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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 7, 2016

Paul Johnson

Greensboro, North Carolina

PAUL JOHNSON: Good morning. We're excited to be back home and have a chance to do our home opener this weekend. We've got a lot of stuff to work on coming off our first game. We were fortunate to get a win over in Ireland, but we didn't particularly play very well. A lot to work on, a lot of things to do, and got an in-state school with a lot of kids from the metro Atlanta area. I'm sure they're going to be excited to come into our stadium and play. Hopefully we can rectify some of our mistakes from a week ago and play a little better.

Q. Freshman running back Dedrick Mills, just what you can say about going from a fumble to a game-winning touchdown, just what you took away from beginning to end for him.
PAUL JOHNSON: Well, Dedrick is a guy who's had a really good camp and has a chance to be a really good player. He's got a lot of ability. He's got good football awareness. So I think he has a bright future. I think he'll learn from -- the more he plays, the better he's going to get. He's probably not going to play this week, but I think he does have a bright future.

Q. And then as far as the overall experience of playing in Ireland, just what you took away from the fans that were there and the experience that you had there.
PAUL JOHNSON: I think it was a good trip. I think it was a fun trip for our guys, an education. We got to do some things, and I think we had about 70 guys that had never been out of the country, so it was a big deal for them.

You know, I would recommend it. I think it was a fun trip.

Q. I just want to ask, 119 yards rushing, 119 passing, that's the balance you really want in an offense, right?
PAUL JOHNSON: No, I'm not.

Q. I'm kidding, obviously. But can you talk about the fact that they did a very good job of controlling your option, but you guys won the game with your passing game; that's what it appeared to be.
PAUL JOHNSON: Yeah, I think they're very good on defense. They've got some really good players. They do a nice job scheme wise and coaching, and they're very good. But we had 54 plays, we had 46 missed assignments. You know, we were our own worst enemy, as well. We did not play particularly well, and like I said, I take nothing away from them. They're a very good defense, and they did a very nice job. But if we're going to win another game, we've got to play better than that.

Q. But you have to be gratified that on a day when your option wasn't really clicking that you could win the game with the passing game; that really has to bode well for the future, doesn't it?
PAUL JOHNSON: Yeah, well, we made some plays. I think individual kids, Justin Thomas made some throws and escaped a couple of bad situations, and we did just enough to win. I tell our guys all the time, sometimes the best way to win is don't lose, and we didn't lose the game. We won the turnover battle. We probably won the special teams. In those areas we did just enough to win the game.

Q. What do you do offensively with your team this week to correct those mistakes? How do you go about getting them to be better?
PAUL JOHNSON: Well, you continue to practice. That's not the team I've seen in fall camp or spring practice. You hope that part of it's an enigma, part of it's the first game, part of it's being in Ireland, part of it's being on a wet field, part of it's raining, part of it was Boston College was good on defense. So there was a lot of things. I don't think you'll see that happen again.

We played the same -- that game was early like our Notre Dame game a year ago, our first road game. It was almost identical the way we played. You know, clearly I've got to figure out what's going on when we go on the road for the first time, because I didn't even recognize our team last Saturday.

Q. I wanted to ask a follow-up on Mills; did you say he's probably not going to play?
PAUL JOHNSON: That's correct.

Q. Is he injured, or is there another reason?
PAUL JOHNSON: No. Violation of team rules.

Q. So it's a suspension?
PAUL JOHNSON: Yeah, he's just not going to play this week. I told him he's not going to play.

Q. So are you going to rely more on Marshall this week?
PAUL JOHNSON: Yeah, we've got Marcus Marshall, Marcus Allen who played last year, Quaide Weimerskirch. KirVonte Benson is also a guy who's not going to play, both of them, he and Dedrick, so two guys at that position.

Q. Is Benson out for the same reason as Dedrick?
PAUL JOHNSON: Yes.

Q. You said 46 missed assignments; were there any particular common threads that ran through that, things that bothered you more than others?
PAUL JOHNSON: Well, you know, I don't know if there was a common thread. The offensive line we had a hard time. I think we had a hard time blocking them, too. But you also have a hard time when you have that many missed assignments. But it wasn't just them, it was perimeter, it was all over. I mean, they did a nice job changing up defenses. They got into several fronts. But they didn't line up in anything we hadn't practiced against. It was disappointing that we didn't do a little better job with that.

Q. Any particular points of emphasis in practice that you'll work on to try to get some of this straightened out?
PAUL JOHNSON: Yeah, we were a little more physical yesterday, and we will be today, too.

I don't think it's anything we can't fix. I was just disappointed in the way we played because we had had a really, really good camp. We had played really well and come off the ball and done those things, and we reverted back, and we're not going back. We'll get it fixed this week.

Q. Talk about playing that game over in Ireland last week; will that help you guys get recruiting for any people there overseas knowing about Georgia Tech football? Will that help you get maybe some good players over there in Europe?
PAUL JOHNSON: I don't know, I hadn't thought about that. We had, of course, a guy from Australia, but I don't know that we've ever had anybody from Europe on our team. I'm sure there's some good athletes over there. It would probably be a good place for a satellite camp.

Q. Talk about this week's game against Mercer, what you see on film getting ready for an in-state school.
PAUL JOHNSON: Well, I think Mercer has -- they're like everybody in today's game. Everybody is going to have some good players, and they've got a quarterback who's played a lot of football. I think he's been in every game they've played since they've been back he's been a starter. They've got good skill at wide receiver. They run around pretty good. They're your typical Southern Conference team. I think they'll be a hard out. They lost a heartbreaker to Citadel last Thursday, and the Citadel beat the University of South Carolina just a year ago, so it'll be a challenge for us.

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