BYU scrimmage report: Building on the team concept

"Overall, a good day, I think." That was BYU football coach Bronco Mendenhall's assessment of the final scrimmage of preseason camp, held Thursday at the stadium in front of a couple hundred boosters and members of players' families. Media members were not allowed to watch the first couple of series, so I can't give you a complete rundown of each and every play. But BYU's crack sports information staff provided complete stats, and we will get to those in a minute. It was unlike last week's scrimmage in that teams were chosen, with Chad Lewis and Curtis Brown acting as celebrity coaches. Basically, the first-team offense went against the second-team defense, and the second-team offense went against the first team defense. Of course, the lines between first and second team were blurred because several starters were held out. For instance, we did not see Mike Alisa and Ross Apo on offense or Kyle Van Noy and Brandon Ogletree on defense. "Basically, a fairly clean conclusion to what camp is going to be," Mendenhall said. He continued that there will be a couple "clean-up days" on Friday and Saturday, then preparations for Washington State will begin on Monday. "And no injuries today," Mendenhall said. "You kind of keep your fingers crossed, but we held our quite a few players to make sure that didn't happen." With referees and play clocks in the corners (the scoreboards at LaVell Edwards Stadium are still being installed), and a mixture of blue and white jerseys on both sides, it was more like a game atmosphere than any previous BYU fall scrimmage that I have covered. "That was the intent," Mendenhall said. "We had a little fun, dividing the coaches up and eliminating players we didn't think needed to play, and then took whatever remainder one offense we had against whatever remainder one defense we had. So they were on opposite teams. Same with the twos." Riley Nelson led the first-team offense to a touchdown against the No. 2 defense on the first series, we were told. It was capped off by a 17-yard touchdown pass to Cody Hoffman. A couple observations from series No. 4 on: * Adam Hine had an otherwise marvelous day running the ball, but was stripped by Blake Morgan in series No. 4 with James Lark quarterbacking. Matt Hadley recovered the fumble. * David Foote made the outstanding play of the day, putting a juke on linebacker Austen Jorgensen that caused Jorgensen to totally whiff on the tackle attempt. Foote picked up a first down with his yards after the catch, then added a 1-yard TD run on the same drive that was directed by Riley Nelson. JD Falslev made a 24-yard catch on the drive. * Hine broke free on a 50-yard run on series No. 6, with Lark at the controls. The bad news is the RB was tracked down from behind by Morgan Unga, a walk-on DB from Ogden's Bonneville High. Didn't matter though, because Lark threw a 15-yard touchdown pass a few plays later to Kurt Henderson, a freshman from St. George's Snow Canyon High. * Taysom Hill was sacked (whistle sacked) twice on the seventh series, once by a combination of Remington Peck and Spencer Hadley, and the other time by linebacker Jherremya Leuta-Douyere. * Lark, who had a nice day, directed another TD drive on series No. 8. Paul Lasike, the rugby star, made a couple nice catches and runs on the drive, and Hine capped it with a 4-yard TD run, beating corner Micah Hannemann to the pylon. Taysom Hill kicked the extra point, while regular kicker Justin Sorensen watched from the sidelines — still not having returned to practice yet. * Falslev made another big catch and run in series No. 9, which was directed by Nelson and ended with a short TD run by David Foote. Brett Thompson had a 27-yard catch on the drive. * Jason Munns finally got his chance on series No. 10, and moved the team a little bit before a scrimmage-ending sack by Matt Hadley. Some of the stats: * Riley Nelson completed 10 of 16 passes for 169 yards and a touchdown. He was never sacked. * James Lark was 6-for-8 for 60 yards and a TD. He had three carries for seven yards. * Jason Munns was 2-for-4 for 10 yards. * Taysom Hill was 0-for-1. He carried the ball twice for minus-1 yard. * Adam Hine had 117 rushing yards on 13 carries, and one TD. * David Foote had six carries for 19 yards and a TD and caught two passes for 17 yards. * Paul Lasike had two carries for 23 yards and three catches for 16 yards. * Teu Kautai had a sack. Leading receivers: * Cody Hoffman 2 catches, 28 yards, 1 TD * Marcus Mathews 1 catch, 19 yards * JD Falslev two catches, 56 yards * Stehly Reden, two catches, 18 yards