By Jim Henry

jhenry@joplinglobe.com

Missouri Southern marked the midway point of spring football — practice No. 8 — with a scrimmage on Wednesday afternoon.

“It went great,” head coach Bart Tatum said. “The best thing about a scrimmage is when people don’t get injured. I’m not sure we had one injury today in 90 snaps. That’s the best scrimmage to me.”

During the controlled scrimmage, the offense started first from its end of the field, then the ball was placed 20 yards from the goal line.

“The defense was sluggish to start,” Tatum said. “We had some success on offense, but as we went on into the scrimmage is where the defense came on, flew around and made big plays. There were some highlights on offense, but I thought both sides showed some signs of life.

“Adam Hinspeter has had a good spring as you would expect from the school’s all-time leading passer, a fifth-year senior and four-year starter. He’s been consistent. Jordan Patton at cornerback, a returning second team all-conference player, has been playing well. Antwan Dyer, a returning linebacker, has had an excellent spring.

“A newcomer, Brandon Williams, shows signs he can be a good player. He’s rough right now, but within a year or two, he could develop into a nice defensive tackle.”

Williams, 6-foot-3, 315-pounder from Kirkwood, Mo, is part of the Lions’ 2008 recruiting class. He played at Rockwood Summit High School in St. Louis, earning all-conference and all-state honors, then transferred to Harmony Prep School in Cincinnati in 2007. He enrolled at MSSU at the start of the second semester.

Tatum, preparing for his third season as the Lions’ head coach, sees improvement in the Lions after eight practices the last two weeks.

“There’s no doubt in my mind we’re better,” he said, “but as you know, the MIAA is better. With the addition of a perennial top-10 team in Nebraska-Omaha and the subtraction of the worst team in the league in Southwest Baptist, you’d better get a lot better. You hope you’re a lot better.

“We were right in the middle of the pack (in 2007), our first winning record (6-5) in nine years. That’s a nice hump to get over, but it just doesn’t get any easier.”

Spring workouts provide opportunities for players to catch the coaching staff’s attention, and it gives the coaches the chance for constant evaluation.

“We’ve graded every player on the offensive side of the ball every day, and that constant evaluation will continue,” Tatum said.

“We have probably 70-80 percent of what we plan to look at on offense inserted. We still have new material to insert, and the defense still has a few things they want to look at in their package that is not inserted. We’ve worked on phases of the kicking game in all eight practices, and the remaining seven practices won’t be any different.”