Video: Offensive Coordinator Timmy Chang pleased with first practice

In the first day of fall camp last season, the Jackson State football players didn’t have practice uniforms.

Instead, they had to write their numbers on masking tape and put it on their helmets.

Things were different this time around.

On Tuesday, the first day of spring practice, the Tigers donned new blue-and-white practice jerseys. It’s just one of the changes that has come along with the recent facelift for the football program that’s looking for a trip back to the Southwestern Athletic Conference championship.

But it’s about four months since the players made that trip.

“Things got a little slow there for a while and it finally got picked up a little bit, but that’s the way it’s going to be when you first get started,” first-year coach Harold Jackson said. “A lot of these guys have been out of football for the last two weeks, so it’s kind of getting (back) into the flow of things.”

With changes comes an adjustment period for the 73 players listed on the practice roster and the new coaching staff, who all convened on the soccer practice field around 5:45 a.m.

“The guys are coming in pretty good, picking up the system pretty good,” Jackson said. “I was very pleased to see the way they came out (Tuesday) morning and then grabbing the plays and lining up in the proper positions.”

Offensive coordinator Timmy Chang and offensive line coach Tommy Poynter, both who came after spending time with the Southern Methodist program, worked with the players for the first time on the field, running through formations and alignments.

“It’s a growing process any time you implement a new offense,” said Chang, a record-holding quarterback at Hawaii from 2000-04. “Coming in here, starting fresh, we just got to continue to work through the growing pains of it and just get better on and off the field.”

Chang didn’t expound on his offense or whether it would mimic the run-and-shoot style that made his former coach and boss, June Jones, well-known. But given his success as a player and as an assistant with Junes at SMU, Jackson State will likely threaten teams through the air.

“I’m going to implement my thing on it,” Chang said.

via New Jackson State coaches pleased with first practice | The Clarion-Ledger | clarionledger.com.