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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN MEDIA CONFERENCEOctober 9, 2006Lloyd CarrCOACH CARR: I'm very impressed with this Penn State team, when you look offensively the rushing for 191 yards a game, which is amongst the leaders in this country. And offensively, a great tailback, Tony Hunt. We tried to recruit him here. I thought for a minute we were going to get him, but he's having a great year. And of course Brown, I think is one of the best tackles in the nation. They have probably more speed at the skill positions than anyone we've played this year, and a quarterback that gets better every game. So Penn State, offensively, gives you a lot of problems. Defensively, they are equally impressive giving up less than 80 yards a game rushing. When you put those two statistics together, they've lost to two excellent teams on the road. So now we have to go back on the road and I think play our best game. Q. (No microphone.) Talk about the challenge to the offensive linemen. COACH CARR: Penn State, they are an eight-man front by scheme, by design. They contain the football extremely well. They are well coached. I think Alford is certainly an All-American candidate three-year starter, an outstanding football player, and of course their linebackers are extremely talented, secondary with two corners that can really run and cover. So it's an outstanding defense. Q. (Inaudible.) What did you see in those group of guys? COACH CARR: Well, I think Shawn Crable, throughout the winter, throughout the spring, his role a year ago was more specialized. He didn't get off to a good start at the beginning of his junior year at training camp. He just didn't perform like we all knew he was capable of. So I think he's made dramatic improvement. I think he's having a great year. And Prescott Burgess really at some point at training camp began to play like we expected him to play. He played a year ago, he started a lot of games, but I think he's made dramatic strides. He's having an excellent year. I thought Saturday was his best game. David Harris, I always expected that David would become a great linebacker, and I think he's having a great year. I think they've all -- they're all motivated, they all can play the game. They're all tough. I think they've done a great job. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, I think they understand that Steve, as far as his expectations, are extremely high. I think they've come to understand that, you know, his praise is hard earned. And when they earn it, they know they're playing at a very high level. So I don't know other than that. But I think for whatever reason, they're all playing extremely well. Q. Ryan, it looks like he's really comfortable back there (inaudible.) COACH CARR: I think Ryan has played extremely well. I honestly, going back into the spring, I did not -- I was not very optimistic that he would play, because my experience with those injuries has not been very good. So when he came back in the fall and was allowed to have contact, you know, he's really been a physical player. He's made a lot of good hits, a lot of good tackles. He can run. He's athletic. He's having a very, very good year. Q. Chad feels he's playing his best football in his career so far. Do you agree with that? COACH CARR: Well, I think he's played awfully well since he's been here. He's just been through a lot of circumstances that have enabled him to gain a wide range of experience in a lot of different situations. But I think at some point -- I think in the Central Michigan game, even though we didn't throw the football much, that week in practice, that week in the game, if you watch him throw the football, there was a change. I think he's throwing the ball extremely well. I think he's very confident where to go with it and he's made a lot of plays. Q. What kind of change? COACH CARR: I don't know. You would have to ask him, and he might disagree with me. That would be unusual. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, I saw the ball -- he's always had a strong arm. He's always had a good release. I just saw something it's hard to put my finger on. You might ask him that. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: I'm always optimistic, extremely so. Q. Is he going to play? COACH CARR: Who? Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Is he going to play? Well, we'll have to see. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: I don't have any comment on Mario. I'm sure you understand, because I don't know everything there is to know. At some point I will. Make sure you leave your cells with me and I'll call you. Q. Are you acknowledging there are issues that you need to find out? COACH CARR: I'm not acknowledging anything. Q. There are rumors (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, no, I can't -- I just don't have anything to tell you. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: I really don't have anything to say. Q. Do you try to prepare your team, the emotion you might face? COACH CARR: Well, first of all, I've always believed that the idea of what happened last year is really, with very, very few exceptions, it's a dead dog. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter whether you won, it doesn't matter whether you lost. It's really about the concentration that you have on this game this week. It's about what we do. We have no control over the opponent. We have no control over what they think or how they're going to play. We do have a lot of control over what we think and how we play. To me, that's what it's all about. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, when you have a real, real bad experience that you don't forget, that you can't forget, then that's the exception. Q. (Inaudible.) A lightly recruited guy, but made a quick impact. What do you see for him? COACH CARR: He's an amazing football player. When you see what those guys did a year ago and the season they had. Of course Williams was highly touted and King was highly touted, so it wasn't surprising that they would come in there and play like they did. But Norwood is an outstanding football player. They're fun to watch because they can run and they're tough. They're competitive. And it's obvious -- when you come in someplace a true freshman and play an important role in any program, but particularly in a great program, it speaks to your confidence, your composure to the fact that you're not a guy easily intimidated. Q. It seems they really enjoy the atmosphere there at Penn State. What's the draw? Is there something specific that you really like? COACH CARR: Well, I've just -- I think when you fly in there, it's a beautiful place, a beautiful setting. It's a college town, much like Ann Arbor from the standpoint there's not a big metropolitan area there. And their stadium -- what I like about their stadium from a playing standpoint is there is room on the field. It's not one of those places where you're backed up against the wall. So there's plenty of room; and the enthusiasm with which they support their team. And of course, I think I'm accurate, it's the second largest stadium in the country, I think. And the guys that always play for Penn State, they have great tradition and so they play the game like you like to play it. Q. How important is the time of possession and how do you feel about what you've done there? COACH CARR: I think it's like playing great defense or great offense. The key, the goal, is to win. If you can run the football and if you can stop the run, then -- and you are good in protecting the football and not turning it over, then you have a great chance to win. And I think the time of possession is an outcome of playing the game totally. So I think it's important. I mean, I don't know anybody who would not like to have the ball more than their opponent, because if you have it more than your opponent, in most cases you have got a good chance to win. Q. Do you feel comfortable with Mathews stepping up? COACH CARR: Well, I think Greg Mathews has really done a great job up to this part of the season, and we felt confident in his ability from the first game. That's why we played him early. I think we anticipated at some point that his role would increase. I'm hoping that Carl Tabb, who has been nursing an injury throughout training camp in the fall is about -- he's close to 100 percent. I don't know if that answers your question. Q. Compared to last year, what difference does that make to your club to have a consistent lineup, for the most part? COACH CARR: Well, it means a lot. The chemistry -- as far as the timing, I shouldn't say chemistry, the timing, the understanding, the experience, all those things are important. With that said, this is a game -- Tyler Ecker missed the last two games, and so injury is a part of it. It's the least fun part. It's the worst part of my job. It's the part I hate the most. And yet it is a part of the game and it is a test of how your team responds. That's always the case. Q. Do you think Tyler will be able to play this weekend? COACH CARR: I don't know. I know Tyler told me on Friday that he expected to play this week, but I do not have a report yet so I can't answer that. And I think Ross is okay. I don't know that he's where he was. Q. What has it been like to have Jake Long back right from the start and fully healthy and trimmed down? COACH CARR: Well, he's a great football player and at a position that is as difficult to play, I think, as any place on the football field, maybe with the exception of quarterback. So he's got every quality you want I think in a person and an athlete. He's smart, he's tough. He loves to win. He's willing to do whatever his team needs him to do. He's made a major difference, a major difference. Q. Is that a result of keeping more guys in? COACH CARR: Well, I think there is no question. I thought Michigan State had an excellent plan to make it difficult. They moved Stanton around and they had some great ideas in terms of the formations, the way they -- some of the new wrinkles that they put in for that game, and they hurt us a couple of times because they did have a good plan. You understand this, that you can keep from being sacked. I think Minnesota, their plan was to throw the football five steps and get rid of the football or play action. So we haven't had sacks, but I think we've had some pressure. But at times, in that game, we weren't able to get the kind of pressure we would like, but that's because when you keep eight guys in there to protect, then you're going to cut down on the sacks. Now, you don't have as many guys out. So there is a trade-off there. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Mad at you? I've never been mad at anybody. It's a free country. Q. Last year Penn State (Inaudible.) What do you expect? How are you going to deal with it? COACH CARR: Well, I've always told guys I recruit, I say, Look, you may go play 15 years in the NFL, but you're never going to play in front of a bigger crowd than you played in as an 18-year-old freshman at Michigan. With that said, it's extremely loud. I think the positive for us is that we've been to Notre Dame. We've been to Minnesota, which was an extremely loud place to play. So that doesn't make it any less daunting a challenge in terms of the noise, but it's not like every guy that will make that trip has been in those circumstances. So I think that helps you. But that doesn't mean it's easy, no. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, it was not, as it isn't many times, an easy decision. We just feel like he's in a position on that depth chart where he will get enough opportunities to play to make this a valuable year for him. That's why. Q. Is that your call or did you leave it up to him? COACH CARR: I talked to him about it, yes. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, he had played earlier. And I think there's something about the experience that you've gained in practice. So for example, it's hard at this stage of the season to take a guy and make him, put him in a backup role if you know you're not going to play him. I mean, that's not -- that's not good for your team. So even though they may not get a lot of work in the games, they are going to get a lot of work in practice and hopefully they'll get enough game competition to make it worthwhile. But it's never an easy call. Sometimes it works out that it's easy, but sometimes you don't know really until very late in the season or late in the season whether it was the right move or not. Q. (Inaudible.) Is this an easy team to coach or do you have to do much to coach them on that? COACH CARR: I think going back to the wintertime, I don't say that it's ever easy because you're dealing with a lot of personalities, you're dealing with a lot of personal goals that people have. Any time you're trying to take that many people and get them focused on one goal, that's never easy. But what I do say is that it's been a lot of fun because they have been highly, highly motivated from the first day, from the winter, through the spring, through the summer, there's always some issues that are part of college life that as a coach you're involved with. But it's really been, from a chemistry standpoint, a group of guys that really get along well and support each other and guys that have played on a daily basis I think very hard. And that has enabled them to improve throughout the course of the season. But anything they accomplish is going to be based on their ability to continue to improve and continue to stay focused on the task at hand. Q. How much of that is coaching and how much of that is leadership? COACH CARR: I don't have that answer. I think both are important. On a football team, without leadership from the players, you're up against it. You're not going to be successful in terms of big goals. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: Well, based on -- I read where Coach Paterno said he's going to coach how many more years? Ten? Well, I can assure you I'm going to be first. Q. (Inaudible.) COACH CARR: I honestly don't know how I could get into any hall of fame. I received an award -- I don't know that I'm a member. I received an award there and I was honored to do so, but I can't tell you. Okay, it was great being with you again.
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