	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

BOSTON COLLEGE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

August 27, 2018

Steve Addazio

Boston, Massachusetts

STEVE ADDAZIO: Obviously excited to get going here, start the college football season off. We're really fired up about that. It's been a great preseason camp, got a lot accomplished, a lot of great effort by our team.

Announced our captains. I think many of you saw that. Will Harris and Jon Baker we voted in as the two captains, two fabulous young men, really good players with a lot of game experience, a lot of program experience. We're thrilled about that coming out of camp.

Heading into this game against UMass, without a doubt this is the best UMass team we've faced since I've been here. Have so much respect for Mark Whipple. I was a high school coach in Connecticut, he would bring a box of donuts in. Head coach at New Haven. I go a long way back with him. Lot of respect for him, heck of a football coach, he's built a good program.

They have a lot of talent both sides of the ball. They have a great speed. Watching them play Saturday night, I thought they looked fantastic. Seem to have strike ability on offense, on defense they're blitzing, doing a lot of different things. He's got a heck of a football team. Be a tremendous challenge for us here Saturday afternoon. We'll have our work cut out for us. We're in the heat of preparation right now moving forward.

With that, any questions?

Q. Talk about the offensive line. I saw you had Ben at right tackle, Jon back at center, Lindstrom...
STEVE ADDAZIO: Ben was a natural right tackle. He did a great job at center. He could certainly move back to center. Jon Baker has played at a high level in training camp, like he did in the opening game last year till he got hurt. He's the most veteran player, captain of the team, the apex of the offense so to speak.

Ben is a natural right tackle. He spent most of the camp there. He's taken certainly a number of center reps. Lindstrom has emerged in training camp as a real up-and-coming player for us. He's done a great job at center.

The good news is we went from I remember a year ago, we had an issue with Jon got hurt, Shane was out, (indiscernible) ended up being done for good. All of a sudden Ben rolls in, got to make him a center.

Now we feel like we have a handful of centers that can all play. That's a good thing, practice.

Q. Chris more natural at right guard, Chris Lindstrom?
STEVE ADDAZIO: Chris could play tackle or.... we do a lot of pulling and things like that. He's one of the best I've ever seen. He's an excellent puller. I think he's a natural guard. If we need him to, we have all those position moves available to us.

Sam is playing high level at guard, Aaron is playing left tackle, John Phillips has had one of the best training camps. He certainly can play either position. We've got versatility and depth up there. That is the kiss of death: next thing you know you have a run of injuries. We have seven or eight guys that we feel confident can play full-time up front.

Q. Are we going to see a lot more versatility from AJ Dillon than what we saw last year, one-dimensional for him?
STEVE ADDAZIO: Last year I thought our runningback coach, our staff did a good job of bringing AJ along. He's been playing third down, catching the ball out of the backfield, understands all the protections.

I look at a young player in David Bailey right now. It's funny, David is another one of those really talented young backs. Watching him right now, he reminds me of where AJ was at this time a year ago.

The growth that AJ has had has been phenomenal. Your simple question, will his role expand, every down back? Yes. I can't wait to see him catching the ball in the backfield out of the perimeter.

Q. Is he one of the best natural athletes you've ever seen?
STEVE ADDAZIO: I mean, you can say that, yeah. His uniqueness is his sheer power and size and speed. He also has the finesse of a smaller guy. He's got great hands. He's got great fine motor skills.

In terms of big, powerful men, yes. I mean, you compare AJ to a wide receiver, his uniqueness is just his sheer power, size and speed. I've never seen anybody like him. I mean, he's unique, very unique. Then he can make you miss on top of it all. He's a different kind of guy, special, special guy.

Q. You mentioned the UMass team speed. I know you guys run a lot of tempo, too. How do you try to match up with that defensively? They run three-wide, four-wide sets. When you look at the depth of your team, how do you match up against that, how will you?
STEVE ADDAZIO: They get it every day. I mean, we're going pretty fast on our offense. That will be of no shock for our defense, that's for sure. That's the good news.

But we give our defense, we go one-one today. We got fast guys, too. Smith is pretty good, Mike, Kobay White is pretty fast. Our defense is seeing that speed and they're seeing the tempo every day. That's a bonus.

Q. The shackles off of Anthony entirely now at this point because it's a game week? Is he 100% ready to go for you?
STEVE ADDAZIO: 100% ready to go. The shackles are off, I know it's going to (indiscernible) him till Saturday. Yeah, he's been full go here for almost a couple weeks, maybe 10 days, something like that. Doing great. Feeling great. Looking great.

Like anybody else, you've been away from football for a while, missed spring practice, that kind of stuff, takes a little bit back to get going again, get in the groove. That will be a little bit of an adjustment curve in there, I'm sure.

Q. (Question about Whipple.)
STEVE ADDAZIO: I was the head coach at Cheshire High School, lived in Cheshire. He lived in Cheshire, a head coach there, New Haven. I saw him all the time. He would come over, see me all the time. We used to have these New Haven Foundation football dinners on Thursday, I'd see him there. Got to know Mark good. Always respected him, a good offensive mind. I've talked to him even in my history on different job opportunities.

I know him well. I think the world of him. He's a heck of a football coach. He has built an outstanding program twice, once before, then come back and he's doing it now at the IA level.

Based on what I saw the other night, this is surely his best team as well at UMass in this second return. He's put together a lot of talent. He understands how to attack defenses as the play-caller. He's a very accomplished guy, a pro. His team looks and is playing like a well-coached football team.

Q. (Question about UMass offense.)
STEVE ADDAZIO: I mean, he's going to throw the ball down the field. They were 17th in the country last year in throwing. He wants to put it down the field. Always felt like Mark was a guy that was a gambler in terms of he's going to take his shots. They're going to have trick plays, take their shots down the field, they're going to push the tempo. He still believes in the run game, too. He's got the weapons right now.

Isabella is a real fast guy, change-of-direction, speed guy. I think Porter is the other guy, an excellent guy. Palmer, I'm sorry. They have the weapons. They have a returning offensive line that has a fair amount of career starts. They've got good size. You see them take the field, both tackles, 6'4", 6'5", 6'6". They have a runningback that's a very good runningback. They have the pieces, the receiver. The quarterback is very accurate forward thrower. We recruited him. I know him well. He actually went to Virginia Tech, scouted him out of Virginia Tech. He's a really good player.

They have weapons. If you have the horses and the weapons, you can do some things. If you don't, it's a little harder. They've got them.

Q. Passing game, seemed like they were very successful with their shallow crosses. How difficult is it to defend the horizontal part of their passing game in addition to their ability to go deep?
STEVE ADDAZIO: Passing is very similar to ours right now. They want to create runners, yet they have the ability to hit you deep. I think you better get some shots on the quarterback. You better disrupt the quarterback. That's hard to do sometimes when the ball is out of your hands real quick. You have the ability to make sure of coverages, play man, zone, mix it up. We can run a little bit in the back end. We'll be able to do some different things there.

Without a doubt, we have our full attention on the speed that they have at the receiver position, the ability to stretch the field.

Q. You mentioned Isabella is a good wide receiver for UMass. Are you excited for (indiscernible)?
STEVE ADDAZIO: Yeah, I mean, he's a heck of a player. He's a proven player in ACC competition. He played a bunch of snaps last year. He had maybe one of the best camps of anybody, playing at a high level. You're talking about a guy that can flat run now. He's a fast guy, got great anticipation on the ball.

Yeah, looking forward to watch him play, Lukas, Marcus, Taj. These guys, they've all been in the fire. It will be great for them to match up against what I think are two really outstanding receivers.

Q. You talk about the returning quarterback, runningback, receivers, offensive line. Do you see any similarities between their program and yours in terms of returning talent?
STEVE ADDAZIO: Yeah, I mean, I think any time you have a bunch of guys coming back, you got veterans coming back, I think you have guys that have been in the fire before. On top of that, they got a chance to play a game and we didn't. That's a good advantage, to get one under your belt. No matter who you play, that's a good thing. No matter who, where, what, opening day sometimes can bring about some malfunctions. You're hoping that doesn't happen. Opening day has a tendency. They talk about your most growth is in your first two to three games. There's a reason for that.

One of the things we're trying to do is get best game tempo as we can take. We did not have a game on Saturday. We got that accomplished. Obviously if you have a game, a bunch of injuries, maybe that's not so good. You have a game, come out healthy, get that game under your belt, that gives you a chance to work out some of the kinks a little bit.

There's nothing like being in the game, nothing like it. No matter what you do in practice, you can't quite resemble a true game.

Q. You talk about disrupting Ford. Zach and Wyatt from the outside, is that where you think you can attack him?
STEVE ADDAZIO: Yeah, any time you have your three- or four-man rush, those are guys that are really good pass-rushers. We're going to get some one-on-one matchups. I'm sure UMass will do what they can to double them up. The more people you put in, less people going out. I'm sure we'll see a bunch of that, too.

We're going to do some stuff to try to free these guys up and move the pocket, not only from the outside in but from the center up, make that pocket a little bit more of a disruptive pocket, unsettle it. Any quarterback, you let him sit back there, treat it like it's seven-on-seven, they have the ability to hurt you, for sure.

Q. About the energy level of the team. Coming down the end of camp you had the dog days of camp. What has it been like jumping back in, having a game week, preparation for an opponent that's not a teammate?
STEVE ADDAZIO: The energy was great today. Our kids did a great job. We came off of a player day yesterday. I thought they hit the ground running today. We had a jump-start on this last week. We put Thursday, Friday, Saturday into UMass. We're back at it again today.

I think the energy is high. I think the excitement level is high. It's opening day. These guys work year-round for these 12 shots. That's what they're guaranteed. This is one of the precious ones. It's coming right here in front of you. We're trying to do enough to get prepared, but we're also trying to keep our team fresh and fast.

Sometimes the players get saved by game week. There's so much you can do in a game week. It's not like training camp. Hopefully we'll get them in that groove, get their legs back all the way. We still got plenty of time.

Q. With a sense of your excitement level, nothing better than an opening game, where you're at with this team, what you've been able to accomplish off of last year going forward?
STEVE ADDAZIO: I personally am very excited, our staff is, our whole program is. Opening day, it's one of the cool things. You come out of camp, truly culminates a year's worth of work. You're back in it, ready to roll. We're excited about I we're excited about the fact that we have a team that's a very together team. They love football. There's a great camaraderie on this team, a great chemistry. There's not a lot of distractions.

Obviously everybody, us included, you're still super hyper focused on game one. It's a marathon, though. Your hope is you come out and play clean game one, not be sloppy, have a bunch of penalties.

This is what I tell the kids, what I believe in: all that matters game one is getting a W, okay? That gives you a chance to come back and regroup and get ready for game two.

What I fear with teams sometimes over the years is there's so much expectation in game one, sometimes game one isn't necessarily the best reflection on what your team is going to be. You hope it is, but it doesn't always work out that way.

No matter what, you swing and fight, when the fourth quarter is done, you look at the scoreboard, you're 1-0, that's the expectation level. Not how many yards we can get, how many points we can put up, this or that. No, it's just we're going to play a really good opponent, we're going to battle our tails off, we're going to find a way to sing the fight song in the locker room and be 1-0. That's the mindset.

What you're asking me is accurate, the expectation and the energy of the start. Sometimes that can cloud it, then all of a sudden kids are in there. One expectation: find a way to win the game. We have a good team. We've got talent on the team. Now we have to play cohesively together on Saturday. Saturday is what matters. We have had a great training camp, really had a great training camp. That's fantastic. That's in the bank. Saturday we need to have a great day.

The old adage: you need to be the best team on that field that day. That day matters. That's the message I'm into right now, focused on being the best team on that field on Saturday with no other expectation.

Thanks, guys.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297