Justice says OL has improved health over break, talks Donaldson return

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Stefan Adams

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As the Miami Hurricanes return from taking the past two weeks off due to COVID issues, OL coach Garin Justice said on Tuesday that the time off really helped in getting Miami’s OL back to full strength.

“We’re probably the most healthy we’ve been since UAB line-wise,” OL coach Garin Justice said. “We had a little bad luck streak before the Virginia Tech game. We’re the healthiest we’ve been overall.”

Head coach Manny Diaz talked in the past about how the offensive line almost didn’t have enough healthy players to play vs. VT in their last game, and Justice echoed that sentiment in saying there was only six available players he trusted against the Hokies; the starting five on the OL ended up playing every snap in the contest.

“Thankfully and lucky for us, we were able to stay healthy and not sustain any injuries that game,” Justice said. “Navaughn (Donaldson) was a guy we had targeted as a sixth man. DJ Scaife knew he’d have to bump out and play tackle (barring injury). Ousman (Traore) knew he’d have to play center if something happened to Corey (Gaynor).”

Donaldson has not yet played this year during his recovery from a knee injury, but he was available on an emergency basis vs. VT and he has been cleared in full ahead of the Duke game this weekend.

"We’re trying to be as careful as we can with Navaughn,” Justice said. “His rehab has been going well, he just got cleared a week and a half, two weeks ago. Like anything, it’s how you do in practice whether he starts or not - it would take him totally blowing away the guys and killing it this week. He’s a guy I would like to slowly mix in the games, get him back because we do think very highly of him. At the same time, we don’t want to put all the load on him and then we’re back to square one. He’s been really good the last couple of weeks before the shutdown.”

If Donaldson does play vs. Duke, you could see him work in at LG, where Ousman Traore started Miami’s last game after regular starter Jakai Clark was out with COVID-related issues.

“Given the circumstance with Ousman - Ousman came off injury on that Thursday (before VT) and was cleared and played the game without practice,” Justice said. “All things given, we’re pretty proud of the effort Ousman gave. It really speaks to Ousman’s capacity mentally to stay engaged even though you start the season as the starting guard, Jakai comes in and takes your place.

“The thing about Jakai, Jakai has been steady since day 1. You know what you’re getting with him. Jakai will always be a factor in what we’re doing. He’s steady, reliable and an all-around good player.”

Does Justice see the OL being further ahead at run blocking or pass protection at this point in the season?

“It depends what game - all in all, I’d like to think we’ve improved them both from last year,” Justice said. “The thing that still has to take off is the run game. We’ve been able to run at times - you look back to the Pitt game, we had the ball I think all but three minutes of the fourth quarter in the Pitt game, were able to run it, keep it out of Pitt’s hands. The NC State game we were able to run the ball, ice the game running the ball. There have been times we’ve been good here or there, have shown flashes, but we’re not as consistent in either phase.

“The reasons we’ve been more productive pass protection wise, the run game has to be a lot of guys working together on the same page. Once it clicks, it’s going to click. Unfortunately, it hasn’t clicked like we want to yet.”

Looking ahead to next season’s roster, Justice says he anticipates current senior starting RT Jarrid Williams going pro, while he sees adding Donaldson back after a full year of recovery as being akin to landing a three-year P5 starter in the portal.

“Really that’s Jarrid’s call,” Justice said. “I would think the fact (is) he would try to go (to the NFL). We haven’t had those discussions. He came with a purpose - Jarrid was an older senior as it was. That’ll be his call. If you had to guess, I’d guess he would try and leave.

“The neat thing about Navaughn is we can kind of look at Navaughn as a portal guy - he hasn’t played for us this year yet. If someone could come and say this spring you could add a former high-notch recruit who has 30 plus college starts under his belt to the guys you have, everyone would be excited about that. That’s the way we look at Navaughn, he’s going to be our transfer guy. Outside of that, you never turn down a great player. I don’t know if it’s something we’ll actively try to do. But if great players present themselves, I’m never going to say no to those situations. That’s more of a head coach call. Hopefully Navaughn can be that boost like Jarrid was to us this year.”

Another player from the portal that could contribute on the OL next season is Issiah Walker, who hasn’t played this season due to both medical and transfer eligibility issues.

“We’ve had Issiah some on scout team and he wasn’t eligible to play anyway,” Justice said. “Shows a lot of upside and hopefully this’ll be a great spring for him.”
 
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oline can really be a good unit next year. experience, strength, another year older and in feely's system. Gaynor, Clarke, scaife, Campbell, Donaldson, walker, rivers, reed, ousman. if these guys take it up a notch and guys like scaife and Donaldson get serious and see this as their money year, we could have a dominant oline.
 
oline can really be a good unit next year. experience, strength, another year older and in feely's system. Gaynor, Clarke, scaife, Campbell, Donaldson, walker, rivers, reed, ousman. if these guys take it up a notch and guys like scaife and Donaldson get serious and see this as their money year, we could have a dominant oline.
This could be the most talented OL the Canes have had since Searles arrived. I like this group. The Canes can move the pile with this group
 
oline can really be a good unit next year. experience, strength, another year older and in feely's system. Gaynor, Clarke, scaife, Campbell, Donaldson, walker, rivers, reed, ousman. if these guys take it up a notch and guys like scaife and Donaldson get serious and see this as their money year, we could have a dominant oline.
Do you not think Zion will be a major contributer on OL next year or just forgot about him?
 
Someone has to supplant scaife next year I mean... its at the point where you cant even take him seriously. He's a point shaving candidate I mean u gotta be getting payed to do the chit he been doing.

Regardless its hard to say if this online coach is worth anything right now. I'm not holding my breathe. I don't see guys firing off the ball, In allot of cases I don't see guys even engage the man in front of them it's weird to watch.
 
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Man if Vaughn could be better than what Scaife has been giving us then we should be alright going forward. Or maybe Scaife gets his **** together for the rest of the year and Vaughn could take some of Clark’s snaps at guard.

Next years line is going to be deep and excites me. Going to be interesting if they try Campbell at G and Rivers at T. I could see Rivers or Walker battle it out at T next year and Zion obviously the other T. Then I would open up all competition on the interior spots. Let Campbell, Scaife, Vaughn, Clark, Reed, Gaynor, Traore battle it out. Redshirt all 3 true freshmen unless they could steal snaps throughout the year.
 
Someone has to supplant scaife next year I mean... its at the point where you cant even take him seriously. He's a point shaving candidate I mean u gotta be getting payed to do the chit he been doing.

Regardless its hard to say if this online coach is worth anything right now. I'm not holding my breathe. I don't see guys firing off the ball, In allot of cases I don't see guys even engage the man in front of them it's weird to watch.
Agreed. The names, because of their rankings, sound nice but we STILL can't run block and the pass blocking is inconsistent. I'm excited about potential and that's about it. Nothing has been shown to get giddy over.
 
I bet the players appreciate that Justice is a straight talker.

Doesn't sugar coat anything. Praises and criticises where necessary. A huge upgrade from the last two OLine coaches.
 
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Nelson
Campbell
Walker
Rivers
Clark
Traore
Donaldson
Gaynor
Reed

Is a pretty good 2 deep with options across the board with guys who can play multiple positions. That’s what the program needs. The 10th spot can be a dog fight between the developmental guys and freshmen.
 
How’d I forget Nelson? Geez. That’s a deep oline. I’m not giving up on scaife. It’s his last year and he was poised to be an all ACC type a couple years ago.
 
Zion is our best lineman right know. A great example of someone working hard to suceed. You could tell he was very athletic, he just needed to get stronger, get used to his weight, and work on his technique. Also, kudos to Coach justice.
 
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As the Miami Hurricanes return from taking the past two weeks off due to COVID issues, OL coach Garin Justice said on Tuesday that the time off really helped in getting Miami’s OL back to full strength.

“We’re probably the most healthy we’ve been since UAB line-wise,” OL coach Garin Justice said. “We had a little bad luck streak before the Virginia Tech game. We’re the healthiest we’ve been overall.”

Head coach Manny Diaz talked in the past about how the offensive line almost didn’t have enough healthy players to play vs. VT in their last game, and Justice echoed that sentiment in saying there was only six available players he trusted against the Hokies; the starting five on the OL ended up playing every snap in the contest.

“Thankfully and lucky for us, we were able to stay healthy and not sustain any injuries that game,” Justice said. “Navaughn (Donaldson) was a guy we had targeted as a sixth man. DJ Scaife knew he’d have to bump out and play tackle (barring injury). Ousman (Traore) knew he’d have to play center if something happened to Corey (Gaynor).”

Donaldson has not yet played this year during his recovery from a knee injury, but he was available on an emergency basis vs. VT and he has been cleared in full ahead of the Duke game this weekend.

"We’re trying to be as careful as we can with Navaughn,” Justice said. “His rehab has been going well, he just got cleared a week and a half, two weeks ago. Like anything, it’s how you do in practice whether he starts or not - it would take him totally blowing away the guys and killing it this week. He’s a guy I would like to slowly mix in the games, get him back because we do think very highly of him. At the same time, we don’t want to put all the load on him and then we’re back to square one. He’s been really good the last couple of weeks before the shutdown.”

If Donaldson does play vs. Duke, you could see him work in at LG, where Ousman Traore started Miami’s last game after regular starter Jakai Clark was out with COVID-related issues.

“Given the circumstance with Ousman - Ousman came off injury on that Thursday (before VT) and was cleared and played the game without practice,” Justice said. “All things given, we’re pretty proud of the effort Ousman gave. It really speaks to Ousman’s capacity mentally to stay engaged even though you start the season as the starting guard, Jakai comes in and takes your place.

“The thing about Jakai, Jakai has been steady since day 1. You know what you’re getting with him. Jakai will always be a factor in what we’re doing. He’s steady, reliable and an all-around good player.”

Does Justice see the OL being further ahead at run blocking or pass protection at this point in the season?

“It depends what game - all in all, I’d like to think we’ve improved them both from last year,” Justice said. “The thing that still has to take off is the run game. We’ve been able to run at times - you look back to the Pitt game, we had the ball I think all but three minutes of the fourth quarter in the Pitt game, were able to run it, keep it out of Pitt’s hands. The NC State game we were able to run the ball, ice the game running the ball. There have been times we’ve been good here or there, have shown flashes, but we’re not as consistent in either phase.

“The reasons we’ve been more productive pass protection wise, the run game has to be a lot of guys working together on the same page. Once it clicks, it’s going to click. Unfortunately, it hasn’t clicked like we want to yet.”

Looking ahead to next season’s roster, Justice says he anticipates current senior starting RT Jarrid Williams going pro, while he sees adding Donaldson back after a full year of recovery as being akin to landing a three-year P5 starter in the portal.

“Really that’s Jarrid’s call,” Justice said. “I would think the fact (is) he would try to go (to the NFL). We haven’t had those discussions. He came with a purpose - Jarrid was an older senior as it was. That’ll be his call. If you had to guess, I’d guess he would try and leave.

“The neat thing about Navaughn is we can kind of look at Navaughn as a portal guy - he hasn’t played for us this year yet. If someone could come and say this spring you could add a former high-notch recruit who has 30 plus college starts under his belt to the guys you have, everyone would be excited about that. That’s the way we look at Navaughn, he’s going to be our transfer guy. Outside of that, you never turn down a great player. I don’t know if it’s something we’ll actively try to do. But if great players present themselves, I’m never going to say no to those situations. That’s more of a head coach call. Hopefully Navaughn can be that boost like Jarrid was to us this year.”

Another player from the portal that could contribute on the OL next season is Issiah Walker, who hasn’t played this season due to both medical and transfer eligibility issues.

“We’ve had Issiah some on scout team and he wasn’t eligible to play anyway,” Justice said. “Shows a lot of upside and hopefully this’ll be a great spring for him.”
If Justice thinks Clark has been steady I question Justice mentally capacity. Seriously I get coach speak but that man has like 15 to 20 penalties alone by himself. He averaged 2 or 3 penalties the first 6 games.
 
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Next years OL has alot of potential but they will be tested in Game 1 to see if that is all it is...potential. There really is no excuses for the OL next year. That will be the first year where we shouldnt have to force any TF into the 2 deep if they are not ready. We have alot of veteran guys who have been here 4-5 years and some talented guys too. Justice has a OL room he can work with. Not too many bums hanging around like in years past.
 
LT: Nelson
LG: Vaughn
C: Clark
RG: Campbell
RT: Issh

That’s a ******* O-line....

You think Issh ready next year? I think he is going to need 2. I think Campbell will kick outside and Rivers will take that guard spot to start then once Campell is gone slide outside.
 
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