BOWLING GREEN — For the Bowling Green State University football team, the start of spring practice could not come soon enough.

And that start officially took place Monday morning, when the Falcons held a short walkthrough at a sunny but cold and windy Doyt Perry Stadium. BG took its Tuesday practice indoors for a full two-hour session at Perry Fieldhouse, but senior wide receiver Scotty Miller said the warmer setting was not the only reason for the excitement bubbling in practice.

“We want to get what happened in 2017 behind us,” he said. “It’s good to get a fresh start … so we’re excited to get this started and excited for what is to come.”

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Bowling Green hopes to turn the page on a 2-10 season that included a 2-6 mark in Mid-American Conference play. Third-year coach Mike Jinks said one of the goals for this year’s spring practices will be to fight a “Superman” complex that at times hamstrung last year’s team.

“There were times last season where we seemed to play outside ourselves, and that led to mistakes we couldn’t overcome,” he said. “You hear the saying, ‘One play at a time.’ That’s what the good teams do. That’s what the great teams do. That’s what the championship teams do.

“We’ve talked about that coming into spring, and that’s something we’ll continue to focus on: Good or bad, let it go and come back to fight the next play.”

Defensively, Bowling Green looks to dramatically improve after surrendering 506.6 yards per game last season, a total better than just four of the 129 FBS schools. To that end, the Falcons hired Carl Pelini as defensive coordinator and completely revamped the defensive coaching staff, adding line coach Jimmy Williams, linebackers coach Jacob Schoonover, cornerbacks coach DeJon Gomes, and secondary coach LaMarcus Hicks

“We’re going through a time of transition, so we’ll have to be patient,” Jinks said. “There’s a learning curve, but luckily we have a lot of guys who have played a ton of football. …

“More than anything else, the thing I’ve noticed is body language, confidence, and effort. Those are things that we can control, and we want to maximize those things in the spring.”

While the defensive staff has been redone, the Falcons return a number of players who saw extensive action last season — including five of the team’s six tackle leaders and 12 of the 17 defenders who finished with at least 20 stops.

“It helps to play with the same safeties, same corners — to know what they are going to do, and what they do well, and how they play certain coverages,” senior safety Marcus Milton said.

The biggest challenge this spring, according to Milton, is adjusting to the terminology used by the new staff.

“We need to learn what they mean when they say certain things,” he said. “With a new coaching staff, what they say and what they mean is a little different than it was with the old coaching staff.”

Offensively, Jinks would like the see the Falcons build upon their performance from late last season.

“I felt toward the end we had become pretty efficient,” he said. “We still want to stress ball security because if we don’t turn the ball over, we have a chance to experience success.

“We also want to push a lot of reps to our back-up quarterbacks — Grant [Loy], Bryce [Veasley], and Rico [Marble] — to make sure we’re comfortable where we sit behind Jarret [Doege].”

Miller said he and the rest of the team’s receivers hope to build a connection with Doege.

“Last year we worked with James Morgan a lot because he was the starting quarterback,” Miller said. “This year we’re working with Jarret since he’s the established starter here.

“We’ll work on our timing with him and sharpen our routes.”

While the defensive coaching staff is new, Miller said having the same offensive staff returning is an advantage.

“Since we know the offense, we can work on little things inside each play,” he said. “For example, for receivers we can work on the releases for each play, different stems, and different things like that.

“Working on the little things, the details, will make us better this year.”

INJURY REPORT: Among the players who saw limited action Tuesday because of injuries are running back Matt Domer and receiver Deric Phouthavong, both seniors. Sophomore Darius Wortham was on crutches for Tuesday’s practice.

“I don’t think we’ll see Matt this spring,” Jinks said. “Phouthavong did some linear movements, but we won’t see him cut — although his rehab is going well.

“And Darius is out indefinitely. He will be reevaluated in the next month or two.”

Contact John Wagner at jwagner@theblade.com, 419-724-6481, or on Twitter @jwagnerblade.

First Published March 20, 2018, 9:00 p.m.