The Front Row with MARK NELKE April 21, 2013

Toughness.

Togetherness.

Not sure whether that's the motto of this year's Idaho Vandal football team under first-year coach Paul Petrino. But as Vandal coaches and players were ushered in front of the cameras and the tape recorders after Idaho's Silver and Gold spring football game Friday night at the Kibbie Dome, there was a common theme.

Toughness.

"We're getting tougher," said Petrino, the former Carroll College quarterback and offensive coordinator at Arkansas, Illinois and Louisville, among other places. "If you noticed the last two scrimmages, for the most part you don't see guys lying on the ground."

Meaning, earlier in camp, players might stay down with minor injuries. Now, they get up quickly - unless they're really hurt.

"We just continue to improve, continue to get tougher," Petrino said. "If you play with passion and play with emotion and be tough, it gives you a chance to win."

On Friday night, we saw Chad Chalich impress in his bid to be the No. 1 quarterback. He made good throws, he ran when he had to, and when he got knocked down, he got right back up - basically, all of the things we saw from him during his two years as starting quarterback at Coeur d'Alene High, when he led the Vikings to back-to-back state 5A titles.

"We hate to see him get hit at all," running back Jerrel Brown said of Chalich, "but to see him get hit and get back up, he's a true warrior, a grinder. He gets up, and that just brings fire. If Chad can take it, we can take the hits. Of course, we need to keep him from getting hit, but we love to see the fire in Chad."

Said Chalich: "It's football; you just have to get up after a hit. If I get hit, I've just got to get up, because you can't let the defense know that you're weak, you have to be strong. I'm just being strong, trying to make plays."

As part of that toughness, quarterbacks were allowed to be hit in practices and scrimmages — often, that’s not OK, except for games.

“It’s definitely a different mindset,” said defensive end Maxx Forde, whose smiling presence during interviews is in sharp contrast to a defender who, moments earlier, is trying to inflict punishment on the offense. “Instead of just tagging off on them, you actually get to hit them … defensive linemen like to do that.”

“From the beginning of spring ball to now, we go full-contact in every practice and every scrimmage and it’s making us tougher, and it’s making us know how to take hits,” said Chalich, a freshman who practiced with the team as a redshirt last year. “All the guys are healthy because of it, and come the first game, we’re going to be ready because we’ve been going full-contact.”

Petrino said one of the best things about spring practice was, now the Vandal players have a lot of tape on themselves from practices and scrimmages that they can watch as they try to learn Petrino’s system.

(Actually, he said film. Others said tape. In reality, since most of that stuff is digitalized anymore, it’s neither. But you get the drift.)

“We already had lots of film of Louisville guys doing it, Illinois guys doing it, Arkansas guys doing it,” he said. “But now they can see themselves doing it, and how they can get better.”

Chalich also spoke of watching tape — er, film, er, whatever — to get better.

“I’ve fairly got it down,” he said of learning Petrino’s offense, which includes some read option, some straight passes, some straight handoffs. “There are areas I’ve got to get smarter … I have some reads where I need to know where to go with the ball better. These last 15 practices have really clicked. I think I’ve got it pretty down, but there’s still areas I need to improve on.”

As for Petrino’s evaluation of Chalich in the spring, he said he was impressed with “just his ability to keep fighting, just his ability to extend plays. He’s just got to continue to improve. Probably one of the hardest things for him right now is calling plays in the huddle. All high school he was shotgun, no-huddle. That’s just something he’s got to keep working on — keep having a command in the huddle, calling the plays, be confident when he calls them. And then just continue to work on his reads and going through his progressions.”

Togetherness.

Jerrel Brown and Kris Olugbode are junior college running backs who were able to be on campus at Idaho for spring ball, giving them a head start in learning the offense, building relationships with coaches and teammates, etc., over those unable to be there until the fall.

Both have impressed in the spring, though come fall, there will be only so many carries to go around. No problem, Brown says.

“Back home in California, our junior colleges were actually rivals, so when we came down here, we joined forces,” Brown said. “We feed off each other. We both signed on our recruiting trip. We’ve just been feeding off each other and working hard.”

And if senior James Baker, a returnee from last year, runs like he did on Friday night, the Vandals could have a three-headed running back in the fall, instead of two.

Well, maybe not yet.

“We’ll stay at two right now,” Petrino said. “He (Baker) has got to practice more to get to three. But he looked good today. No question he’s a stud — he needs to be an active stud, not a sideline stud.”

Ten freshmen, and two more junior college transfers, including quarterback Joshua McCain, will join the squad in the fall.

As for some of the standouts in this camp, Petrino praised several defensive players, including sophomore defensive end Quinton Bradley, juco linebackers Marc Millan, Juan Martinez and Eric Tuipulotu, as well as Forde and another returnee, sophomore cornerback Solomon Dixon.

He also had praise for Austin DeCoud, a redshirt freshman who came in as a quarterback, but offered to move to safety this year to get on the field and help the team. He had an interception in the spring game.

“He’s a big kid, a tough kid,” Petrino said of the 6-foot-3, 216-pound DeCoud. “We’ve got to find a way to get him on the field. He might grow into a linebacker.”

Now, whether this optimism translates into victories on the field, with a new coaching staff and an influx of JC transfers trying to turn things around after seasons of 2-10 and 1-11, we’ll find out starting Aug. 31, at North Texas.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter at CdAPressSports.