New Jersey CB Saboor Karriem recaps Illini visitPosted by freeamfva on April 5th, 2022 New Jersey CB Saboor Karriem recaps Illini visit
After three years as a tight ends coach under Lovie Smith, during which he helped develop Daniel Barker into one of the Big Ten\'s top tight ends, Patterson was retained by Smith\'s successor, Bret Bielema, and shifted to running backs coach. In Patterson\'s first season coaching the position, Chase Brown became just the 13th Illini to top 1,000 rushing yards in a single season and Josh McCray put together one of the best freshman seasons by an Illini running back, totaling 592 yards from scrimmage with two touchdowns. Cory Patterson: \"No doubt. It\'s great to have his leadership in the room. It\'s great to have his leadership, which is one of those things I\'m happy to see with him. He\'s starting to take charge of the group, getting the young guys going. I see him in the room, working on film when I\'m not in there and those types of things. Those are the types of things you need if you\'re going to have your group continue to go forward, and he\'s doing those right now.\" Cory Patterson: \"Chase Hayden is phenomenal. He came back. He got his mind right. He\'s running good. He\'s making great cuts. The guys are all locked in. I\'m really excited about what he\'s going to do for the rest of the spring. The guy\'s made some really good plays for us this spring.\" Cory Patterson: \"We\'re just continuing to work on getting Reggie healthy and taking care of his body. But he\'s one of the smartest guys in the room. He\'s always going to know what to do and where to be, but he\'s got to take care of his body a little bit, and I\'ll think he\'ll be all right.\" Cory Patterson: \"He\'s really good. He\'s a great inside zone runner. The guy\'s got great feet, great moves, real shifty, can run, can move a little bit. He\'s one of those guys you love to just have. You see him on film running inside zones you love to have him out there, and he\'s also really good in pass pro, so you love to have him on the field.\" Cory Patterson: \"Aidan Laughery, how can I put it? What do they call it, a splash in the pan? When he gets it, now you see him, now you don\'t. And he\'s doing some really good things in the classroom. He learns well. He picks things up really fast and asks all the right questions. When he gets out on the field, he\'s able to put it on the field as a young guy, and sometimes you don\'t see that with young guys, they\'re kind of slow picking things up. But he\'ll get out there and just jump into it with the older guys right away.\" Cory Patterson: \"That\'s phenomenal. That\'s one of the things that he has that gives him the opportunity to have an early role. Because right now you could line up Aidan anywhere and give somebody fits. He can run by you. You don\'t want to get caught standing still. He\'s been doing a phenomenal job with that, and I just love watching him play because I thought he was going to come in and be a little tight, but he\'s coming in and playing free. He\'s asking questions. He\'s the type of guy you want to coach.\" Like it? Share it!More by this author |