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As Maryland’s football team entered its 10th spring practice on Tuesday, head coach D.J. Durkin is starting to see his players become more adjusted to the new offense, which is led by offensive coordinator Matt Canada.
“There are guys that have picked it up well that are working hard at it, you can see the progression they’ve made,” Durkin said to the media before practice. “And as we keep going and getting guys back healthy, obviously that’ll help too. But I think overall, our whole offense really learning the way that Matt [Canada] has put in and taught it, so everyone’s learning all the formations and we can get the personnel later – in terms of who’s doing what. They’re all learning the system.”
Durkin believes the new offensive system the Terps will be running in the upcoming season provides flexibility when it comes to who should go out on the field.
“I think it really serves our personnel really well and helps us to be multiple in what we do,” Durkin said. “We can be multiple in how we utilize those guys. I think we have more than five offensive linemen that can play at a high level, that we can win with. We can use more than five at a time.”
Maryland continues to watch how running back Anthony McFarland progresses after sitting out his freshman season. Durkin has been impressed with McFarland, who is starting to look fully healthy after recovering from an injury he suffered during his senior year at DeMatha Catholic High School.
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“Anthony really finally looks like his old self right now,” Durkin said. “He’s been tremendous at practice. He was coming off the injury when he got here, we had the plan to redshirt him right away when he got here, and he’s now finally looking like the guy that we all know who he is. He’s explosive, he’s dynamic.”
Quarterbacks Tyrrell Pigrome and Kasim Hill continues to recover from their ACL injuries. Durkin hopes they will be able to compete for the starting job after an entire summer of workouts.
“They’re right on target,” Durkin said. “They’re throwing and doing some things, we’re holding them out of practice and they’ll have a full summer to get ready to go and they’ll go compete for the job.”
Meanwhile, quarterback Max Bortenschlager is getting plenty of reps and showing signs of improvement.
“Max has done well, he really has,” Durkin said. “He’s working hard to pick up the things; the terminology and a lot of things differ and actually breaking out of the huddle at times and all that. He’s done good with it. He’s gotten a lot of reps with where we’re at at quarterback and it’s been good for him.”
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