Wegher 'dinged'; Jewel 'a mile a minute'

Sophomore running back Brandon Wegher is "dinged," according to offensive coordinator Ken O'Keefe. His status for Saturday's spring scrimmage is up in the air, but he likely won't play, out of caution more than anything else.

"Brandon's been doing everything all spring long up until he got dinged up," O'Keefe said Tuesday. "Brandon was doing everything (in spring practice) until he got a little banged up. We weren't going to tackle Brandon, anyway, this spring because we're a little thin there."

Wegher rushed for 641 yards and a freshman record eight TDs last season. He was the only one of the three viable starters for the position healthy this spring. Sophomore Adam Robinson is out after offseason shoulder surgery. Sophomore Jewel Hampton is practicing but isn't going through contact after a torn ACL last June.

The likely running backs Saturday will be freshman Brad Rogers and sophomore Jason White.

Hampton's exposures this spring have been in non-contact, mostly 7-on-7 and other drills where there is no tackling.

"I would say yes," O'Keefe said to a question about Hampton being back to where he was physically. "Guys come off major injuries like that and they're holding back or just not sure or confident in what they're doing and so they might be tentative. Jewel has never been tentative in anything.

"The other day we threw a swing pass out to him. He juked a guy on the edge, ran up to the next guy and juked him and kept going as well. That's not a guy who's worried about his injury. That's a guy who's confident, is back and ready to go. He's going a mile a minute and he's doing those kinds of things, which, to me, means he's confident and ready."