	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 5, 2015

Mike Bercovici

Tempe, Arizona

MIKE BERCOVICI: Obviously incredible win for our team, but the message today is that we're moving on. This is a new week. Obviously this is the most important week of the year, playing Colorado. It's going to be a blackout game so we're excited to see a packed Sun Devil Stadium. And our mentality is the same way. We're going to stay true to ourself, and at the end of the day come out of the week 1-0. That's the message, and excited to see the fans out there Saturday night.

Q. A lot has been made about Norvell being back on the sideline. Can you tell a noticeable difference from your perspective?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Obviously Coach Norvell is the leader of our offense and specifically the leader of the quarterback group, so it was exciting to see him down there, just his on-field presence is unmatched, and just being able to communicate with him face-to-face, it was just a great night on Saturday night.

Q. How important was it to have Kalen back in an expanded role, and what have you seen as he continues to get his feet under him?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Yeah, Kalen is a special player. Offense, defense, special teams, whatever you need out of Kalen, he'll bring 100 percent effort. And the biggest thing for him is that he's still a young player and he's still learning, and one of his best qualities is being a communicator. He talks to me throughout the entire week. He has great relationships within the running back group, and you can just count on Kalen Ballage showing up on Saturday.

Q. 80,000 people at the Rose Bowl. Seemed like you guys were a lot more comfortable than the opening game where it was really a road game. What kind of enabled that and how did it feel as a quarterback out there?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Well, for some of the seniors, this is their third time back at the Rose Bowl. There's something about California for Sun Devil players; if you feel comfortable playing there, and it was just -- it was an exciting night. We've gone through adversity in the prior four weeks, so when things did happen, we knew how we were going to respond, arm in arm, and like I've said before, we just have leadership that just you can tell the presence in the locker room, that this was our night, from the time we stepped off the airplane in Burbank, it was our night, and the message was clear we were going to get back on the airplane 3-2, and we did it.

Q. When you came in last Monday you came in wholeheartedly believing that you guys would win that game. How much did it mean to you to lead the team and to carry that spirit and perform well and lead your team to a victory Saturday night?
MIKE BERCOVICI: You know, for this team, it's not surprising for this football team because we do have -- we do have guys on this team that have been in this situation before, like I said, so it's just exciting to know that we can put it together, that we can come together at practice on Tuesday, compete our tails off all the way through Friday. Even at walk-throughs the mentality was elite. It was a National Championship style of practice, and I think that we really did show and prove to ourselves that practice makes perfect, and it's not just one week at a time. You can't just get ready for a top-ranked UCLA team. Nothing is going to be handed to us.

Q. Announcer Gus Johnson said in the course of the game, later in the game, when you guys had the game in hand, that you would probably be getting a call from Kim Kardashian. My first question is do you know Kim Kardashian, and secondly, did you hear from Kim Kardashian later that night?
MIKE BERCOVICI: So hopefully my girlfriend is not listening because I can't get in trouble here, but I didn't get a call from Kim Kardashian, but my dad has actually done a video shoot of her house, so I guess my dad is in with the Kardashian family.

Q. Can you kind of elaborate on the phone call?
MIKE BERCOVICI: I mean, she -- I mean, Calabasas natives are -- it's a strong-knit group. But the Kardashian family is out of my distance right now.

Q. Coach Graham talked about confidence and the confidence that you had going into the game and the urgency that you went into this game with. How do you redo this urgency all over again this week for Colorado?
MIKE BERCOVICI: It started this morning, from weight lifting to running out there on the field this morning, getting our legs back in shape, that we come out to practice the same way that we did, but even better. The biggest thing that we preached this week, at the start of this week, was fundamentals. It's basically going back to what we do best as football players, and that's stay true to who we are, and it's just exciting to know that we have guys that are eager to go back out there and practice on Tuesday, eager to go watch film, and I think when you have a football team like that, things just happen.

Q. You had a teammate last week that literally got tackled by a kicker's helmet on a kickoff return. Do you know the play I'm talking about, Tim White?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Yeah, I think so.

Q. How does that go over in the locker room?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Tim might be one of the most confident players that you've ever -- that I've ever met that's been here for such a short amount of time, but the thing about Tim is if he scores or if he messes up, he's always going to have a smile on his face because he is that type of player, that he knows that he's going to get -- all he wants is another opportunity to show what he can do, and he'll be the first person to thank the guys around him for blocking. But guys get a little grief once in a while. But it's Tim; he makes too many plays to make fun of him.

Q. You talked a little bit about this last week, but your offensive line got off to kind of a shaky start against A&M and they've kind of settled down through there. What's the biggest thing you've seen with that group?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Yeah, offensive line is a very -- as people know, they're a very tight-knit group. They're the funny guys on the team. They're the ones that will be the first person to call you out if you're not performing. And what they've been doing well is they've been going out to practice and playing at a very high level, whether it be inside run against our defense or on-air work. They've been communicating and they have one of the best coaches in the entire country, Coach Thompson, as the leader of them, and he's built a foundation of that offensive line to show that we as an offense believe in our offensive line. All they've been doing is keeping their mouth shut and they've been going to work, and it's really been showing on Saturdays.

Q. Saturday night seemed like one of the first times you had a good rhythm going with multiple receivers during the game. Do you feel that something is starting to click with you guys getting in more of a rhythm, trying to time each other up a bit more?
MIKE BERCOVICI: Yeah, absolutely. I think one of the biggest things from a playmaker's perspective is that we played fast, we were explosive. Guys were well-rested, and when this offense is rolling, everybody can have fun. As a quarterback, your job is to distribute the football and go through your progressions and not cheat reads, and obviously there are plays that we left out there, but with the way our line played and the way our backs ran the ball and blocked in protection, you know, it's fun to be a Sun Devil receiver if everything is going right.

Q. You kind of mentioned your dad did some work for the Kardashians. What did your dad do?
MIKE BERCOVICI: My dad does video production, owns a video production company, so I'm not sure exactly what it was, but they live just up the street, and -- not up the street. They live about a nice five-minute drive away, and I couldn't tell you exactly what they did, but I know that my dad has met Kim before.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297