VALDOSTA –– At the conclusion of Tuesday’s practice, Valdosta Wildcats head coach Alan Rodemaker made a challenge to his team.

Rodemaker pointed out that two of the first four practices were bad performances and asked his team, ‘We’ve had two good practices and two bad practices. How’s tomorrow gonna be?’

Day 5 of spring practice featured a 30-minute scrimmage with the first, second and third string offenses against the defensive units. Going through a grueling third practice in a row, the ‘Cats flew around and made plays on both ends, as the offense finally found some continuity and success with its running game and the defense forced two turnovers on the day.

“We scrimmaged 30 minutes today –– I thought it was good for us to get after it and scrimmage a little bit, see where we are,” Rodemaker said. “We’re still sloppy, but the effort was good today. I thought the attitude and effort was good today. For us, going three days in a row, that’s kind of tough. We’re not lining up perfectly, we’ve still got to clean up a lot of stuff but I thought the attitude was good.”

Rodemaker and defensive coordinator Justin Montgomery kept a sharp eye on the defense, a unit they feel has promise heading into the fall. Thus far in the spring, the ‘Cats defense has increased its level of activity and physicality each day. While still not as perfect as he’d like, Rodemaker likes what he’s seeing at the defensive end at the halfway mark.

“I think defense has dominated the first four days,” Rodemaker said. “But I thought the offense moved the ball good today. We’ve got a little ways to go (defensively) –– We’re doing a lot of stuff of defense right now so there’s some confusion, still some guys that don’t know exactly where they fit, so we’re learning a lot, hopefully, every day.”

The ‘Cats offense, led by senior quarterback Tate Rodemaker, put pressure on the defense –– scoring four touchdowns, with three coming on the ground in the form of long runs on stellar blocks from the offensive line.

After struggling to run the ball much the first four days of practice, the ‘Cats took their game up a notch on the ground on Wednesday behind running backs Tarrell Roberts, Shavious Wright and Terrell Denson among others.

When asked how his platoon of backs performed, Rodemaker didn’t mince words.

“A lot better,” Rodemaker said with a grin. “We hadn’t run the ball yet. I don’t know that we threw it great, but we ran the ball pretty good today so that’s encouraging to me. I don’t know if that’s them or it’s us [laughs]. You never know, but it was encouraging to see us run the football today.

“Our first group, offensively, is going to be OK. Our backup guys, our depth on offense is concerning right now. We’ve got to get our twos and our threes to where they can at least run a freaking play. I thought with the ones, it was the best day we’ve had offensively since we started.”

It was fitting that the team’s collective breakthrough comes midway through the spring schedule. With the offense beginning to hum, the largely-unproven offensive line finding its way and the defense showing its might, Valdosta offensive coordinator Josh Crawford discussed the value of getting in as many repetitions as possible in the time the team has left before next week’s spring game.

“At this point in the spring, it’s just about reps –– reps, reps reps,” Crawford said. “We’ve got a lot of young guys up front and everything has to work in its part. The OL working together with the receivers on any type of pass or run play. The biggest thing is we just got reps and we got film on tape. That’s the biggest positive I’ll take from today.

“Sometimes a bad rep is a good rep, if that makes sense. We really try to teach so, good or bad, I think we’ll be able to learn something and move forward and get better.”