Syracuse football: NFL Combine Friday recap

Lot of takeaways from our Orange men at the combine

Everything got started pretty quickly at the Indiana Convention Center Friday morning. I got to the media work room around 8 AM, got settled, and just before 9:15 AM, former Syracuse Orange quarterback Kyle McCord was already at the podium getting ready to speak.

“Being here right now, it’s a little surreal… it was a dream growing up,” McCord added. “ I remember when I first landed here on Tuesday, seeing Lucas Oil Stadium and all the combine stuff, and being like, wow, I’m really here.”

McCord was asked about a number of things, including his experience at Ohio State, his relationship with Ryan Day, his decision to transfer to Syracuse, what part of his game he feels like he’s improved upon the most, and, most importantly (probably), what the NFL draft process has been like for him, etc.

And, I was really impressed with his answers. This response especially.

“I’ll be the first person to admit, I didn’t play my best football at Ohio State,” McCord said when asked about his junior year starting at OSU. “The hardest thing about being a first-year starter is you kind of are learning by trial and error, and your errors are in front of millions of people… you’re learning on the fly, you’re learning how to bounce back from an interception or a misread or whatever.”

McCord was very humble for a guy coming off of one of the best seasons in not just Syracuse program history, but ACC history. I mean look at the Ohio State transfer’s profile page on Cuse.com.

Very briefly, McCord mentioned he’d met with the New York Jets informally earlier in the week, he added, that he’d spoken with Kevin Stefanski, the head coach of the Cleveland Browns, during his time in Dallas at the East-West Senior Shrine Bowl.

McCord will work out on Saturday after 1 PM. He’s QB9, so he’ll be on the earlier side among quarterbacks to run the 40-yard dash and go through drills.

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Former Syracuse running back LeQuint Allen spoke to the media not shortly after McCord on Friday.

Despite several attempts, Allen declined to answer any questions about which teams he’d met with at the combine and Reese’s Senior Bowl. He mentioned, specifically, that he had NOT met with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, which I reported earlier on X.

Towards the end of Allen’s press conference, he was asked, ‘What about his time at Syracuse prepared him for this moment [the NFL Combine]’? And, his answer was awesome:

Allen had a terrific year in the Orange uniform. All-ACC honorable mention, 1,500+ all-purpose yards, and 20 total touchdowns, and although he is considered one of the more underrated prospects, he’s gained the respect of several NFL draft experts over the last few weeks.

“I’m very versatile, whatever you need me to do, special teams, running back, receiver, I’ll do it, whatever it takes to help the team win in any aspect of the game,” Allen on what an NFL team is getting in drafting him. “They’re getting someone who doesn’t get tired of being great, someone who’s going to come in and work every day, someone that wants to gain respect from their peers and coaches.”

The star Syracuse running back is RB1 and will be the first of the running backs to work out on Saturday, after the quarterbacks and wide receivers, around 6-7 PM (my best guess).

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Alijah ‘Cinco’ Clark met with the media on Thursday and worked out on Friday with the safeties after the corners finished.

Clark ran an unofficial 4.5-second 40-yard dash on his second attempt after running a 4.61 on his first attempt, an improvement of more than a tenth of a second — although his workout stats were nothing out of this world. Clark finished in the top half among safeties in the 10-yard split (1.53 seconds), but was fairly middle-of-the-pack in the 40-yard dash, broad jump (10’2”), and vertical jump (33.00”).

Though there is some good news, WIVB’s Josh Reed first reported that Clark did meet formally with Sean McDermott and the Buffalo Bills defensive staff on Wednesday. If the Bills were to draft Clark, and that’s a big ‘if’, they’d likely use what would be one of their three sixth round picks — 179th overall (from New York Giants), 206th overall (from Detroit via Cleveland), and 208th overall.

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Oronde Gadsden elected not to run the 40-yard dash on Friday night and finished in the bottom-half among tight ends in the broad jump (9’6”) and vertical jump (34”).

I’m not positive why Gadsden didn’t participate in the 40-yard dash, among other drills, but he showed out in the gauntlet drills and the numbers certainly back it up:

Per Chiefs Blitz, Gadsden formally met with the Kansas City Chiefs this week. I’ve read projections that Gadsden could be taken as early as the third round, and, currently, the Chiefs have two third round picks (66th overall and 95th overall).

Personal biases aside, what NFL coaching staff, with more teams playing two tight ends on offense, wouldn’t want a player, like Gadsden, with his versatility and intangibles in the middle rounds of the draft… just saying.

I’ll be at the combine all day Saturday and I’ll have more on what I see from McCord and Allen during their workouts at Lucas Oil Stadium. Follow our social media for live updates!