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STANFORD UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 8, 2018

KJ Costello

Stanford, California

Stanford - 17

USC - 3

Q. Have you ever put a radar gun on some of your fastest bullets that you've thrown?
K.J. COSTELLO: No, but I would be curious to put a radar gun on a pitch on my baseball. I haven't played baseball in a long time, but.

Q. Were you a pitcher at one point?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah. A little bit, yeah.

Q. So what did you throw back then?
K.J. COSTELLO: I stopped pitching in 8th grade, so I mean my dad really never let me throw a curve ball to protect the elbow. It was really just fast ball, circle change, knuckle curve.

Q. Did you get a velocity on your fast ball?
K.J. COSTELLO: No, not in Little League.

Q. What was it like watching your defense in this game?
K.J. COSTELLO: It was phenomenal. It's funny, this year for the first time before every game, last week and this week, I looked at Frank Buncom, I looked at Sean Barton and Benny Ed, kind of pregame, and I said, hey, we're going to go as you go, as the special teams go, we go, and we're all kind of going to work off each other. And tonight I really felt the momentum in terms of when I came off the field on a third down that we didn't pick up, I really had trust that I was going to be out there pretty quickly and that's a great feeling as a quarterback, to communicate with your guys fairly quickly, knowing that you're going to be heading out, back out on the field pretty soon.

Q. How big was this win for you guys given early in the season only second week, but you faced a top-25 team in the country?
K.J. COSTELLO: The plan is always to go 1-0 every week. And I mean this win is big. Since I've been here I've played SC three times. I've been on the sideline for two of them and then loss in the PAC-12 championship. So it felt really good personally and as a team to beat these guys. They had our number for the past couple times and we don't like it when it's that way.

Q. What were you expecting to see from the defense, and were you surprised by anything tonight?
K.J. COSTELLO: Good question. I mean, SC's defense, I was expecting veterans on the back end and Marvell Tell, Iman Marshall, and then they had the new strong safety in there and they were subbing in a new corner in the boundary. So I was kind of expecting them to make sure there's some veterans out there and some guys that would kind of get a little bit of a feel out there. So I think we did a great job game prepping for these guys. And then also adapting late there in the first quarter and just seeing what their plan was for this week.

Q. Obviously you guys connected really well with the passing game last weekend, but obviously USC has better receivers. So were you expecting to maybe not be able to press as much as you did?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah, I think the plan for me preparing and as an offense, Coach Shaw and Coach Pritchard included, is to prep ourselves with an arsenal of taking what the defense gives us. Last week the defense was asking us to throw the ball over the top. This week it was kind of a mixture. I looked up there in the fourth quarter and kind of saw an even keel in terms of somewhere around 180 passing and rushing and that's what this game called for and that's what we did.

Q. There was so many times, I think the average third down distance today was 12 yards, which is obviously something you don't want, but you guys converted a lot of those. What is it about this particular version of this offense that makes you guys so deadly in those kind of situations?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah, I mean number one, we knew we were making it hard on ourselves there that first half. At times we came out with a good first drive and then from there we continuously shot ourselves in the foot. But third down, we converted some of those, we always want to be playing in front of the stick. But when we did have to make a play, I know Kaden came up big for me a couple times there on a linebacker type body, and that's a tough situation for us, but we work with that a lot in practice, we really do. And it showed up tonight.

Q. (Talking about losing players from last year and having new players in the game.)
K.J. COSTELLO: I think that means our entire football team. I've been going against my defense for a long time, I'm going on my third year and I knew what these young guys could do. I knew what Paulson Abedo could do, he's a great player and so that back end, we got a veteran back end in Ben Edwards and Fred Frank Buncom directing traffic and guys that played extremely hard in the box, you got Sean Barton, Mustafa playing really well and so at the end of the day it's kind of nice to have that group back there.

Q. On some of these packages you have all the huge tight ends and ends, J.J., big receiver. From your advantage point as a quarterback is that kind of cool just like going through all years of playing football have you seen anything differently when you have all those huge targets roaming around down field?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah, so I think that's one of the reasons why I decided to come here and once I committed getting guys like Colby, getting on a guys like Kaden in the picture, guys that can play flex tight end, they can run. So in those situations when we want to pack the box, if they're going to go base or bring in another big person, they're going to have to cover, run down the stripe with a linebacker, if they want to clock. So if he they want to go cover two they're going to have to cover them one-on-one down the middle and that's a great feeling to know that you got answers.

Q. Yeah, that's, and that's -- a lot those guys came in your class, right?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah, Kaden did and Colby came a year behind. I had a good feeling that Colby was coming. We're from the same area, so.

Q. And that's kind of a recruitment that you're running a little bit with text messaging, I'm sure.
K.J. COSTELLO: For sure. Yeah.

Q. And as high schoolers, did you envision this, did you envision this offense that's so unique and so big? When I saw you guys operate today, the explosiveness, like I said, third and 12 didn't seem like a big deal, so I'm wondering if this is something that you kind of saw coming in the past?
K.J. COSTELLO: That's a great question. In fact, I was thinking to myself in the locker room going back over the game, I envisioned coming here being able to get myself in the right call, knowing that the system was going to allow me to be in an advantageous situation, come into a system with a line -- we're all on the same, we are communicating at a level that is, in my opinion, the highest in college football. So knowing that I can feel secure in protection and then knowing that if I got one-on-one, we're not necessarily always having to beat them vertical, we're able to use size, use position, use ball placement. And that's one thing that a lot of people, most people don't really do any more in our game. Everyone wants to be in a vert down the seam, get on the top side, when we're kind of playing taking whatever they're giving us.

Q. (No microphone.)
K.J. COSTELLO: He's a really good guy. He takes pride in his ball game, but at any point in time he's ready to do his job to the best of his ability. His ability to move is incredible and it's a combination of moving and strength. And he then what I think puts him over the top is his knowledge of the game. I mean he can run, he can see linebackers popping over, he knows if the safety's coming down. He's got great intelligence for the game. And I don't know if that was going back before he got here or he learned it when he got here and it really picked it up then.

Q. (No microphone.)
K.J. COSTELLO: All the time. That was the main focus. Even when I was down and when I was cleared to start throwing again we were running check downs. And it's a timing thing, it's a feel thing, it's a trust thing. And from then he had developed quite a big -- his routes are getting better, his hands have always been good, it's been more understanding how to play at the wide receiver.

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