Fall Practice No. 7 – Quick Hits from defensive backs coach Evan Cooper
After the team had an off day on Sunday, the Nebraska football program held its seventh practice of fall camp Monday.
Following the practice, defensive backs coach Evan Cooper and special teams coordinator Ed Foley took the podium to chat with the media. Here are the quick hits from Cooper.
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Cooper doesn't have a depth chart right now, but he knows what he's looking for — consistency
A Big Ten football season is a grind. Cooper wants to know who he'll be able to count on when things go wrong or get tough to handle.
Finding the players who are most consistent will be the ones who play.
"Those guys who show up every day, those are the guys who I want to go to war with," Cooper said.
Cooper views everyone in his room as defensive backs. You won't catch him calling a player a corner, safety or rover very often. They're DBs, and everyone is learning every position in the back end
Cooper is cross-training his defensive backs. Corners are playing safety. Safeties are playing corner.
The coach wants to make sure each player in the back end understands the defense and what role every position has. That way, if a situation ever arises where a replacement is needed, the players will be ready.
"I want to get them all ready," Cooper said. "I might need Malcolm (Hartzog) at safety, I might need Quinton (Newsome) at safety at some point. I may need Tommi (Hill) at safety at one point. So the more they can do, the more they can do."
The rover position is a little different, Cooper said. He cross-trains the safeties and the rovers, not the rovers and the corners.
Matt Rhule said Tommi Hill is a "turnaround guy" who has shaped up after an adjustment period with the new staff
Cooper agrees with Rhule about Hill, who started the first four games of 2022 at corner before being benched against Oklahoma and eventually moved to receiver, where he didn't make an impact.
Under Rhule, though, the 6-foot, 195-pound Hill is back at corner and showing flashes of the elite athlete he is. What's Cooper seen from Hill so far through spring and fall camp?
"Consistency," Cooper said. "I think that's where it starts. Those guys, just coming and showing up, being the same guy every day, attacking it, trying to work hard, trying to be the brand that we set for ourselves. I think he's done that."
Cooper didn't just end with Hill. The coach said he thinks the entire DB group has followed Hill's lead with doing everything the right way.
"I like the direction we're headed in," Cooper said.
As Cooper put it, Hill has a lot of experience having to bounce back and respond after adversity finds him.
"The light bulb is going on," Cooper said. "I haven't seen him in a game situation, so I can't fully tell. But I like the direction he's headed in. And we'll see where it lands."
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Cooper has seen everything he needs to see with Isaac Gifford, who is looking more and more like the top guy at rover
During his Saturday press conference, Rhule said the 6-1, 205-pound Gifford is the man to beat for the starting rover position in Tony White's 3-3 stack defense.
On Monday, Cooper said Gifford is showing his toughness and competitiveness this spring and fall camp.
"He works his butt off, is relentless, he's disciplined, he's a violent player," Cooper said. "He's the captain of that group. He's trying to push us to somewhere we haven't been. I appreciate that from him."
Gifford, who's entering his fourth year in the program, finished third on the defense in tackles last year with 70, which included five tackles for loss. You could tell last year's coaching staff valued Gifford greatly when he was the man who replaced the suspended Myles Farmer at safety against Michigan, and again against Wisconsin following Marques Buford Jr.'s season-ending injury.
Cooper has seen Gifford's confidence on the field and off grow. He's upped his leadership.
"He's stepping out of his shell a little bit more, getting on the guys and trying to push them," Cooper said. "Like I said, he wants it really bad. He wants it as bad as I do, and he's bringing the group along."
Rhule said Florida transfer Corey Collier Jr. "has a ton of football in him, we just have to get it out of him.” What has Cooper seen from Collier?
The former five-star recruit Collier spent two seasons at Florida, but was mostly a backup and special teams player. He's looking for a fresh start in Lincoln, and earned himself a start at safety with the first-team defense in the spring game back in April.
But on Saturday, Rhule said Collier got banged up during the short scrimmage session the team had.
"Just the every-day grind. Some people are ready before others. It takes some time for some people," Cooper said. "He's just attacking it every day. I'm proud of his effort and he's been working, fighting through some injuries and that's it, that's all I can ask for."
Cooper said he's not worried about Collier, who's listed at 6-1 and 190 pounds, when it comes to physicality at the safety position.
"I have zero problems with Corey's physicality," Cooper said. "He is a physical person and wants to be tough. He wants to be physical. Zero problems with that. It's just the day-to-day grind. All players go through it. It's just the day-to-day."
Cooper "loves" true freshman Eric Fields, who has the attention of the fan base and the coaches
Fields has been working some at rover at fall camp, and Cooper sees the potential the Oklahoma native has. Attention will always follow when a freshman gets a shoutout from the head coach on signing day and has the kind of head-turning tape like Fields does.
"I love Eric Fields. Eric Fields is like the other freshmen, trying to figure it out," Cooper said. "But he's 1,000 miles per hour, he works his butt off and he's learning. I'm excited about where he's going."
Cooper views Omar Brown as someone who can "be on of our better players"
There's potential for Brown to play a lot of snaps this season at safety. But for him to do that, Cooper said, he needs to continue embracing the day-to-day grind of acting like a professional.
"He's trying, he's working at it," Cooper said. "He's very gifted, and we'll pull him through it. He's just gotta keep working, and that's it."
Brown, who flipped from corner to safety to nickel last year, played in 11 games in 2022 and notched five tackles.
Cooper has a lot of bodies in his DB room, which means there is competition galore
Spots are up for grabs in Nebraska's defensive backfield. While there are favorites to start at certain positions, like Newsome and Hartzog at corner and Gifford at rover, no starters have been named yet. There's not a depth chart, according to the coaches.
That breeds competition. But Cooper is also there adding another layer.
"I like to fuel the competitive fire," the coach said. "I want them to be competitive, I want them to fight nail and tooth and claw and scratch for everything them get, I want them to compete in everything because that's what life is. Just showing up and competing."
Cooper has never coached or played in a 3-3 stack defense. Now he's teaching his players how to play in it. What's that adjustment been like?
Any time there's something new, Cooper attacks it. And that's exactly what he tells his players.
But at the end of the day, the secondary is the secondary. It's football.
"Cover-three is cover-three, quarters is quarters. Cover-two is cover-two. Man is man," Cooper said. "Small adjustments here and there, but it's all just football. It's expanding my knowledge base, that's it."
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