College Football
Brian Hartline Era Begins as USF Opens Fall Camp: “Everyone’s All Excited and Everything’s New and Shiny”
The USF football team is officially on the road to its season opener against Florida International on Saturday, Sept. 6, at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida.
After a strong 9-4 season last year, the Bulls are now fully locked into the Brian Hartline era, with the season and home opener on the horizon.
“Everyone’s all excited and everything’s new and shiny and looking forward to day 9, 10, 11, 12 when it’s really hard,” Hartline said. “But we’re glad to be back on the field. I’m excited for these guys to get back some more football, you know, and really everything they acquired in the offseason to now apply to the football field. So, you know, individually they’re trying to enhance and then as we continue to work through the summer and work through fall camp, have the team come together even more and four or five as a unit. So excited about camp and excited to be here.”
One of the biggest storylines of fall camp will be the quarterback battle between Luke Kromenhoek and Michael Van Buren Jr. While camp will move quickly, Hartline has left the door open regarding who will take the first snaps as the starter in Week 1.
“It will be dictated on the guys,” Hartline said. “We feel like we’re very confident in the decision and there’s been maybe an opportunity where any hesitation has been removed, I mean, to try to outline it with criteria, I mean, that’s hard to kind of do. You’ll know when you know. And frankly, it’s up to them to separate themselves, have one guy separate themselves. But I really haven’t given myself a final call date when I want to necessarily do that. We’ll work through camp and we’ll see what happens.”
Although the quarterback battle is one of the biggest position battles to monitor throughout camp, Hartline is focused on implementing his vision across the entire roster.
“Yeah, fundamentals and technique,” Hartline said. “I mean, we’re trying to do a good job developing the skills it takes to execute plays. Early in camp, you want to try to get as many reps as you can possibly for each guy because reps get very cut in half, if you will, as camp goes. It sounds good to have everybody, maybe potentially four groups getting reps. But then between getting a group put together, like for an O-line to kind of build chemistry, all those kind of things, you want those guys to start working together a little bit. So early on, to answer your question, fundamentals and techniques, and then we’re really trying to get as many reps as you can early in camp, but being mindful of blowing guys out too. So those are the first two targets.”
While there is still work to be done, Hartline has already noticed improvement throughout his roster.
“Yeah, it’s definitely improved,” Hartline said. “Obviously we a lot of guys came in as individuals. As we put them through tough environments, they started to kind of forge together a little bit and come together a little bit. You know, spring ball. I think guys start competing a little bit for jobs, so earning continue to earn some respect a little bit. And then you get into the summer, like I said, it got really hot and those guys had to go through all that together. That kind of, forges a bond a little bit. And hopefully we’re going to have that opportunity through camp, being that we do a good job as coaches and coaching staff and as head coach of creating those environments. Because really when things get hard, that’s when good bonds are formed. So trying to make sure we create as much of those as possible.”
