San Marcos, Texas – Texas State football fans will have a chance to preview the 2012 football team when the Bobcats play in their annual Maroon-Gold spring game at Bobcat Stadium on Saturday at 2:00 p.m. Admission to the game is free for the general public.
 
Head coach Dennis Franchione is anxious to see how a group of redshirts from last season and some newcomers who joined the program at the beginning of the semester perform in the game.
 
“This is the one true opportunity for coaches to see how they play in a game-like atmosphere,” said Franchione. “It won't carry tremendous weight for our veteran players because we have seen them play in games before. For the others, this is about as close to a game-like atmosphere as we are going to be able to give them before we play at Houston in September. It will be interesting to watch how they prepare and perform in the game. I don't think anyone can hurt themselves, but they can help themselves.”
 
The game will be played as a normal football game with the exception that teams won't be able to use on-side kicks and every player has to play in the game.
 
The two teams were selected in a player draft with five members of the leadership council on each team making the selections on Wednesday. Adley Eshraghipour, Shaun Rutherford, Marcus Curry, Brian Lilly, Jason McLean and Isaiah Battle chose the Maroon team in the draft, while Thaddeus Watkins, Tyler Arndt, Chase Harper, Darryl Morris and Joplo Bartu chose the Gold squad.
 
“They really prepared for the draft,” said Franchione. “There were some questions before it began and I was impressed with how quickly they made their choices. You could tell that they want to be able to have some bragging rights when the game is over.”
 
Those players along with the potential addition of Jordan Norfleet will serve as Texas State's Leadership Council for next season. The members of the leadership council also serve as game captains for the 2012 season with permanent season team captains being chosen by the players prior to the final game against New Mexico State.
 
The head coach for the Maroon team is Craig Naivar, and he will be joined by Dennis Darnell, Jeff Conway, Mike Hudson, Dustin Porterfield, Wesley Condra, Jeff McKinley and Vincent Ibewnike.
 
Mike Schultz will serve as the head coach for the Gold team, and his staff will include Brad Franchione, Jason Johnson, Reuben Vaughn, Jason Washington, Kyle Tatum, John Reid, Rod Woodard and Eddie Veyran.
 
Dennis Franchione will serve as a commentator on Texas State's radio broadcast of the game. The other announcers will be Brant Freeman calling the play-by-play and Bill Culhane serving as an analyst. The game can be heard live on KTSW (89.9 FM) in San Marcos and on the www.txstatebobcats.com website.
 
“I am going to be watching be watching individual players as much as anything,” said Franchione. “I want to see improvement and a hard-fought and well-played game. We have had pretty good workouts throughout the spring. The players have demonstrated as much effort, enthusiasm and intensity with a purpose as I could have asked in every workout. We have improved as a football team this spring.”