, they lost a lot of yards off that horrible snap. Also, the blocking made by the offensive line wasn’t always great.
Defensive Overall Grade: C+
There’s only word to describe Nicholls’ defense. Mediocre. While they did make a lot of good plays such as usually stopping the run game, catching an interception, and doing some great goal line defense, they also gave up a lot of big plays such as some good runs by Chase Fourcade, a touchdown, another touchdown which was disallowed because the defense barely touched the quarterback, a few long passing plays, and a field goal with 5 seconds left in a drill.
Special Teams Overall Grade: D-
The special teams didn’t impress me at all. below are their many mistakes.
1. The kick returner fumbled the ball whil trying to catch it in the endzone.
2. Poor defense on the kickoff. Let returners get passed the 25-yard line on almost every kickoff, including the one where the returner fumbled the football.
3. All of the kickers missed multiple field goals that they should’ve easily been able to make.
Well, I only wrote down 3 mistakes. However, if I had separated each of the times the defense let the returner passed the 25-yard line and all the missed field goals into separate numbers then there would be many more mistakes written down. The truth is that I forget how many times the defense played badly on the returns and how many times the kickers missed field goals. Otherwise, I would have written each exact mistake.
Team Overall Grade: B
That’s not a bad grade for an FCS team. I already wrote about the scrimmage, so I’m not writing any more reasons for the grade I gave.
Who knows? There might be hope for Nicholls to have a great run in the playoffs. They just need a couple of improvements and then they might even have a chance to win the FCS Championship.
