Not much to say entering the make-or-break game of the season. I was interested that Baseball America projected Tulane as a 3 seed in a regional if it beats ECU, which would make a huge difference, but I'm skeptical. I follow the selection process pretty closely even when Tulane is not involved, and the committee usually pays slavish adherence to the RPI. Tulane will have one of the 16 worst RPIs even with the boost into the top 100 it would get by beating ECU.

Here are the quotes from yesterday that are relevant:

JAY UHMLAN

On Carter Benbrook:

"He was unbelievable, but the unbelievable part is believable for us because that's what we see every day since the time he stepped foot on our campus. We feel great when he's in the game, and he was tremendous, and then of course Mont, yeoman's work. He gets out there and slams the door still throwing 94. Offensively we grinded and really made it tough on their guys. Once again we got clutch hits. Tanner Chun's big hit in the six hole to score two was gigantic. That's what you've got to get in these kinds of things. Just really proud of the effort, resiliency and resolve of this club."

On pitching and Anthony Izzio:

"As much as people want to badmouth our pitching (Tulane had the third-worst ERA in school history, better than only 1990 and 2023) and our pitching coach, coach Izzio's done a tremendous job for three years here. We're not putting out first-rounders sans maybe Michael Lombardi if he gets that opportunity. We run a bunch of guys out that compete their butts off. He calls every pitch. He makes every pitching change, so he deserves all the credit for the things when they go good. I'll take the blame when it's not good, and that's just how it works. He's done an unbelievable job with his pitching staff and this program in the three years he's been here. It's actually three-and-a-half years. He was the outfield coach in 2020. Without his contributions with our pitching staff, we wouldn't be in this position. Him and his pitchers held one of the top six offenses in the country at bay for two straight games, and I don't think anybody else has beaten them three times this season, so my hat's off to coach Izz, coach (Frankie) Niemann and our pitching staff. They were unbelievable."

On today:

"It's all hands on deck. If somebody comes to us and they're not prepared to pitch physically, we're not interested in side-tracking somebody or getting them hurt for short-term satisfaction. If they tell us they're good to go, then we'll respect that and we'll provide that opportunity, but we're always going to take care of our players first."

On Lombardi's availability:

"We'll see. We'll about that. 105 pitches is the most he's thrown in his career. We've got to be the adults, so we'll manage that and communicate well. There's a high level of trust amongst us, so we'll figure that out going into tomorrow."

On why Clearwater is so good for team:

"First, we've got one more game to go, so we are going to be focused just on that. We haven't done anything yet. We haven't accomplished anything. We've put ourselves in a position to get what we want, but that doesn't guarantee you anything. It's always about the next opportunity. I wish I could just tell you it's some magic potion or pill or some New Orleans voodoo, but it's not. I don't know. When we show up, I want our guys to enjoy the atmosphere--Clearwater, the Phillies' stadium, the people that work in it. The people that come with the conference for this tournament are all first class. They are tremendous supporters of baseball and they make it really easy to show up every day. You always are going to be taken care of, but for our guys, I tell them go on the beach. I'm not trying to lock them in a room and tell them they can't go out. What I do every single year is if this is what you say you want, which is winning a conference championship and winning a conference tournament because that's the only automatic way of earning your way into the NCAA tournament, I just gently remind them that if this is what you say you want, there are going to be some things you have to discipline yourself to do. I don't set a real curfew. Maybe it's 11 or 12 on the road depending on the time of the next day's game. The only thing I tell them is try to stay out of this heat and the water, pool included, from 12 to 3, and before and after that, if they want to go out there and enjoy that, I'm all for it. I don't try to catch them being bad or any of those things. I treat them like grownups. They deserve that. They earn that, and frankly if they don't take advantage of that and abuse that opportunity, I'll send them home, but I believe in the player, I believe in their attitudes, I believe in that this is what they really want. There's just something about the postseason where you don't have 20 games left in the season. This is it, and so the level of focus that you're able to expend in this time frame, you can empty your tank each and every day mostly because we get a day off. It's always about the players and their focus and their intent and their attitudes."

CARTER BENBROOK

On Uhlman trusting guys:

"He's the best. We've got an amazing staff here. It's rare to find an entire staff that really cares about the players and cares about more than just the number on their back and the stats that they put up on the field. It's a special place here, and I love being here. It's an incredible experience, but it's not over yet."

On Clearwater magic:

"We believe in each other. We believe in the work that we put in. Past years guys have been so successful here. We just play for each other and we all want it so bad. This is showing how well we can play. It's just a special group of guys that love playing with each other."

ECU COACH CLIFF GODWIN

On Tulane matchup:

"Well obviously Jay's got the recipe to get to the championship game, so maybe I need to talk to him to get some pointers for sure. They are very confident when they come to this tournament. There's a lot of guys who have been here before on Tulane's team, so we'll have our hands full tomorrow, but we're just excited that we'll get an opportunity to compete for a championship."

Tulane is going with Luc Fladda tomorrow against UTSA. I was not sure which direction they would go in the unappetizing choice between Fladda and Trey Cehajic to face by far the best hitting team in the AAC. Cehajic fared better in San Antonio than Fladda, but I think they believe Fladda is more capable of exceeding his normal level in a big setting that Cehajic and will not beat himself. I agree, but I'm not sure either one of them is good enough to give the Wave a good chance to win. Fladda has been crushed this year, giving up 91 hits in 71.2 innings, including a whopping 20 doubles and 12 home runs. The way the ball carries at BayCare Ballpark, that spells trouble.

Tulane will need to score early and often against a right-handed pitcher, Zach Royse, who is so-so. He gave up four runs on seven hits in six innings while opposing Fladda, who allowed seven runs on seven hits in five innings at UTSA (he was reasonably OK until the 6th, when he did not get an out).

What Tulane has going it for it is the knowledge it already has beaten UTSA once, joining Incarnate Word as the only teams to win on the Roadrunners' home field all year, and its incredibly run over three years in Clearwater. This is the highest hurdle the Wave will have to clear, though.

I've gotten some grief for saying Tayler Montiel had a really good year, but he proved my point yesterday with a masterpiece out the bullpen when it looked like Tulane was about to lose a must-win game in the AAC tournament. His stuff is legit, and after a very shaky performance closing out FAU on Tuesday, he was sensational yesterday, getting a double play (with the help of an interference call) when it was absolutely needed right after he entered, retiring the AAC player of the year for the first out of the next inning and then striking out four in a row. He extended the streak to eight outs before giving up a couple of base-runners in the 9th, but unlike Tuesday, when it really felt like the Wave was in trouble, he coaxed a weak grounder to Connor Rasmussen to preserve the 10-6 victory.

It feels like Tulane does whatever it takes to win in Clearwater, and yesterday it was a bizarre power surge, with a season-high five home runs, including four that were mammoth shots. That is not explainable, but this team clearly plays with tremendous confidence at BayCare Ballpark. Plus, the defense was immaculate.

The concern is who will pitch Saturday. My guess is Blaise Wilcenski will start the morning game, with Will Clements available for quick relief and then hope and prayer after that. If Tulane loses, I would expect Trey Cehajic to start the second game. He threw only 15 pitches yesterday.

Here is what was said in the Zoom interviews after another terrific performance:

UTSA COACH PAT HALLMARK

"Tulane was really good and we were kind of mediocre to not very good."

On Tulane hitting good pitches:

"We threw bad pitches. We didn't walk them, which is our first goal, but we threw bad pitches. We threw some terrible pitches. 0-2 pitches got us in trouble again (James Agabedis' first home run was the only one on an 0-2 count). Yeah, we threw some bad pitches. We always try to not get beat by the walk. We didn't get beat by the walk, but we didn't throw enough good pitches."

On offense:

"The offense was OK. It was decent. It can be better, but it was decent."

On starter Zach Royse:

"He didn't make pitches when he needed to. He didn't pitch bad. He got ahead 0-2 and got beaten 0-2 multiple times. It keeps happening, It's frustrating. You're not going to beat good people when you throw 0-2 pitches over the plate, and Tulane's good, and we keep doing it. This is not the first game it's happened. The second half of the season it's been a little bit of an Achilles heel. I don't see adjustments being made when adjustments need to be made. We need to be better as coaches, too."

On Montiel:

"He's good. He's been doing that all year. If you look at his numbers he doesn't get hit. it's well less than a hit an inning. Nobody hits him. He's got that fastball that moves a little bit, and he hides the ball and he throws hard. I did not expect to hit him real good, but I did expect with the game tied or one run that anything is possible, obviously with our team. But the two-run home run after the solo home run hurt us a little bit. That was a bad call. We called a high fastball to a high fastball hitter. Our catches call the pitches. We're one of the few teams in the country that let the catchers call the pitches, and they do a great job with that. We just happened to make a mistake there. And it's Rob (Orloski)'s best pitch, so I know why (Andrew) Stucky called it. He called his pitcher's best pitch. I don't know that it's a mistake, but Wachs is a good high fastball hitter, and that's what the report is. But I'm more frustrated with the pitches early in the game where we get ahead of people and we throw stupid pitches right down the middle."

JAY UHLMAN

"Tremendous victory against a really well coached, tough team. Just a gritty, gutty effort by us. Fladda did a tremendous job getting us off to a really good start. We had a baton pass there, went for it with Cehajic and sometimes things work out, sometimes they don't, and then we passed the ball on to Tayler and what a gutty performance by him. He emptied his tank. And then offensively we just kept pressure on them with some two-out RBIs and some big homers and a lot of individual performances, great defense. It was a really complete effort by our club to beat a really good 40-plus win UTSA team. I have tremendous respect for how they go about it. They are a tough team."

On if home runs surprised him:

"Not that it surprises you, but when you have far more doubles than you do homers. In years past we had 98 homers and 87 homers or something like that. That was always part of the play. But in Clearwater when the prevailing wind is that way, if you just square up a ball and gets some backspin on it, it's got a chance to go. I'm not surprised, but it certainly has not been the cowbell of our offense."

On Agabedis hitting two homers:

"They were huge, and he's done it here before. His freshman year he smashed a big homer. He had one off of (former ECU star pitcher Tre) Yesavage at our place. His homers have been few and far between, but they've been really important ones. The game rewards guys like him. He works his butt off. He's patient. He waits his turn. He's a great teammate. The game loves players like him, so I'm not surprised by his success. It's the kid that he is and the person that he is. It's awesome that he gets rewarded that way, and he deserves that."

On getting leadoff hitter out in eight of nine innings (gave up three runs the one time he got on):

"Yeah, it was huge. We got the double play to end it with (Mason) Lytle sitting on deck. That was a ginormous part of the game for us to get out of that and get off the field tied with that double play with him on deck. Just huge. That's one of the criteria we always talk about--six or more leadoff guys off base--and we did that. When you keep a team like that that is one of the top offenses in the country, hat's off to our pitching and our defense. Those guys did a tremendous job."

On why Tulane keeps playing well in Clearwater:

"I would like to think of that as a body of work. It doesn't always work out the way we wanted it work out in terms of wins, but we teach through the wins, we teach through the losses, we teach through the tough times. Our guys believe. We're like families. We have arguments and fights and disagreements. I don't give everybody what they want all the time and that's a hard pill to swallow, but the body of work as you go through a season, the trust that even in times when they don't get what they want, that we're doing everything we can the right way is really important. We're not running our guys out there for 120 pitches every single game, the whole 14 weeks of the season. Case in point, Lombardi yesterday was fresh and ready to go. We didn't put our self interests and our egos in front of our players' needs. It's never about us. It's always about our players, and again, we don't always get what we want in terms of the volume of wins, but the body of work with how we do it internally that nobody else can see, how we go about our business allows us to put ourselves in position here. Our guys are just ready to play. They feel good about being here."

On what said before the game:

"It wasn't some super rah rah speech. It was just a lot of truisms and things I wanted to see them do. Nothing super special. It's always the players that go out and do those things."

I'm sure every Tulane fan who watched this game was nervous as heck when FAU loaded the bases and had the winning run at the plate versus Tayler Montiel after Michael Lombardi's masterpiece, but Montiel, who had been shaky and threw a nothing slider right over the middle of the plate that could have been a game-tying grand slam to the previous hitter, who fouled it off instead, saved his best thre pitches for last with an easy strikeout on good sliders to preserve the victory.

Tulane got what it needed and more from Lombardi and will play Thursday in a winner's bracket game, extending its streak in Clearwater to seven games and improving to 9-1 under Jay Uhlman there since the start of the 2023 tourney.

FAU coach John McCormack, Uhlman and Lombardi spoke on Zoom after the game.

MCCORMACK

On Lombardi's performance:

"He was really tough. Metrically that fastball is special. The release point is special. It's really hard for the hitters to pick it up. I don't know what happened internally where they changed him from closer to starter, but good move on their part. He was phenomenal. He was really good. And from a coaching standpoint, they knew we were having trouble getting to the fastball, especially up at the letters, and they just kept throwing it and kept throwing it and changed away from breaking balls and changeups."

On Trey Beard's performance:

"I've seen him better. I appreciate him trying to fight through it. He wasn't as sharp as I've seen him in the past, but he fought, and I do credit Tulane. They had a really good approach against him, especially on the changeup and the breaking ball. I'd give hm the ball again tomorrow, but it just wasn't his day. As he gets older, he'll figure out a way to get out of that inning, the three-spot. He had two outs and a seeing eye single and then another one, and I don't know if he lost composure or it was just too long out there on a hot day, but he walks two guys back to back and sets up the error. We wanted to take him out, but he was like, no, and he did a nice job of redeeming himself in the sixth, getting a zero, and then we had to take him out. The pitch count was just too high. If we're able to work our way back in this thing, we're going to need him in some aspect whether it be a close or a short start."

On nearly coming back in ninth:

"We had success on Montiel in New Orleans, and I think our guys felt good about it. They battled. They did a nice job. They've done it all year. Just came up a little bit short. If Ayden (Garcia, who struck out to end the game) got on, then there were some real decisions to be made and things would have gotten a little bit tighter. He's had a real good year, but it wasn't his day and wasn't his at-bat."

UHLMAN

"What a pitching performance by Michael Lombardi. Total command, really gave us a shot in the arm and really set the tone for us. When he's out there, the guys have a high level of belief. His stuff's electric. There's a reason why pro teams out there are going to want to get their hands on him here pretty shortly, so I was really proud of him and his mentality and his effort. To watch him blossom over the course of two-and-a-half going on three years now has been really cool, and then the back end of our bullpen--Benbrook and Montiel--tremendous job. Montiel's a really good story about where he came from to where he is now, and to be in that moment to close out that game, it's pretty special as well. Production by the offense. We have a guy in my opinion, Blake Gillespie (of Charlotte) is worthy of being the pitcher of the year, but Trey Beard is every bit as worthy of being the pitcher of the year, and we made him labor through 117 pitches in six innings. Really battled him and were able to get the lead. Their third baseman made a tremendous play and just didn't complete the play (on a throwing error that allowed two runs to score with two outs). If he doesn't get his glove on it, it was probably two runs anyway. That was a big inning and Jason Wachs' homer in the ninth was pretty cool. All in all a really good effort against a really good team."

On Lombardi going a career-high innings:

"He's our best arm. FAU hadn't seen him last time. We were protecting him from a left oblique (injury). At the time I said to people we were not interested in jeopardizing the young man's career. We weren't interested in jeopardizing the rest of our season for short-term gain, and then lo and behold, he gets feeling good and healthy again and here we are."

On why he started Lombardi:

"He's our best arm, and we felt that that was the best matchup against that team to win game 1, and when you're in this tournament, winning the first game is the most important. It saves your bullpen, gets you a day off, it makes other people have to battle through. We went with our best guy, and he proved why he's our best guy. Just a gutty, gritty performance, and really handcuffed what I feel like is one of the best offenses in the league. They are really dangerous. It was pretty special."

On Lombardi's competitiveness that goes with his stuff:

"Yeah, it's the separator. That's what separates the guys that have consistency versus the guys that struggle through consistency, is your elite mindset, your competitive nature, your ability to take maybe a close pitch when you're right on the edge of maybe the inning turns a different way, and you're able to move on to the next pitch. He does that as well as anybody I've ever coached. I can't say enough about the effort he gave us. A career high in all things today on one of the bigger stages out there."

On if it was easy decision to go with Lombardi:

"It really was. We're scoreboard watching last week as things unfolded, trying to predict where we were going to land, and as it started to become obvious where that sat, there was a reason he was on a limited pitch count last weekend. It was knowing we were probably going to face this club, the matchup was screaming at us. It was a no-brainer."

On offense:

"What was crazy it was role reversal from the first scoring. We get on on a pop fly they misplay, and I let Pinkney swing away to drive to bring him in, and then I switch to bunt and he fouls it back and then he punches out and then the next two get out and it's like, uhhh. And then they get a guy on, they bunt him over and get a two-out hit to take the lead, so it swings the momentum and then Gavin Schulz, I kidded him before the game, I said, well, Teo (Banks) and Jackson (Linn) got MVPs. You've been here this long, too. It's about time. And he smashed that ball to center to give us a run to tie it and kind of loosen it up a little bit. We had a nice safety (squeeze), a 3-1 safety (by Pinkney to go ahead in the next inning). I was not interested in grounding into a double play. We needed to get that run. I was actually kicking myself when we just didn't bunt Hugh to start with, but hindsight's 20-20. The way we extended the lead was huge, and the ninth-inning homer (by Jason Wachs for the first of his career) was a huge run."

On saving the bullpen:

"That is the thing I've been saying since we've been coming here. Get that first one, get a good performance out of the first guy out there and save the pen and get rested because they have a low pitch count. Sometimes that's worked here and sometimes that hasn't. In 2023 we started Castro and he didn't even make it out of the second and Chandler Welch came in and went five. We've done it some different ways there, but it's really critical. That day off on a low pitch count out of the pen when you feel like you're an eight-to nine-arm team, you need those days off. It's really helpful for those guys, and they've pitched in that environment and can get back out there on Thursday and rock and roll."

Although the home-run power is lacking, Tulane is good enough offensively to make a run in Clearwater again this year. Theo Bryant, who had a family crisis in December I am not allowed to reveal that really set him back mentally, has become the player the Wave coaches saw in the fall and actually is leading the AAC in OPS (on-base percentage plus slugging percentage) during conference play. Jason Wachs is tied for second in batting average at .370 in league games. Gavin Schulz is a proven clutch performer who was out-of-this-world good in Clearwater two years ago and productive again last season. Connor Rasmussen is a winner who understands what to do at the plate. Kaikea Harrison, the 9-hole hitter, is batting well above .300 since the start of April. Matthias Haas, Hugh Pinkney, Jason Agabedis and Tanner Chun all are capable of doing good things. And who knows? Maybe Jackson Linn will come off the bench and do something after having a shockingly miserable year. He is a good guy who has not checked out.

The million-dollar question is whether or not Tulane will get the pitching with its seemingly ERA of a million to make the potential hitting matter.

Barring a sweep in either direction this weekend, it looks like Tulane will be in the 8 a.m. Tuesday opener against FAU in the 4-5 seed game. FAU ace Trey Beard is far superior to anyone Tulane will throw, most likely Luc Fladda, and the Wave will need him to have an off day. Fladda gave up eight runs in 1.1 innings against FAU just two weeks ago, giving up one hard hit after the other, so the Wave coaching staff may go in another direction if they feel it is a matchup issue. Obviously Tulane has to win the opener to have any kind of a chance, so the odds will be stacked against the Wave if FAU is the opponent.

The second game would be a tough matchup, too, if Tulane ends up in UTSA's half of the bracket as appears likely. Yes, Trey Cehajic beat UTSA in San Antonio last month, but Wave pitching against those bats is a mismatch in almost any scenario. The hope would be that UTSA, which does not have a real ace, would lose to the No. 8 seed (of the potential opponents, Rice has the best ace, Memphis has a serviceable one and Wichita State has next to nothing). UTSA won't have much to play for because it already is a lock for a regional and did not even bother to bid on a hosting role because its facility is inadequate, so you never know what the motivation level would be.

Regardless, some Tulane pitcher who has endured a rough year will have to step up in Clearwater. Maybe Will Clements, who has good stuff but has not been a good pitcher in his two years in New Orleans, or Jacob Moore, who has been quite poor after having an excellent season in 2024, or Blaise Wicenski, whose good week last week appears to be an outlier, or even Garrett Payne, who has excellent stuff but zero control. You know Michael Lombardi will be terrific at the back end, but he has not proven he can pitch the same way as a starter. Tayler Montiel probably will pitch well--he has a good year and has good stuff--but after that, it's pitch and pray.

Lombardi will not be available as a hitter because of his injury, but he was struggling at the plate anyway recently and Bryant has been outstanding as his replacement.

Jay Uhlman, who has pulled the right strings in Clearwater, will have a lot of decisions to make along with Anthony Izzio as to who pitches when. There is no clear answer when a team struggles on the mound like Tulane has.

SEED SITUATION

Here are the only ways Tulane avoids being in the 4-5 game, either rising to 2 or 3 or falling to 6

1) Sweep Charlotte and FAU does not sweep UAB
2) Win 2 out of 3 against Charlotte and USF gets swept at home by ECU and FAU loses series at UAB
3) Win 1 of 3 against Charlotte and have ECU sweep USF and FAU win at least one game at UAB
4) Get swept by Charlotte and have ECU win series against USF

CHARLOTTE NOTES

Ace Blake Gillespie is a dominant workhorse who has gone at least 6.2 innings in every AAC start, but he almost certainly will be on a pitch count, so his durability will not be a factor.

Charlotte has the very rare combination of having the best fielding percentage in the nation but being last in the AAC in turning double plays.

Charlotte has stolen 16 bases for the year, ranking fourth-to-last in all of Division I.

Charlotte has only two left-handed pitches it uses with any regularity. Both are relievers.

Charlotte is near the bottom of the AAC in hitting but just scored 29 runs on Tuesday against UNC Asheville.

Charlotte's coach reminds me of David Pierce in the way his staffs always pitch well. The 49ers' ERA of 3.73 in league games is nearly a run better than anyone else in the AAC.

It is Cade Scott, who is rated 3 stars by 247Sports but did not have a rating from any other site. I just created his profile.

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Guerry, I understand Tulane has a couple of commitments this evening a very large OT & an Athletic I think out of Mississippi?

Now that I'm back in a world where I don't feel excruciating elbow pain 24/7, it's high time I update Tulane's transfer portal situation, and yes, I know I did not respond to the thread on that topic from about a week ago. Let me know if I've missed anybody

By my count, Tulane has accepted eight players from the portal since the end of spring drills.

1) Mitch Hodnett, freshman OL, TCU

Outlook: Likely starter on the right side of the line.

2) Alec Clark, punter, Marshall/USM

Outlook: Tulane's starting punter. Averaged 42.4 yards for Marshall last year before transferring briefly to USM this spring, following his coach. Jonathan Galante, Tulane's new specialk teams coahc, was at Marshall with Clark.

3) LJ Green, soph CB, Troy

Outlook: Likely starter. He started every game for the Trojans last year and Sumrall and his staff recruited him to Troy

4) Brendan Sullivan, senior QB, Iowa

Outlook: Decent chance to start after the way Kadin Semonza and Donovan Leary looked in the spring. Depends on his ability and the speed in which he picks up the system.

5) Armandous Cooley, senior DT, USM

Outlook: Don't know. Will Hall and his staff recruited him to USM as a redshirt freshman transfer from Mississippi State in 2022. He started twice that year and made 16 tackles, then missed all of 2023 with a foot injury before returning last year and making only seven tackles in seven games.

6) Tre Shackelford, senior WR, Washington State

Outlook: Don't know. Tulane needed an impact wide receiver. The Wave missed with both of its post-spring additions last season. Shackelford had a good year at Austin Peay in 2023 (52 catches, 799 yards, 6 TDs) but had only 10 grabs for 144 yards at Washington State.

7) Dorian Jackson, sophomore CB, Troy

Outlook: Don't know. He played 38 snaps last year after being recruited by Sumrall and his staff and playing in five games while still being redshirted as a freshman.

8) Johnny Pascuzzi, senior TE, Iowa

Outlook: Don't know. He caught one pass for 40 yards for the Hawkeyes last year. That pass did come from Sullivan.


Tulane has lost 13 players since right before spring drills started or since then. Five have transferred to power five schools. The rest transferred down in my book

1) Will Karoll (UCLA)

Comment: NIL payment

2) Rayshawn Pleasant (Auburn)

Comment: NIL payment

3) Jesus Machado (Houston)

Comment: Not the same player as before his injury, found a home with former coach Willie Fritz

4) Adonis Friloux (Baylor)

Comment: He would have been a valuable rotation player, but his production has been meager since his knee injury before the start of the 2022 season.

5) Jude McCoskey (Purdue)

Comment: I am lost on this one. He was not a first-teamer at practice, but Iowa wanted him.

6) DeShaun Batiste (FAU)

Comment: wants to be a starter. Likely would not have happened at Tulane but he would have played.

7) Ty Cooper (Tulsa)

Comment: Probably expected to be anointed as starter transferring from Miss St. Would have been backup who played.

8) Sidney Mbanasor (Old Dominion)

Comment: He looked the part but never played the part. Was not going to be in the rotation and was outplayed by the similarly built (but much better athlete) Kellen Tasby right after Tasby moved from QB

9) Mandel Eugene (Prairie View)

Comment: Never a factor.

10) Gabe Fortson (undetermined)

Comment: Never a factor, which was surprising as a highly touted transfer from Georgia Tech last year

11) Robbie Pizzolato (undetermined)

Comment: Nicholls transfer was not a factor in the spring.

12) Guiseann Mirtil (undetermined

Comment: I actually liked his receiving ability after he recovered from injury from last spring as early enrollee, but he was not big enough to fit Tulane's definition of a tight end.

13) TJ Finley (forced)

Comment: I knew this was coming through sources right after his suspension. Tulane moved on.

Although it has not officially clinched a spot in the AAC tournament, Tulane realistically will finish anywhere from second to sixth. It is one game behind USF and FAU while losing the tiebreaker to both, also a game behind Charlotte, which it hosts to end the year, and tied with ECU, which it beats in a tiebreaker.

There are two keys down the stretch. The first is finding reliable pitchers in a year when the ERA is straight-up awful, the third worst in program history behind 1990 and 2023. Uhlman said today he would like to have eight pitchers he could use in the conference tournament. Luc Fladda, who has been bad most of the year but proved in Corvallis last year he could come up big under pressure, and Trey Cehajic, who has been mediocre, have to be two of them. Michael Lombardi, who has been brilliant, and Tayler Montiel, who was terrific for most of the year before sliding, have the makeup and the stuff to be counted on heavily. Blaise Wilcenski, who was outstanding last week but never good before then, and Carter Benbrook, who has a lot of savvy but only average stuff, need to become reliable. Jacob Moore, who has been inexplicably bad with a loss of control this year, has to find his form, and someone else needs to be the eighth. Maybe that's Will Clements, who has excellent stuff but has never been reliable in two years, or Julius Ejike-Charles, whom the coaches like but has not impressed me, or Grayson Smith, who was god-awful as a touted transfer from Florida before pitching really well in relief on Saturday.

The other key is avoiding the 4th or 5th seed. Yeah, I know UTSA dropped two in a row as the top seed (No. 2 overall) in Tulane's half of the bracket last year, but that team is the class of the league this season and is a horrendous matchup for Tulane's pitchers because of the way it rakes. Get the Roadrunners on the other half of the bracket and hope they get eliminated or run out of pitching by the championship game, when they will not have the same motivation as an at-large lock anyway. That means finishing 6th would be much better than 4th or 5th, although 2nd or 3rd is obviously preferable because Tulane would enter the tournament with more confidence.

No team other than UTSA is remotely scary, but the problem for Tulane will be winning that first game. Fladda has not pitched as well as any other team's ace, and Tulane is nowhere near good enough on the mound to come out of the losers' bracket. I do like Tulane's chances if it finds a way to win the first game. The hitting has been quite good for more than a month, with no holes in the lineup, and once you get past the opponent's ace, no one has elite pitching in this league.

Memphis will play with a lot of desperation this weekend under Matt Riser. After starting 0-8 in the league, the Tigers are 7-6 even though they got swept by UTSA in that span. They have plenty of incentive to do well this weekend since they are tied for the final spot in the tournament with Wichita State and UAB. Thankfully for Tulane, they are the worst hitting team in the league by a long way (Tulane is dead last in ERA by a long way during conference play), but the Wave lost a series on the road to an even worse hitting team in Pepperdine.

Uhlman talked today, and he offered good news about Lombardi, who missed Saturday and Sunday with a strained oblique. Without a healthy Lombardi on the mound in Clearwater, Tulane would be toast.

On Memphis being a tricky opponent:

"They are on their first four-game winning streak of the year (becoming the first AAC team to sweep UAB and beating a garbage SWAC team) and are feeling good about it. They beat a good Friday night starter in UAB's Colin Daniel, the preseason selection for pitcher of the year. They are going to play hard. Coach Riser does a great job, and I know he's trying to get that thing going in the right direction. They might be fighting for their lives, but so are we. At this point of the year we're all fighting for our lives."

On Memphis Friday starter Seth Garner one-hitting Tulane over five innings last year:

"Tongue in cheek, we had finals last year when we played them. In all seriousness, he throws fastball-change to left-handers and fastball-slider to right-handers. He was able to locate and pitch really well. It's like everything else. It's a Friday night matchup, and we're going to have to be up to the task and score runs."

On Memphis being light-hitting team:

"The good news is offensively we're starting to trend in a better direction that gives us more ammunition and bullets and protection than maybe we got in the middle part of the year or even the beginning part of the year. That part helps. This is the time of year the ball starts flying. Their park can play very offensive depending on which way the wind's blowing. Really positive steps forward. Trey (Cehajic) getting back out there for a good spin on Saturday this past weekend. He would have probably gone longer had he gotten an out on the one bunt when we were up 7-1. It cost him more pitches and more hitters and the compound effect of that. He had a pretty good outing from the two times before that, and then Blaise has been tremendous the last three times. We get Lombardi back, so we'll have some things working for us and some guys doing some better things as we move into May."

On if Lombardi is cleared to hit and pitch:

"We'll see. Our hope is that he'll be fully ready to go. I'm speaking that a little bit more into existence than probably a firm mandate that he's back, but my expectation is for him to be back in some capacity."

On losing FAU series:

"Game 2 we were in totally command, but as you look back on it, we left 16 on (base) and when a team comes from behind, it's not just the things that led up to the big blow, which was the grand slam, but it's all the other things behind that--the defensive plays or lack thereof, maybe one got away, we didn't collect certain outs, we didn't turn a few double plays, those kinds of things. Then leaving meat on the bone from an offensive standpoint. All those things could have changed the complexion of the game. We're staring at being up 7-1 and I'm thinking like all right, let's get this into 10-run range and call it a day, and the next thing you know they kind of just chipped away at us. You've got to give credit where credit's due. They hung in there, and we weren't able to put the bow on the present. Friday was just a strange deal. We didn't start off the way we wanted to, but we kept battling and we got it close several times, and Grayson Smith came back in the resumption of that game 1 and pitched really well for us. I'd like to see him take that success and build on that and any other opportunities that he gets."

On what he wants to see from pitching staff moving forward:

"Here's what I would tell you. I think every year if you look at pitching staffs across the country, you could pick out the stats and look at the top eight pitchers, top nine pitchers, and usually it's the bulk that's going to be getting the vast majority of the opportunities (at the tournament) as we move down the stretch. Had we used eight guys strictly for the past two months, they'd be out of gas. We've had a track record the last couple of years where we've played our best down the stretch. We've gotten to postseason play and been able to maneuver through very tricky tournaments. Winning is hard, but winning tournaments is really difficult. For us, to be able to take care of our top end arms, to allow us to be in a better position at the end of the year is good. You are going to take some lumps. When you're out there and if Luc goes out there and has a tough one or one of the starting pitchers goes out and has a tough one, you have an obligation of not throwing in the towel so to speak, but how do we not use the guys that we know we need to use to get the series win, and when you're using the back end of your staff, a lot of times it's hold your breath and hope and pray and sometimes it's a bag of snakes. You don't get bit and sometimes you get bit. Unfortunately for the young people in that position, they want that opportunity and they're trying, but sometimes the try an the over-analyzation of what they need to do sometimes gets in the way and affects production and performance, but in terms of the bulk group of guys that we've had that have been productive, I'm happy with where they are. I feel like that group of guys gives us the best chance to get us where we need to go, which is Sunday in Clearwater."

I talked to Harris on the phone today about the $3.5 million to the athletic department by Don and Lora Peters and the coming changes in Tulane's approach to NIL and revenue sharing, with the school taking it in house rather than having the Fear The Wave collective continue to run it. We also addressed the scholarship numbers for football and baseball and what Tulane plans to do about it. I did not have mhy recorder on for the first minute, which was about the donation, but I got the rest.

On how payment has become the dominant issue in attracting players:

"We know that NIL is becoming increasingly a difference-making piece of the puzzle for them, and so to have the ability to be able to address that area is significant. If you talk with our coaches now, they will say that so many of their conversations that were once centered on the big picture of what it means to come to the university and all the benefits have now in many cases become singular conversations about the financial piece of it, so we're still going to build our culture around the idea that when you make the investment to come to Tulane it's a 40-year decision, but at the same time we understand that the world of college athletics means the financial component is significant and we have to be competitive in that area in order to keep our sports teams competitive, and so that's what we're looking to do."

On the sea change and having to adjust on the fly:

"We're all learning and we're all trying to figure out what is the best strategy possible based on who we are as a department and a university and the things that each of us feel like we have strengths in. We want to play to our strengths. We want to make sure we can keep our teams competitive. We want to make sure that we have the appropriate resources to be able to have success, and we want to be aggressive and we want to make sure that people continue to understand the tremendous momentum that we feel we have as a program based on things that have happened in the past few years and things that are happening this year, so the more days we have like we had yesterday, the more momentum we continue to garner and the more that our student-athletes have success, the more championships that they win like we've done this year with cross country and indoor track and field and sailing and we have some sports programs that have yet to finish this year, but all of that continues to paint the picture very positively about what we are looking to accomplish at Tulane."

On bringing athlete compensation in house and not using the Fear The Wave collective in the same way as the past:

"For us it was about being in a position to bring all the resources of the department and the university to bear on making sure that we can do a great job in this area. With Fear The Wave, Michael (Arata) and Jimmy Ordeneaux) have done just a phenomenal job if you look at the success we've been able to have, especially in the sports like football, you can trace a significant amount of that to the hard work they've put in to just volunteer to raise money to be able to help us with our NIL efforts, so we are going to be forever indebted to Michael and JImmy and people like Kelly Comarda, who just did a phenomenal job of help giving us an opportunity to compete during that time period, so now where we're in the position where it doesn't have to be done outside the department and doesn't have to be done the way that it has been, and we can bring the full resources of the university and the department to this effort, it just felt like this was the right time to be able to make this transition and to build on what Fear the Wave set the foundation for with us to try to make it bigger and better and more significant and bring in more money and be able to win more championships."

On changes from how Fear The Wave operated in the structure of soliciting revenue for payments:

"We haven't discussed that. Our conversations have really been about why we felt the transition was appropriate, and which we got on the same page. Michael and Jimmy were fantastic and obviously have been keeping up with this as much as anybody, so they understood exactly what we were trying to do and why. Most of our conversations have been about how do we make sure that for everyone who has been supporting Tulane athletics through Fear the Wave, they understand that this is the new way to do it and they start July 1. Up until then, the collective is still active in fund-raising to be able to meet our commitments, but as we get to July 1 going forward, and we want and need quite frankly everyone who was giving to Fear the Wave to give to the Green Wave Talent Fund. That's the way that we continue to have success, and I know that Michael put something out yesterday on social media about the importance of that happening, and so those guys got it from the very beginning. They were great to work with from the very beginning, and they understand exactly what we're trying to accomplish."

On the manpower that will be involved in Green Wave Talent Fund after Arata and Ordeneaux ran Fear The Wave by themselves after Kelly Comarda's departure:

"It will be an operation for myself and our development team, so I think all of us will have some piece of that puzzle and while there will be some of us that will be doing more than others because we have other initiatives that we're obviously trying to raise money for, I think in some form or fashion over time if you're working within in Tulane athletics in the development area, this will impact you, and then quite honestly there will be those who work within advancement in the entire university who have already been involved or will certainly be involved in the future, so this is certainly an all-hands-on-deck type of initiative for us."

On new Fear the Wave role:

"They will continue in their role as a media company providing behind-the-scenes access to those who subscribe to Fear the Wave, and I know they are interested in doing some special projects with us that will continue to help our student-athletes, so we will be having further discussions with them about what those things will look like, but they want to continue to be in the position for the people that follow them and subscribe, providing behind-the-scenes content on our sports programs and we know they've done a great job with that. They expect and we expect that they will continue to do so moving forward, but in this day and age when everything is constantly evolving, there's nothing to say that six months from now or heck, even six weeks from. now, that things won't change to where we're having further discussions, so it's one thing you learn when you're working in college athletics right now is nothing is standing still. It's a very dynamic environment, so we are certainly going to maintain our partnership with them and make sure that whatever they are doing for us, it lines up nicely with what's in the best interest of our student-athletes."

More on payment to players becoming THE top priority:

"Yeah, it really has shot to the top as being the thing we discuss most with our coaches because that's what they're discussing with our current student-athletes as well as prospective student-athletes, so we all recognize that facilities continue to be important and we're going to continue to make investments in those areas. We feel like the overall student-athlete experience is still critical for us, and graduating from Tulane is still a 40-year decision that pays dividends for decades down the road, but you can't be in this environment and not recognize that revenue sharing and NIL payments are at the top of everyone's mind an our student-athletes and their parents and their family members, so you have to have a plan to be able to meet those challenges and address that in those conversations. It is critically important for us to be competitive. We don't have to be in the position where we can outspend everyone. That can't be the strategy, but at the same time you know that you have to be in a position where what you are providing is competitive in combination with the other things that you bring to the table."

Sorry for the one-week delay, guys. I had somewhat of a health crisis late last week when my blood pressure spiked to above 170 and I started feeling shortness of breath and chest pains. I've been on medication for hypertension for a couple of months that was supposed to bring the blood pressure down and it was going the opposite way, so I had a battery of tests done Friday and Monday, and although the blood pressure remains too high, the tests showed no other issues and I actually passed them with flying colors. I don't know. Maybe thinking about Ed Daniels passing away from a heart attack gave me some type of panic attack, though that's not my nature. But now instead of taking one prescribed medication, I am taking three daily plus aspirin.

At the same time, and presumably unrelated, I woke up Thursday morning with unbelievable shooting pain in my elbow that radiated down to my wrist off and on and was present more than 50 percent of the time. The symptoms are classic tennis elbow, but I have not played tennis since 2023 because of having no cartilage in my right knee, with the bone on bone friction causing too much pain to enjoy the game. The elbow got so bad Sunday and Monday that I had a hard time thinking about anything but the pain. When I did the EKG stress test for the heart/blood pressure issue on a treadmill at Ochsner yesterday, I had to hold on with only my left hand. I finally saw someone in orthopedics today and they are treating it as a severe case of tennis elbow with physical therapy starting next week. The elbow feels better and hopefully the pain will run its course soon, although I was not exactly encouraged when the nurse practitioner told me he had a case of tennis elbow in the past that lasted nine months.

Anyway, here, finally, is my defensive analysis. I know somebody who thinks this may turn out to be the best defense in Tulane history, and while that seems a tad overboard and is impossible to judge in the spring because you never know how much of it is suspect offense, I am high on the group, particularly up front.

DEFENSIVE TACKLE/NOSE GUARD

Defensive tackle

1) Santana Hopper
2) Derrick Shepard

Nose guard

1) Tre'Von McAlpine
2) Elijah Champaigne
3) Eliyt Nairne

Analysis: Hopper is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Teammates rave about his ability to shed blockers and get to the ball, and while the other guys in the middle are not as dominant, all of them can play well at a position that requires frequent substitution to stay fresh. It still is not totally clear how these guys will mesh when the games start, but they dominated most of the spring and should be significantly better than last year's group even though Patrick Jenkins is gone. McAlpine, a Texas Tech transfer, can be a big-time player. Nairne was more inconsistent, which is why I have him third behind the more reliable Champaigne, but that's a pretty talented depth chart. The coaches liked Adonis Friloux's commitment to losing weight at the beginning of spring, but he has not been very productive since his knee injury in August of 2022 and would have been a backup rotational player if he had not entered the portal.

DEFENSIVE END/BANDIT

Defensive end

1) Kam Hamilton
2) Gerrod Henderson
3) Jordan Norman

Bandit

1) Mo Westmoreland
2) Jah'rie Garner
3) Harvey Dyson

Analysis: I'm not confident this will be the order at bandit once the season starts, with all three guys capable of starting, but Westmoreland earned the most praise from the coaches and teammates. Whatever the order, Tulane should get more production here than it did from Adin Huntington, whose performance was decent but did not match his reputation coming in. Garner has been set back by injuries in the past but is ready to make an impact. Dyson, from Texas Tech, can play, too. Look for Kam Hamilton to have his best year after the coaches realized midway through last season he was more comfortable at end than he was inside. Henderson was the most surprising player on defense a year ago and should be better with the experience he gained.

LINEBACKER

Starters: Sam Howard and Dickson Agu
Top backup: Chris Rodgers
Next: Makai Williams

Analysis: It will be hard to keep Rodgers out of the starting lineup the way he played in the spring, although Agu is quite good, too. Look for them to rotate pretty much 50-50 until one outplays the other. Both are nice complements to the steady, heady Howard, who is not an elite athlete but makes plays and will be on the field most of the time. Sumrall raved about Williams' development at the end of the spring. I can't say I noticed it as much as he did, but I'll take his word for it. If that's the case, Tulane will have better depth that a year ago, when Rodgers was not ready at the beginning of the year but came on at the end of the year to provide a fourth solid player behind Howard, Tyler Grubbs and Agu. Grubbs will be missed a lot for sure, but he and Howard were similar type players. The athleticism will be a little better this time with either Agu or Rodgers on the field.

CORNERBACK

Starters: LJ Green and Jahiem Johnson
Backups: Armani Cargo and E'Zaiah Shine

Analysis: Tulane shored up its biggest potential weakness on defense with this week's addition of Green, who started every game at Troy last year as a redshirt freshman and had six breakups, two interceptions and 27 tackles. He definitely will start at a spot that had zero proven players, with former backkup Johnson and redshirt freshman Armani Cargo working with the first team in the spring. Johnson was impressive--far better than last spring, when he was outplayed by Rishi Rattan--but he has little experience. Cargo and Shine have zero experience. A good transfer portal addition was a must, and from all indications, Green will at least be at the level of Micah Robinson and Johnathan Edwards a year ago. Wofford transfer Isaiah Wadsworth showed some potential in the spring, too.

NICKELBACK

1) Javion White
2) Jayden Lewis
3) Tavare Smith

Analysis: White had an excellent spring. I know the coaches loved Caleb Ransaw, and so did the Jacksonville Jaguars, but I feel like White can be better in coverage. Lewis is versatile and could end up playing corner. Smith flashed at times but made some mistakes.

SAFETY

Strong safety

1) Bailey Despanie
2) Kevin Adams

Free safety

1) Jack Tchienchou
2) Joshua Moore

Analysis: I loved Tchienchou last year and was surprised he did not start in front of Jalen Geiger, and he has only gotten better since then. He will be a playmaker at the back end. Despanie provides experience, while Adams came on in the spring and should get significant time. This is a solid group with more experience at Tulane than any other spot on defense.

With the exception of Rayshawn Pleasant, Tulane has not lost a player who would have been a likely starter and significant difference-maker to the transfer portal since the spring semester started, although Adonis Friloux definitely could have been an important rotational piece and Jesus Machado could have been a factor if he regained belief in his knee. I had not heard anything about Ty Cooper likely leaving, but I also do not believe he was on the two-deep depth chart, so he likely saw the writing on the wall. Sidney Mbanasor simply never made enough plays as the tall target the coaches wanted, and Kellen Tasby looked better in that role from the day he switched to wideout than Mbanasor ever did. That means Tulane never got anything out of its post-spring transfers at wideout last year, with Khai Prean leaving at the end of the fall and now Mbanasor departing.

Here is my projected depth chart with analysis at each position on offense. I will do defense tomorrow.

QUARTERBACK

1) Kadin Semonza or Donovan Leary
2) Kadin Semonza or Donovan Leary

Analysis: Even though both of them had really rough days in the spring game, the QBs were ahead of where the three QBs were at this time last spring in the last week of practice. That's not really relevant, though, because Darian Mensah improved exponentially over the summer, and that type of improvement is an outlier rather than the norm. Tulane is going to bring in another QB to join the fray, but that obviously will have missed all of the spring and will come in behind. I have no idea who will end up being the starting QB--no idea--but I'm slightly partial to Semonza, who made plays off schedule frequently in the spring. Leary is the slightly better athlete and has a stronger arm, but I'm not sure about his decision-making. The concern with Semonza, though, is he sometimes panics and throws the ball up for grabs when he is under pressure, something that simply cannot happen in a game. I'm not worried about his height. The NFL is no place for quarterbacks with his height, but plenty of guys his size flourish in college as passers. The QB that comes in soon definitely will have a chance to win the job, too, but they have to find the right guy. It is not clear that Semonza or Leary can take this team to a championship game.

RUNNING BACK

1) Maurice Turner
2) Jamauri McClure
3) Arnold Barnes
4) Zuberi Mobley or Javin Gordon

Analysis: I list all five guys because all of them have a shot. I've been a McClure guy almost from day 1 of camp last year. He makes more big runs in live 11-on-11 action than any running back Tulane has had in the last 10 years other than Tyjae Spears, and that has to count for something. The concern is his lack of knowledge of the offense, which shows up in blitz pickups. He has to buckle down this summer and in preseason camp to earn the playing time his ability says he deserves. I expect Turner to be the starter against Northwestern because he does everything the right way, but I'm not sure he's an every-down back. He likes to go for the home run and reverse field a lot, but I want to see more from his as a downhill runner. Barnes, who missed most of the last two weeks of drills with a nagging injury, is a physical runner whose attention to detail needs to improve. Gordon, an early-enrolling true freshman, was impressive from the start of spring, and Mobley really came on in the last weeks. I'm not sure there's enough carries for five backs, particularly since Tulane opens with Northwestern and has zero cupcakes on the non-conference schedule, so the latter two will need to show out in camp to earn a shot. Gordon is physical and fast, but is he mentally ready? Mobley has good acceleration and is effective as a receiver out of the backfield, too. Obviously Makhi Hughes' consistency and ability to pick the right hole will be missed, but I like the running back room as a whole and believe McClure can be a difference-maker if his mentality approaches his physicality. In my opinion, this is the strongest position on offense.

WIDE RECEIVER

Starters: Bryce Bohanon, Shazz Preston and Omari Hayes
Backups: Anthony Brown-Stephens, Zycarl Lewis and Jimmy Calloway
In the picture: Garrett Mmahat, Oliver Mitchell and Kellen Tasby

Analysis: They really need to hit on a receiver in the portal, which as I referenced above they did not do last summer, because I don't see a No. 1 in the group like Mario Williams. Bohanon and Preston are locks to start, but Bohanon, who had a very impressive spring, still needs to prove he can get separation in a game after not being much of a factor in his first four years. Preston is big and fast but caught zero passes in two years at Alabama before being bothered by a hamstring injury last year. He did have two touchdown catches, but the first one may have come when he ran the wrong route. Consistency is the challenge for him. I'm completely speculating about Hayes, who missed almost all of the spring with a leg injury, but Sumrall mentioned more than once the coaches thought he was their top pickup out of the portal at wideout. Calloway was limited for most of the spring, too, so I don't really know what he can or cannot do. Brown-Stephens is small but made plays regularly in the spring. Lewis came on in the final two weeks and appears to be well-rounded. Sumrall likes Mmahat, who consistently makes plays in practice, but he had never played receiver in his life until Willie Fritz moved him from quarterback in preseason camp of 2022, and it is not clear he can duplicate his practice feats in games or will be able to get separation. Tasby is the wild card if he sticks around. He is gifted physically and showed a knack for high-pointing the ball in practice, but his learning curve will be pretty steep. Overall, I am as concerned about wideout as quarterback. The top three guys from last year are gone, and no one on the roster is a certain success.

TIGHT END

1) Anthony Miller
2) Justyn Reid
3) Ty Thompson

Analysis: I like offensive coordinator Joe Craddock, but he made what on the surface appears to be one of the most surprising statements I've heard in 16 years covering this team when he said the tight end room could be the best of any G5 school and maybe the entire country. Wow. I didn't see it in the spring. Anthony Miller was solid but does not appear to the weapon Alex Bauman was before he transferred. Justyn Reid made plays here and there but did not look special. And Ty Thompson, who looked really good in the first week playing a brand new position, has a serious knee injury that may or may not heal properly, although Sumrall insisted he would return ahead of schedule in the summer. I don't know. Craddock clearly sees something in this group or he would not have said what he said. It will be interesting to see how much of a factor the tight ends can be.

OFFENSIVE LINE

Left Tackle

1) Derrick Graham
2) Dominic Steward

Left guard

1) Shadre Hurst
2) Jayce Mitchell

Center

1) Jack Hollifield
2) Elijah Baker

Right guard

1) John Bock
2) Landry Cannon

Right tackle

1) Reese Baker
2) Darion Reed

Analysis: I had Jude McCoskey second at right tackle, but with his departure, I'm putting Darion Reed there although he got most of his work at left tackle in the spring. He and Steward may be flip flopped. I'm concerned about this group, too, which got overrun in the spring game and has only two proven performers in Graham and Hurst on the left side. I have not seen enough from any of the other three positions to be confident the offensive line will hold up, although the talent level of Tulane's mostly new defensive front could be distorting the picture. Hollifield started every game at center for Appalachian State last year, so he has experience. Bock started 10 games over the past two seasons at FIU (primarily at center), getting suspended for a calendar year for testing positive for a banned ingredient and returning for the last three games in 2024. Reese Baker is a redshirt freshman, and the other two guys competing at tackle have zero starting experience. If the defensive line is as good a I think it might be, the offensive line will not have to make as much improvement as it appears on the surface, but that's no guarantee. The line simply could not handle the defensive front in most of the live drills this spring. A portal addition who can start would be helpful, but Sumrall said those guys are hard to find in this window. Graham had a connection to the staff last year, having played for them at Troy.

I will write up the defense tomorrow.

QB, DT, WR

I am going to delay my defense position-by-position post-spring analysis until tomorrow. I forgot I never transcribed the interviews after the spring game.

JON SUMRALL

"Appreciate y'all being here to cover our game. The model of spring games has changed so much that people aren't even having them. As long as I'm the head coach, we're probably going tio have some form of the spring game. The challenge now with the roster sizes, we have all these crazy rules about what our roster size limits could be and as we prepare for that, you're probably not going to see a conventional 1 team versus another. Our model is offense versus defense, and some guys were very uniquely rep counted. Some guys probably took 6, 7, 8 reps today and some guys probably took 20 or 30. I would read nothing into who went out to start the game at quarterback. They were brought in the room with the offensive coaching staff and told to pick a number between 1 and 10. The number was already picked. It was 3. Donovan Leary picked 4 and Kadin Semonza picked 5. I actually credit Kadin for after one guy picked 4, actually picking the next number up to give himself the best odds of starting, but the number was 3 and that's why Donovan started today. A really scientific process of who started.

"All in all the defense started the day better, faster. It's been very back and forth. The first couple of weeks of the spring I would tell you defense was ahead. Then I would tell you the last four or five practices leading up to today the offense was ahead, and off of what it looked like today, the defense looked better. What's easy about defensive football is you can gake a couple of guys out of the equation and not drop off as much. When you take a couple of guys out of the equation on offense, it can look really bad if you're not careful, and that's why we have to develop the depth in our team. But I like the direction we're headed. A lot of work left to do. We're in the middle of the transfer portal, which makes a ton of sense to be in the middle of spring and the transfer portal all at one time. It's a great design that we have. We'll meet with our guys next week, figure out who's going to stay. Hopefully as many of them will stay as we can get, and then we have some additions that will be coming here over the next month roughly that we'll be working on to try to redo our roster to some degree. We'll be looking for a frontline player at a couple of spots and a couple of spots it's just continuing to build the roster in the right manner."

On his evaluation of the two QBs at the end of spring drills:

"It's been neck and neck throughout the spring. There were times when Donovan looked better, times when Kadin looked better. Today we didn't play good enough to win to be honest with you. We've got some work to do there. Kadin operated really the last four or five practices at a high level. We're a long way from being where we need to be. I like both guys. They are both great teammates. They both throw it well enough. They both work incredibly hard, but we are not where we need to be yet there. Who's the starter? I have no idea. We're really no different than we were a year ago at this time. I left the spring game last year not knowing who our starter was, and I still don't. Nobody has separated themselves enough for me to feel like that's the guy to this point."

On if he is committed to bringing in another QB:

"We are very likely bringing in another quarterback. It's not a shot at the other guys. I'd like to have four scholarship quarterbacks. That's sort of the number in college football that you carry. With Tasby sort of right now being a receiver that can still go at home to play some quarterback as needed, but Tasby's flashed enough at receiver that we're like his best way to contribute to this year's team is probably out there. We'll kind of have maybe a package for him at quarterback. We've got to get a quarterback just to make the room right and also to add competition and see who are starter's going to be."

On sales pitch to prospective QB:

"Every job is open. No job has got anybody that's cemented. Now certain guys that have started game have more likely an opportunity to be a starter. The pitch is a year ago at this time, Darian Mensah wasn't the starter. Hell, he was the third man. There's a lot of football left. Guys will get a little time off in May and then they'll come back in late May, early June and we'll have a couple months of summer stuff and we'll come back in August and have training camp, so there's really three-and-a-half, four months before we play a game once the guys get back here, so there's a lot of time left and nobody has cemented that they're the starter yet. I'm not saying they're not. If there was a guy that elevated and separated enough that I felt like he was the starter, I'd name him. I'm not trying to play the cards close to my vest just because I don't like holding everybody hostage. I don't. I haven't seen enough to make that declaration yet. Last year when I knew, I made the call and we rolled with it and we didn't look back. When we know, we'll know, but I just don't know yet, so there's a real opportunity. The pitch is do you want to win and be a big-time college quarterback in a place that has won and we intend on continuing to win."

On challenges of developing guys that aren't proven at a lot of key positions and re-establishing a brotherhood:

"We have to develop the guys that are here. We have to acquire new players and help them get into the fold and help them create the culture where we care about each other and become a family and don't let the standards fall, and that is the biggest challenge we have in college football. We lost our starting quarterback, our starting running back and our starting tight end (to the transfer portal) and we lost all three receivers to graduation. Center, right guard, right tackle--graduation. And then you have to figure out what young guys are going to elevate, what new guys can you add, how do you get everybody to come together. It's challenging. It is."

On what he wants the culture to be defined as:

"Our core values are attitude, toughness, discipline, love. We define those to our team very clearly. The only disability in life is a bad attitude. Tough teams win. We've got to be disciplined, which means the ability to defer short-term comfort for long-term growth. The little decisions you make add up and become the decisions that we want our guys to love each other. The way I talk about love in our program, it's the action, not a feeling. Love's not going on campus and seeing a pretty girl. That's called lust. We want our guys to actually like care about each other and look after each other and invest in each other's lives. Coach Greg McMahon, who was back this week, said man, when you do this the right way, you walk together forever. I don't care if you play one snap for me or a thousand. Once you do it with us, we walk together forever. It's how quickly can we get this unit to grow together and walk together. It is work. It's not easy. It takes a very focused, conscientious effort, and it's a hell of a lot easier when you recruit really good people. When you recruit people that are made up of the right stuff, it's a lot easier. When you don't, it's harder."

On DL showing out again:

"Yeah, golly. That group's got a chance. We'll see. That group right now is probably eight, nine, ten-ish guys deep. We probably need to add one more player in that room if everybody stays right now, I like playing multiple D-lineman. The hardest thing to do in football is rush the passer, like in a two-minute situation, just rush, rush, rush, rush, rush, so I want to get enough bodies there that can play at a high level. We've got a lot. We could probably use one more, but we're not going to just go take another guy to take a guy. If it's going to a guy that can add top-end value to the room."

On if Friloux leaving was unexpected:

"Yeah, everybody's got different reasons for looking and leaving. If you had asked me about a guy like that leaving four years ago, I would have said it was unexpected, but nothing surprises me anymore. It's like, all right, good. Want to go, I hate it, don't like it, wanted him to stay, wasn't trying to get him to leave, but I get surprised by nothing anymore. There's no such thing as an unexpected departure. The model we're in, everybody can leave. I know everybody things we've got some big checkbook around here, but our guys are not getting paid like a lot of people are getting paid, so that's the fight."

It was an overcast day with a good breeze from the south. The scrimmage started at 10:13 and ended at 11:35. It was 4 10 minute quarters. @A 2 minute break between quarters and a 10 minute half time.

The 1's came out and started on the north 25 going south. Leary was at QB.
1-10: Incomplete to Mobley as Leary was under pressure.
2-10: Mobley ran for 2.
3-8: Sack by Dyson.

The 2's came out. Semonza at QB. Going S to N.
1-10 at the 30: Turner ran right for 2 yards.
2=8: Turner went for no gain up the middle as he was stuffed by several defenders.
3-8: Pass blocked by Derrick Shepard.

The 1's came out with Semonza at. Going N-S.
1-10 at the 22: Pass to Reid for 5.
2-5: McClure ran for 3
3-2: Pass to Reid for 9

1-10: Pass to Nicholas batted away by Jaheim Johnson
2-10 Pass to preston to the right for a loss of 1
3-11: Turner lost 1 on a run.

The 2's came out with Leary at QB. Strted at the 30 going N-S;

1-10: Pass to Mbanasor for 9
2-1: Gordon ran up the middle for 2

1-10: Pass to Gordon for 7
2-3: Gordon ran for 4

1-10:Leary missed a wide open Mitchell down the sideline for what would have been an easy TD
2-10:Mobley ran up the middle for 3
3-7:Leary ran for no gain. Holding was called on the offense but they just proceeded with 4-7
4-7:Missed an open Mitchell over the middle for what woukld have been a first down

1's came out with Semonza at QB. started at the 30 going S-N.
1-10:Semonza intercepted by Howard .

1-10: MclClure ran for 1.
2-9: pass to Bohanon for 1 who was greeted with a big hit by Jayden Lewis
3-4:False start by the offense.
3-9: pass to Preston for 3.
Preston was shook up by a big hit form a DB right after he made the catch. he did bounce off it to get the 3 yards but then bent over for a bit before a teammate helped him walk off.

2's out with Leary at QB. Started at the 35 going N-S:
1-10: Pass to Zycarl Lewis for 7. Sumrall refers to him as CJ.
2-3: Pass to Mmahat for 4
2 minute warning.
1-10: Penalty on the defense for offsides
1-5:Leary overthrew the receiver and it was intercepted by Kevin Adams.

1's came out with Semonza. Started at the 35 going S-N:
1-10:10 yard pass to Anthony Brown-Stephens ,who has had a good spring and will be referred to as ABS.
1-10: Pass to Lewis broken up by Tavare Smith
2-10Pass to Mithchell broken up by Joshua Moore
3-10:Sacked by Geordan Guidry and Jah'rie Garner for a loss of 10

2's with Leary. Started at the 33 going N-S.
1-10:throwaway under pressure
2-10; Pass to preston under pressure. It was little behind him and he batted it around some but ultimately dropped it.
Flag on the offense for holding and ineligible man downfield.
They went with 3-10 ignoring the penalties. McClure ran for 7
4-3:Interception by Dallas Winter-Johnson. When he went off the field he was dangling his right arm.

Half-time

2's came out with Semonza. Strarted at the 30 going S-N.
1-10:McClure ran up the middle for 25
1-10:McClure stuffed by Ty Cooper for a loss of 2
2-12:Gordon ran for 3
3-9; Pass dropped by Lewis
4-9:sack by Cooper

Tasby came out at QB. Started at tghe 35 going N-S.
1-10:run for no gain by Turner
2-10:Turner ran for 3 up the middle
3-7:Tasby ran for 5
4-2: Pass to Mobley for no gain

2's came out with Leary. Started at the 40 going S-N
1-10: Pass to McClure for 11

1-10: McClure ran up the middle for 13

1-10: Pass to McClure on the left for 2
2-8:Gordon ran right for 11

1-10: Gordon ran for 14

1 and goal from the 9:Mobley for 5 up the middle
2 from the 4: Mobley ran to the right for the TD

Went for 2 but he overthrew Mitchell

Semonza came on. Started at the 35 going N-S.
1-10: Pass to Mmahat for 11
1-10Pass to Mmahat for 14
1-10:Gordon ran for 6
2-4:Chase Green tackled Gordon for a loss of 1
3-5;pass to ABS for 10
1-10:Gordon ran right for 2
2-8; Pass to ABS for 8
1-10:Gordon ran left for 5
2-5: pass to Mirtil for a loss of2
3-7:Semonza lost 1 on a run


At this point the defense was up 35-6. They clearly dominated as they have for most of the spring. The QB's were often under pressure. We have to hope we can find help in the portal there and at QB.

Mostly 3's and walk-ons played the last 2 series. Dgam Bruno QB's the first series and led them to a TD on a pass to Anthony Miller. . They went for 2 but the pass was batted down by Nik Alston.

Jakson Judge QB's the last series and led them to a TD. Made the 4 point try.

The final was 36-22 for the defense.

On the O-Line the only 2 sure starters are Graham at LT and Hurst at either LG or Center. Too much mixing and matching plus players out like Darion Reed.

Turner will likey be RB1. McClure looks good as does Gordon. Barnes must be out injured.

Preston and Bohanon will likely start at WR with probably Lewis.

TE is up for grabs with Miller and Reid.

On D- it looked like Henderson, McAlpine,nairne and garner went out first. Howard and Makai Williams were the LB's. The DB's were Eziomume, Adams, Tchienchou and Smith. I missed one player. I'm a one man operation and with the no huddle tempo and having to sit in the Glazer seats instead of upstairs. it's hard to get a lot of the numbers.

We obviously have a ton of work to do on offense. With he portal and the way coaches can work with players during the summer now there is hope.

In addition to the others Deshawn Baptiste, Rayshawn Pleasant, the punter, etc. Just found out Edge Ty Cooper (previously of MSU) has hit the portal as well as TE Guisann Mirtil.

I was expecting today to be a much lighter practice than it was, so I am going to do a report rather than the depth chart analysis, which I will post tomorrow instead.

The offense, which has been coming on since a dismal performance in the scrimmage two weeks ago after TJ Finley's suspension, had its best day of the spring this morning. At one point, Will Hall approached the receivers on the sideline and praised them for making a series of tough catches. Neither Donovan Leary nor Kadi Semonza has proven he can be a quality starting QB at this level, but I'm definitely not closing the book on either of them. They both are ahead of where any of the three quarterbacks were last year at this time, although expecting the dramatic improvement Darian Mensah made in the summer from either one of these guys is no certainty. Jon Sumrall has to get another quarterback ini the spring portal for depth purposes alone, but I'm not convinced a guy coming in after missing all of the spring will be the frontrunner for the job.

Jha'Quan Jackson attended practice today, and as per the usual, inspected my socks and told me to push them down further. Don't ask. It was a routine that started early last year and never stopped. I asked him why Tyjae Spears did not get the ball more last year with the Titans, and he pulled up the head coach's phone number and asked if I wanted to call and ask him directly. Jackson was giving encouragement and some coaching to the receivers on the sideline.

I did not notice any extra absences other than Jude McCoskey and Deshaun Batiste, who announced yesterday they were entering the portal. The Tulane staff is pretty confident there will not be any more big-time defections (neither of those guys qualify in that category, although Batiste would have gotten playing time in the d-line rotation), so we shall see.

Kadin Semonza directed a long touchdown drive in the first 11-on-11 segment, completing a bunch of passes in a row with quick decisions. He gets in trouble sometimes when he gets pressured, throwing the ball up for grabs or scrambling into more trouble, but he is at his best when the ball comes out of his hands fast. He hit Shaun Nicholas over the middle to start the drive and then threw a deep out to Anthony Brown-Stephens, who made a terrific leaping catch along the sideline. Semonza even made a completion with a hand in his face on a pass rush right up the middle, hitting Garrett Mmahat. A pair of connections with Shazz Preston moved the ball to the 11, where Semonza threw a perfect fade to Nicholas in the back of the end zone, beating KC Eziomume for a touchdown as the offense celebrated en masse.

Leary did not produce a touchdown on his drive, but he made a nice pass to Guiseann Mirtil on third down to move the chains, hit Oliver Mitchell outside and over the middle and threw a quick out to Brown-Stephens. He scrambled for another first down, showing what I thought was good foot speed before getting shot down by Sumrall after practice, but then took a sack that killed the chance to score. Mitchell, by the way, has really come on this week after not being very noticeable in the first few weeks of spring drills. If the Karr product becomes a big factor in his career, it could open up a pipeline to the premier New Orleans area program that has long been closed.

At the end of practice, they had a tough 2-minute drill with the offense starting at its own 45 with a minute left and two timeouts and needing a touchdown to win. Leary almost produced one right away, throwing deep to a streaking Shazz Preston, who laid out for the ball at the goal line but could not bring it in. A scrambling completion to Zycarl Lewis (who they call CJ) gained a first down, but a long pass to Preston in the corner of the end zone again was slightly too far, going off one outstretched hand in what would have been a miraculous catch. Leary then could not connect with Mmahat on a crossing pattern under heavy pressure, with the ball going off his fingertips. With time running out, Leary threw underneath to Maurice Turner inbounds, forcing the offense to burn its final timeout. He then threw short of the end zone to Anthony Miller in a bad decision since time ran out on the play.

Semonza was next, and he took a "sack" on the first play that put the offense behind the 8-ball and forced a quick timeout. After a short pass to Duda Barnes, who reversed field to try to make something out of it but was touched down, and an absolute duck to Lewis he threw deep under intense pressure up the middle that easily could have been intercepted but wasn't, he made a gorgeous dart over the middle to Lewis, splitting two defenders fora first down on fourth-and-11. A short completion to Lewis forced the offense to burn its final timeout with little time left, and the defense broke up a sideline pass that would have picked up a few yards. Semonza threw for the end zone on the next play but did not get enough air under the ball. Brown-Stephens still nearly made a circus catch, trapping the ball as he came back for it just in the end zone. With time for one play left, Semonza threw a long fade for Sidney Mbanasor, who did not make a play on the ball while Eziomume, in perfect position, nearly intercepted it.

William Hudlow got a lot of work today, and while I do not think he will be the punter next fall, he has improved significantly since Will Karoll's departure. When the drill was not live, he was consistently booming them high and nearly 50 yards, something I never, ever saw from him in the past. When they put a rush on him in a live drill, though, he became more erratic. One punt went 31 yards off the side of his foot to the left. Another was low and 41 yards to the right. He hit a 57-yarder that was high enough for the coverage to surround Lewis after he caught it, but then he dropped a low snap and hit a 36-yarder back to back. He finished with efforst of 47 and 41 yards before attempting two coffin corner kicks from the defense's 40 and placing the first one inside the 5 where it bounced out of bounds and kicking the next one very high, where it was caught around the 15. The two punt returners were Bryce Bohanon and Lewis.

Tulane has been a little shorthanded at wideout for most of the spring. Omari Hayes was on his scooter again today with his injured leg propped on it with a cast. Antwaun Parham was on crutches, and Jimmy Calloway did not practice. Hayes is expected to be the primary punt returner in the fall.

Patrick Durkin made field goals of 30 and 38 yards in live situations. I should have checked to see who the holder was after Hudlow struggled in that roll last week, but I didn't.

Sumrall and Joe Craddock spoke after practice. I will have their quotes soon.

Facing a pass rush it could not handle consistently, the Tulane offense was on it back heels for a significant portion of the 11-on-11 work in the last full practice today before the spring game, but it responded with three big plays for touchdowns down the stretch. The first one was the longest, with Bryce Bohanon getting open about 10 yards down the field, making a slick move after the catch and beating everyone down the field until a defender finally reached him inside the 5 and pushed him out of bounds just after he crossed the goal line for a 75-yard touchdown. Almost the entire offense (starters and backups) sprinted down the field to celebrate with Bohanon. That play came after Kadin Semonza, who appeared particularly bothered by heavy pressure, dropped a snap on first down and threw the ball away on purpose on second down at the start of a series.

Donovan Leary, who had the better overall day of the two quarterbacks, took over for the next series and led a long drive in which he took a "sack" from Derrick Shepard (they were in shorts and shoulder pads), found Garrett Mmahat open on a crossing pattern to make up that yardage, got pressured into a throwaway by Santana Hopper and watched Gerrod Henderson clobber Javin Gordon on an inside run that produced no reaction from anyone (I thought it might cause a fight). On the next play, Anthony Brown-Stephens got open on a deep corner route that had Bailey Despanie complaining about something illegal after Brown-Stephens turned and ran into the end zone for a 35-yard touchdown that produced another group celebration.

The scrimmage ended with a red zone drill,and on the final play, Kellen Tasby, who has been a revelation in the past two weeks after moving to receiver from quarterback earlier this spring, made a leaping catch in the back of the end zone with two defenders right on him for a touchdown from Semonza. That terrific grab resulted in another huge celebration, and Jon Sumrall blew his whistle seconds later signifying the end of practice. If Tasby sticks around, and that's an open question because he still probably thinks he can be a quarterback somewhere, he could be a factor in the passing game this year. He's everything the coaches hoped Sidney Mbanasor would be when he arrived last fall--a tall target who can make plays.

Earlier in the practice, they had a situational 11-on-11 when every down was second-and-7. Semonza, who was rushing his throws when he felt pressure, threw deep to no one in particular on the first play. He hit Bohanon underneath for virtually no gain on the next play and then threw the ball away under duress. Next was Leary, who handed off to Jamauri McClure and watched him get popped by linebacker Dallas Winner-Johnson, who has made a lot of plays during the spring but also makes a lot of mistakes and is raw. Leary was on the run do to pressure a lot, but one of his scrambles he made a nice throw to Oliver Mitchell on the sideline when I thought he was throwing the ball away.

Before the first 11 on 11, they had 7-on-7 work. Leary threw too high for Tasby, who could not hold on to the ball, on the first play. Anthony Brown-Stephens showed good concentration on a pass from Semonza that bounced off his hands twice before he caught it. Maybe the best pass in the entire drill came from walk-on Jaxson Judge, whogunned the ball to Shaun Nichoals for a touchdown over the middle with little space, although Leary made a nice throw to Guiseann Mirtil for a score, too.

Next, they did 1-on-1 drills. Jahiem Johnson blanked Brown-Stephens on the first play, preventing him from getting any separation. Shazz Preston dropped a short pass on a slant, an uncharacteristic mistake for him this spring, before Bohanon beat Chase Green. You can book Preston and Bohanon as two of the three starters at wideout in the fall. They have separated themselves from the rest, and Sumrall likely will bring in a third starter this summer, although injuries to Omari Hayes and Jimmy Calloway prevented them from proving what they could do in the spring. Nicholas looked like he had beaten E'Zaiah Shinee, but an underthrow from Semonza allowed Shine to knock the ball away in the end zone. Tavare Smith broke up a pass for Oliver Mitchell, who made some plays today but was relatively quiet this spring as an early enrollee from Karr. Brown-Stephens, who has been the best of the newcomers, burned KC Eziomume on an inside route. The session ended with Preston juggling a pass that he may or may not have caught inbounds when he brought it in inside the 5. It looked to me like his foot was on the sideline.

Tasby actually took some reps at quarterback in between the 11-on-11 sessions for the first time since he moved to receiver. I'm not sure what that was about.

Sumrall reiterated he will go after a punter in the portal, but William Hudlow actually punted well today in a special teams segment. It's the best I've seen him look. He was hitting them high and long, but of course without the game pressure or even live-drill pressure that make a difference.

Greg McMahon stopped by practice today and will speak to the team tomorrow. Sumrall tried to get him to stay another year and really values his thoughts, but he was ready to retire.

Ed Orgeron was there, too, wearing a green shirt and injecting his usual enthusiasm as he talked to recruits on the sideline and to the team with a pep talk after practice. As one observer put it, he's still being paid by LSU but is basically working for Tulane at the moment, with his son on staff as the tight ends coach.

Dickson Agu and Santana Hopper talked after practice. Agu has been held out of contact drills after having surgery in January on a shoulder injury, but he has participated in individual drills. Hopper was a little reserved when he talked, but Agu said Hopper had moves he had never seen from a Tulane lineman and would be a huge factor in the fall. I will transcribe their interviews here likely tomorrow morning.

There was a surprising amount of hitting in practice today considering they were not in full pads. It was a very spirited workout, the way Sumrall likes it.

They will have a 90-minute practice Thursday morning to wrap up spring aside from the spring game. I will post my projected depth chart after that one with analysis.

Sumrall said today he definitely would go after a cornerback, a wide receiver and a punter in the post-spring portal, with the possibility of adding a quarterback.

He's been arrested for possession of stolen property valued over $25,000.

So I was entering Yulman Stadium yesterday when I got a text from my boss at The Advocate saying the owner of the business (I assume he was referring to John George) wanted a story up within a day about Carlin Hartman winning a national championship and Florida and asking me if I could write it. You can't say no to a text like that, but I spent the next 24 hours working on what I thought would be mission impossible trying to reach Hartman for an interview and trying to get Perry Clark and Kim Lewis as extra voices.

It turned out to be easier than I thought--my connections at Florida came through for me and my connection at Tulane put me in touch with Clark and Lewis--but I was fully occupied until I finished the story this afternoon

I now have time to write the practice report I intended to write yesterday. It should be up within the hour.

The offense had its best day of spring practice on Thursday at Yulman Stadium, picking up where it left off at the end of Tuesday's workout. I'll get to that in a bit, but the biggest news today was the absence of punter Will Karoll, who has become the third significant player to leave the team either right before the start of drills (Rayshawn Pleasant) or during them (Jesus Machado and now Karoll). This pretty much came out of nowhere--Karoll was at last Saturday's scrimmage--and Jon Sumrall suspects tampering from another school, although there is nothing he can do about it. I noticed Karoll was not out there today after watching Patrick Durkin struggle on field goals for the first time and realizing his holder was Jesuit alum William Hudlow instead of Karoll. I asked Sumrall about Karoll after practice, and this is what he said:

"He's leaving. He's decided to move on. It's the world we live in. We talked and I'm not going to say everything that was said. You never know who's been talking to him. I think he probably already knows his destination. I'll just say that."

I pointed out Australians like Karoll were placed at schools by the agency representing them--Karoll told me as much when I wrote a feature on him.

"He's sort of changed the group he's with," Sumrall said. "He's not with the group he came over with. It's one of those things. I'm for Will. I like Will. I hate that he's gone. We have to go get a punter now, probably. It was very out of the blue. It was fine until it wasn't. I'm not real smart, but I've been doing this long enough to know there's some foul play. There's some backdoor things that are outside of our control. I wish him well and hope it goes well wherever he ends up."

Hudlow was the No. 2 punter, but Tulane definitely will need to find its punter from the portal.

Back to the practice. I did not write down a ton of the play-by-play because I was focused on depth chart info on the defensive line, but in 7 on 7, Kadin Semonza, whose last name pronunciation is Semahnza when I had been thinking Semoanza all spring, hit well-covered tight end Anthony Miller in the hands deep downfield, but Miller dropped it. It was not an easy catch, but it was one he should have made. Semonza then threw over the head of Bryce Bohanon deep when Bohanon had a step. He then went underneath to Sidney Mbanasor for back-to-back completions, nearly threw an interception on a deflected pass and hit Jamauri McClure for a 40-yard touchdown on a wheel route when the defense forgot about McClure. Kevin Adams was the closest defender, but I don't think it was his responsibility.

Donovan Leary took over and finished his drive with a 40-yard touchdown pass to wide open tight end Guiseann Mirtil, who made his second big play in as many days after being invisible since returning from a serious knee he sustained in the middle of 2024 spring drills as an early-enrolling freshman. Leary's next drive ended in a 39-yard field goal attempt that Durkin sent wide left for his second miss in a row, prompting me to notice Hudlow as holder.

After a break for individual work, they finished practice with an 11-on-11 2-minute drill in shoulder pads but with no tackling to the ground. Leary got first crack and threw deep for Shaun Nicholas, who stopped his route when he realized he was not open and got chewed out for not finishing the play. The drive ended with a nice touchdown run by Maurice Turner, who would be the starting running back if the season started Saturday. Sumrall has offered nothing but praise for Turner, a big-play threat who also can be tough as a runner when needed.

When Semonza got his chance, he hit Kellen Tasby on the play of the day-- a jump ball on a deep pass down the sideline in which Tasby leaped to make the grab over Adams, drawing loud cheers from the offense. The drive ended with no points when Semonza threw the ball into the stands because no one was open on third down before Jayden Lewis broke up a pass for Tasby in the corner of the end zone, sticking his hand in there just as the ball arrived.

Leary went back in and hit Zycarl Lewis on a deep out, threw a short pass to Garrett Mmahat, hit Lewis before Lewis slipped to the turf making a cut and fumbled a snap, recovering it himself. He then hit Anthony Brown-Stephens over the middle of the field to move the offense within field goal range, waited for the clock to run down before spiking the ball and watching as Durkin made a 37-yard field goal. The whistle blew ending practice at 10:02.

DEFENSIVE LINE DEPTH

I continually wrote down the front four while they rotated guys in and out. The first group I saw was Mo Westmoreland at bandit, Santana Hopper and Elijah Champaigne inside and Kam Hamilton, who is back to wearing No. 70, at end. Jah'Rie Garner roated in for Hopper quickly, and Deshaun Batiste replaced Hamilton. A little later, the D-line was Garner, Geordan Guidry, Derrick Sheppard and Jordan Norman. Then it was Gerrod Henderson, Drammeh, Nik Alston and Ty Cooper. A little later, it was walk-on Michael Guruli, Guidry, Sheppard and Norman. Then it was Batiste, Tre'Von McAlpine, Eliyt Nairne and Garner. The last grouping I wrote down was Garner, Guidry, Sheppard and McAlpine. My best guess for a starting unit y would be Henderson, Hopper, Adonis Friloux (who is out for the rest of spring) and Hamilton, but guys will rotate in and out on the deep unit.

INJURY

During the 11-on-11 work, Elijah Baker went down screaming with a knee injury that did not appear as severe a couple minutes later as he made it look at first. Although they moved the scrimmage away from him while a trainer examined him and stretched his leg, he walked off mostly on his own power while favoring his left leg. We will see how that pans out.

PHYSICAL DRILL

They did another version of Oklahoma kickoff drill they ran before the first scrimmage today, but with only two players competing at a time and no returner. One player lined up at the 15 and another lined up at the 20. They started toward the goal line, and the player in front had to turn around and try to prevent the other one from getting to a tackling dummy at the 3. Chris Rodgers beat Dallas Winner-Johnson comfortably, getting around him and slamming into the dummy. The others were more of a wash.

Sorry Guerry, have to ask bc the reports are few and far between.

After conducting a regular practice, Tulane scrimmaged from 9:45 to 10:17 on Saturday morning at Yulman Stadium. Instead of having an Oklahoma-like kickoff coverage drill right before the start, they had three one-on-one races between offensive and defensive players. They lined up at the 45-yard line, ran around a cushion at the other 45 and race back to dive across the 45. The first two were so close that the offense and defense claimed victory, with Jamauri McClure going against Kevin Adams and a pair of numbers I didn't catch in the second one. The last one had Zycarl Lewis against Armani Cargo, and Cargo won.

Several players were held out of the scrimmage. On defense, Sam Howard, Dickson Agu, Kam Hamilton, Javion White and Adonis Friloux were notable absences. On offense, Arnold Barnes and LaRon Husbands (knee, crutches) sat out while Derrick Graham and Shadre Hurst got eight reps before heading to the sideline to let other gets needed work. TJ Finley of course was not there. Darion Reed continued to be unavailable with a minor injury, wearing his jersey but not having his helmet. Antwaun Parham is out with an injury, too, joining Omari Hayes.

The scrimmage started with the offense backed up to its 1-yard line. On the first play, there was a botched exchange between Jack Hollifield and Kadin Semonza. The ball went forward, and Jack Tchienchou picked it up for an easy scoop and score. Donovan Leary went in and nearly threw a pick-six, with Chris Rodgers reading the out pass, stepping in front of it but failing to hold on to the ball.

Next, they did a third-and-one drill from the offense's 20. Leary threw incomplete under heavy pressure, then the offense was called for holding on a nice run by Zuberi Mobley, Mobley picked up a first down by inches and Semonza sneaked for 2 yards.

The regular portion of the scrimmage started with the ball at the offense's 20. After Leary threw incomplete, a penalty backed the offense up to the 19 and McClure busted a 21-yard power run where he ran through tackles. A quick out to Shazz Preston picked up 4 yards--he was unable to break free as he did twice in the first scrimmage--and Maurice Turner powered his way for 8 yards. Leary hit Preston for 25 yards on an inside route before Turner gained 2 yards and McClure gained 9 yards on a powerful run to make it first down at the defense's 12. Leary kept for a 3-yard loss (the whistle of course blew before any contact with the quarterbacks), and McClure was met in the backfield by a host of tacklers, breaking two of them but still ending up with a 2-yard loss. Leary then threw late to the outside for Justyn Reed on a pass that was not close. Patrick Durkin kicked a 35-yard field goal to finish the drive.

Semonza was next and started with three straight incomplete passes--including an overshot and another that was broken up by Jah'Rie Garner. They started over and Turner was stuffed for a 5-yard loss before breaking loose on second down for 22-yard gain down the sideline. He fumbled at the end, but the ball went ouf of bounds. Rodgers, who is having a good spring, tackled Anthony Miller for a 2-yard reception on the next play, and Shaun Nicholas beat KC Eziomume for 10 yards to move the ball to the defense's 44. Joshua Moore blitzed for a 6-yard "sack," Turner picked up 6 yards and Semonza scrambled on third down before the whistle blew for a sack.

Leary got the next turn and found Anthony Brown-Stephens wide open on a crosser for 24 yards to the 49. McClure was cut down for 1-yard gain, failing to break a tackle for the first time in four runs and looking a little dinged up as teammates pulled him up, and Leary overshot McClure on a simple pass in the flat where McClure did not appear totally ready. On third-and-9, Leary held the ball a little too long and when he threw, it went right to bandit Ty Cooper for an easy interception.

Leary got another possession and threw a quick out to Garrett Mmahat for 3 yards. Javin Gordon bounced outside for 5 yards but got popped hard near the sideline. McClure, still not looking right, tried to run wide to his left on third-and-1 and lost 3 yards. Leary tried to throw a quick pass on fourth-and-4 and Adams jumped it for an interception.

Leary got a third consecutive series, this time from the offense's 40, and started with a beautiful pass to Nicholas down the sideline for 20 yards. Moore sacked him for 5 yards on the next play before Mobley gained 4 yards. Turner tried to bounce outside on a surprise third-and-11 run call but gained only 5 yards. On fourth and 6, Leary overthrew an open Lewis on a deep ball to the end zone. They still allowed Durkin to attempt a 52-yard field goal, and he nailed it with a couple of yards to spare. The last time a Tulane kicker made one of 50 yards or longer in a game was Cairo Santos in 2013, which is insane.

Semonza went back in and handed off to McClure, who looked recovered from his early ding, gained 8 yards but fumbled at the end. The offense recovered it. An incomplete pass followed before Oliver Mitchell caught a 4-yard pass and slipped. A quick throw to Gordon netted 9 yards, and he then broke a tackle on a 17-yard power run to the 22. After a throwaway, Turner gained 14 yards up the middle on a play that ended in a fight between two players whose numbers I did not catch (an offensive lineman and a defensive lineman). On first-and-goal from the 8, Semonza overshot Reed in the corner of the end zone. He then hit Lewis on a quick out, but he was pushed out of bounds for no gain. Deshaun Batiste had a sack on third down, leading to a 32-yard field goal by Durkin.

They went to red zone work next, and Semonza was not clsoe on a pass for Bryce Bohanon. Mobley ran through a big hole for 11 yards to move the ball to the 9, and I thought McClure scored on the next play. The offense celebrated as if it were a touchdown, but the ball was marked just inside the 1. A Semonzs sneak was ugly as he went too low, and McClure was hit for a 2-yard loss on third-and-goal from the 1. A TD pass to Reid, who ran into the end zone and simply turned around, was wiped out by a penalty before Semonza connected with Bohanon on an out route in the back of the end zone, floating it in nicely. over Chase Green. Durkin converted the extra point.

The scrimmage ended with one red zone possession for walk-on Dagan Bruno. He found Brown-Stephens for 18 yars on the first play. A 1-yard run on first-and-goal set up Turner for a 1-yard TD plunge, and Zach Marini made the extra point.

DEPTH CHARTS

The starting O-line from left to right was Derrick Graham, Shadre Hurst, Hollifield, John Bock and Reese Baker. The No. 2 line was Tristen Fortenberry, Landry Cannon, Elijah Baker, Robbie Pizzolato and Dominic Steward. Anthony Miller was the first-team tight end, backed up by Reid. McClure was the first running back, with Turner next, then Gordon, then Mobley. The starting wideouts were Bohanon, Mbanasor and Preston. The No. 2 wideouts were Nicholas, Brown-Stephens and Lewis. Kellen Tasby and Mmahat got in the rotation, too.

The starting D-line was Gerrod Henderson, Tre'Von McAlpine, Santana Hopper and Jah'Rie Garner, with Deshaun Batiste, Elijah Champaigne, Eliyt Nairne and Mo Westmoreland getting plenty of work inthe rotation along with Cooper, PaLanding Drammeh, Geordan Guidry. They rotate in and out so much it is hard to get a read on the order. I did not see Nik Alston but might have missed him.

The linebacker were Rodgers and Dallas Winner-Johnson, with Jean Claude Joseph and Makai Williams getting work.

The nickelbacks were Eziomume and Jayden Lewis. The cornerbacks were Jahiem Johnson and E'Zaiah Shine together at the sart, with Armani Cargo rotating in and Isaiah Wadsworht getting backup reps.

The starting safeties were Tchienchou and Despanie, with Adams and Moore behind them and Green rotating in at times.

They had the first basketball interviews today since the day Tulane lost in the AAC tourney, and there is a lot of news. For one, Mari Jordan was back at practice after missing Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday (the Wave did not practice Thursday), and Ron Hunter said Jordan had taken his name out of the portal. Second, Kam Williams committed to Kentucky, an indication of how high his reputation is. Third, Rowan Brumbaugh, who is more of an open book than any player I have ever covered, refused to commit to returning next year. Here is his full interview today, where he was brutally honest about everything he was asked.

On Mari Jordan being back and how significant that is:

"It's great news. Obviously he was a big part of this year, but at the end of the day we gotta go do it. We came in fourth place in the conference, like, that's cool and all, but we have a lot of stuff to do. Just having one player, we have to continue to build a good culture."

On the significance of the College Basketball Crown:

"I mean it's tough because we don't have a full roster. It's almost like a bowl game. It's a great idea. It should be fun, but going into next year I wouldn't expect this tournament to represent anything honestly."

On if he is over what happened against Memphis:

"Yeah, I'm over that. It's God's will at the end of the day. It's something to learn from. We'll be back."

On how comfortable he is with staying next year:

"I haven't made an official decision or anything like that, but I love it here. It's a great system. It works for me. It works for the team, so I just hope we can get some more guys."

On the deciding factors of staying or leaving:

"I love it here. There's nothing more from a people perspective, basketball school perspective. Honestly it would be more of a financial thing at the end of the day. When you look back five years from now, do you regret not taking a big opportunity? That's where I'm at for me. I'm always going to be an open book. I love it here. There's nothing more Tulane can do now at the end of the day."

On how much team needs to improve to get to NCAA tournament:

"A ton. You had one year of decent success, but we still came in fourth place in the American Conference. I don't even know if it was a top-10 conference this year (it was 11th), so we had success, but now is the time of year where everyone is told how good they are and people are told they are way better than they are. We literally came in fourth place in conference. We aren't that good. We don't have to keep getting so hyped up. We have tons of work to do. I'm just excited to get back in the gym. I love just working out and stuff because at the end of the day you have to guard the dude in front of you. You have to beat the team in front of you. It doesn't matter how much money you make, what school you go to, who thinks you're so good, who told you you're so good because you're not. I'm under an audience of one, and that's God."