Texas Tech football, 5 topics: Joey McGuire picks player who had best off-season
The Texas Tech football team's cornerbacks rotation last season boiled down to three players: Rayshad Williams started 11 games, Malik Dunlap and Bralyn Lux eight apiece with Lux making some starts at other secondary positions.
With Williams and Dunlap out of eligibility, Lux and highly rated 2022 signee Maurion Horn began spring practice as the first-team corners, but there's another young candidate to watch.
"I think if you ask anybody on our team, any player, who is the number-one biggest surprise in the off-season," Tech coach Joey McGuire said, "I think every single one of them will tell you Jalon Peoples. He's had a great off-season. He was never over 189 (pounds) last year, and he's 197 right now, so he's battling."
The 5-foot-11, 190-pound sophomore from Cedar Hill underwent shoulder surgery late in the 2022 season, and Tech coaches tinkered with moving him to safety last summer when depth at those spots appeared less certain.
Related: Behren Morton eager to air it out after comeback from shoulder injury
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Josh Kelly must fight for favorite jersey
Former Fresno State and Washington State wide receiver Josh Kelly caught 61 passes for 923 yards and eight touchdowns in 2023, all five-year career highs. It was Kelly's first year at Washington State and his first wearing No. 3 in college.
It made sense he'd like to keep going with what worked, but the No. 3 jersey at Texas Tech is given to a player who best represents the fighting spirit of the late Luke Siegel. Linebacker Bryce Ramirez earned No. 3 last season, but two players can wear the same number as long as they're not in the game at the same time.
"He (Kelly) wore number 3. That's a big deal to him," McGuire said. "I told him, 'Number 3's earned here.' I said, 'I have no problem with you wearing number 3, but you've got to earn it.' So he's wearing 18 right now, and he said, 'Coach, if that's what I need to do ... .' "
Two-sport athlete Mike Dingle tries new spot
Redshirt freshman Mike Dingle has moved from inside linebacker to star, the Red Raiders' hybrid field safety/outside linebacker. It's partly because three of the four inside linebacker spots on the Tech depth chart will likely belong to Ben Roberts, Jacob Rodriguez and Bryce Ramirez.
In addition, McGuire said redshirt freshman John Curry "is coming on like a freight train," not to mention early 2023 rotation players Wesley Smith and Trent Low are coming back from injury. Curry, a 6-foot-2 Coronado graduate, weighed 187 pounds when he committed to Tech in 2021 and now is listed at 225.
The Red Raiders want to see what Dingle, the two-time Big 12 60-meter hurdles finalist, looks like on the outside.
"Miquel is fast enough," McGuire said. "He's such a disruptor. Chaos follows this guy, even when he was running hurdles. He can always go back inside, but I think we've got to get more (production), because we send that (star position) so much in some of our blitzes."
Others at star are Brenden Jordan, who started five games there last year as a true freshman, and A.J. McCarty, who transferred from Baylor last summer and sat out the season.
One caveat with Dingle: He's yet to be cleared for live contact because of the shoulder injury that shelved him from October on last season.
Tech taking stock of how Caleb Rogers, Vinny Sciury, Davion Carter fit into offensive line puzzle
Caleb Rogers said in December he expected to play center in 2024. It might work out that way, but the former 42-game starter at tackle will be evaluated at center and both guard spots, McGuire said.
When the subject was raised during the Red Raiders' onsite preparations at the Independence Bowl, McGuire said only that Rogers could play center or guard. That was at the prompting of NFL scouts who thought Rogers could help his pro prospects by moving inside.
In December, Tech landed a pair of interior-line transfers: Vinny Sciury, a 33-game starter for a Toledo program that went 11-3 last season, and Davion Carter, a 23-game starter the past two seasons for Memphis, which went 7-6 in 2022 and 10-3 in 2023.
McGuire said Sciury will practice exclusively at left guard and Carter will train at right guard and center.
Will American football be a snap for Devyn Cromwell?
Newly arrived defensive back Devynn Cromwell spent the past two seasons at the University of Guelph, an Ontario school west of Toronto. Canadian rules allow pre-snap motion in any direction for players in the backfield, including wide receivers not on the line of scrimmage, as long as they're behind the line.
American cornerbacks might see sophisticated passing games, but they don't have receivers charging full speed toward the line of scrimmage pre-snap.
"Whenever we said, 'They'll actually be in a stance; they won't run at you,' " McGuire related, "he said, 'Coach, I can cover these guys.' "
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Texas Tech football: Joey McGuire picks player who had best off-season
