DeMatha grad having a sensational camp
Kenny Tate revealed his secret Tuesday — jelly sandwiches.
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For the rapidly-emerging Maryland safety, a pregame meal isn’t enough. Tate needs additional fuel. So he packs two sandwiches with strawberry jam and eats them on the field.
“I use the bread to hold me up when the game gets tough,” said Tate. “And the jelly is sweet, so that gives me energy.”
After a year as a backup safety, Tate will need the extra nourishment this year. Blossoming this preseason, the 6-foot-4, 225-pound sophomore speedster is not only making a case for a starting role, but a starring one.
“Kenny Tate is having a sensational camp. He’s all over the place,” Maryland coach Ralph Friedgen said last week. “He’s intercepting passes. He’s sacking guys. [We’ve] got him blitzing, covering. Every time you look up, he’s making a play.”
It’s a role Tate didn’t envision coming out of DeMatha, where he was an All-American and a conspicuous weapon at wideout. At College Park, Tate was the logical follow-on to Darrius Heyward-Bey, the school’s No. 2 all-time pass catcher and now a member of the Oakland Raiders.
But a year later, Tate has evolved into a weapon of another sort — a multi-purpose defensive back with a unique ability to cover, contain, rush, and hit. Last spring the Terps’ brain trust lined Tate up at other positions and discovered he had other skills.
“He’s an exceptional athlete when we put him in different positions,” said safeties coach Kevin Lempa. “We’ll put him at linebacker. We’ll put him at defensive end. We’ll even put him at the corner. We’ll put him in different positions where the offense won’t know where he is or where he’s coming from.”
It’s an ideal situation for Tate, considering Maryland’s new defensive coordinator, Don Brown, brings an attacking style that emphasizes forcing turnovers.
“[Last year] we were probably 80 percent zone, 20 percent blitz. Now we’re 80 percent blitz, 20 percent zone,” said Lempa. “You have to have a more aggressive mentality. Rather than react to the offense, guess what? They’re going to have to react to us.”
Linebackers Adrian Moten, a junior, and Demetrius Hartsfield, a rapidly-developing redshirt freshman, will be two of the defensive disruptors. But opposing offenses also will have to account for Tate, who has warmed to his new role.
“What I can do fits our defense,” said Tate. “We had the packages and it sounded good. But we really escalated it when they saw I could be a dominant rusher. Rushing seems to come natural for me. Whenever I make a move, it seems like I’m unblockable.”
