UCLA Football Practice Report: August 11

A couple of key returning players on offense adds an interesting wrinkle to the status of the Bruins' star quarterback

One of the Bruins' two missing quarterbacks made his return to the practice field Wednesday, but it wasn't the one who was projected to be the team's starter.

Parker McQuarrie was back running drills with UCLA football Wednesday, and considering the first throw the media saw from him was one that missed the passing pocket net entirely, he may have been a bit rusty after missing over a week of fall camp. His mishaps don't mean much to the Bruins' upcoming season, considering where he's likely going to be penciled in on the depth chart.

The more imported signal-caller who had been out since early last week, Dorian Thompson-Robinson, was missing again Wednesday.

Again, all coach Chip Kelly would say about his status was that he was unavailable. However, thanks to some clarification from UCLA Athletics on certain timelines of COVID-19 policies, there may be some hints about Thompson-Robinson's status coming by the end of the week.

If any student-athlete tests positive for COVID-19, vaccinated or not, they have to be away from the team for 10 days. If the reason for Thompson-Robinson's current absence is COVID-related, he could be back by Friday. That certainly isn't definitive, but it is an important benchmark to keep an eye on in the coming days, especially adding in the fact Thompson-Robinson made posts on social media saying he was eager to get back on the field with his teammates.

In terms of what happened on the field during the 20 to 30 minutes of media access, there was again a lot of special teams work. The key drill in this segment of practice was a punt block and recovery drill, pretty much just working on the hand technique of both aspects of the play.

Punt block/recovery drills for #UCLA, feat. some soccer balls pic.twitter.com/zhIu5vYb9w

— Sam Connon (@SamConnon) August 11, 2021

Once players split up into positional groups, we again got a good look at the defensive backs and inside linebackers. The linebackers did some more work in the trenches with the workout ball, a drill that we first saw a few days ago.

The defensive backs actually had a joint drill with the defensive lineman and outside linebackers, where they would run towards each other before making a sharp cut around a cone.

Freshman defensive lineman Quintin Somerville was practicing with the team for the second straight day after missing time late last week, but he was seen removing his helmet, talking to a trainer and disappearing into the weight room.

As has been the case for the rest of fall camp, there wasn't much to see from the offense other than who was or wasn't there.

Receiver Chase Cota was back running routes after spending most of the past few weeks on the workout bike. Receivers Logan Loya and Bradley Schlom were on the stationary bikes again, getting coached up by trainers and seemingly pushing themselves pretty hard. It's pretty much impossible to know what their injuries or issues are that are keeping them off the field, but it doesn't seem to be anything lower body-related and neither are wearing casts, splints or slings either.

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