Florida 2023 Spring Camp Notebook: Observations From Day 7

All Gators' notes and observations from day seven of Florida Gators' 2023 spring camp, focusing on Florida's cornerbacks.

Photo: Corey Raymond and Jason Marshall Jr.; Credit: Zach Goodall 

Florida is back on the practice field, with 2023 spring camp underway ahead of head coach Billy Napier's second season with the Gators.

All Gators serves up its notes and observations from the seventh day of spring camp below, with our focus on secondary coach Corey Raymond and his work with Florida's cornerbacks on Saturday.

Check out our previous 2023 spring camp notebooks:

• Day 2: Focus on new QB Graham Mertz
• Day 3: Focus on new defensive coordinator Austin Armstrong
• Day 4: Focus on the defensive line
• Day 5: Focus on new assistant Billy Gonzales and the wide receivers
• Day 6: Focus on the offensive line

Focus on the cornerbacks

While he was promoted to oversee Florida's entire secondary in February, assistant coach Corey Raymond continued to solely work with the Gators' cornerbacks during the media viewing window of practice on Saturday, keepng his eyes on the position he coached a season ago.

Raymond's group of scholarship outside cornerbacks consisted of junior Jason Marshall Jr., redshirt juniors Jalen Kimber and Jaydon Hill, sophomore Devin Moore and freshman Ja'Keem Jackson. Walk-ons Javion Toombs, Sebastian Vargas and Peter Asumani were also among the cornerbacks. 

Redshirt sophomore Ethan Pouncey, sporting a no-contact jersey, observed the workout with strength and conditioning assistant Edward Thompson and conducted some footwork drills on his own to the side. Moore also wore a no-contact jersey but took part in drills in limited fashion, such as sharpening his footwork in a press coverage drill without using his hands to jam the opposing receiver.

The first drill viewed by media involved the cornerbacks sharpening their backpedal and reactionary footwork in coverage, each rep ending with the cornerbacks catching passes. 

Freshman Ja’Keem Jackson and sophomore Devin Moore going through the same drill. pic.twitter.com/g5IeR039sC

— Zach Goodall (@zach_goodall) March 25, 2023

The group then moved into a press coverage drill with training bags placed on the ground behind each cornerback to limit their space to backpedal, ideally to ensure concise footwork-matching with the opposing route-runner and a physical jam near the line of scrimmage.

Continuing to focus on man coverage, the corners then performed one-on-ones within the position group. 

Against pre-determined stutter-stop, in-breaking routes, each cornerback aligned with outside leverage pre-snap and was tasked with matching the receivers footwork on the vertical stem before undercutting the route-break to make a play on the ball.

Hill and Jackson put together two of the better reps All Gators observed in this specific drill, each player intercepting the pass thanks to good coverage technique. Jackson's pick can be viewed in the clip of the day section at the end of this story, while Hill's play can be seen here: 

CB Jaydon Hill undercuts a route for an interception in individual drills #Gators pic.twitter.com/Nh4gtfFCPc

— Zach Goodall (@zach_goodall) March 25, 2023

Marshall, who has collected 19 starts since joining Florida as a consensus five-star prospect in the class of 2021, continued to lead the cornerbacks as the first player up in every drill. Asked on Tuesday which player he has seen the most improvement from this spring compared to the 2022 season, Raymond pointed to the South Florida product, who has just two interceptions to this point in his career.

"He was a highly recruited guy, everybody recruited him. You see that coming out right now," Raymond said about Marshall. "[He's] doing everything the right way. Working extra, working hard at practice, doing all those little things. It’s like, he’s ready to be a professional and he’s working like that to be a professional.” 

Participation report

Below are the players that were seen wearing no-contact jerseys throughout the media viewing portion of practice. An asterisk indicates that the player worked off to the side or watched practice instead of being on the field during the media viewing period. Quarterbacks will only be noted if they did not participate in drills, as they wear no-contact jerseys traditionally. 

• OL Jalen Farmer
• LB Derek Wingo*
• CB Devin Moore
• CB Ethan Pouncey*
• CB Aaron Gates*

First-team offensive lineman Micah Mazzccua was absent from practice with an undisclosed injury that is expected to sideline him for the remainder of spring camp, All Gators has learned. The fourth-year junior left guard, who transferred to Florida from Baylor in January, tweeted on Thursday evening that he intended to re-enter the transfer portal but deleted his post by Friday morning and remains with the team at this time.

Fellow first-team lineman Damieon George Jr., however, was witnessed practicing fully during Saturday's media viewing window. George was not observed in Thursday's viewing session.

Tight end Jonathan Odom remained absent as he recovers from a significant knee injury suffered in Dec. 2022's Las Vegas Bowl matchup with Oregon State.

Clip of the day 

Jackson is featured in our clip of the day from Saturday, seen taking part in a one-on-one coverage rep during individual drills without a helmet. He didn't need head protection to soundly mirror his receiver's footwork on a stutter-step, in-breaking route and intercept the pass thrown his way. 

Freshman corner Ja’Keem Jackson, helmet-less, with a pick in individual drills.

He mirrors routes well for someone with just over one year of DB experience. Great athlete. pic.twitter.com/jtaty520mk

— Zach Goodall (@zach_goodall) March 25, 2023

For a player with just over one season of experience at his position, Jackson appears to have a good feel for footwork and coverage techniques in practice settings. Raymond would appear to agree, suggesting on Tuesday that the Kissimmee (Fla.) Osceola product will take the field as a freshman despite his lack of time spent in the secondary in his career. 

"He’s going to be real good. He has a chance to be special, we just got to keep him going, keep him understand what we want, the details of playing the position," Raymond described of Jackson. "At the end of the day, it’s about your athleticism but there’s a lot of details in the position that you have to learn and it’s going to be changing every play. 

"Things change and you have to be able to change quick so you got to be a critical thinker. That’s what he’s starting to learn, how to become a critical thinker ... he’ll get some playing time. We got some really good guys here but, you know, he’ll get in there.”

And by the way, Jackson was wearing his helmet for his next rep. 

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