NORFOLK, Va. — The biggest change in the ODU football program in the off season came when they hired a new offensive coordinator. On a staff that is one of the youngest in the nation, the Monarchs added a man with over 30 years of college coaching experience. Dave Patenaude has seen it all and likes what he sees with his new school, "It's a program that is on the rise and it's fun to get in on the ground floor."
Patenaude's most recent job was as Georgia Tech's offensive coordinator. With a new "O.C." comes a new offensive scheme. Patenaude explains the most important part of the transition for the players, "Just buy in, understand what we're doing, really work at understanding things conceptually and then just the execution piece."
Patenaude makes it sound like this is not an earth shaking change, "There's tremendous amount of similarities between the ODU offense and my offense historically."
Leroy Thomas is one of the big men on the offensive line. He's been taking notes, "It hasn't been anything too crazy with the changes. We've just been trying every day to adapt with it."
And just what are they adapting to? Patenaude gives a quick summary, "We want to be fast paced, good execution, physical, good mix of run and pass, take some shots down the field."
How is it looking halfway through spring practice? You would think, the guys on the other side of the line of scrimmage would have a pretty good idea. Alonzo Ford is a defensive tackle. He says, "Honestly, it looks pretty good. They're helping us, keeping us on our toes. They're hard to stop sometimes."
Ford also had something to say about Patenaude and all his coaching experience, "Kind of a little joke around here. He's the granddad of the team."
After Ford had a good laugh, he added this, "It's good. He's got some good wisdom and just talking to him, he's a cool guy."