Arkansas’ signing class swells with addition of record-setting punter

By David Moorman  |   Monday, March 02, 2009  |  Comments( 1 )

College Football
Got something to say?

Log In above and share your thoughts on this topic with other fans!

National signing day has come and gone in college football, but that hasn’t stopped Arkansas from adding players to its growing number of recruits.

The Razorbacks hiked their signing class to 32 players when they landed punter Briton Forester, a junior transfer from Palomar College in California. Forester played at Hawaii in 2007 after having redshirted there in 2006.

A punter isn’t likely to be a game-changer, but he can affect field position -- which Forester certainly did at Palomar last season. In averaging 36.2 yards on 42 punts, Forester kicked 16 punts inside the 20-yard line. He set a school single-game record with five inside the 10.

Besides that, he kicked the second-longest punt in school history at 77 yards. He also had punts of 59 and 58 yards and a 76-yarder nullified by a penalty.

<b>GETTING AN EARLY JUMP<b>: If early to practice counts for anything, South Carolina is in good shape. The Gamecocks were scheduled to begin spring workouts Tuesday, March 2, which put them ahead of most every other team in the Southeastern Conference. South Carolina’s spring game is set for April 11.

What’s more, the practices will be open to the public and people with cameras will be allowed to shoot the first 15 minutes of each practice.

Obviously, coach Steve Spurrier doesn’t plan to introduce much new that he wants to keep under wraps. Then again, he doesn’t have to given that he returns 40 lettermen, including 12 starters.

<b>HIT THE ROAD:<b> Ole Miss coach Houston Nutt dismissed defenders Justin Sanders and James Scott for violation of unspecified team rules.

The losses aren’t expected to impact Ole Miss on the field, although the action could have an effect on the strength of Nutt’s discipline.

Sanders hadn’t played in two years, while Scott transferred to Ole Miss from Ohio State and sat out the 2008 season. He had six tackles in nine games this past season.

<b>LET'S PLAY:<b>In what seems to be an intriguing intersectional matchup, LSU and West Virginia have agreed to play a home-and-home series beginning in 2010. The teams have never faced each other before.

LSU will play host to West Virginia in 2010 before the Tigers will visit West Virginia in 2011. LSU hasn’t ventured to the East Coast for a non-conference game since traveling to Virginia Tech in 2002.
West Virginia, of the Big East Conference, finished 9-4 last season, including a victory over North Carolina in the Meineke Car Car Bowl. LSU's win over Georgia Tech in the Chick-fil-A Bowl gave the Tigers an 8-5 record.

<b>BRAINS, NOT JUST BRAWN:<b> The strength of the SEC is certainly deserved, but its academic prowess isn’t just confined to Vanderbilt.

Georgia redshirt sophomore defensive tackle Ricardo Crawford will travel to world-famous Oxford University in England this summer to study British literature, Tudor-Stuart history and Shakespeare. He will stay at Georgia’s residence in Oxford while there from June 13-28.

A native of Fair Bluff, N.C., Crawford has never traveled out of the country. He will arrive in Oxford on his 22nd birthday.

Also, former Kentucky linebacker Dr. Jim Kovach is a finalist for the Academic All-America Hall of Fame. Inductees will be announced in April.

Kovach remains Kentucky’s leading tackler with 521 total stops. After earning Academic All-America honors in 1978, he spent seven years in the NFL with the New Orleans Saints and San Francisco 49ers.

Having earned both medical and law degrees, Kovach currently is president and chief operating officer at the Buck Institute for Age Research in Novato, Calif.
Got something to say?

Log In above and share your thoughts on this topic with other fans! (1)

About David Moorman

Dave Moormann is an award-winning journalist, who has covered LSU athletics since 1980. He began his coverage with the Baton Rouge Advocate, where he was a writer and editor from 1980-98. In 1996, he authored a book on the history of LSU football entitled, "Fighting Tigers Handbook: Stories, Stats ...
read more
Article Tools Share!   |  RSS  |  Bleacher Report About Bleacher Report