Miami Hurricanes set spring football game for April 16 at Lockhart Stadium

The University of Miami announced Friday afternoon that its spring football game will be at 2 p.m. on April 16 at Lockhart Stadium in Fort Lauderdale.

The 15-day spring session begins March 15 and runs through the spring game. Practices, closed to the public unless otherwise noted in the future, will be every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

And new coach Mark Richt, a graduate of Boca Raton High, continues to show his love for the 561 area code. Before the spring practice period ends with the big game, the Canes will have another scrimmage open to the public at 2 p.m. on April 9 at Oxbridge Academy in West Palm Beach.

The first closed scrimmage is April 2 at Greentree Field.

The West Palm scrimmage should make Travis Homer happy. Homer, a four-star running back out of Oxbridge, is one of three top recruits who signed letters of intent on Wednesday to play football at UM. One of the others, linebacker Zach McCloud of Lantana, is already enrolled. The other is receiver Ahmmon Richards of Wellington High.

“Palm Beach County is great,’’ Richt said Wednesday. “So is Broward. So is Dade. … How far are we from Palm Beach? Not very far. It used to be Dade was the place.

“Then Broward started getting kind of hot. Now Palm Beach is just as hot. Hopefully, we get the greatest players in all of those counties.”

The Canes also had scrimmages outside Miami-Dade and Broward counties under former coach Al Golden. In 2011, a scrimmage at Spanish River High in Boca Raton drew about 3,000 fans. In 2012, the Canes had a scrimmage in front of more than 6,500 fans at Bishop Verot Catholic High in Fort Myers. And in 2013, Miami scrimmaged before a similar crowd at Naples High.

This story was originally published February 5, 2016 at 2:46 PM with the headline "Miami Hurricanes set spring football game for April 16 at Lockhart Stadium."