HANOVER — Coming off its 20th Ivy League championship last fall, the Dartmouth College football team is back on Memorial Field this spring for the Big Green’s first spring on their traditional practice schedule since 2019.
Dartmouth will have plenty of returning production this fall, but several position groups will see new faces step into starting roles. Three-year starting quarterback Derek Kyler, who tossed 17 touchdown passes with just one interception last year, is gone, leaving rising senior Nick Howard, who rushed for 787 yards in 2021 but attempted just 11 passes, at the top of the depth chart.
Howard may be called upon to throw more this year, but if the Big Green opt for a two-quarterback system again, rising junior Dylan Cadwallader will likely be on the field for many of the passing downs.
“We’ve been a two-system team for a while,” Dartmouth head coach Buddy Teevens said after Tuesday’s practice session. “Nick Howard is back, Cadwallader has stepped up, (rising junior) Gavin Muir has shown some positive things as well.”
Teevens discussed his philosophy on spring workouts, position battles and a new addition to the coaching staff as Dartmouth prepares for the spring game on May 7.
The Big Green’s spring ball mentality: It’s no secret that the Ivy League operates with a different mindset from the rest of college football — that was never more evident than in the league’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, when it canceled the 2020-21 season while the rest of the Football Championship Subdivision played in the spring. Even in non-pandemic times, the Ivy League starts the season two weeks behind nearly every other conference and plays 10 consecutive weeks without a bye.
Combine that with Dartmouth being on the quarter system, and the Big Green hold their spring practices later in the year than almost all other teams. For both Football Bowl Subdivision and FCS institutions, the spring game is typically in April, with some even held in March. Preseason practice for Dartmouth usually begins in late August.
Teevens was a pioneer of sorts in eliminating tackling in practice in 2010. The move was initially reactive rather than proactive — the Big Green had struggled mightily with injuries and on the field the previous two years — but in 2016, the rest of the Ivy League followed suit, with the coaches unanimously voting to ban tackling for in-season practices. Dartmouth is still the only member of the Ancient Eight that does not tackle in the spring.
“Everybody has cut back to some extent,” Teevens said. “But I watched cut-ups and pieces of other Ivy schools that had their spring games, and it’s full go. They’re tackling people. I say it often: Our kids will have 4,000 to 10,000 fewer sub-concussive hits during the course of their career because we don’t tackle at the heavy-hitting times, preseason and spring practice.”
Position battles begin to take form: The Big Green are in great shape at running back, with Zack Bair (476 yards last season) back for his fifth year and rising senior Noah Roper (349 yards) set to take on a bigger role to complement Howard.
The receiving corps should contain a few nice security blankets for the quarterbacks in rising juniors Paxton Scott and Jamal Cooney and rising senior Dale Chesson. Scott was far and away Dartmouth’s leading receiver in 2021 with 46 catches for 505 yards and four touchdowns, but that title may well have belonged to Chesson had he played in more than four games.
Elsewhere, the picture is a bit murkier. The offensive line, as is usually the case, is a work in progress, with JP Flores transferring out and Calvin Atkeson and Jake Guidone graduating. The linebacking unit loses leading tackler Jalen Mackie to graduation, which leaves Marques White, who had 9.5 sacks last season, to lead the way.
In the secondary, top cornerback Isaiah Johnson transferred to Syracuse, and DeWayne Terry exhausted his eligibility. John Pupel and Robert Crocket will both return for their fifth years in Hanover to bolster a unit that was third in the Ivy League last year in passing yards allowed per game.
“We lost a good number of seniors, some very talented players at a variety of positions,” Teevens said. “One of the nice things is we’ve played a lot of players, so there are a lot of guys who have played snaps. We have a lot of competition in the secondary, the linebacking corps and the offensive line.”
The Big Green also need to replace kicker Connor Davis, who was 7-for-9 on field goals last season and did not miss an extra point. Teevens, who works specifically with the kickers and punters in addition to his head coaching duties, is holding an open kicking tryout next week — he said there are a lot of former soccer players on campus with strong legs, and he’s even recruited kickers from the ski team in years past.
Rising senior Cameron Baller handled kickoffs last year while ceding punting duties midseason to then-freshman Davis Golick, who should have the inside track to be the starting punter in 2022. Zach Drescher, another rising senior, will also be in the mix.
Laurent joins staff as tight ends coach: Dartmouth hired Wendy Laurent, a 2016 graduate of Penn State, as its new tight ends coach in March to replace Cheston Blackshear. Laurent spent the last two years as a graduate assistant at his alma mater, where he worked with the offensive line.
The tight end position is one of the Big Green’s biggest question marks, with Jace Henry, Alex Geraci and Joe Kramer on the depth chart at the moment. Teevens said Laurent — a former offensive lineman himself — works closely with offensive line coach Keith Clark on helping the tight ends refine their blocking skills.
“He’s really been embraced. He’s smart and football-savvy,” Teevens said. “Obviously he played a lot of football at Penn State, but his relationship with the players is very solid. You worry, you lose a guy that’s been here, (but) he’s stepped in and seamlessly helped us move forward.”
Benjamin Rosenberg can be reached at brosenberg@vnews.com or 603-727-3302.