@MizzouFootball Media Day - Week 3
9/14/2015 2:21:00 PM | Football
COLUMBIA, Mo. – Mizzou Football head coach Gary Pinkel met with the media on Monday to preview Saturday's Tiger Stripe game against UConn, set for an 11 a.m. kick at Memorial Stadium. It will air live on ESPN. Pinkel previewed UConn, praised SEC Defensive Player of the Week Kentrell Brothers and DE Charles Harris. Quotes from Pinkel's press conference are below and be sure to listen to sound from Brothers, C Evan Boehm and TE Sean Culkin below.
Opening Statement…
Good afternoon everybody, I appreciate you all being here. We're in preparation for our meeting with UConn. This is an off-day for our team other than media day today. A lot of them are going to be watching film on their own and such, so that's really a positive. Injury-wise, Russell Hansbrough will not play in this game, we'll keep him completely out. Other than that we expect to have everybody back and ready to go. Obviously after games you've got guys nursing some bruises and things, some strains, and obviously we're going to do that. The University of Connecticut is a very good football team. They're a very disciplined team, well coached. They're 2-0. Offensively, they run the ball very, very well and mix in the pass. They've got a very, very good scheme. Defensively, they run multiple schemes. They've got a lot of players back, so it's going to be a huge test for us. Any time you come out of a game, whether you win by 40 or you win by 3 or you lose, there are always things you need to do to get better and improve. That's what we're trying to do, we're trying to improve as a football team. We've had a lot of teams in the past that have improved tremendously. It takes a great effort and focus, and certainly the will and desire to become a better team and a better player, and so those are things we're talking about and we're going to get going again on Tuesday. We're going to get that done.
On the injuries at the running back position…
Yeah. [Ish Witter] is 100 percent. He came off and we were very cautious of that type of injury, you know, as far as being in danger. He didn't have any headaches at all, which is really good. Our medical staff makes those decisions, they do a great job. We're very, very cautious of that. It was more of just making sure that we're not playing him again. We expect him to be back. Tyler Hunt is nursing a hamstring and a groin, so he played through that a little bit. Morgan Steward's continuing to improve and get better. We expect him to continue to make changes. Chase Abbington we're going to try to get him involved a little bit. You can't get seven running backs ready to play. It can't happen. It's hard to get four ready to play, really three is what you try for. So here's what we have. We have to adjust a little bit, and you know we will always do that. Last week, Chase, why we didn't play him in the 4th quarter, and again, we're not going to put a guy in a pressure-packed situation that hasn't played much. That was not going to happen. It's something that comes from me and the decision that I make, the guy carrying the football and such, but we want to get him more involved and we will continue to do that.
On how the injuries at running back affect preparation…
You can't get seven guys ready. You can't do that. Three is what you really work to get ready with a fourth player in the hunt if you need that. So that's something we have to work at. We don't want a player playing in one game and then not playing the rest of the year so his year is gone, so we have to kind of watch how we work that out. What we'll do is we'll probably bring in one of the freshmen to get him involved mentally to make sure he's on top of it before we activate him. We've done that before with an injury at a position where we've had several injuries. That's kind of where we're at and that's the way we handle it.
On Maty Mauk running the ball…
We're going to have to run him a little bit more. That's one of those- we're going to have to do that, you know? So that's something that he's good at. He's got to be very smart about how he runs and I think for most part he's been pretty good. He had one time where he got hit pretty good. Hopefully that'll get taken care of. For the most part I think he was pretty smart in how he did things in third and fourth and quarter. He's pretty smart how he handles those things, but we're going to have to do that a little bit. We have to take advantage of his athleticism.
On Russell Hansbrough's injury…
I don't think he hurt it more, I think it's just not healed yet so we just need to back him off a little bit. Again, I never make a decision on any of those things. Our medical staff does all of those things. Rex thought we could get him ready to play, he played a little bit, and we certainly need to get him healthy 100 percent because he is definitely a force. It's very important to the success of our offense if we can get him healthy.
On Chase Abbington's preparation…
Well, for Chase, he had to learn everything really quick, that's what's difficult. That's a process and he's been working hard with that. Hopefully he's very excited about that himself. We've just had to pick our moments, and practices have certainly had a lot to do with when we make those kinds of decisions on Thursday.
On Morgan Steward's progress…
I think he's still working through that, movement wise, I think that's where he is. He's tremendously better than where he was four weeks ago and we expect him to get better and better as he keeps going. Here's a guy that ran a 4.3, was 205 pounds, fastest guy on our football team a year and a half ago, went through a really difficult surgery. We're going to stay very, very positive and hopefully we can get him back. It's just unfortunate that we've had so many problems at a position, but we've got to find answers and overcome them. Another player's got to step up a little bit.
On Ish Witter's progress as a runner…
He got a little work a year ago and did some really good things. I think what happens is, just like the guys that we've lost the last couple of years, Henry (Joesey) or Murph (Marcus Murphy), those guys, they weren't running in their senior year like they were in their freshmen and sophomore years. You get stronger, you get faster, you get quicker, and you get smarter. And you understand that in high school you bounce outside and you get around everybody. In this league, if you bounce outside you've got people that can run too. I think it's a little bit of just being young and guys learning when to take your creases when you get it and don't try to get too much out of it. I think he'll get better and better. Brian Jones is a really good coach. What those guys did, they were better senior year than freshmen years.
On Trevon Walters' injury…
I hope we can get Trevon back. I think it'll be more possibly mid October. And that's just me kind of guessing. I haven't talked to him in a while. He's doing better than he's been doing, but we certainly can't count on that. He's already used his year, we redshirted him a year ago. In order to get an extra year, he'd have to have 2 medicals in a 5-year period of time. So hopefully we can get him back, but we can't count on that so we've got to get guys ready to go.
On the team's struggles catching the ball…
I don't think we've been playing catch very well at all. Again, I remember saying this when Chase Daniel was a sophomore, the frustration in practices of our inconsistency throwing and catching, all of those things. You know you don't want to, but we're going through it. You go through it. That's what I'm simply saying: when Missouri's beating Missouri, your opponent has nothing to do with it. You have to throw catchable footballs, and for a receiver that can get two hands on the ball, that's a catchable ball. That's playing catch. When you break either side of that down, we're creating the inefficiency. It's getting old, it's frustrating to go through, but as long as we're getting great focus and great effort, we're going to stay very, very positive with our players. I think people improve more with positive reinforcement than getting frustrated. Coach (Don) James used to always say before a Sunday, we met with our players on Sunday. We'd watch film with them after the staff meeting. He'd say if we lost a game at Washington, the last thing he'd say if we lost a game or didn't play well, he says "Make sure you're real positive with the kids." I didn't want to be positive, I was mad that the players weren't playing good enough. I wanted to go in there, but that's his genius back then. You try to be positive as long as you're getting a great positive attitude and focus and effort from your players. We've just got to work through it. We're talented enough, we've just got to get it done.
On who will be kicking off against UCONN…
We just have to get approval form Rex that he can kick, and he can kick, we're just going to be smart about it. Corey's (Fatony) been doing a good job and that's a conversation in itself- and I think that's an understatement. I think everybody sitting here, and myself, the good job he's done doesn't even apply to him. The remarkable job our young player's been doing, but we're going to see how that sorts itself out this week. Andrew (Baggett) will be a part of that decision, how he feels. With who's kicking the field goals, we've just got to be smart how we handle it.
On Cory Fatony's performance so far…
I think so, there's a lot of ways you look at it. You look at it this way: we've got the ball with four minutes and ten seconds (I may be off a little bit), on the nine yard line. I think we almost gained 28 yards, one first down on third down we decide not to throw the football because we'd exhausted our timeout, we can knock forty seconds more off. We've got a punter that, if he hits it right, he can flip the field and that's what he did. I think they got the ball on the 10-yard line. So we start out on the ten and we end up giving it to our defense on the other ten. I think there's a lot of ways you can look at that. It's very exciting to think a guy that has only played two games, his potential. He's s really impressive young man. He's also a great competitor. That's who he is. He said to me two weeks ago, and I mentioned this last week, I said "Are you scared or a little bit nervous?" two weeks ago and he said "No, I was so excited I just didn't want to get overexcited." His isn't nervous, his is excitement. That's just mental, that's kind of who he is. Knowing you've got a guy like that for the rest of the season and 3 more years, it's good.
On Wesley Leftwich scoring a touchdown…
He missed the previous game with injuries and he's had a few of those, so it was great to see him do that. We're going to need that from him. He's very capable of doing those things. He's got great speed and he's the most experienced player that we have on our receiving core. It was great to see that, I just want to see him catch a lot more.
On whether Leftwich can continue to produce…
I think he can, he's got great speed. He can run, great foot speed. We've just got to take advantage of it, get him to where he's going out and catching balls. Again, we saw that great catch he made on a post route at South Carolina last year. A huge football play. He's just got to make some plays and we've got to encourage him to be positive and he can do more. I think he's doing a good job leadership wise with a real, real young group of people.
On Sean Culkin's progress as a player…
It's a little bit more maturity. It's like Kentrell Brothers, like Michael Sam. He played really good then all of a sudden he wins the Defensive Player of the Year in the SEC. I think it's the same thing; Sean's been around and he's done a lot. He's starting to get confidence so he's going to make some plays. He's physically gotten better as far as preparation, strength, speed, quickness and all of those things. It's neat to see him do that, we need that from him. It was really nice that we got that performance from him, and hopefully we can get a little more. Hopefully there'll be a little bit of a confidence factor there too.
On the team's success on defense…
I think it starts up front on defense. Getting through gaps. Any time you get penetration in a gap, what it does, it really makes it difficult for the offensive lineman and the running back, or even the passing game, to function as the play was designed. Penetration in the gap creates a lot of problems. I'm thinking of that one time, we punted the ball and put our defense, backed them up to the five-yard line and almost got the safety. I think one time we had four freshmen in there, a redshirt freshmen in there at one time afterwards. I wasn't happy with that because you don't want to be in that situation, but we've also got some players playing at a high level being young guys. I think that's really helped us, especially coming off all the guys we lost. Having this core group of guys doing some good things has been a real plus. I think it starts up front. Scheme-wise, we can do a lot of things too. On defense, you can put a lot of people in different gaps. That's what you see on TV, you see it a lot. We did it a year ago, it's just our designs were a little bit different. We're going to get a certain percentage of that in every game is what you're going to see. I think it's a combination of all of those things. Nothing hurts the run game more than penetration. It destroys all blocking assignments and it creates a lot of problems.
On what being able to have freshmen contribute on the defensive line says about the program…
That says a lot, it's great. It says we've recruited well. They're also very eager to learn and play at a high level. That's certainly a huge plus for us. They're going to get better and better. Stronger, faster, quicker. They'll become different players.
On the team's depth at the cornerback position…
Yeah, I think we're doing pretty good there. You know, we're very fortunate. KD (Kenya Dennis) is outstanding. Aarion (Penton) is maybe as good a player as we've got. We're just very fortunate there. When you've got guys who can lockdown, everybody wants to be a lockdown corner, they're remarkably competitive. You're going to get beat, the great ones can do that. Those guys (Arkansas State), a couple catches they had were just remarkable catches. For most part, when you get pressure on, you get good corners, get a good nickel guy that allows you to do a lot of things. Defensively also, that being said, there's still a bunch of things we can get better at.
On Kentrell Brothers…
I was just kidding with him today, he's going to graduate in December. Five years feels like 15 to me. I love him. The most rewarding thing you get to do with my job, just see them grow up as young men. Works hard, has developed a great work ethic. Very talented, he can run. Really neat to see a guy taking his game to another level. A number of people have played at a different level their senior year. It's neat to see, and he's made some huge football plays for us.
On Evan Boehm playing through his ankle injury…
He leaned a lot, he's a tough guy. No. 1, because of the game was so important, but he's a pretty tough guy. He's not going to let an injury break his streak. He's very competitive, even as a captain he was going to be pushing. It was great to have him out there doing the things he did.
On DE Charles Harris…
Yeah, it doesn't surprise me. He's in there lifting weights right now, that's the way he is. Redshirt sophomore, came in here 215 pounds; he's 255, 260 now. Al the intangibles. It's neat to see him get production now. You're not rushing the passer as well as you should, now it's all starting to come together. Getting down in the A gaps, so I think a combination of all those things. He has a chance to be a great player. He's got his ideas of what he wants to be. Great football family, Mizzou football family. Verbally, with that whole group right there. He's done a good job. It's been a real plus for us. We've been fortunate to have guys at those positions. Not surprising at all. He'll get better because of how committed he is, how dedicated he is. I look back, I remember saying, on the football field he's okay. He's a real good basketball player. You saw him athletically, came on his visit and he's a really nice kid. Broad shouldered, tall. We didn't know he was a remarkable competitor. You don't know all those things, we search for those answers but we didn't know that. He was just a decent football player. Threes' criteria we look at. It's a good story about a great kid.
On LT Connor McGovern….
Well, Connor went from inside to outside. He's a good enough athlete to do it. It's a little different. It's something he's going to continue to learn. You've got to be technique-conscious. He's strong enough, he's big enough. No he has to be in position to make the play. He's doing a lot of good things, hopefully he'll get better.
