When the North Carolina football team takes the field Saturday in its annual spring game, don’t expect any flashy calls from the Butch Davis playbook.
More than anything, Davis said he plans to use Saturday’s scrimmage as an opportunity to see just what kind of players he’ll be working with during the Tar Heels’ 2011-12 campaign.
“It’s not so much how much can you scheme to try and have success,” Davis said. “As much as you can, you just call generic, fundamental, good football plays, offensively or defensively, and does a guy have the innate ability to make a play.”
Saturday’s scrimmage will be the finale for the squad until August, and a culmination of 14 days of spring practice.
During the past two weeks, Davis has gotten a sneak peak of what he’ll have to work with this fall. And for the most part, the coach is delighted with what he’s seen.
Davis gushed about his team’s depth on special teams and was thrilled about the Tar Heels’ new and improved offensive line — a position at which Davis thinks North Carolina will excel next season.
“I think that we’re more athletic than we’ve been any time since I’ve been here,” Davis said. “We’re bigger, we’re certainly a little bit stronger than we’ve been in the past, and there’s certainly a lot more depth.”
In splitting up his team for Saturday’s scrimmage, Davis said he wants to make it as competitive as possible. But the game is also an opportunity for some of the underexposed Tar Heels to demonstrate their skills.
“We’ve scripted some scenarios where we’re going to interchange some guys on the depth chart just so you get some different matchups,” Davis said. “As much as possible, you try to script to give guys opportunities.”
