DWU football continues spring practice, adds 10 recruits for next season
New Dakota Wesleyan University football coach Ross Cimpl is pleased with the amount of defensive recruits he’s landed this year.By: Luke Hagen, The Daily Republic
- Batista
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New Dakota Wesleyan University football coach Ross Cimpl is pleased with the amount of defensive recruits he’s landed this year.
Cimpl, who was hired as the Tigers’ head coach in January, announced the second wave of recruits for next season Monday.
The DWU football team has now landed 37 recruits for Cimpl’s first season as head coach. The first list of recruits had 26 players and 15 were defensive players.
Monday’s list of recruits had 10 players, including four listed to play defense. Cimpl mentioned Lucas Daggon, a defensive end from Valencia, Calif., as one of the players he’s extremely excited about.
“He’s a real athletic kid,” said Cimpl, whose team concluded its third day of spring football practice Monday.
Cimpl also listed Henderson, Nev., native and inside linebacker Michael Gamboa as a player to keep an eye on.
“I think a lot of the linebackers and defensive linemen we’ve recruited have a chance to compete right away,” Cimpl said.
Among the other recruits listed in Monday’s release were Winner native and offensive lineman Taylor Haley, Bon Homme High School linebacker Travis McDonald and Colome’s Michael Rohde, who’s listed as an all-around athlete and doesn’t yet have a designated position.
Other players were quarterback Logan Burwell and running back Andre Lopez, of Chubbuck, Idaho; kicker Gus Haskell and center Dylan Ljunggren, of Dell Rapids; safety Cody Reder, of Philip; and tight end Conner Thompson, of Sioux Falls Christian.
“We still need to add some guys on the offensive side of the ball in the wide receiver and the (offensive)-line position,” Cimpl said.
Besides focusing on next year’s incoming players, Cimpl has been running spring football practice, which began on Thursday.
The team practiced in helmets and shoulder pads on Monday.
“It was the first day of hitting a little bit and you could definitely tell it was a little sloppy,” said Cimpl, who added the team will go to full-padded practice on Thursday. “It was good to have guys running around and having them do those sorts of things. We have a lot of work to do, but I was pretty happy with the way guys ran around and flew around.”
NOTES: Cimpl said quarterback Kyle Cool is no longer on the team.
Cool played in three games last year for the Tigers and threw five passes, but Cimpl said he was granted his release from the football team. Cimpl said Cool is still enrolled in classes at DWU but is exploring different options for football.
“It was a mutual decision,” Cimpl said of Cool leaving the team. “This wasn’t quite what he was looking for, and it wasn’t exactly what we were looking for. It definitely wasn’t a negative thing.”
The Tigers have three quarterbacks in spring camp, including last year’s starter Jon Bane. Other quarterbacks at camp are Joey Olson and Steven Batista.
Tags: sports, updates, football, dwu, tigers
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