Fessler steals the show
EVANSTON-There are a lot of different ways to interpret one of Northwestern’s practices. It’s a very subjective thing.
It’s difficult to keep track of players shuttling in and out of the lineup, and plays happen so quickly it’s hard to sort out who is who. On top of all that, two different people could look at the very same play and see completely different things. Every good play by one Wildcat may be a bad one for another.
But at Friday’s practice at Hutcheson Field on the lakefront, anyone in attendance could objectively see that one player was the clear-cut star: Charlie Fessler. The redshirt sophomore wide receiver made three spectacular, SportsCenter Top 10-level catches to steal the show.
Fessler used every one of his 75 inches in height to highpoint and come down with the ball for each of his leaping grabs.
The first catch was on the east sideline, when he climbed the ladder, got twisted around with a defensive back, and still somehow came down in bounds. That drew some big oohs and ahhs from his teammates. The second one was similar, a leaping grab under tight coverage when he just went up higher than anyone else to come down with the pigskin.
But the tall, 210-pounder from Erie (Pa.) Cathedral Prep saved his best for last. Backup quarterback Matt Alviti, under heavy pressure with pass rushers closing in on him, heaved the ball in Fessler’s general direction down the west sideline. Fessler jumped up and stole the ball away from a D-back who had inside position and a couple others that were closing on the ball. Both sidelines erupted for what went for a gain of about 40 yards.
Even head coach Pat Fitzgerald was impressed. After his speech to the team at the end of practice, Fitzgerald let Fessler do the break.
Friday may have been Fessler’s day, but Northwestern’s offensive line also drew its share of attention.
On Wednesday, the buzz at practice was about Jared Thomas, a former interior lineman who was playing on the first team at left tackle, replacing two-year starter Blake Hance. Fitzgerald on Wednesday threw a wet blanket on reading anything significant into that move and today the coach proved that he was spot-on when he said that the staff would be trying several different combinations in an effort to five “the best five, regardless of position.”
Today, Thomas stayed at left tackle, but Hance played left guard with the first unit. JB Butler, last year’s starting left guard, was the second-team center. Gunnar Vogel, who had been the starting right tackle for most of spring and most of this week, was spelled for a while by Andrew Otterman as the No. 1 right tackle. On the second line, freshman Rashawn Slater, who came to NU as a guard, was playing left tackle, while Nik Urban, Wednesday’s second-team center, was playing right guard. Trey Klock, the graduate transfer from Georgia Tech was at left tackle. Then Vogel went back to the first team.
Got all that? Put it this way: other than center Brad North and right guard Tommy Doles, no one – including coaches, it would seem – really knows at this point who will trot out with the first-team offense against Nevada on Sept. 2.
(WildcatReport interviewed offensive line coach Adam Cushing and Vogel after practice; look for a feature story soon.)
Want to read more notes, quotes and observations about Friday’s practice? Check out our Practice Notebook on The Rock premium message board.
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