ATHENS, Ga.—Following a weather delay of more than two hours due to lightning in the area, the Georgia football team finally hit the Woodruff Practice Fields around 5 p.m. this afternoon for its third practice of preseason camp. During the delay, the Bulldogs were forced inside the Nalley Multi-Purpose Room where the team conducted meetings, a walk-through, and stretched.
Ironically, today’s weather delay, which limited the squad to roughly half the practice time originally planned for outdoors, comes on the heels of a statement made this morning by UGA athletic director Greg McGarity that underground utility work and site preparation for the program’s indoor practice facility will take at least several months to complete. Apparently, the preparation cannot begin until the football team finishes the upcoming season, meaning it may not be until 2017 when the indoor facility is finally ready for use, falling well short of defensive coordinator Jeremy Pruitt’s original hope that a facility would be ready as early as this year.
“Despite the fact that we had to deal with the weather delays, we did get some quality work in at practice even if we had to cut it short outside,” Georgia coach Mark Richt said. “We did a lot of team work, some more installation including extra point and field goals. Overall, we got in what we needed.”
The team’s limited time outdoors resulted in practice, as well as post-practice player interviews, being completely closed to the media. Therefore, until tomorrow, the media is left to speculate on the Bulldogs’ early preseason progress, including the much publicized and contested quarterback race between Brice Ramsey, Greyson Lambert, and Faton Bauta.
Still, as recently as last night, immediately following Georgia’s second practice of fall camp, we seemingly were given a slight hint in regards to which of the competing players had the upper hand thus far.
“If there is a frontrunner, I’d say it’s [senior tight end] Jay Rome,” sophomore tight end Jeb Blazevich kiddingly replied—very tongue in check—when asked about the three-way quarterback race. “[Rome is] who we all think will get the job. He has wonderful deep-ball accuracy, and he’s a running quarterback too!” Blazevich added with a laugh.
The Bulldogs are slated to practice in shells Friday before donning full pads for the first time on Saturday. And, for all of those involved, the good news is the forecast for the Athens area calls for hardly a chance of rain through Sunday—thus, surely no approaching delay due to weather.
