RUTGERS UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 22, 2020

Greg Schiano

Postgame Press Conference

Michigan - 48, Rutgers - 42

GREG SCHIANO: Okay guys, I apologize, I know it's late, some guys down there that are hurting pretty bad. I want to make sure they're okay. Try to answer any questions for you.

Q. The strategy in the first overtime after Michigan missed the field goal, were you okay with setting up for the field goal in that spot, were you okay with the range, 45 yards? The play before, you obviously set up by trying to I guess get in that position for the field goal.

GREG SCHIANO: Yeah, the two plays we didn't, we weren't going to be overly aggressive, but they were plays that we felt were in range. And they did, it was third and six and then we just said, Let's center it. That's where Val wanted it, in the middle. And you know what? Sometimes you make them, sometimes you don't. I definitely thought that that was in his range. It just wasn't tonight. It wasn't meant to be.

Q. After a game like that, so many highs and lows, what's your message to the team and what's kind of the mood there?

GREG SCHIANO: Well, there's a bunch of guys that are hurting really bad. My message, I'll always keep private with me and the team. But needless to say, a bunch of guys went and really spilled their guts out there on the field. It just, you know, we're not there yet. We're just not quite there yet. We'll keep chopping and keep working at what we do and we will get there. That's why we're all here together working as hard as we are. We just haven't quite figured it out yet.

Q. Obviously you guys had a 17-point lead. You had a 10-point lead last week. Is there just something about a young, a team that's kind of going through this for the first time that they have to learn how to finish a game like this?

GREG SCHIANO: Well, I worry about people, you know, it's still a half of football to play. It's not really finishing. To me it's just playing every play. That's what you have to do. You don't -- it's coach speak, I know, forget the scoreboard. I tell the team, Let me worry about the scoreboard. The only thing the scoreboard dictates is do we go for two, do we go for one, do we go for it on fourth, don't we go for it on fourth. Those are the things that the coach needs. The players need to just execute. I'll let them know what we need, if it's a two-minute drive or it's a drive, what type of score we need, we need a touchdown, we need a field goal. Now, that's a little bit to the extreme. I get it, but I really want guys, our guys to learn to just chop every play as hard as you can. And we did that for a ton of plays tonight. I was really proud of the way that we approached the game. Forget the result, but how we approached the game. We just got to keep doing it. We got to do it a little bit better. We got to do it a little more often and one of these days that will put us over the top. Until then, it's very frustrating. It's painful, really painful for our guys, our coaches, but it's part of competitive sports. One team's going to win and one's going to lose.

Q. How much did it affect you when they went from Milton to McNamara? How much did that change things for you guys?

GREG SCHIANO: We fully expected to see multiple quarterbacks. That was not a surprise. Certainly he had a little more success the second quarter, had a little more success moving the ball than the starter, but, yeah, we planned for both, so...

Q. I had two, actually. One, Noah's performance, if you could comment on that and then the Michigan touchdown with about five minutes to go, it looked like a pick play, a lot of people have been asking about that. Was that legal?

GREG SCHIANO: I thought Noah played great, I thought Noah played really well. Certainly statistically that played out. But just everything, I thought he was very focused, executed well. The other question, I'm not allowed to answer on that. Stay out of the dog house on that one. But I appreciate it, guys.

Q. I'm not trying to get you to criticize the refs, I was just, is there an interpretation in that where, if the receiver doesn't force the contact, is that, is that what the interpretation was?

GREG SCHIANO: I didn't ask. It wasn't going to change the call. I didn't really -- we got to figure it out. We got to figure our stuff out. We will. Again, guys, apologize for being late getting up here, have a great weekend we'll talk to you on Monday.