Transcript
Opening statement:
Frustrating day, but I felt like in looking at the game I felt there was some positive things in the game, even though we weren't a factor with getting a chance to win this one. It just got away with us. But I was encouraged by the young freshmen that when we decided to use. I felt he (Owen McCown) did some positive things overall, and he did some rookie things as well, but I was encouraged by really his poise. He had a lot of good poise. I'm sure he'll look at the tape and say that there's a lot of stuff that he can definitely improve on. We didn't help him at times, particularly early. We had some drop passes that probably could've given us some consistency early and really at least the opportunity to put some points on the board. We didn't get a great series early. We did start the first series of the game without a turnover, so that was encouraging. Watching him play, I'm sure he's going to say 'I had a few more plays that I could've made out there. On the flip side of it, though, the game just got out of hand a little bit towards the middle of it. There was some consecutive series, particularly when offense wasn't getting any points and we're putting the ball back to them, they scored consecutive touchdowns that can get the game out of balance pretty quickly. That was kind of the case a little bit for us, even though we made it run and it was 21-10 at halftime. We just didn't do those things that we needed to do in the second half. Right now we have a lot of things to really shore up. There's a lot of areas that need a lot of work that we've been working on and we're going to continue to work on overall as a young team that needs to continue to grow and mature as we go. And hopefully as we go, we want to have success, but that's been short of it right now. We have plenty to work on and a few things that we can utilize in this game as some positive things to move forward with. We just have a tremendous amount of work to do with this team.
On Owen McCown being the starter:
We'll talk about that. I'll talk with the offensive staff. It's hard to really say that right now after the game, but I was encouraged. I'll definitely tell you that. I was really encouraged with how he worked out there. I don't think it got too big to him, but there was a few plays there you'll see his jitters. But I thought overall he played okay. I don't know if it was good enough to win. Obviously we didn't win, but there was some positive moments there I saw in his play.
On the defensive line’s performance:
We're really working hard on trying to get those things shored up and some of it has just been some of our players are just in a wrong gap and not getting their proper gap in that particular call. That's the challenging part, particularly if they're busting through their own touch and somebody's in the wrong gap. We're using a lot of our linebackers, we need to find the best consistency that we can there to get us to play a little bit better. Sometimes it was a linebacker issue or it was a D-line issue with our defensive line being cut out of a gap. That's a big issue right now and we need to shore up more than anything in my opinion. I know they hit some passes against us, but the rushing game in the last three, the last four games has been our nemesis on defense, so we have to find a way to get that shored up.
On Jayle Stacks, Charlie Offerdahl and Anthony Hankerson:
[Stacks] had a little bit of a big shoulder from the Minnesota game wasn't really I didn't feel comfortable playing. So that's why he didn't play. You know, the other thing is we're utilizing we got Anthony Henderson back we got Charlie we got beyond those are the primary three and we're going to rotate those guys. We don't necessarily treat any of them as a start. You know, we're gonna go with the hot hand. You know, we've got Charlie gave us the most efficiency.
On the flow of the offense:
We did some positive things in the first half. I was encouraged that the no turnover in the first series was a base point. I'm not joking. That's was something that was seriously talked about making sure we don't turn the ball over the first series. And you know, he did some really positive things and you know, and he did some rookie things too. You know, and he's, he's got to get tested every week. You know, particularly if no longer bam, saying if he ends up being our start moving forward. They're going to challenge him every week just because he's so young, and he just got here this summer. The other two the reason why he wasn't in the equation and he just got here this summer, we felt very comfortable with vivo. And JT has been really the top two guys to really work to be getting the bulk of the work to run the offense. So you know, we weren't it's hard for just like it's hard for offensive linemen. Defensive Linemen and play in their first year is pretty hard for a quarterback to do as well that you know, he did you know, with his progression he makes him when he came in in June through your training camp, we caught up to everybody that kind of gave us a little bit of a thought process of you know, maybe he should be our three going into the season. So that's kind of how it led to be and at that point, and now where we are right now.
On the true freshman starts:
I thought Anthony Hankerson did a couple of nice runs in there today. I was really encouraged by that. He's a guy that you know, he had a good training camp until he had a soft tissue injury and it set him back for four weeks and this was a week to come back so I was encouraged there. I was encouraged by Jordan Tyson. He just has to have a knack of making plays. You know inopportune times he finds a way to get open, he makes a good scrambled play where all Owen hits him in the red zone and then he scores a touchdown on a different drive later in the game. Chase Sowell is one of those players I really think is a really good player, a young player that's playing. Van Wells who's are starting left guard right now it's refreshing and we've talked about that, with him being a true freshman being playing in the offensive line. That's usually very, very unique for that to happen. So we have you know, we have a few guys like that, obviously will be on secondary so we just gotta get better. You know, we gotta get better. The encouraging thing in the locker room is that, believe me, they’re challenged about getting better. They’re challenged among each other about getting this thing right. It’s in their minds, they know it’s back to the grind about getting this fixed. It’s not a we’re quitting or it’s not a feeling sorry for ourselves. A lot of these things can happen when you’re at this position in a season. These guys have shown some resilience about moving forward and getting this thing going because they think they have that type of capability to do so. We’re going to keep pushing. We have got to coach better. I have got to start that along with the coaches and our guys want to work. They are working, they are getting better. We just have to get better a lot faster than what the pace is right now.
On defense:
I think that the first thing is first is we got to show up our run game gap integrity of our rush. That’s plaguing us through four games. And then we have to find the right people you know that's in our program and we’re rotating a number of players we’re just trying to find the right combinations to help us on that side. And believe me they’re frustrated too. They want to get this thing fixed.
On the run defense:
It's been a big concern since the TCU game we had a bunch of other big rounds get out where we didn't even get in front of them. So it's still plaguing us right now. That's a you know, we felt we had those things shored up or did a couple of different defensive schemes this this for this game, and they worked well for the most part. But still, we had some of those rushers that seemed like they were on touch. And that's, you know, that's not good. It's not good. And, you know, we have to, we have to get those things fixed.
Why fans should hang in there:
Well, it's a young team that's going to continue to get better they'll get better, we'll get better. It's hard to you gotta go at the pace of where you know where you want your your experiences. I don't, you know, I want our fan base to to understand there's you know, there's we're putting a lot of work and effort into trying to get these things adjusted to be more productive to be more of an improvement for everybody. I have one example. You know, and, you know, you're just kind of similar but, you know, I did leave Colorado in 1994 to go to Arizona State to coach there. And that's when the new high school came here, you know, with Bill McCartney. And that team that I was coaching at Arizona State was a sophomore freshman team. You know, we had young quarterback with Jake Plummer, you know, so we took our lumps that year. And obviously I've came back here because that's when you rip out the head job. But I think a year or two later, we are in a Rolls Royce one, one championship. So, you know, some of it is just the youth. You know, I hate to use that as an excuse, but, you know, you have to they have to learn, you know, it's like what Owens going through, right, he's playing, he's going to see some things go grow and learn from as he continues to play and his experience. You know, that's really at every position they're learning. Oh, if I get beat on a double loop from a corner, or if I'm trying to work a combination block between the tackling guard and the three technique loops inside the guard. And so the guards doesn't necessarily have the combination now we're going to tackle so there's a certain things that the adjustments of, of football in play in games that you can't replicate in practice. Those are the things that you have to anticipate will be able to function well in, perform well in games. And that's why again, the players are challenged more than guys that are with experience because they've seen a lot of those things in their past before. So we just want to encourage everybody to hang in there. You know, just hang in there and we're going to keep battling. We're going to keep fighting. We're going to play for 60 minutes, we're going to play until the very last play. And this play this team has enough character about that. So but within all that we want to play good football for our client, our fans to enjoy what we're doing so we understand the frustration we believe me, and that's why we've been working pretty hard.
On rebuilding the Buffs at the same pace he rebuilt ASU:
It's hard to do that nowadays with transfer portal, changing rosters, all that stuff, so that's why I say it was much more balanced and there's a lot more vision. You can kind of see your how you're gonna be in two years, for example, or a year and so I think every year now in college football is going to be a change.
On negative comments:
Well, that's part of life. I think, you know, Arielle, and Brian, you know, part of life is going to be people that are for you and people are going to be against you. You know, that's, that's in everything. There's people usually against me for a wedding too. So it's, it happens a lot. You know, that's kind of what life is you're going to have to deal with some very difficult circumstances. And going through adversity is part of growing up through that process. And our players understand and are beginning to understand that, you know, they, they don't like it, you know, we all don't like it, but they understand that sometimes that's what's that's what the issue is and you have to find a way to get yourself out of it. And we got fighters on our staff, we got guys on in our program, coaches players that are gonna fight their way out of this, including myself. And, you know, those are the only things that we can control right now. We can't worry about all the other things that could or would happen, you know, we just have to worry about the things that we can control from our own efforts.
