Penguins make no decision

Another spring football practice has come and gone and Youngstown State still has made no decision as to who will be the quarterback in the fall.
This marks the third straight spring that the Penguins have not made a choice as to who the starter will be going into fall practice.
Junior Aaron Marshall, who has started most of the games the past two seasons, has worked with the No. 1 offense most of the spring with redshirt freshman Tom Zetts.
Redshirt freshman transfer Vince Gliatta, who joined the Penguins this spring, showed what a game player he is in Friday's Red and White contest, and could be another candidate in the fall.
Gliatta didn't look that good most of the spring as he had to adjust to two years of not playing quarterback when he was at Penn State as a defensive back.
Zetts, the Boardman native, probably looked the best of the three candidates overall this spring, especially in the two jersey scrimmages.
Hands off quarterbacks
But again all three quarterbacks played the entire spring with black jerseys, signifying hands off to the defensive team. It is more than likely that Marshall, Zetts and Gliatta will not have any serious contact until they step under center against Slippery Rock in the season opener Sept. 2.
The question surrounding Zetts is not his ability, because he's more than proved he has that. It's whether he can stay healthy.
He fractured his collarbone in his senior season at Boardman and then broke it again in the Penguins' season opener last year.
Although Marshall hasn't done anything to lose the starting job this spring, he hasn't shown the improvement that he made between his first and second year.
YSU coach Jon Heacock doesn't sound like he's made any decision on the position, or if he has he's not sharing it with anyone.
"They've all shown 100 percent improvement this spring," Heacock said Friday night after the Red and White game. "Now we will evaluate the films and talk with all of them."
The one thing that did come out of spring practice is that the offense is much improved over last season, especially the offensive line and the wide receivers.
"Our line is pretty patched up this spring, but the good thing is that they are all getting plenty of reps and they've been steadily improving," Heacock said.
Deep at wide receiver
The Penguins are deep at wide receiver, led by seniors Phil Larmon and Matt Rycraft, both of whom had strong spring sessions. There is also last year's top receiver, Kyle Smith, along with youngsters Damian Wright, T.J. Peterson, Chris Goffer and Tyler Morton.
"This is the best group as a whole since I've been here," said Larmon, a fifth-year senior.
The Penguins lost three senior tailbacks from last season, but the three that they have this year have not missed a beat.
Junior Josh Cayson, a Warren Kennedy High product, led the team in rushing as a sophomore and has picked up right where he left off this spring. He led all rushers in the spring game and scored a touchdown.
Sophomore transfer Monquantae Gibson, who came from Kentucky, has shown that he can step in at any time, while sophomore Justin Reams has improved greatly this spring.
There is no doubt that the Penguins have one of the best kicking duos in all of Division I-AA football.
Senior kicker Nick Terracina and sophomore punter Joe Bishop are both coming off excellent seasons and both have become even better this spring.
Defense takes step forward
The YSU defense, which had undergone some changes brought in by its two new co-defensive coordinators, made big improvements over the last two weeks of spring.
The front line appears to be solid with some depth and the linebackers, led by senior Yancey Marcum are of YSU caliber.
The only question is in the secondary, where the only holdover is senior Mike Bracken at strong safety.
The pass coverage has been the big problem this spring, in that there hasn't been much. Either the YSU receivers are that good or some shifting in the secondary needs to happen.
We'll see this fall.
XPete Mollica covers YSU athletics for The Vindicator. Write to him at & lt;a href=mailto:mollica@vindy.com & gt;mollica@vindy.com & lt;/a & gt;.