Oct. 12, 2009
Head Coach, Gary Pinkel
Injury Report:
“Munir Prince is back, he is coming off a hamstring sprain. Those are real difficult, but hopefully he will be ready to go Saturday. Will Ebner had a scope this morning. It was an injury that could have come out with a bunch of different scenarios, but he had the best one and it was just a small repair to his meniscus, Very possible for him to be ready next week for the Texas game. That’s huge, it could have been an entire season injury. We didn’t know anything until [team doctor] Pat Smith went in there. He’s being taken care of by some of the best surgeons in the country and we’re very thankful for that. Blaine Gabbert and Carl Gettis both have ankle sprains and are probable for this week’s game”
Opening Statement:
“Oklahoma State is a real good football team. Mike Gundy is doing a real good job building that football team. They are good on both sides of the ball. It’s a great, intense place to play, like all places in the Big 12. We’re going to work hard, try to improve as a football team. I think any time you come out of a win or loss, you really approach it the same way; find out what you have to do to get better. And continuously play better each week.”
On preparing for players or a system:
“I think Dez Bryant, we will assume he will play. I have to say, I thought their players did real well against Texas A&M. They threw for 250 yards. But I think it’s a good idea to prepare for the best players. Also, prepare for players who might play or are probable is smart. Obviously the system is important but if you have great players in certain positions you have to be aware of that.”
On their spread offense:
“First conference game they threw the ball a lot more than they ran the ball. They throw it well, and they run the ball well. They are one of the top running teams in the league, they like to run the ball. That’s part of their spread offense, everybody’s got their own versions now a days. But they do a very good job.”
On running game design:
“I think we like how we have it designed. D-Wash [Derrick Washington] ran for 80 yards last week, I think we ran about 90 yards and they [Nebraska] ran about 103 yards They are a pretty good running team themselves. I don’t know how good of an offensive day it was for anybody last week. But we were about 30 yards apart. We want to be able to run the football better, and we’re working hard at it. We’re not changing the design of what we’re doing. I would also give Nebraska some credit. Suh is one of the best defensive tackles I’ve seen ever seen. So I think you start with that, but there is no question we want to run the ball better.”
On what team learned from loss last week:
“I think experience-wise, you played a lot of great players, a lot of guys that will be playing in the NFL. That’s one of the great challenges of this conference. You take back the things that you learn, the pluses and minuses and you store them and apply them for the next year. You find out you got to get better at something when you play a player like that. We look at that from a scheme standpoint too. There is only so many things you can do sometimes to help yourself out. Suh’s really a great player, we played him last year and he certainly got better after he played us.”
On Oklahoma State defense this year compared to last year:
“They are similar schemes although they have a new defensive coordinator. They do a good job on defense, they have a real set scheme they believe in. They execute well, have good players, they are very well coached and disciplined. Hopefully we can up our production from last week.”
On Gabber ankle injury:
“It can be difficult. Gabbert’s right foot is his plant foot. If you’re throwing a football and you’re right handed, your right foot is what you drive off of. You push everything off that that foot. So you make some adjustments and weight transfers, and adjust your drop a little bit. Maybe not taking as big of steps and putting pressure on it as you come back. It was a pretty courageous effort on his part. How we make decisions there, the medical staff really makes most of the decisions first and they counsel and communicate with the player. Then we say okay they are ready to play, but are they functional? We have to do that with every player. That’s our call with Coach [David] Yost, but first the medical staff with the player. I think it was very difficult conditions offensively that day anyways, so I think it was more difficult for him, not doubt about that with that ankle injury.”
On how loss affected team:
“It was a tough loss because we’ve done a pretty good job around here the last few years of winning games in the fourth quarter and keeping leads, so it was tough on all of us. There are lessons to be learned here. Penalties and turnovers, we all know about those things, we talk about them all the time. The lesson to be learned though is sometimes things bad happen. It’s not about the bad things that happen, it’s how we handle it as a football team, and that’s what I was disappointed in. Bad things are going to happen sometimes, that’s the way it is. How are you going to respond when adversity hits? It’s over, we’ve learned that lesson. But to sit there and blame the fourth quarter on turnovers, on big plays, if you’re good enough you’re going to find a way to win and we didn’t do that. That’s what I’m disappointed in because I think we’ve got a pretty good football team.”
Blaine Gabbert, Quarterback
On his soreness after the Nebraska game:
“You take some shots—it’s a football game. It’s a physical sport, so I was sore but it was nothing out of the ordinary.”
On Nebraska’s pass coverage:
“When we got down, we had to try to throw the ball. In a passing situation, the other team is going to try to drop more people into coverage, and Nebraska did that. Our offense has to both run and throw the ball, and we didn’t really do either of those things. That falls on the offense.”
On Oklahoma State:
“They’re a good football team. They’re physical, and they’re fast, and it should be a good game.”
On how penalties affect a drive:
“You’ve got to get a little bit of yardage on each down after that. We never want to be in those situations, because it really minimizes the play calling. We’ve got to throw down the field and try to get big plays [when that happens]. We need to eliminate mental errors, and that will just come with experience.”
On what changes that need to be made to win in conference:
“We just need to focus on the little things. Getting yardage when we need it, and getting a better first down efficiency. We didn’t really get a lot of yards on first downs, and we need to eliminate mental errors. Penalties really stalled a lot of drives and eliminated a lot of points for us. We were in the red zone more than once and we didn’t come away with any points. Those are drive killers, because you can’t be in 2nd- and-25, 3rd-and-18, 1st-and-20… those are hard to convert on.”
Derrick Washington, Tailback
On the spottiness of the run game:
“It’s very frustrating, because I know what we’re capable of doing—both me and the offensive line and the other running backs. We haven’t really had a breakout game besides Bowling Green, but I think it’s going to happen. We’re getting better at our timing each and every week, and we’re practicing that. Once we get that, we’re going to be explosive.”
On playing in Stillwater:
“It’s going to be my first time there, and I’m looking forward to it. I’m excited. I’ve heard that it’s crazy there, and I’m looking forward to that. I like playing in those kind of environments. It brings a lot of emotion out of the players, and a lot of adrenaline is going to come out of that.”
On whether rough games can shake an offensive line’s confidence:
“I think that can happen to anybody. Up front, though, those guys do a great job and I don’t think they’ve lost any kind of confidence. They have all the confidence in the world. They have a great leader in Kurtis Gregory, and he always gets his guys ready to go. The coaches are going to get those guys fired up, and they’ll be fine.”
Sean Weatherspoon, Defensive Linebacker
On their upcoming games:
“It’s going to be a tough October for us, and we knew that before we played Nebraska. Going into Stillwater, we just need to make sure that everyone’s over that Nebraska loss. We need to focus on this film, and just make sure that everybody is ready to go down there and face this team.”
On not knowing whether Dez Bryant will play for OSU:
“We’ve got to prepare like they’re going to play him, because we don’t know what’s going on. We’re not really sure what’s going on with [Dez] Bryant, so we’ll see how that plays out, but from a defensive standpoint we’ve just got to prepare like their best players are going to be playing. If not, we’ll just go out there and play our game the same way.”
On playing in Stillwater:
“It’s always tough to go on the road and get a win. I’ve never been to Stillwater, so I don’t really know the atmosphere yet, but I’m pretty sure their fans will let us know pretty quickly how they do it down there. We’ve just got to go in there with the right mindset and be focused. The best thing about this is no home team has won the game in this series so far, so hopefully we can keep that going.”
On OSU quarterback Zac Robinson:
“He’s a very athletic quarterback—I remember that from playing against him last year. He’ll surprise you with his ability to get out on the edge and make some plays with his legs. He makes some good rolls and gives his receivers good opportunities to make plays with the ball.”
On bouncing back from a loss:
“When you face adversity, you’ve got to respond better than the way we did on defense this past week. We had a little adversity, and we came out and gave up scores, and you just can’t do that. No matter where the defense goes out there on the field, and no matter where the offense gets the ball, we’ve just got to go out there and defend. We really just want to focus on facing adversity better.”
Kurtis Gregory, Offensive Lineman
On offensive penalties:
“It just seems like it’s always just that one more block that we need. Every penalty that we had on the run game wasn’t a matter of flat-out grabbing a guy—it’s just if the hands would have been a little more inside it still would have been a great block and we would have had the great running plays.”
On improvements the O-line has made:
“We should have been better than we were, but we’re getting there. We’re better now on the run game than we were in the Illinois game… even if it doesn’t seem like it. Watching the film, there’s so much that we’ve gotten better at. We’ve just got to keep getting better, but we’ll get there.”
On playing in Stillwater:
“They beat us here last year, so we just want to go down there and get the first conference win. Everyone says you have to win at home, and we didn’t get that done, but you’ve really got to win on the road in the Big 12 Conference. Coach Pinkel always says, ‘To be remembered you’ve got to win in November,’ but to be remembered in November you’ve got to win in October.”
Kevin Rutland, Cornerback
On the depth of the defense:
“We have about nine guys that can play at any time without any let down in the run coverage or stopping. These guys can all play, and it’s amazing how many of our guys can play well at one time. It does keep you fresh—I’m not sure what the safeties’ rotation is, but with my rotation, to have a break like that in a defensive game… you can’t ask for a better situation.”
On Dez Bryant:
“He’s not just a number. When a guy is that explosive and has that kind of talent, you can’t say you’re not worried about him. We key in on him, so you definitely have to up your game when he’s playing, but if he doesn’t play we won’t slack in our preparation. We’ll still go out there and practice just as hard. You can’t just worry about one player and think that he’ll be the only one to get you, because he won’t be.”
