The Cats are off to a good start on the season winning three of the first four games. Unfortunately, the one loss partially happened because of bad snaps from the center position.
Nick Haynes, who has been off and on during the season and we just found out over the summer, that he is battling diabetes. Haynes snapped the ball over Stephen Johnson’s head against Florida in one of the most crucial times of the game. It was third and goal for the Cats and the bad snap forced the MacGinnis to kick a field goal, instead of score a touchdown and get the extra 4 points.
At Monday’s press conference, head coach Mark Stoops said, “We’ll continue to work all options” when referring to the bad snaps. Stoops also said, “I mean, obviously we can’t have that. I think, as I said after the game, it was very hot, he was very sweaty. There’s times where I think his grip is an issue.”
Drake Jackson, who is a former Army All-American Center from Woodford County, Kentucky could be the answer for the Cats exchange problems this season. In every game there has been at least one bad snap by the center. Jackson could possibly fix that problem. For the first time, the redshirt freshman has been listed on the depth chart as third string center. That’s huge! Basically, it means at least Stoops and his staff are considering Jackson being put into the game.
Stoops said they will have to see what Jackson can do this week in practice, saying, “We gotta continue to look at all options. We’ll give… Maybe look at Drake (Jackson) a little bit this week too and see if we can move bunchy to guard a little bit. We gotta continue to tweak that and try to be as perfect as we can.”
Stoops also said Thursday that Jackson could get playing time against Eastern Michigan.
“We need to. Get in there. He’s had couple really solid weeks of practice the past two weeks, and so I think we’ll get him in the rotation at some point. He’s been very consistent with his snaps,” Stoops said.
This could be huge for the Cats, it’s just that something has gotta give, and the redshirt on Jackson could be that thing that has to give.