MOBILE, Ala. – University of South Alabama football participated in contact drills Tuesday morning for the final time before Friday’s scrimmage, the last of the fall which will be held at the practice fields on campus.

The Jaguars will not go through contact drills until Friday, which will allow a couple of extra days for any bumps and bruises to heal as well as allow the student-athletes to get their legs back under them following preseason camp.

The Jaguars worked on third-down situations Tuesday morning, which offered the ones versus the twos on both sides of the ball. The offense hit on several big plays, both on the ground and in the air, and moved the ball fairly efficiently.

On the second play of the drill, Ellis Hill scored on a 56-yard touchdown run around the left end. Two plays later, Myles Gibbon connected with Ralph Turner for a 15-yard pass completion. Brennan Sim found Ryan Onkka for a 20-yard completion, and C.J. Bennent connected with Jeremé Jones for a gain of 20 yards. The drill ended after Kendall Houston broke through the left side of the line for a 40-yard gain.

Minus the big play in the third-down drill, the defense stood its ground. The Jaguar defense held the offense to two yards or fewer on half of the 16 total plays ran in the drill.

“There is no doubt the competition level has increased,” head coach Joey Jones said. “Both twos, offense and defense, are doing pretty well. They are going out there and giving us a good look. They’re not far away from the ones, so there is a lot of competition.”

Tuesday’s practice opened with special teams work followed by screen drills. From there, the Jags worked on inside running while wide receivers and defensive backs worked one-on-one against each other with the quarterbacks.

Following the inside drill, the offensive line focused on pass protection versus the defensive line while the skill positions worked on route-running and coverages in skeleton passing drills.

The Jaguars began Tuesday’s practice about an hour later than previous practices this season, due to classes which started Monday at South Alabama.

“I think the attitude was good today,” Jones said, “but I think some of the guys just ran out of gas a little bit in the heat.”

South Alabama will return to practice at 7:25 a.m. Wednesday morning at the fields on campus.

For more information about South Alabama athletics, check back with www.usajaguars.com.  Season tickets for all Jaguar athletic events can be purchased by calling (251) 461-1USA (1872).

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