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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 5, 2018

Mark Richt

Greensboro, North Carolina

MARK RICHT: Had a practice this morning. Of course we're on a short week, playing on Sunday and then having to rally and get going with the new game plan right away. Certainly not a whole lot of off time. We did give our players off time, but the coaches immediately had to start grinding on the new opponent after we broke down the film of the LSU game. It's been a really busy few days, but we had one of those types of practices that you really need after getting beat, and it was hot, it was -- you had to really dig deep to focus and concentrate and do the things that you need to do to get better on a daily basis. So we got just what the doctor ordered with the weather and the practice that we had today.

Q. You mentioned the short week; what do you give up or what is sacrificed in a short week? Do you have to just do things faster, or what do you lose in that setting?
MARK RICHT: Yeah, really just the recovery time for the players, although we did give them Monday completely off, and it was a holiday, so they didn't have to go to school, so that was good for them. But as coaches you've got to get all the film graded and then you've got to start working on the game plan so when the guys do come back, you've got something going on. So what we did was we treated that first day after the players were off, that Tuesday, we had like a Sunday short practice. Not only to have a day off after that, but we went right into a Tuesday practice, which was today. Tomorrow we treated like a Wednesday practice, and then the day before the game, we usually have a dress rehearsal type of a practice, and my guess is it'll be more of a glorified walk-through than it will be timing up routes, running -- you'd like on a Thursday practice to throw and catch real good and get some game speed type things, but my guess is we'll be walking through assignments rather than running through them because it is the day before the game. Those are some of the types of things you do.

And then we actually go against each other, our No. 1 off against our No. 2 defense, No. 1 defense versus our No. 2 offense, and we actually work our threes versus threes in some full-speed drills other than we're not going to tackle to the ground. We like some fast-paced work because when you go against the scout team, it's just not the same competitive spirit because the scout teamers, just a lot of them are taking every single rep, can't hardly get a break. We're just hoping to get them lined up and give us a look rather than actually have a competitive drill. If all you do is scout team, you struggle. So we try to still have some 11-on-11. But like tomorrow we probably won't do that. It'll probably be all scout team, too. So we'll lose a little bit of that competitive time against each other.

Q. What went wrong Sunday night with Malik? LSU just had a better game plan, or what went wrong?
MARK RICHT: Well, we didn't win, obviously. I don't know what you mean what went wrong. What went wrong in regard to what?

Q. Like the play calling and the schemes. Did LSU throw something different at you guys that you did not see getting ready for that game?
MARK RICHT: Not really. They ran probably a little more zone coverage than man coverage like they had done in the past. That's probably the one thing that they did a little bit more of. But execution has a lot to do with everybody. It has to do with how well we coach on the front end and prepare everybody. It has to do with how well guys execute their assignments. We had some self-inflicted wounds with jumping offsides and holding calls when we've got a 2nd and 1 and we get a nice run for a 1st down, and then all of a sudden we get a holding down that brings us back to 2nd and 11 or whatever it is and not being able to convert.

A combination of them being a pretty good defense -- I mean, they're one of the better defenses in the country a year ago, and us not doing as well as we could do, we did score 17 points and had some success, much more success in the second half, but just couldn't finish.

Q. Talk about the fourth quarter; what can you work on from the fourth quarter, because you guys did better in the fourth quarter scoring touchdowns, you were only down 33-17?
MARK RICHT: Yeah, we had a chance to get one more score. We were down inside the 40, I think, with maybe five or six minutes and two time-outs left. If we get in the end zone there and go for two, we're within one score with plenty of time. But we just weren't able to finish. They caught us on a blitz that we didn't pick up very well and ended up getting a sack and ended the drive. We've just got to do everything better. We're not running the ball, pass protecting, the whole thing. You've also got to give credit to your opponent. They're a pretty solid football team. They've recruited as well as anybody in America the last five years, and it shows in their skill set.

It was one of those games where we had to do more right than we did, and it just didn't work out.

Q. Can you talk about the development of Gerald Willis and him coming back after being off last year and being defensive lineman of the week?
MARK RICHT: Yeah, so proud of him. I mean, I can't tell you how proud I am to -- from the day he walked on our campus, and he was even here a year before I got to Miami, but he had some things to work on, just with his life in general, but the one thing about him is he kept getting better and better and better, and he always -- there came a time in my opinion when he really began to trust us, and sometimes guys just need somebody to trust, somebody to love them.

You know, as he was developing into this guy that he's become now, there were some growing pains, but we never gave up on him, and he never gave up on himself. But he made some changes in his life that were really important, and then once he did that, and he also took some ownership of some mistakes that he made, then I think he turned the corner and became what he is now, which is one of the best leaders we've got on the team and one of the best players we've got on the team.

I could tell you that I would tell any NFL team this guy is a guy that you would want on your football team for a lot of reasons, and just happy for him.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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