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UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 30, 2015

DeShone Kizer

South Bend, Indiana

An Interview With:

DESHONE KIZER

Q. DeShone, seems like you guys have great success and you personally in two-minute-drill-type situations. I was wondering what is it about those kind of situations that have sort of brought the best out of you?
DESHONE KIZER: It's sort of time to let loose. Those two-minute situations, there are times where quarterbacks finally get the opportunity that they know that they're going to throw the ball each down, takes a little bit of pressure off of each play in a sense where you don't necessarily have to worry about, you know, putting together run, run, pass or getting yourself into the next best position. It's more along the lines of just trying to grab yards and get things rolling. And with the receivers that we have out there, it makes it a lot easier and it makes me a little more comfortable in getting the balls in their hands and trying to get the next six, seven, yards, play at a time and hopefully get ourselves into scoring position at the end of the drive.

Q. You talked after the UMass game about having the mindset of always believing that the offense will outscore anybody. Is that a mentality that you've always had, just that kind of self-belief, that you'll always be able to score on every drive?
DESHONE KIZER: Yeah. The ball's in my hands the majority of the plays. If the ball's going to come through me, then I better be the one who's going to have the confidence that we're going to do something big when the ball is in my hands. It's hard not to have a sense of confidence with the guys that we have. Our offensive line is amazing, all the way across the board, from the left side with Ronnie and Q, all the way down to the right side when you have Mike on the outside and Steve on the inside and then obviously the anchor Nick Martin in the middle. The offensive line is amazing; skill positions are amazing. Will Fuller is having a great season so far right now. Breezy is getting things going. Amir got things going last week. We're really getting things rolling, and with all those guys out there all playing great, along with one of the best backs in the country right now, there's nothing left to have but confidence and scoring every time you have the ball.

Q. With going to Clemson, I know you guys do a lot as far as crowd noise and that kind of stuff in practice to try to prepare for it, but mentally when you have not been in that situation as the starter, do you do anything to try to put yourself in that situation or do you just have to experience it?
DESHONE KIZER: You know, I think I've done a pretty good job so far with being able to cope with the hype of each game. There's always been something new for me, whether it be coming in late in the game when Malik goes down against Virginia, having my first start at home against Georgia Tech. There's always some sort of a hype. We're Notre Dame. Every game is going to be a big game in its own sense, and obviously this is the first time that I'll really be playing in front of 90,000-plus screaming fans from down south. But we won't necessarily have the following that we normally have at away games and home games.

When it comes to my preparation, I just know that as long as I'm comfortable in my own shoes and I believe in the game plan and I fully get the game plan. But if we can get the communication down, which we're doing a good job of it so far with good practice mindset, having the music on loud and crowd noise on during practice, then we'll be completely all right and we'll be able to do the things that we always do from week to week.

Q. Coach Kelly was talking about the relationship between the quarterbacks. What is the room like with the quarterbacks and how has that helped you getting ready to take the field as the quarterback with all the help of the quarterbacks?
DESHONE KIZER: Yeah. Since I've been here, we've done -- I've had a good upbringing with Malik and Everett pulling me along, and now I take it as my job and my duty to make sure I'm bringing along the guys below me. We all have different experiences. We're all able to share those. Obviously Brandon had a great game against UMass, just as expected. The kid is an amazing athlete, and we always have conversations about just do the things that you do best. You don't have to be anyone but yourself out there. Brandon was a weed athlete in high school and has one of the widest arms probably in college football right now. And all he has to do is let it go. All those things kind of translate very well to the college field as long as he's out there without this crazy, big-game feel in his mind. If he can get the comfort level that I'm starting to get now, I believe that he's going to be a very good quarterback. And with that being said, the rest of the offensive room is right there with him. We're always having a good time when we're at practice. We're all about business, with Coach Sanford leading the way, I think we have one of the best offenses -- or one of the best quarterback rooms in the country.

Q. You mentioned Carlisle. Was there a bit of a concerted effort to get Amir involved last week or if not just Amir, more players involved? You really spread the wealth a lot more against UMass than Georgia Tech.
DESHONE KIZER: We played quite a few more plays against UMass than we played in most other games. It's not necessarily that we game plan on getting someone the ball, ever. It just happened to be where Will is starting to get some extra attention. They're going to start helping safeties over, and in order to go against that, we're going to have to throw the ball inside. And we had a couple of opportunities. I put one in the dirt, which should have been a nice 15-yard completion, but then came back to it again and hit them a couple of times. And then one great thing about our slot receivers, Amir played running back in college at one point in time. He's a great rusher. You bring the emotion and get the extended feel is great and Tare can do the same exact thing on their inside. So it's not necessarily that we game plan getting Amir the ball at certain points in the game, but it's more just putting the ball in your playmaker's hand.

Q. The other two I think you hit converted third downs, and after missing your first third-down pass, you didn't miss again the rest of the day. Is that similar to two-minute situations where you can just on third down and passing situations, you can just let it rip and you're not thinking about footwork and things like that?
DESHONE KIZER: Completely. Completely. I've always said it's all about being comfortable. The couple balls I've had in the last few games that are low and away are me just being too tense or something in the lower half of my body that is not really working. I've been doing a pretty good job of attacking those things in practice the last couple of weeks, and I've been ripping the ball pretty good. So hopefully they'll eventually be eliminated. When my mind is elsewhere and I'm not really focusing on getting the ball out to where I should be getting it out, sometimes you have flaws, and I'm a big guy with a chance of being a big motion, and when I elongate everything, there's a greater chance of error.

Q. Coach Kelly mentioned you will have to go to silent cadence obviously in this environment. Do you have much experience with that, and is there ever an advantage for an offensive silent cadence in that the defensive line might not be getting off the ball as quick if they have your cadence down?
DESHONE KIZER: I do have some experience. I did it a little in high school. We've done it quite a bit throughout the off season. We started incorporating it way back in Culver. We know the environments that we're going to play in throughout the year and we're going to take reps in throwing through the silent cadence mode. When it comes to advantages and disadvantages, I think you can incorporate the silent cadence just the same way that you do with your verbal cadence when it comes to having a different rhythm doing some things different from a quarterback perspective that to try to get a jump on what the defense is doing. When it comes to defensive line, I mean eventually they're going to get off just the same way they get off in a verbal cadence. Eventually it's going to be the same exact way. The only difference is Nick Martin will be yelling go after I give him the signal instead of myself yelling go.

Q. Coach Kelly always talks about next man in. How quickly does that reality hit you when you see a teammate like Malik go down like he did earlier in the season?
DESHONE KIZER: There wasn't necessarily a transition period for me to really give you a duration on how long it took for me to get it. It was just here. I was in. You know, Coach Kelly as much as he preaches next man in, preaches even more about preparation, and in order to be the next man in and be successful what you're doing, if you're preparing like that before that, then the transition period doesn't last as long and you're able to get into a groove and get things rolling like the guys who have been playing as backups in the beginning of the year are now.

Q. Emotionally when you see an injury like that take place and you watch it happen, how quickly do you have to put that out of your head and just go into that mode of preparation to suddenly being in the moment?
DESHONE KIZER: There's so much going on on a week-to-week basis when it comes to game planning and preparing that you don't necessarily think about the situation and all the emotions from the game. I mean when Malik went down, I didn't have time to think about how bad his injury was. I mean to be truthful, you don't even have time to feel bad for him because you're out there playing ball. The last thing you're thinking about is what's going on on the sideline. You're trying to make sure you can win the game. After the game is when you can spend time making sure your brother is okay and really figuring out the situation. When it comes to a week-to-week basis, there's so much time spent off the field with preparation for this week's game and with your studies that the emotional side of things doesn't really get involved because you're so engulfed with everything else that's going on.

Q. One of the more interesting players for Clemson is Mackensie Alexander, the cornerback. Those guys have stats kept about what they've done. They keep stats about how often they've been avoided or how often he's been avoided. When they do throw the football his way, what do you see from him?
DESHONE KIZER: He is a very good athlete. He's aggressive; he's strong, he's fast. Probably going to be one of the better corners that we play against throughout this season. But at the same time Will Fuller is fast; he's strong, he's a great athlete. Breezy is fast; he's strong, he's a great athlete. I mean this is college football. Everyone is elite once you get here. We're a Top 10 team; they're a Top 15 team. We're going to have great athletes on both sides of the ball. So when it comes to him in particular, we're going to treat him as if we game plan against any other athlete. We're not going to shy away or go towards him or how many targets. We don't really keep stats on that. We're not going to go out there with the mindset of keep the ball away from that guy. I'm going to throw the ball to the first read that's open. If it's on his side, it's going to go that way. If it's getting away from him because he's covering down and playing good defense, then go to the back side and try to find the next open man.

Q. Don't avoid him like other teams have?
DESHONE KIZER: If the guy who he's guarding is open, I'll throw him the ball. If he's not open, I'm moving on.

Q. And that came up last week because obviously there was safety help on Fuller last week. And then you have to get other, you know, receivers involved. Do you -- is that what you anticipate with Will Fuller this week, a similar treatment?
DESHONE KIZER: You know, from what they've shown throughout the season this year, they rely heavily on playing man coverage. Makes me believe that they have really good corners as they do and their defensive backs are very good. They play a lot of man coverage. I don't necessarily think that they're going to go up and change too much on affecting Will. They have a lot of confidence in the guy out there, in Alexander, and we'll see how that turns out. I don't necessarily know their game plan towards him, but I kind of expect that every week if Will makes that one or two plays, they're going to make an adjustment and each team as we go along in the season will make some sort of a different adjustment. So we'll go on the fly, and we'll be able to talk on the sideline and I'll talk on the phone up top to really figure out how to go about their adjustment that they make if they do have to make one.

Q. You mentioned Chris Brown trending up and you also said in the past that you have a good pass-catch relationship with him. I mean that's a guy that -- I know that you're looking to who's open in the progressions, but that's a guy that you feel comfortable with turning to in a big-game situation like this.
DESHONE KIZER: He's been in every experience possible. He's been in every big game possible, and he has experience. Most people on our team don't. He's made some big catches in his career. He's been around the block a couple of times. He's the type of guy where if the ball's in his hands, I know he's going to be able to make a play after the catch. He's not a guy where I'm looking to get him the ball at the sticks because he's going to get tackled right there. He's the guy that if we're going for 8 yards, I know I can give him the ball at the sticks and he's going to be able to make a play to make it nine.

Q. In terms of getting the football to the tight end, you have a couple of more tight ends -- you guys are really deep at tight end -- step up last week. Is it the tight end because of where he's positioned and the position of the field that he works, is he a young quarterback's best friend, so to speak?
DESHONE KIZER: Yeah. Tight ends at this university are -- we're great all the way across the board. Obviously we're down a starter from the beginning of the year, and we're moving on. But we still have great people in that position, great athletes at the position. So when it comes to getting them the ball, teams tend to -- they typically have to make a decision. Whether they guard down on the tight end with a linebacker, if they want to bring them into the box. If he's in the box, we'll try to incorporate the tight end. If he's outside the box, we're going to try to run the ball until they bring the guy in the box. So when it comes to getting the ball to the tight end, it's a cat-and-mouse game. And the only way that they can eliminate the cat-and-mouse game is to play man coverage, and once they start playing man coverage, then obviously it's time to play ball. And if they go one-on-one, whether it be on the outside to our great receivers that we're talking about or playing some hard-nose football inside and bringing a tight end down and maybe going two tights and playing hard-nose football up the middle.

Q. That's how it all unfolds?
DESHONE KIZER: When you're preparing as much as we do, there's only a few different things that you can do.

Q. DeShone, you mentioned Martin being the anchor of your offensive line. What has it meant for to you have someone with Nick's experience in front of you as you've taken over?
DESHONE KIZER: It's amazing. He's a great communicator. He's the same guy every day. He's a guy that, I walk in as a freshman, and you just sense that he's, you know, a competitor, and a true leader. And with that being said, I've been looking up to a guy like him for the last year now and now I get to work with him hand in hand. He does a great job of communicating with me. We have a really good relationship when it comes to seeing the defenses and understanding the boxes. We talk quite a bit off the field, which makes it great. And when it comes to, you know, being out there with him, he's a guy that I can look to as my, you know, my body guard, my pillow, my guy that I can, you know, if anything is going wrong, I can look into his eyes and understand that, hey, we're going to get through this together. That just comes with experience, like I said before. And when he has the talent to the left and right of him, it makes his job a lot easier as well.

Q. That kind of been the case with the line collectively has made this transition you talked about a little bit easier for you or a lot easier even?
DESHONE KIZER: Yeah. I understand that if I'm calling the right protection, there's a good chance I'm going to be protected each play. Also as a line we do a great job of communicating from drive to drive and from week to week. As long as we continue to do that, I think we'll have great line play.

Q. Is it fairly easy for you to call the right protection? Is that something you're real confident in right now?
DESHONE KIZER: Yeah. I believe that protection has always been something I've been pretty good at. You know, as we go on into the season, the blitzes are going to continue to get more exotic. The better the defense, typically the more they do on the defensive side of the ball when it comes to giving you different looks. But I think I've done a good job throughout my career here in really studying tendencies of safeties or the way that they want to play their defensive line and understanding where the pressure is coming from. And also what makes it a lot easier is when you have guys who are talking to you. I mean my offensive line and I are having a legit conversation before the play when it comes to understanding which side is going to drop, which side is going to come. And with the experience and with the communication that we have up front, it makes the protections a lot easier.

Q. Could you put into perspective like how often you're right with that? Is it like 99.9 percent? Is it like 80?
DESHONE KIZER: The great thing about the offensive line that we have here at the University of Notre Dame is even if I'm wrong, typically I'm right. They're able to make their own calls; if, you know, there's something I miss on the outside, they can communicate and get it down the line. We have great backs who block. So if I am wrong when it comes to manning up the sides or that the blitz is coming from, C.J. Prosise isn't afraid to get in there and pull a guy down or Josh Adams or Dexter Williams. They're all great when it comes to that, and we have a lot of great concepts and a lot of great game plans when it comes to exotic looks where we can just go max pro and get the ball outside.

Q. Last week when you looked at the tape, I think on actual dropbacks you got sacked on the first one and then pretty much it was clean pocket the rest of the day. Is that something you expect maybe not necessarily to change on Saturday night, but do you have to anticipate a little bit more of a distressed pocket where there's maybe somebody in your face sometimes based on talent level?
DESHONE KIZER: You know, that's -- as a quarterback, that's something you can't necessarily do. If you're out there thinking about the distress in the pocket, you're not going to be throwing the balls you need to be throwing. This is probably going to be one of the better defensive lines that we play this year, but once again, I have complete trust in my offensive line. They've seen it all before. Coach has gone it over and over and over and over again, the looks that we're going to end up getting this week. With that being said, trusting the pocket and trusting how things work, I'm going to be doing potentially the same thing I've been doing in the last two games when it comes to being comfortable and understanding where the weak spots in the pockets are and where the weak spots in the blitzes are.

Q. You traveled to Florida State --
DESHONE KIZER: I did.

Q. -- last year when you were on the road. What do you remember about that environment? Is there anything you could take away from that experience? Is it just like, okay, this is sort of what I should be expecting?
DESHONE KIZER: Yeah. Florida State is something that I've thought about quite a bit this week. It was a very, very loud environment. I've never heard anything so loud in my life, something where, you know, it feels like your insides are shaking on third down. But with that being said, being able to feel that and being able to go through the emotions and being able to see Everett almost conquer that loud crowd gives me a little more confidence going into, you know, a bigger environment like this against Clemson that although it can get loud, the best way of coping with it is being -- you know, doing the extra small things, making sure you're being quick in getting up there and relaying the play a couple times down and getting back into your stance so you can be able to make a check. And also with that being said, the best way of quieting a crowd down is making big plays, and I got to experience that last year against Florida State where every time we got some momentum going, it wasn't as hard to communicate. So we gotta make sure that we get things rolling as soon as possible and hopefully at least take it down a couple of notches on the loudness scale.

Q. How quickly last year did it hit you, that okay, this is a different environment than I'd ever been in before? Was it pregame, as soon as it started?
DESHONE KIZER: As soon as the first tomahawk thing, it was unreal. I never really expected it to be as loud as it was. We heard it all week at practice. We're out on the grass field and Coach Kelly played it over and over and over again. But once I really heard it and felt it and got to understand how loud it was going to be on game, which is probably the first kickoff, that's when I really started knowing how loud and how crazy an experience it was going to be to play at an environment like that.

Q. Not to belabor the whole like dirt ball or dirt burger. I'm not sure the term you used for short passes that short hop a little bit. When you've got so much on your mind, is it easy to always think about your footwork when you're also trying to pick up protections, who's blitzing, reading my routes, all that stuff?
DESHONE KIZER: I think that right there is what takes a quarterback and separates the good to great, that gap right there. Being able to have so much trust and so much muscle memory that your lower half is going to be doing the right thing, that mentally up top, that the mental area of that doesn't necessarily distract what's going on down low. And that's all that we're doing on a week-to-week basis when it comes to practicing is making sure that I can make that lower half muscle memory, so those issues don't happen. When it came to the throws that I made in the UMass game and the difference between the throws that I made in UMass versus Georgia Tech or Virginia, it wasn't necessarily all lower half. The mistakes that were made in the UMass game had to do a little more with understanding the timing of the route and understanding the contact that we're running the route for. My eyes got caught inside. I was late to the outside, and the ball just didn't get there on time. If I'm understanding the defense and understanding why we're running the plays a little more, then those balls will make it out there in time, and that's all going to come with me understanding the game plan this week and understanding why we're calling the calls that we're making.

Q. And in particular just on that topic, you sort of had a fake flip screen to Will and their two corners like just jumped it immediately and you kind of missed Amir. What sort of happened on that specific play?
DESHONE KIZER: I was just sped up, completely sped up. Clock is rolling. We had a motion. I had to get the motion across. I started clapping for the ball to get in my hand. Didn't necessarily get the right grip on the ball. Expected Amir to throttle up a little more than he throttled up. He ran the route like he was supposed to. I put the ball behind him. Completely on me.

Q. Early forecast for the game on Saturday are calling for some rainy conditions. What's your experience been like handling rain in the forecast before? Do you feel prepared for this game to do that? How comfortable are you with those type situations?
DESHONE KIZER: Looking back in high school, I never really had too big of an issue when it came to rain. I have pretty good-sized hands where I can grip the ball pretty well. Some of my best games in high school came in the rain. So it doesn't necessarily worry me. It's definitely something that I haven't experienced lately, but we'll definitely prepare for that with using wet balls in our practice and understanding that the wind is going to come into play and things like that. It's all going to be a mental mindset. As long as I can focus on getting the other things down and really understanding the game plan and preparing in the right way that way, then the rain and those conditions don't necessarily come into play.

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