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00:00 All right, thank you all for being here.
00:02 That game took a while,
00:04 so y'all probably been waiting in here a little bit.
00:07 Great win, a lot of respect for BYU's program,
00:12 and I think Kalani,
00:14 one of the better human beings we have coaching in,
00:16 and he's obviously done a really good job there
00:18 for a long time, so really a good win for us.
00:23 Thought it was a complete game,
00:25 defense, offense, special teams.
00:26 Felt like the last two weeks have played
00:29 what we call good football,
00:31 and today was probably our most complete game
00:34 where we played good in all three phases,
00:37 played good on defense,
00:39 played good on offense, special teams-wise.
00:41 And I wanna say this too,
00:43 I wanna thank the crowd,
00:45 because other than our students,
00:48 and our Maniacs, they get here early,
00:49 but other than our students,
00:51 the crowd got here early tonight,
00:52 and there was energy, there was juice in the stadium,
00:55 and I think our guys felt that, even in pregame.
00:59 I think there's something special
01:00 about playing at night here,
01:01 and there's a little different aura.
01:02 Even coming in in the mantrip,
01:04 we had a bigger crowd.
01:05 The weather helps, it was a beautiful day,
01:08 but man, there was a lot of energy in the mantrip,
01:10 and I thought it bled right into pregame,
01:12 and our guys really fed off that,
01:13 so I wanna thank our crowd for doing that.
01:15 If you look at it,
01:16 I think the stats pretty much tell the story.
01:19 Defensively, only gave up 277 yards,
01:22 held 'em to seven points,
01:22 and that was with some backups.
01:24 Thought we were really good on third and fourth down.
01:27 Anytime you hold a team to 67 yards rushing,
01:30 that's a pretty good day.
01:30 You're gonna have a pretty good chance to win that game.
01:33 Offensively, we continued to play at a high level.
01:37 I think that's several games in a row now
01:39 that we're doing that.
01:40 The things that sticks out,
01:41 336 yards rushing, 200 yard rushers.
01:45 We held the ball for over 35 minutes.
01:48 And then on special teams, our kickoff coverage,
01:50 we gotta get better at that.
01:52 I thought we'd made some improvements.
01:53 I'm not real sure.
01:54 I gotta watch the video
01:55 and see where we failed on that.
01:57 But I only punted one time.
01:59 I thought our field goal protection was really good.
02:01 Mike made a really difficult kick.
02:03 Talking about specialists, really proud.
02:05 Danny King got an opportunity,
02:06 went in there and really hit the ball well.
02:09 But I thought we played well on special teams.
02:13 I think no big plays,
02:16 but we didn't give up any negative plays either.
02:18 So only negative was the penalties.
02:20 We've been a team that hasn't had that all year.
02:23 And man, there was a lot of penalties in that game.
02:26 And here's the thing, most of them were legit.
02:29 I don't know what the heck that delay was forever,
02:30 that we had to go to replay and all that.
02:32 But the rest of them, they were probably legit
02:34 and we gotta clean that up.
02:35 And so without questions, Greg.
02:39 - So start with defense.
02:40 You guys have struggled there the last few games,
02:42 but today, very good injury situation.
02:46 Your backup's starting to get comfortable now.
02:50 What was the reason why the defense improved?
02:51 - Yeah, so hard for me to say until I watch the tape.
02:54 But what I thought is, I thought that
02:57 we obviously did a good job in the run game.
03:00 And I felt, they probably felt like coming in,
03:02 they needed to be one dimensional.
03:03 You know, it's tough.
03:05 The quarterback, who's got a quick release, man.
03:07 He got rid of the ball fast,
03:08 threw the ball from a bunch of different arm angles.
03:10 But that's hard, he hasn't played all year.
03:12 And he's gonna make his first start on the road,
03:15 two time zones away, national TV, all those things.
03:18 That's a tough ask.
03:19 And so a couple things, I thought we tackled well.
03:23 After a couple initial quick screens,
03:25 I thought we tackled well, got 'em behind the chains.
03:28 That helped.
03:29 And I thought, you know, when you watch the tape,
03:31 Cutter and Visor, those guys probably played better.
03:34 You know, D-line wise, I think we're doing a better job
03:36 of keeping it clean for those guys.
03:39 And then, without question, that was the best
03:41 our safeties had played in a long time.
03:44 So I thought Anthony Wilson was really good in the game.
03:46 Aubrey Burks is back looking like he did pre-TCU.
03:50 So I think those are some of the reasons
03:51 why we played better.
03:53 - How to get Jaheim White more involved
03:55 over the last couple weeks
03:57 and you really see what he's capable of tonight,
03:58 start to finish, what's it been like bringing him along?
04:01 - Yeah, you know, I think this game's really hard to play
04:03 as a true freshman.
04:04 And that's why, there's a reason why
04:06 you don't see a whole lot.
04:07 And usually the ones that are able to do it,
04:09 like the guys that we've had,
04:11 if you look at Zach Frazier, Wyatt Milam,
04:14 people like that that have played a lot of football
04:16 as true freshmen, they're usually pretty special.
04:18 And he's got a chance to be special.
04:20 You know, he's a long way.
04:21 Where he's at, you know, right now,
04:23 what he can be, there's a big gap.
04:25 And so if he continues to do the things
04:27 that it takes to be great,
04:29 then he is gonna be a great one.
04:30 And he can break tackle, he's got good burst,
04:33 he's really improved on his ball security.
04:35 He's learned how to practice and prepare,
04:36 which is probably the hardest thing to do
04:38 when you go from high school to college.
04:40 And he's earned these opportunities.
04:42 You know, he got 16 carries today.
04:43 That's the most he's had in a game.
04:45 I'm pretty sure.
04:47 And this is the second time he's gone over 100.
04:50 You know, he had around 90 last week.
04:52 And so he's gonna be important for us, as is Rodney.
04:55 You know, we got Rodney some touches,
04:56 and he's gonna continue to be important for us, too,
04:58 as we go down the stretch.
04:59 - Were you at all surprised that Slovis didn't go,
05:01 and how did that change your prep at all?
05:03 - You know, I saw it, it was weird.
05:06 So I'm not on social media,
05:09 so I get all my stuff on ESPN,
05:11 and on ESPN and some Apple News stuff.
05:16 And so I got on my phone after our practice on Thursday,
05:21 and we have a call with our data analytics,
05:23 and a lot of the data analytics are tied
05:25 into your, the point spreads.
05:27 And our game really jumped, and I thought that was weird.
05:30 And so when it came out, I guess that's the reason why.
05:35 I don't know, you know, I'm not in there.
05:38 I don't even know if he was here.
05:39 I have no idea.
05:41 But it was too late in the week to change.
05:43 You know, we spent a lot of time
05:44 watching junior college football on Thursday evening,
05:48 late, you know, some of our advanced people,
05:50 and on Friday, and then we went back
05:52 and looked at some film from last couple years,
05:54 because, you know, BYU's had some,
05:57 you know, they got two NFL guys starting on Sunday.
05:59 You know, so the last two starting quarterbacks
06:01 they've had are starting in the NFL this weekend.
06:04 And so, and both those guys are a little bit, are mobile,
06:07 so we went back and watched some film on that on Friday.
06:09 But we didn't really alter our run game.
06:11 I mean, excuse me, we didn't really alter
06:13 our plan defensively, it was too late in the week.
06:17 - Neil, you really needed to get Jaheim and CJ going
06:20 after the stretch they had.
06:22 Just, it seems like you and Chad have just,
06:24 I guess, pushed all the right buttons for both of them.
06:26 - Well, I don't know, you know, Jaheim was more of a,
06:30 he wasn't playing a little, he wasn't playing as much,
06:32 and that was more of a, you know,
06:36 it was more of how he was practicing and preparing.
06:38 You know, and so, I think when you have a veteran group
06:41 up front, like it's important that you're in
06:44 those opportunities, and he just wasn't there.
06:48 You know, and we had a lot of faith in him
06:50 because we knew he was talented.
06:51 And so, you know, we just kept on,
06:53 and a lot of credit to Chad, kept on Jaheim,
06:56 and you know, he was coming around, you know,
06:58 and he started practicing better,
07:00 and he started preparing better,
07:01 and taking care of all the stuff off the field,
07:02 and now he's seeing the fruit of those results.
07:05 And my guess is that he probably won't backslide again,
07:09 'cause now he sees, okay, you know,
07:11 if I invest this, this is the result.
07:12 And so, I like how this feels,
07:14 I like the results I'm getting,
07:15 I'll continue to do the things that it takes to do that.
07:17 And then CJ was just, you know,
07:20 it was part confidence, part him,
07:23 you know, what was happening when he went through
07:24 that stretch where he really wasn't playing well,
07:27 he was really pressing, people were playing him different,
07:31 and he was just leaving a lot of yards out there.
07:33 And really, last week, and I'm pretty sure
07:36 this is the case this week,
07:38 is he went back and just did the basic things
07:41 as far as setting up his runs,
07:42 not being impatient, using his blockers,
07:45 lowering his pads on contact.
07:48 But it hasn't been anything that's necessarily
07:50 been a revelation by any means,
07:53 it's just, hey, we kind of went back to basics,
07:55 and it's paying off for him.
07:57 - And what's it mean to be full eligible,
07:59 and you're doing this early,
08:00 and did you sell that at all to the team?
08:02 - No, we didn't talk about it.
08:04 No, we really didn't.
08:05 I didn't even say anything about it in the locker room.
08:08 Really, to me, it's about, you know,
08:11 the best teams play their best in November.
08:13 And that was the best game we played this year.
08:15 And so, we got a four-game stretch in November,
08:17 that's the way we're attacking it, we're 1-0.
08:19 You know, and what I told them is, like,
08:22 results are, you know, bowl eligibility,
08:26 all those type of things.
08:27 We're alive and well in the conference race,
08:29 and that's what we're talking about.
08:31 And obviously, a big game next week
08:33 to continue to play our way in.
08:36 But we're on a quest to play our best, you know?
08:39 And I felt like tonight was the most complete game
08:41 we've played.
08:42 We've played at a high level offensively in games,
08:44 we've played at a high level defensively in games,
08:46 and we've played at a high level in special teams.
08:49 But until tonight, we really hadn't played
08:50 all three together.
08:51 And so, and I'm sure we're going to watch the film.
08:54 I know, like, the penalties irritate me.
08:57 So, I'm sure that we're going to watch the film
08:59 and say, hey, there's a lot of improvement to still make.
09:02 But that's kind of discussions we've had in-house.
09:05 - Five or six false starts,
09:06 and any way to explain that?
09:09 - Yeah, so, part of it, they do a good job.
09:14 They do a little shift there right before the snap.
09:17 And they've gotten other people on it, too.
09:20 And, you know, whether that had an effect on it,
09:25 I'm going to say it probably did.
09:28 And, you know, that was a point of emphasis
09:30 last year in our league.
09:32 And we started calling it a little bit on the defense
09:34 for simulating a snap.
09:36 And without watching the TV copy,
09:38 I don't know if they did or not,
09:39 but I know they've done that in the past,
09:42 and they've had a bunch of false starts on them offensively.
09:45 And we worked on it, and obviously not enough,
09:48 'cause we had too many, you know?
09:49 And several of those were down in the red zone,
09:52 so really costly.
09:53 - It was really versatile from the defense tonight
09:55 with the 67 rushing yards,
09:57 and then you break up eight passes on the back end.
09:59 I guess just aside from players making plays,
10:01 what in the scheme do you like right now?
10:03 - Well, we've really simplified.
10:05 We're not doing a ton.
10:06 We've really, you know, kind of playing
10:11 just more two-gapping it up front
10:14 to try to clean it up for the running backs.
10:15 I mean, excuse me, for the linebackers
10:17 where they know their gaps.
10:19 I think our D-line's playing double teams better,
10:22 and that's been a piece of it.
10:23 Thought we rushed the passer better tonight.
10:25 You know, and they've got a left tackle,
10:26 it'll be a first-round draft pick,
10:28 and the right tackle's one of the bigger human beings
10:29 you're gonna see.
10:31 But I thought we rushed the passer better.
10:33 And without watching on film,
10:35 but the way I felt like on watching the game
10:39 is I felt like we were more on our landmarks
10:42 and zone coverage.
10:43 And when you stay on your landmarks,
10:45 the quarterback's gotta be really accurate
10:47 to get completions.
10:47 You're gonna give up some,
10:48 but he's gotta be really accurate.
10:49 So I thought we were on our landmarks better tonight.
10:52 - You know, you could probably split the season in half
10:54 for just the two versions of your offense, right?
10:57 Last couple games, the sequence before that,
10:59 how much of that is gradual, maybe inevitable,
11:01 like you just thought you were gonna get better?
11:02 Maybe it was sidetracked by the quarterback help.
11:05 And then how much was it like a dramatic difference
11:07 where you guys made some changes
11:08 and created different ways to get better?
11:12 - Yeah, so I think if you look at it,
11:14 we've probably played pretty good since the bye week.
11:17 And it's as much health as anything.
11:19 And so I really felt like,
11:21 and I think I've said this before,
11:22 is I really felt like that we were gonna take off
11:24 offensively.
11:25 You know, if you go through the order of our season,
11:30 Penn State's one of the top defenses in the country.
11:33 And we just had some missed opportunities.
11:35 If you remember, we dropped a couple passes
11:38 and had some missed opportunities.
11:40 But that's as good a defense as we're gonna play all year.
11:43 Duquesne kinda got going there.
11:48 And then at Pitt, I really felt like
11:49 we were gonna take off.
11:51 And we had a great week of practice offensively.
11:53 I felt like that was gonna be Garrett's
11:55 kinda coming out party.
11:57 And then he gets hurt there on play four or five.
11:59 And where Nico hadn't got a ton of reps
12:01 'cause Garrett's in his first year starting.
12:03 So Nico came in and kinda managed the game
12:06 and we just did what we needed to do
12:08 'cause they were really struggling offensively.
12:10 And then we get into the Texas Tech game
12:12 where Nico is the starter,
12:14 but we don't have much behind him.
12:16 You know, we have nobody that's ever played
12:17 in a game behind him.
12:19 And so you take out all your running back,
12:20 you really take out a lot of your read game,
12:22 you know, 'cause you don't wanna put the quarterback
12:24 in jeopardy getting hurt.
12:25 And so we win that one.
12:27 Then we go to TCU and Nico sprains his ankle on Wednesday.
12:30 Garrett doesn't really practice.
12:32 And all of a sudden he's gonna play on Thursday.
12:34 And I really didn't know what we had.
12:36 You know, and he ended up playing better than I thought.
12:39 But then, so we get that win going to buy.
12:41 And then we've really played offense.
12:42 I mean, we've really played at a high level since then.
12:46 And we've been more, you know, reading the run game.
12:49 We've been more perimeter oriented
12:50 as far as getting some receivers involved in that.
12:53 And we're throwing the ball downfield better, which helps.
12:56 We didn't hit it as many the last two weeks as I'd like to.
13:00 But we're starting to hit our stride.
13:01 I mean, there's a lot of things we can do better,
13:03 but we're starting to hit our stride.
13:04 And I said this last week too,
13:05 is Six gives us a chance.
13:07 Like, you know, he's a really good player.
13:09 And he gives us a chance week in and week out.
13:13 - Does a win like this, I don't know,
13:17 validates the right word,
13:18 validate, reinforce the way you all felt
13:21 coming into this season about the preseason ranking?
13:24 - Well, I think that we're starting to hit our stride,
13:27 you know, and it is what it is.
13:29 I mean, that's where we were picked.
13:30 And week in, week out, we gotta prove
13:33 that that's not who we are.
13:35 And so, yeah, I think this team
13:38 plays with a chip on their shoulder.
13:40 They're resilient as any group I've been a part of.
13:43 You know, we've had some really low points,
13:44 and they've been able to bounce back.
13:47 And so I think the story on this season
13:48 is far from written.
13:50 I think it'll continue to progress as we roll.
13:53 - What was the tone of the locker room afterwards?
13:55 Was it kind of focused?
13:56 - Yeah, I think, you know,
13:58 like the game has been out of reach,
14:00 you know, for probably a quarter and a half.
14:02 And so, maybe not as exuberant as you do sometimes
14:05 when you go into a locker room.
14:07 But that's, you know, I think that it was kind of
14:12 a feeling of, 'cause this is what we talked about.
14:14 We felt like that we were really close
14:15 to having a dominant performance.
14:17 And that was a dominant performance.
14:20 And so I think there was a feeling,
14:22 okay, you know, November, four games, one down.
14:25 All right, next one up.
14:26 Let's celebrate this 'cause they're hard.
14:29 But let's also be smart about how we're gonna do it
14:31 so we can get ready for the next one.
14:33 - Second straight week, opening drive touchdown
14:35 with a four down conversion on it.
14:37 What does that mean, I guess, to the overall,
14:39 you know, effectiveness of the offense
14:41 as a confidence boost at Irving?
14:43 - Well, you know, y'all asked a bunch of questions about it.
14:45 And we did, we kind of went back.
14:48 And I think any time you don't get the result you want,
14:51 you know, you make some changes.
14:53 And we, really what we're doing is
14:55 we're just making decisions earlier
14:57 on what the opening script's gonna look like.
14:58 And we practice it.
14:59 And I think the kids get some belief in it.
15:02 We get some answers on it.
15:03 And also, we're choosing some plays
15:06 that it really doesn't matter
15:06 what the defense does as much, all right?
15:09 Trying to be different than anything they've seen.
15:12 And so that's worked.
15:13 I thought CJ had a man's run tonight on fourth and one.
15:16 And I thought that really set the tone.
15:18 He had a second effort that really,
15:20 'cause they kind of stuffed us.
15:22 And he had a second effort I thought
15:24 that really set the tone for the rest of the game.
15:26 - You talked about health being a major driving force
15:29 to a lot of the offense get going.
15:30 But you did mention, I think it was before the UCF game,
15:33 the intention of maybe trying to get more aggressive.
15:36 And then it really showed there.
15:37 What maybe triggered throughout this season
15:39 your interest in I gotta get play calling wise
15:41 even more aggressive?
15:43 - Well, we've been pretty aggressive all year, really.
15:46 Yeah, I think the thing that UCF that we did
15:50 is we were gonna be really aggressive there
15:54 as far as going for fourth downs.
15:55 I think that was what y'all were asking
15:56 last week after the game.
15:58 And we were gonna be really aggressive.
15:59 I think Greg asked about going for a fourth down.
16:01 We were gonna be really aggressive in that game.
16:03 But I think what you're seeing is a maturation
16:07 of Jaheim White's playing and he's playing well.
16:10 He's a true freshman.
16:11 Trae'Lynn Ray on the second drive of the game
16:13 made two great plays.
16:15 He's a true freshman.
16:18 Rodney Galler getting him more involved
16:20 in some run game stuff.
16:22 And that's helping.
16:24 And so I think, and then Garrett is growing
16:28 week in and week out also because of making decisions.
16:32 And I think that shows some growth there too.
16:35 The two minute drill at the end of half,
16:36 he didn't put the ball in jeopardy.
16:38 They were dropping eight, sometimes seven.
16:41 And he did a really good job with less than a minute
16:43 kind of making his way down field
16:45 without putting the ball in jeopardy.
16:49 Anybody else?