Four takeaways from Northwestern football’s open practice

Northwestern football took the field on Saturday morning for open practice at Martin Stadium in front of a strong contingent of Wildcat faithful in the West bleachers.

The ‘Cats ran through position drills and some seven-on-seven and 11-on-11 reps — in addition to scattered one-on-one action between the lines and wide receivers and defensive backs.

Head coach David Braun gave the quote of the day during his media availability after practice. “I’m abundantly confident,” he said, “that this group is in a much better spot today than it was a year ago.”

Braun set the expectations for the day pretty clearly from the jump. “If you expect any innovation or creativity to be shown out here today, you’re kidding yourself,” he said. “We basically went back to the first day, two days of install in practice today.”

Still, there was a lot to learn from Northwestern’s first and only open practice of the spring. We’re going to wring out every bit of football we can before the ‘Cats take the field against Tulane on Aug. 30.

Here are four takeaways from Northwestern football’s morning by the lake.

Preston Stone is the real deal

David Braun has waited until the morning of opening day to announce his starting quarterback in each of his first two seasons as Northwestern’s head coach. That will not be the case in year three.

“I anticipate us all being on the same page of who our starting quarterback is very early in fall camp,” said Braun with a chuckle addressing the media after practice.

That starting quarterback will of course be SMU graduate transfer Preston Stone.

Stone ran with the first unit in all team drills and has already showed some of the leadership chops that made him such a popular teammate in Dallas. The Texas native led Northwestern out in warmups to start the day — no…

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Publish date : 2025-04-20 16:55:00

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