Edwards growing into role with U

Lamonte Edwards worked hard this summer to lose a few pounds. Now he'd like to lose a few inches, too.

"Donnell [Kirkwood], he's already short so he can get low. I don't have that attribute," the 6-2 Edwards said of a 5-10 fellow redshirt freshman. "Just like Duane [Bennett, who's 5-9], he's short so it's easy for him to run low and get through the hole. I always look at him like, man, I need that. I need that ability to get low like that."

Maybe it's a good thing there's no such thing as a height-loss regimen. Because the Gophers believe his size is what will make the Woodbury High graduate a success.

"Lamonte is a guy who looks like a Big Ten running back, a guy who can go between the tackles and be a physical force," said offensive coordinator Matt Limegrover. "Not that the other guys aren't physical, but we get excited about [Edwards] because he has a dimension that's a little bit different than Duane and Donnell."

But before he can take a collegiate handoff, Edwards knows he has to prove a lot more than his ball-carrying ability. There's blitz pick-up, pass-catching and route-running, selling a fake handoff and blocking up the field for his teammates. "Everybody always thinks about running backs as guys who just get their 20 carries and that's it, but the mental part is probably even more important," Limegrover said. "If all we're going to do is have them turn and run the football, you won't be able to throw the football."

"You'll get your quarterback killed," warned coach Jerry Kill. "We ain't going to play anybody who makes mental errors. I'll play somebody with less talent if I can trust him."

That's why Edwards, who along with Kirkwood is a leading candidate to back up Bennett, the senior, is thinking about his job constantly off the field -- then trying not to think about it when he's on it.

"The hardest part is probably thinking too much," said Edwards, a second-team all-state back at Woodbury who redshirted as a freshman last season. "You want to know what you've got to do before the play even starts, but then you've just got to react. ... It's hard to learn."

The Gophers are seeing results, though. Hey, with his size, he's hard to miss.

"He's a bigger back, and in the Big Ten, you want somebody who can take a shot," said Kill, who compares Edwards' physique to the Vikings' Adrian Peterson. "Lamonte's got a body like that -- he's not as thick yet, but he's tall like that. But he's got to learn to lower his pad level, or you're going to put the ball on the ground."

Kill said no decisions have been made about playing time for the tailbacks, including newcomers Devon Wright and David Cobb. Well, except for one: "I can guarantee you we'll carry all those tailbacks into the first game. We're going to have to because of our depth."

Evening scrimmageThe Gophers conducted the first of five sets of two-a-day practices Saturday, winding up in the evening with a series of situational scrimmages.

Among the notables was wide receiver Ge'Shun Harris, a junior-college transfer who made a trio of catches in traffic, including a leaping catch at the sideline that wasn't complete until he dragged a toe in bounds.

• Linebacker Aaron Hill played alongside starters Mike Rallis and Gary Tinsley during the final set of drills, in place of Keanon Cooper, who appeared hobbled by a minor injury. Hill has impressed Kill with his consistency.

"You know what you're going to get with Aaron every day. He's going to come to play, he's not going to make a lot of mental errors, he's going to do what you tell him," the coach said.

• Kill invited a pair of Navy SEALs to address the team on Friday night, to deliver the message: "You're only as good as your team."