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STANFORD UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 27, 2018

K.J. Costello

Stanford, California

Washington State - 41, Stanford - 38

Q. What are your emotions like after a game like this?
K.J. COSTELLO: Man, I mean, me and Coach Pritchard and the guys had a surreal moment in terms of just we worked so hard during the week, being process-oriented and seeing growth in so many areas, but not getting the win is a really tough feeling.

But it's part of life. I think as a unit, we grew a lot closer, as a team. But really offensively, with the wide-outs, running backs doing their job and taking what the defense was giving us, we really did what we've been working on for a long time.

You guys have all seen it for a while. We've been waiting for it. For it to be kind of hitting all night was a great feeling, even though there was a couple third downs that were huge, fourth down but that's part of every game. You're going to come across those situations.

But to fire back, with everybody having the will to fire back and go back at it for a to two-minute drive to potentially get us back on track was just an incredible feeling as an offense. I mean, we had guys fighting, Gabe (ph) going down, barely move his shoulder, gets back up. Safety still respects him down the middle; therefore, JJ is still open. Bryce is open, can barely walk. I'm out there fighting. It's an incredible feeling to be fighting with a bunch of guys that are going till the very end.

Q. This paying is a reversal of form for Stanford and you knew all week you would be airing it out. What was your reaction to that?
K.J. COSTELLO: I mean, you know, my philosophy every week is to take coaching and to be very open and vulnerable in terms of understanding their message and what they want me to do, and then my job is to go and execute to the best of my ability.

You know, they called on me early to get us in a rhythm, and you know, I was grateful for that call, and I think we all answered it in a great way. We started feeling ourselves early. We've been asking ourselves to feel that way for, what, eight weeks now? And we finally got in that rhythm early. I think it's a great feeling moving forward with that but still so much room for growth.

Q. Would you like to see this kind of passing game continue going forward?
K.J. COSTELLO: Every week in the Pac 12, defensive coordinators change their looks up. It's going to be whatever the defense is calling for.

Q. Talking about how the pace helped you guys affect everything from their movement up front to their coverage, how important that was to get into a rhythm?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah, I mean, obviously we're not out here trying to give away our hand, but we're going to try to get them to show their hand, but we are also going to go up there and we are going to snap the ball when they are not ready. We did a combination of both tonight. We were winning the chess match pre-snap, post-snap. And you know, Jesse was right, we were getting them to show their hand. Once again, doing so much work in the off-season, we saw it late in the drive, the opposition is starting to get tired and that's where we kind of smile and we really love being in those situations.

Q. What happened when you got stripped?
K.J. COSTELLO: It's a great question. If I remember, I saw it up top on the big screen. I was coming off of my initial read coming down to my follow, which was going to be -- or sorry, a shallow route, which was going to be a nice little catch-and-run and we got nicked out from blind side (ph).

Q. You had career high completions, but when you look at the final scoreboard, do you shake your head at what you have to do to match their offense? Is it firepower?
K.J. COSTELLO: I mean, when you play Washington State, especially under Coach Leach, I'm not surprised by it turning into an air raid versus air raid time game or big numbers versus big numbers because they do that every week to a lot of teams.

I knew that it was going to call on us to fire back because they were going to take a lot of shots. I think we did that, as well.

But you know, football is a team game. That's why people call it one of the best team games ever because no one guy is going to win the game. We saw that tonight. We're ready to get back to the drawing board tomorrow.

Q. Inaudible.
K.J. COSTELLO: You know, I think we executed at a very, very high level. I think in every game -- I mean, I could pinpoint every game I've played since I've been here where there's four, five, six plays that are just so natural to a game in which they can go either way, and you know, tonight, there's a big fourth down there, which we then ended up come firing back after they scored, but I mean, still, those situations are so crucial, and we're only going to get better and better at those.

Q. Can you take us through the fourth down play?
K.J. COSTELLO: Yeah, I mean, saw everything pretty clearly to be completely honest. They were flying Tampa Two, dropping out eight guys, you know, maybe even nine. Hardly rushing two or three guys. Playing right, essentially, into our hand; is where I've got to be ultra decisive.

You know, they are dropping a lot of guys out into a lot of holes. I've got to trust my guys to find holes, and if they don't find a hole, I've got to use my legs. So that's what happened there.

Q. Inaudible.
K.J. COSTELLO: Oh, man, that's tough. Early in the week, told them the feel of playing this game is how much we sacrifice -- controlling your own destiny is all you can ask for. As soon as you can't control your own destiny it's very, very hard. It takes true character and integrity to fight at the same level as when you do control your destiny.

I believe in these guys to do exactly what we did last week, but that is a great question because you know, we do have a decision to make at that point.

Q. Second game in a row where you came out and make a play with your legs --
K.J. COSTELLO: It's been on my goal sheet. I mean, you know, we are all battling out here. We are all battling through injuries. It's part of the game. You know, defensive coordinators challenged me to do that and I saw clear as today. Put it down on the goal sheet and we made it happen. We're 2-for-2 in the past two weeks and looking forward to doing that the rest of the way.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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