Aug. 24, 2004
KENOSHA, Wis. - Throughout camp, Northwestern head football coach Randy Walker had planned on giving his team a day off. Well, in Tuesday's final day at Camp Kenosha, they got it.
On an overcast morning with intermittent sprinkles, the Wildcats went through what is called a `walk-through" -- the offense and defense break up into separate groups and walk-through the offensive and defensive calls.
"We worked these guys pretty hard," said Walker of NU's time at preseason camp. "But I promised them I'd make sure they had their legs back and were in top physical condition come Sept. 2. I'm not a real big proponent of beating guys up during game week, so we got after it pretty good the last two (weeks)."
While NU finished preseason camp today in Kenosha, it also marks the beginning of game week back on NU's Evanston campus.
Northwestern opens up the 2004 season with a Thursday night contest vs. TCU on Sept. 2. The game will be aired at 8:30 p.m. CDT on ESPN2.
After Tuesday morning's practice, NUsports.com caught up with Coach Walker to find out how he perceived this year's preseason camp.
NUsports.com: Today marks the end of your sixth `Camp Kenosha;' how do you feel the team progressed this year?
Coach Walker: First of all, these guys came into camp in great condition, with great strength levels, and it's the best it's been in the six years I have been here. The work they did over the summer gave us a great starting point. As a result we were able to work very hard, and to their credit we did work very hard.
It has been a very demanding camp and I think our objectives were to enhance what we already know about some of our veteran players, but really we wanted to come into camp and really get some of our second-tier players where they need to be to help this football team. And by in large, a lot of that has taken place.
I think we've established some depth and I think our coaches have done a good job with our young guys. It's been a very productive camp.
NUsports.com: Now that camp is over, what steps does the program take in order to get ready for TCU?
Coach Walker: The first game is always the toughest game. There are a lot of unknowns. I'm sure they've (TCU) tweaked their game to some degree and we won't see the same TCU we saw in 2002. But, with Coach (Gary) Patterson back and the great job he's done down there, I'm sure there is also some of the same.
So, in the next eight days we're going to put together a plan against a very good football team and we're going to have to play exceptional football to win. But, we will be putting in more of the game plan as the preseason ends and game week begins.
We started implementing our game plan a couple days ago, giving them some TCU looks and getting them more comfortable with that. Basically, we're evolving more into season mode, which is week-to-week game planning. It's not so much about player development and evaluations; it's more about let's get a game plan together.
Our cards have been dealt, we don't know what some of those cards are, but they're on the table and we just need to play the hand.