Thursday’s practice registered the highest temperatures of preseason camp thus far. The mercury rose to 97 degrees (felt like 108), and head coach Mark Richt said it was the first day the heat really affected the players.

“There was a lot of guys battling through,” Richt said. “There was a lot of guys not thinking about giving it their all, but fighting. There was a couple guys that gave in a little bit, I thought. But it’s though to maintain the tempo and the energy that we’ve had to this point everyday and especially in the heat.”

Richt said though the heat caused the players to struggled, the practice turf doesn’t absorb any heat so the turf is “about 10, 15 degrees hotter than grass surface” so when the Bulldogs play on the cooler grass, it will be an advantage.

Gray getting comfortable at wide receiver

Richt said junior quarterback-turned-wideout Logan Gray is adjusting to the position change well and attributed some of it to knowing what receivers have to do from the quarterback perspective as well.

Head coach Mark Richt said Logan Gray has impressed him with his abilities at wide receiver thus far in preseason camp. Photo by WES BLANKENSHIP

“He’s really running his routes pretty well without having any reps. I know he did it all summer without us watching it, so I guess that’s why it’s a little surprising to me,” Richt said. “I’m just impressed that he’s this far along this quickly. He seems to catch the ball well. He has not been afraid to block. He’s done a good job blocking, which he probably hadn’t had to do much of his career in football.”

Richt said that Gray will still need to be prepared to be thrown in under center if quarterback Aaron Murray were to get hurt. But Richt also said that the decision to play Gray or freshman Hutson Mason would depend on the situation at hand.

“We just want (Mason) to get as ready as possible and God forbid if something happened to Aaron and we had to do something, go to a second guy, we would just have to gauge what would be better — Logan Gray, who’s had three years in the system at QB but hadn’t had many reps as of late or a true freshman who’s done a pretty good job of picking it up,” Richt said.

Richt also said that even though he’s confident in Gray’s athletic ability and his ability to play quarterback, if he were to be thrown into taking snaps at game time, he doesn’t “know if you ever feel comfortable” with that just because Gray would lack practice reps at quarterback.

“He’d be rusty, certainly. If it happened midseason and there was an emergency situation and he had to throw him in there and he had not thrown a ball, it’d probably be a little tough,” Richt said. “But he’s a very good athlete. He’s very smart. He’s not gonna forget how to throw the ball either, for that matter. I think he would do fine.”

Personnel, position changes not likely

Richt said from what he has seen so far, he doesn’t foresee any players switching positions or making any drastic changes in preseason camp. Richt also said if any changes were to occur, the coaches will wait until after the squad finishes installing everything

“If we need to make some changes we will, but I’m not sure there will be any,” Richt said.

Injuries

Cornerback Chad Gloer (hamstring) and offensive guard Tanner Strickland (shoulder) were running in the endzone in green jerseys again Thursday, but were  joined by offensive lineman Kenarious Gates. Thursday was the first day the freshman dressed out in a green jersey, which Richt said was due to cramps the freshman suffered from Wednesday, and he joined Gloer and Strickland in jogging/sprinting around the practice field.

Richt said offensive tackle Trinton Sturdivant is “in and out” of certain practice drills, which is “all by design” in order for the junior’s knee to stay on track in rehab.

Sophomore quiet about house fire, fund started to help family

Strong safety Shawn Williams’ family home in Damascus burned down July 13 and the sophomore remained quiet about the tragedy.

SHAWN WILLIAMS

He kept to himself, not saying much to his teammates or his coaches. Fellow safety Jakar Hamilton didn’t even know what had occurred until a reporter told him Thursday.

“You could look at him and tell something was wrong, but I just never asked. I just thought, ‘He’s tired like I’m tired.’ I heard something was going on with his family because he left,” Hamilton said. “Today was the first day I heard about it.”

Richt said Williams has been quiet about the issue, continuing to work hard on the practice field. He said he wasn’t surprised some teammates didn’t know about it because Williams didn’t broadcast it and it happened during the offseason so the team wasn’t together every single day.

“He hadn’t said a lot since the original shock of it all. I think things have settled down. I think some good tings have been happening for his family,” Richt said. “Even though he did have a tragic thing happen with his home and everything, he didn’t let that keep him from taking advantage of all the hard work he had over the summer.”

Fundraising efforts were started in order to help Williams and his family get back on their feet, and Richt hopes fans respond.

“I think a fund was set up,” Richt said. “That’d be nice to give mention to that again to see if Bulldog Nation would wanna get involved in helping. That’d be big.”

Georgia Sports Communications sent this information out about making donations to the fund:

“After consultation with the NCAA, donations must be deposited into a special account at the Bank of Early (county): Bank of Early, PO Box 527, Blakely, GA 39823, Attn: Andy Smith.”