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BOSTON COLLEGE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCESeptember 30, 2017Jon HillimanBoston, Massachusetts Boston College - 28, Central Michigan - 8 Q. Jon, a couple weeks ago you took a loss very hard, and today you were a big reason why you guys won the game. Leadership, I'm just wondering what goes through your mind in a game like today, especially with Anthony being as banged up as he was? JON HILLIMAN: Well, I knew that. I knew a guy like me would kind of have to make certain plays, and not just make plays but kind of keep the morale high because I've been on teams here where we've won bowl games and been on teams unfortunately where we've been 3-9, and this was kind of like a must win game for us. We kind of knew that coming in. So just wanted just to keep the morale high, just to keep the confidence high in certain guys, and I think we did a good job for the outcome that we had today. I think I did a pretty good job of that. But just got to keep it going. Pretty much we've got a very good V-Tech team coming in, so just got to keep it going, to answer your question. Q. After the way the game started in terms of the running game and the first drive of the second half, night and day, and I just want to get from you how important establishing the running game in that first drive of the second half was. JON HILLIMAN: It's one of the pillars of our program pretty much, running the football. That's one of the main reasons why I came here, because we like to establish the run. The run unit, we're getting better every week. Every week we're getting better. Holes are getting bigger. Guys are getting more confidence, which is the most important thing for our offense, that's just the most important thing is confidence and getting better, and just improving every week, that's just the most important thing. Q. How would you describe the relationship between you and AJ? You're an older guy, obviously, got some experience, and he's a younger guy, but what do you feel like your role is? JON HILLIMAN: Just bringing him along. Obviously y'all can pretty much see I don't really need to do much, but just bringing him along, just keeping his confidence up, if he makes bad plays or indifferent, bad stretches, just letting him know, hey, you're a very good football player. It's no different from high school. The guys are bigger, faster, you're bigger, faster; there's no real difference. Just keeping him up, keeping him humble and everything. He's done a great job. He's working very hard. Very proud of him, and he's just going to keep building. Q. You've been through the schedule before, you know how this goes; those swings from one week to another are very different. How do you navigate one game like the confidence -- the way things can change with confidence from one game to the next? JON HILLIMAN: Yeah, yeah, that's very true. Yeah, pretty much this game, like I said, was must-win for us, but it was like more so a confidence builder. I think we're coming into that V-Tech game a little more hungry, a little more confidence and faith that we can do this. Let's go, we played Clemson toe-to-toe, dropped the rope a little bit, same thing with Notre Dame. But we know if we come with that same energy we can shock this team, and no one is going to be shocked in the locker room if we do it. It's not going to take anything crazy, we've just got to go out there and just get better, just like how we've been, just get better, defense making stops, offense got to keep them off the field, and I honestly think it's a very doable task. It's a very doable talk, a tall task but it's a very doable task next week. Q. Every team is trying to get to six wins to be bowl eligible, do you have the attitude like can we steal one -- JON HILLIMAN: No, we feel like every game is a winnable game. Not to disrespect any opponents, we play the best amateur competition, period, in college football, and we know who we're playing, so straight up we just know that every game is a winnable game, just got to bring it the same. We don't look worse than that team so we should get one. We've got to play every game different. We've got to play every game the same with different opponents knowing we've just got to improve every week pretty much. Q. Just talk about being part of the passing game in the red zone and getting that touchdown pass. JON HILLIMAN: Yeah, that's one thing I worked on in the summer with the quarterbacks, pretty much from the summer and the spring the coach told me in the off-season you're going to be pretty much in protection a lot, you're going to be doing a lot of younger backs, you're the older guy so you're going to be in the pass game a lot more than usual, so I'm just going to have to be ready for that. But I mean, that's just something I worked on, something I embraced, and I just want to continue to do anything, to make any plays that the offense needs, any plays in the pass game, run game, just anywhere I'm needed, just lead the guys, just to continue to keep this thing rolling because it's going to be guys like me, older guys on our team that's going to help turn this ship around. Like I said, it's a doable task. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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