Opening Night is one week away — but in this so-called rehearsal, La’Darrian Page looked ready to take the stage and get the show started.
Page, the Hutchinson Community College transfer expected to give new life to Emporia State’s running game, shined in an informal game walk-through the Hornets held Wednesday night at Welch Stadium. Taking snaps with the first team during an approximately 90-minute series of plays and rotations, Page showed the speed, acceleration and cuts that could make him a force in the MIAA. Again.
“I’m still learning, but I feel like the coaches are doing a good job of helping me learn the offense, and I think I’m catching onto it real quick,” Page said. “It’s mostly just mental reps right now, because I’ve been out for quite a bit with the hamstring injury. But I’m getting back into the swing of things.”
Wednesday night’s practice, termed a “game rehearsal” by coach Garin Higgins, was deemed a success despite a few penalties, turnovers, blown coverages and some miscommunication. Getting Page reps as he gets back to full strength was one big reason why.
“He’s still got some things to work on, just with pass protection, blitz pickup and things like that,” Higgins said. “But all that will come with just some reps.”
It’s been well-documented that Page isn’t your typical juco transfer. He excelled as a freshman at Missouri Western, rushing for 1,261 yards, making the All-MIAA second team and earning the Mineral Water Bowl MVP award. He transferred to Hutch, where last season he ran for 1,340 yards and earned first-team NJCAA All-American status.
If Wednesday night was any indication, Page’s second tour of duty in the MIAA could be even better than his first. He showed his speed and shiftiness on several plays, perhaps none better than when he took an option toss from starting quarterback Andre Sloan El, then slashed back to daylight up the middle for what would’ve been a healthy gain — if the Hornets were doing any tackling at that point in practice. Officials blew their whistles before Page could take the ball beyond the third level.
That hamstring injury Page has been nursing? Not in evidence Wednesday.
“Right now, I think it’s basically just me getting the confidence and the strength back in my leg,” Page said. “I feel like the strength, it’s not all the way there. But I’m getting there.”
With a week now remaining before the Aug. 27 opener against Southwestern Oklahoma State, the point of Wednesday’s practice was to recreate a game atmosphere as much as Higgins and his staff could. Along with the officials, there was an informally used game clock and play clock.
“Just a typical game-like situation,” Higgins said. “You can’t really simulate a true game, but to the best of our ability, we tried to do that tonight.”
In general, Higgins liked what he saw out of the offense. Both Sloan El and backup Zach Rampy had their moments; in an early highlight, on a play that started inside the 40, Sloan El rolled to his left and hit a wide-open Dominic Mirocke downfield for a touchdown.
“I wanted to get the line uptempo, everybody uptempo and upbeat,” Sloan El said. “And I just wanted to get them familiar with just being out there in a game situation.”
First-teamers took relatively few snaps as practice wore on, which allowed some guys down on the depth chart to make some plays. Junior defensive back Breston Wesley got the sideline going when he delivered a jarring hit along the sideline to force a fumble. A few minutes later, he broke up a Dakota Harris pass along the sideline.
“I think we’ve had a good camp,” Higgins said afterward. “I think we’ve had a very competitive camp, (the) most competitive camp that I’ve been around. We are a little bit banged up. We’ve got to get some guys healthy, and we’ve got seven days to get that done.”