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UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT SAN ANTONIO FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCENovember 18, 2017Dalton SturmMarcus DavenportKerry Thomas Jr.San Antonio, Texas UTSA - 9, Marshall - 7 Q. Second year in a row you guys get bowl eligible. I guess for you too, Marcus, what's it feel like? KERRY THOMAS: It's a great feeling. One of the things that you work for. This is one of the things you work for. When you come out -- this football team and I love my teammates so much and this coaching staff. We're a team that believes and we're a team that's going to fight. We knew what was at stake coming into this game and our preparation during the course of the week. And our thing was to get bowl eligible today. And credit to my teammates and this guy right here, we did that today. Q. Marcus, I wanted to ask about your freshman kicker who kicked the winning field goal twice. I guess the first one went through and didn't count, and you had to line him up and he had kicked it through again. What do you think that Jared has brought to this team this year? MARCUS DAVENPORT: With Falcon going down and -- I know he's brought stability. He actually came up to me about a couple series before and said, hey, man, we're going to win this. And I was like, hey, you kick it, you got it. Honestly, he's a great player. He's a great young player and he's doing good for himself. KERRY THOMAS: To piggyback off of him, I think we just got sole confidence in all of our teammates. Whoever is out on the field, we know that they're going to get the job done. When Sackett went out there, we knew he was going to make the field goal. Regardless of whatever the situation was he was going to make the field goal and he did that. Q. What about trying to make it twice? KERRY THOMAS: Like I say, when he's out there we just knew he's going to make it. So, him making it once, him making it twice, if he had to kick it three times he would have still make it. We just got sole confidence in him. He's a great player. MARCUS DAVENPORT: He does it in practice. Q. Marcus, what's it like to be on the sideline -- I know you had a heck of a game, the defense had a heck of a game -- you're on the sideline, very little time left and they score to go ahead with 1:29 left, whatever. Then you're on the sideline, you've done your job, you're watching the offense. Does it come down to that confidence that you just know the big O is going to move the ball and get you in position? MARCUS DAVENPORT: Yeah, we've practiced this. We've done this so many times at the back end of practice, two-minute drill. They've gone against us and they've marched it all the way down the field and done the same thing before. We have the utmost confidence in our offense. It's a team thing. You've got to believe in your team to win. Q. Kerry, seems like you were back today. I don't know, maybe Coach said you weren't 100 percent the last few weeks, but today it really looked like you were really engaged in the offense. And I guess how does it feel to be that, because you were that type of player before? KERRY THOMAS: It always feels good. Like you were saying, I had a little, slight little injury that held me back a couple games. But it's always good to be back around my teammates and these coaches. It's a great family, man. I think we've got a great family here. So to be back and for my teammates to have confidence in me to make plays and my coaches to have confidence in me to make plays, that's just what I try to do every time I'm on the field, to give it 100 percent and that's what I'm going to do. Q. Now that you've gotten your sixth win, bowl eligible again, do you'll have preference on what bowl you all might want to go to? MARCUS DAVENPORT: For me, I can't speak for everybody else, no, we just want to go and play. Anywhere will be fine. KERRY THOMAS: I agree with him. I think our biggest thing was just to get to a bowl game. It doesn't matter where it's at; we just want to get to a bowl game. Now our mindset is now that we're bowl eligible, take it to next week and try to get another win as well. And then when we get to the bowl game, to actually try to win it this time. That's our mindset now. Q. Dalton, you and Kerry came in the same class. Maybe your first game as a quarterback, you tossed a touchdown to Kerry. And here you are four years later in your last game here at home and you threw to Kerry some big throws there on the last drive. Can you talk about, did you think about that at all, just -- DALTON STURM: During that drive? Not at all. Q. Just after the game? DALTON STURM: Yeah. Definitely. I mean, he came up to me after the game and we just hugged it out. He's been my brother day one, since he came in. And Josh came in, what, six months after that or a year after that, something like that, and he fell in right, too. And we have a special relationship. He was my roommate for a year or over a year, and, I mean, I love him to death. I'd do anything for him. Just a happy time to be able to celebrate this win with him. Q. Kerry, can you describe what the emotions were like in the locker room after the game? KERRY THOMAS: To be honest, I can't describe it because I wasn't even in there. I got caught up on the field outside. But I'm sure the emotions was high. I think all the guys -- we just knew what we wanted. We knew that we were a team who was able to do it. We went out here today and fought for it. We had to take it and we knew that from the beginning. Coach told us it was going to be a fight. So much credit to my teammates. That's what we did; we came out and fought. Q. Dalton, at the end of the game when the game was over and you got to celebrate on the field with your teammates and sing that fight song, the school song for the last time on that field, what were the emotions going through your mind then? DALTON STURM: It's been a great ride. I mean, ups and downs throughout my entire career here. We had three-win seasons, four-win seasons and we were able to bounce back and get bowl eligible last year. To be able to do it a second time in four years, back to back at that, it's real special, especially to be able to celebrate with these guys here. We all came in with the same class and knew what we wanted to do. And it's real special. I'm going to remember it forever. Q. Dalton, the Marshall quarterback made a great throw for that touchdown pass and there was not much time left. What was your confidence level going out there with your offense with just a minute to go and you had to get down there to make something happen? Where was your confidence? DALTON STURM: It was a great throw by that guy, who was actually one of my roommates at the Manning camp. We've been talking back and forth all week. So it was good to get the edge on him. But anyways, I mean we were planning for it before it happened. We had all the faith in the world in the defense, but you gotta play the what-if game whenever you get in situations like that. We had our plays lined out that we were potentially going to run if they did score a touchdown. So just telling the guys in the huddle before the game, we do this every, what, two or three days out of the week during practice, to go try the two-minute drill. It's always big. We compete really good with the defense and stuff like that. It's one of our strong points, I think, on offense. So I had all the confidence in the world in my offensive line and my receivers that they were going to make plays. They kept dropping back. And they were playing a little bit of P-33 trying to prevent the big play. We were able to hit them underneath and get some yards after the catch, so that's a big deal. And Sackett came in there, did what he does best. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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