First of all, I'm surprised there have not been many reports yet, but here is mine.

This was the best attended spring or fall scrimmage I have ever attended. I'm not good at guessing crowd numbers, but someone below thought there were 15k to 20k, and I could go with that. But I am sure I haven't seen that many fans there before, whatever the count was.

One real downside to GFGH is that it is really hard to see who is on the field before the snap, so I don't have much to say on who played and who didn't, and how many snaps any given player got (except Hill played almost all of the 7-on-7s).

Taysom really does look like he's throwing the ball better (based on the passing drills, 1-on-1s and 7-on-7s). He was accurate and had good timing and zip on his ball. He wasn't perfect--there were a couple of thows that sailed on him, but he really threw the ball well. In previous years, Hill was always our 2nd or 3rd best passer in the scrimmages (Stewart was always better than him as a passer). But I would say that he has caught up to Stewart now.

Speaking of Stewart, it is a real shame that we don't have him for another year, but it was great that he came back to help the team one more time. He looked like he was having a lot of fun, and I'm sure it was great for him to get to play football one more time.

In the past, Moore hasn't impressed at all. He didn't again today. He threw the ball pretty well in the passing drills (when there was no defense), but he struggles when there is a defense on the field.

McCoy Hill was in a boot. It was such a shame for him that he got injured this spring. This was his chance to get 2nd string reps. He isn't a star, but based on what I've seen in the past, I think he could be serviceable for us if we need him. So instead of being the incumbent 2nd QB, he is going to have to battle for reps with Mangum and Hoge. I'm afraid this was his chance, and it slipped away, which is a shame.

It's hard to say who won the battle in the trenches. The defense didn't get much of a pass rush on (there were a couple of times they pressured Stewart, and they did sack Moore once). Run defense was stout, with one exception, which was a great run by Nate Carter where he did a sweep right, got bottled up, cut back left, and ran for 40-50 yards before the defense could catch up to him. Christian Stewart ended up as his lead blocker, and he made a great block to extend the run. Otherwise the run game didn't yield much, but they really didn't try to run it much, and the RB was usually Carter, AJ Moore, or Cody Bond.

The passing game looked good. Matthews and Kurtz are both impressive with their size outside. Blackmon looked much more comfortable in the offense. Juergens, Pearson, Henderson all looked good. And there were several other WRs that made nice plays. Generally, the passes were on the money, and there were very few or no drops. There were no interceptions. Most of the passes were intermediate length, but there were some nice long completions as well (by both Hill and Stewart).

On defense, it felt like they were mostly 2nd/3rd/4th stringers out there in the back 8. Takitaki did make some nice plays (tackles for a loss), and Kafusi made several back-to-back plays in a goal line stand. Otherwise, it was hard to find guys who stood out much. I was hoping to see more from Takenaki after recent practice reports, but he looked a little lost (hopefully more time in the system will fix that and he can make some plays for us). Jones is huge for a safety, but he seemed to move pretty well (at 6' 5", he is tall, but he isn't a bean-pole, he's just big). He played a lot and seemed to do ok, but didn't really do anything notable. Actually, that's true for most of the defense. There were a few pass break-ups, and the run defense was pretty stout. But they didn't really make many plays.

All in all, it was a very pleasant evening at LES. Tautu's knee injury was a downer, but fortunately that was the only injury (at least that stopped play). Someone said they were hearing it was just a sprain, so hopefully he will be back to full strength before long. The rest of the evening was fun. You can't expect too much from a spring scrimmage, and that's what this one delivered. But it was enjoyable to be in the stadium and to watch some football. We will see how much Bronco's influence on the defense continues over the summer, but right now I would say that we are looking at another year where the offense is better than the defense. Hopefully some playmakers can step up (well, and several guys we expect to be difference makers, like Fred Warner and Jordon Preator, didn't play at all--having them in the fall will definitely help).

Go Cougars!