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IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 28, 2019

Matt Campbell

Waco, Texas

Baylor - 23, Iowa State - 21

MATT CAMPBELL: I'll be really honest with you. I'm really proud of our football team. I thought our kids, the heart and the character of this team, I really appreciate what they're about, appreciate how they responded. Obviously we didn't get the final result that we wanted today, but -- and there's some detail and some little things that we've got to continue to correct, but the character of this team, continuing to play to the very end, gave ourselves a chance to win in a tough road environment, and we didn't get it done. But again, very proud of our Cyclones.

Q. What did you tell them when they were down 20?
MATT CAMPBELL: I said there's going to be three drives for the offense and three drives for the defense. If they don't score any and we score all three, we'll win the game, and that's damned near what we did, but came up a little short.

Q. How tough was it given the way that you're down 20-0, I don't know what the temperature was on the field but it was in the 90s, how tough was it?
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, nothing is tough with this team because of the kids we have. I mean, again, I think the resolve and the character that we've got, our backs against the wall, they continue to believe in each other, and again, another game where we just ran out of a little bit of time.

But where we have to continue to correct are some of those things before we get ourselves in those positions at times. But yeah, this team is really easy to coach, I'll be honest with you.

Q. How tough of a task is it to give the defense one more stop when they had kept plugging away and kept getting stops?
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, that's what team does, right? Team takes care of each other. We didn't do that offensively in the first half, we didn't take care of the defense, and then in the second half, the defense didn't take care of the offense. That's what teams do. We've said that a million times. When we play good football, we play in a rhythm, and we found the rhythm for about a quarter or maybe a little bit of a quarter and five minutes. But hard to win games on the road when you don't have --

Q. Is there a correlation there with kind of like you had said, the offense struggling there in the first half, just kind of adding to the, I guess, pressure of the defense there at the end of the game?
MATT CAMPBELL: No, no. That's silly.

Q. How do you evaluate what Brock did and progressively got stronger in the game?
MATT CAMPBELL: Ooh, I mean, just the character of that guy. I mean, I like to use this word competitive greatness, and competitive greatness is when your best is needed, your ability to give the world the best, and that's what Brock Purdy is, competitive greatness, stands for it, owned it in the locker room at halftime, and he came out and proved it in the second half.

Q. How do you feel he handled Baylor's defense overall?
MATT CAMPBELL: Oh, I thought he -- again, quarterbacks you've got to have the ability to adjust, and Baylor did a couple different things in the first half. I think we had the ability to understand it, adjust, and we missed out on some opportunities. I thought we drove the ball with pretty good consistency in the first half, we just didn't finish drives, and we had the ability in the second half to make corrections. And give the credit to Brock, that's still a young quarterback, and his ability to do what he did I think shows how special he truly is.

Q. On the other side of the ball, how do you think your defense pressured them?
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, and I think Jon would tell you, too, we're just inconsistent at times. We had the ability at times to make plays, and when we needed to make plays, we just weren't our best. Again, I think those are things that -- it's the story of our football team right now, that consistency. You see excellence at times and flashes of excellence. It's putting together those four quarters of it, and we'll continue to fight to figure it out. I know the character of this team, and we'll get it figured out.

Q. Do you feel close to getting to that consistency?
MATT CAMPBELL: Boy, I sure do because you see it. It's just you don't see it in terms of four quarters' worth of it, and if you want to be a great team, then you will get that done in four quarters, but I surely do because I see it all the time and I think we all see it.

Q. How are JaQuan and Tarique?
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, JaQuan, I don't know. We'll figure that thing out here after tonight and see what exactly it is. We'll get some X-rays and see what it is. He has a lower leg injury. And then Tarique I think will be totally fine. The situation was great, some guys stepped up. Sean Shaw again made some huge plays for us down the stretch when Tarique went down.

Q. What did you see on the final drive? There was a couple moments, 39 and Brewer just gets loose and 35, and it seemed like there were a couple plays --
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, but got to make a play. It's the story of our two losses. The story of our two wins, we made plays. The story of our two losses, in the heat of the moment we've got to make a play.

Q. I don't know what Brock's fourth quarter stats were, but have you seen a better quarter, a better 15 minutes from him?
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, you know, I don't know, and it would be unfair for me to say today, man, that's the best I've seen Brock. All I know is when the game is on the line and the ball is in that kid's hands, he's going to give you a chance to have success, and he always has since he's been our starting quarterback. And so it's an honor to coach a player like that. It's fun to watch a player like that lead, and a player like that is only going to continue to get better, and what I love about him is he's got this unique ability to raise others up around him. I appreciate it, and it's fun to coach those guys. Makes us look like good coaches.

Q. What did you think of the run game? As the game went on Johnnie seemed to show some flashes.
MATT CAMPBELL: Yeah, again, I think we adjusted as the game went on. Unfortunately it was a game where you get down, your run game kind of goes to the pass game to try to get you back in the football game. I think we'll take a look at it. Again, that consistency early on I didn't think was great, but I thought as the game wore on, we were able to do some things and didn't figure some things out, but we'll take a look at it and I'll probably have a better answer for you Tuesday.

Q. Not that this made a difference, but you started out with the tents and then went -- before the game you had tents and then didn't.
MATT CAMPBELL: Who knows. I don't know, I don't worry about tents or --

Q. I know, but was there some ruling for the Big 12?
MATT CAMPBELL: Who knows? Don't know, don't care.

Q. Was the heat a factor at all in the way y'all played today?
MATT CAMPBELL: No, I don't know. I'd hope it continues to be hot at least in the second half of games because I thought we played pretty good in the second half.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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