LINCOLN — Cameron Meredith had the luxury of playing last season behind Barry Turner and Pierre Allen, two veterans at defensive end for Nebraska.
Meredith took what he could get as a redshirt freshman, and made the most of his chances with 21 tackles, including five for losses.
With Turner gone, however, the situation changes for the sophomore from Santa Ana, Calif.
“It's a lot more realistic now,” Meredith said Friday. “I've got to step up in a big way because I'm not the second string and just going in once in awhile. We'll see after spring what I come out as, but I'm just working hard every day.”
Meredith said veterans such as Allen and Jared Crick on the defensive line give him good examples to follow.
“They're helping me out, showing me what to do,” he said. “I think it'll help a lot of younger guys who we're depending on to play this year.”
Focus is improvement
Nebraska head coach Bo Pelini made his speech about the depth chart Tuesday. He would have been proud of Crick for pretty much repeating it Friday.
“This is strictly time to get better as an individual,” Crick said. “We're not worried about a depth chart right now. We're just trying to get better every single day. No one is worried about spots right now.”
The Huskers held their second spring practice Friday inside the Hawks Center. Their first in full pads comes Saturday.
“That's when we'll really get after it,” Crick said.
A large Tray
NU needs Dontrayevous Robinson to be a power back, which meant it was good news when the sophomore came out of winter conditioning at 235 pounds.
“He is a powerful runner, and he's handling it real well,” running backs coach Tim Beck said. “I think it was something we lacked. I think Tray gave us that last year, but at 215. Now he's got a little weight behind him, and we needed that a little bit.”
Still, Beck said don't classify the sophomore as just a short-yardage I-back behind Roy Helu and Rex Burkhead. As an example, he pointed to the Gator Bowl after the 2008 season, when former Husker Quentin Castille carried 18 times for 125 yards against Clemson because NU thought it needed a tough, physical runner attacking the Tigers.
“Somewhere along the way,” Beck said, “Tray's going to carry it 30 times, because that's what we need.”
LBs fighting for spots
Eric Martin said the Nebraska linebackers are well into the process of making each other better.
Martin, Sean Fisher and Will Compton — all sophomores — are among those returning from a year ago. The whole bunch knows that NU is often going to play only one or two linebackers because of its use of nickel and dime packages.
“It's just made the competition that much better,” Martin said. “Since there's only being two spots and there's like seven or eight linebackers, that's a lot of fighting. It just makes us better, basically.”
— Rich Kaipust
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