 |
Gary Pinkel met with the media on Monday.
|
Weekly Press Conference Quotes
Pinkel, Daniel meet the media
Sept. 15, 2008
Opening statement:
"We are actually pretty good as far as health goes right now. William Moore has a sprained foot, he had an MRI… nothing really different that what we knew before. He’s probable this week to doubtful. We’re not sure yet, we’ll see how he comes along these next few days. What we may have to do, obviously it’s a medical decision, but we may have to make a decision to just get this thing rested, take a couple weeks off. So our medical staff is working with William to make that decision. Andrew Gackhar has a strained Achilles/calf and he is doubtful. Those are the types of injuries that time can really help. Looking at Buffalo…first of all I have ties in Buffalo. My mother and father were both born in Buffalo, N.Y. All my relatives are from Buffalo, so growing up I’ve been there many, many times. I’ve got a lot of aunts and uncles and cousins that live there. It’s a great city. Turner Gill has done a great job at the University of Buffalo. He has really got a football team that is well coached and disciplined. They had a big win over the University of Texas-El Paso and I have tremendous respect for that program. The second game they went down to the wire with Pitt and then they had a big win last weekend against Temple. So he’s making tremendous progress there and he has a very experienced football team. I’m very impressed with their quarterback, the decisions he makes and how he runs the team. Defensively they’re a good team, good blitz package, they do a lot of good things. It’ll be a challenge. What we’re going to try to do, what we always try to do, is improve in every area of our football team and prepare to try and play our best game. And that’s what we’re going to try and get done, starting tomorrow."
On Missouri’s offense:
"Well they (Missouri) did a good job of executing. I think when you’re executing to that level of consistency obviously you’re doing a lot of things right. Almost every single play you have up there, as we’ve analyzed every single offensive lineman, every tight-end, every wide receiver, every tailback, quarterback, every player out there… There are little coaching points, that even if the play worked, there might be three or four things that the players can do better. So we don’t just say, ‘Oh that’s great, and this is great,’ we analyze every single thing. That’s why when you see our offense you think, “Well gosh, this is perfection at the highest level.’ Well obviously there is some great and consistent execution, without question, but still there are things to learn on every play."
On differentiating between running the score up and getting in gameday practice:
"There’s a fine line there. And I just don’t want to humiliate people. The score was out of hand pretty quick, certainly into the third quarter. But you also need to get work. We got Chase Patton in and tried to throw the football with him. And we got Blaine in, and we need to get those things done. There are a lot of things that come into effect. I did not want to score when we kicked that field goal down there. And I also didn’t want to take a knee. And I also didn’t want to get a first down, so we kicked a field goal. And then Jeff (Gettys) intercepted that pass, which I didn’t want him to do, but I did want him to do. It’s difficult. But trust me this probably won’t ever happen again in my career. We’re just pretty explosive and for some reason we have a lot of big plays."
On running up the score on teams:
"Anybody who knows me, knows that I’m not (running the score up)."
On Missouri’s offensive line:
"It’s coming together, you’re never there. I think it’s coming. Dan Hoch has done a really good job, we played him a little in the first half, our normal substitution plan. I think young players are getting more experience. They key was, can a guy like Elvis Fisher come in and play that position and still keep all the other areas solid and not have to move guys around. And that has enabled us to do that and you have to recognize him (Fisher) for playing at the level he’s playing. He’s certainly had a good test, we’ve been playing some good teams."
On Derrick Washington:
"Derrick Washington has come in and played at a very high level. When you lose a starter like Tony Temple, and you wonder why we might be executing so well, it’s because a tailback comes in and is playing at such a high level and then you have all these experienced players around him so you are able to execute better."
On young Missouri linemen:
"It’s really nice any time you get young guys like that who are impact players. It’s kind of like when we had Chase Coffman when he was young, or Chase Daniel. You kind of know you have something very special there. Offensive linemen are very difficult to find, certainly tackles, considering what we ask them to do. One being a freshman (Dan Hoch) and a red-shirt freshman (Fisher), it’s nice to have."
On Danario Alexander’s first appearance this season:
"He was fine yesterday. He told Coach Hill he was a little disappointed after the game. He has such a high expectation level. I think there’s a certain amount of adjustment you go through after an injury like that and the only way you can go through it is gameday. You have to get in there, you have to get tackled, you need to twist and turn, you need to do some things you probably haven’t done for awhile. And then what happens… your confidence goes up and you feel fine. And I think that’s very normal. I think he did really good. He’ll get better each and every week. That’s natural, after you come off that kind of injury, especially early like he has. I know he feels good about it and he just wants to get back to where he was and he will."
On his decision to red-shirt freshmen:
"I think two things come into factor. One thing is the depth of your position has a lot to do with it. You can sit there and say ‘This guy is good enough to play.’ But if he’s got five guys in front of him who are real good players, where are you going to fit him in, where is he going to get his reps and how is going to work. That’s one of the issues. The other issue is the maturity level of the player. Is he mentally and physically mature enough to play? We go back and look and most kids, and you generally get three good years out of most kids. Pretty high level players get three years, sometimes you get four. There’s not a lot of proof when you red-shirt a guy and you bring him in the next year that you’re not going to get a great year, or one of those best years. Generally the next three after that are the best years. That combination of all that thinking, and also, we are recruiting some high level players and I don’t think it has completely changed but I think there are some different components going into the decision."
Senior QB Chase Daniel
Opening Statement:
"How’s everyone doing today? It’s been a good day so far. I’ve been trying to get as much as I can know about Buffalo so far. They have a very good defense, very sound in what they do. They are very, very well coached by Coach Gill over there. We’re excited about the fact that we get to play in front of the home crowd again. I hear it’s almost sold out, so we’re excited to give the fans a show."
On speed and strength of the offensive line:
"I knew they were going to be good. It just takes a little bit of game time to get in there. You know Elvis Fisher and Tim Barnes the two new starters and they’re doing exceptionally well. Is it a plus? I think so but there are a lot of things we can get better at. A lot of communication that we can get better at as well so we’ve got a long way to go. It’s only the third game of the season so there are 11 more hopefully in our future."
On Danario Alexander’s return:
"It was good. I think it had a huge impact on the team because he’s a team player. He’s a huge player for us. For him to get his first catch out there in a long time means a lot. And just to see how much and how hard he’s recovered and how hard he’s worked to recover from ACL surgery says a lot about him as a person."
On Redshirt Freshmen being a thing of the past:
"I think especially here we want to do whatever it takes to win ball games and if that means playing freshmen, that means playing freshmen. I think freshmen in the past couple of years have had a huge impact on the game. So many different people are playing as freshmen now, and not just playing to play. They’re having a huge impact on the season and on games."
On confidence in defense to be as good as they were at this time last year:
"It just takes time. There’s going to be some growing pains. People are going to experience growing pains. That’s what it is. We have to get the chemistry back on the offense side of the ball, the defense side of the ball, every aspect. We’re just going into our fourth game of the year. It’s good we have this game and then a bye week and then start conference. Is that good? I think so."
On trusting Jared Perry to run the ball this year:
"He’s got all my trust in the world, just the same as any other year. He’s going out there making plays. He’s carefree, he runs great routes, he has great hands, he gets off the press coverage exceptionally well…almost as good as any receiver we have. I think that’s his forte and I think he’s doing a great job at it."
On Jeff Wolfert being seemingly “automatic”:
"That’s where my maturity has to come in a little bit on this offense. If it’s 3rd and 22 from the 35-yard line we don’t need to get 22 yards. We need to get 5 yards to make it a little bit easier for a field goal. And knowing my competitive nature, I want to go for the whole 22 yards but realizing that we have to settle for points and there’s not many good play calls for 3rd and 22 in the playbook."
On a three game span being untouched:
"I’m going out of the game on Saturday… I think playing a whole game in the last two games combined helps, but I mean I’m going out of games and coming in on Sunday like man, I’m feeling fresh, just relaxed and loose and not having bruises on me and that’s a direct correlation to our offensive line players."
On Colin Brown adding to the offensive line’s chemistry:
"He’s a huge part. He’s doing a tremendous job playing this year. He’s the cornerstone of our line. Him and Ryan Madison have had the most starts of the linemen and I think he’s doing a great job leading those guys."
On what is impressive about Buffalo’s defense:
"How well-coached they are. When they blitz they get to their gaps no matter what the play is, no matter what’s happening. Their defenders are always in the right spot. A defense like that can cause some problems from a scheme standpoint of always being in the right spot at the right time and you can’t really rely on them messing up plays."
On his favorite part of the game:
"My favorite part of the game is when I get to come out of the game when we’re winning by a lot of points."
On freshman QB Blaine Gabbert’s performance against Nevada:
"I noticed a lot of improvements. He was a lot more relaxed going out there. As much as we can get him and Chase Patton in, the better. He was a lot more relaxed out there, he made his reads correctly, we were in the mode where we just hand the ball off no matter what. So he didn’t get evaluated as hard as me or Chase Patton because he was handing the ball off a lot but I think he played well."
