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PURDUE UNIVERSITY MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 29, 2009

Danny Hope

Q. How difficult will it be to turn the page after the Notre Dame game; is that your No. 1 concern or priority this week?
COACH HOPE: No, not really. The No. 1 priority is to correct some mistakes that were made in reducing our chances to win. We have the whether to win so turning the page isn't going to be that difficult.
We will be ready to go. We need to get some things corrected that will help us win and that's what we are going to focus on. That's going the difference maker.

Q. How discouraging is it to be sitting here 1-3 when you have, in fact, been so competitive in these first four games?
COACH HOPE: Well, it's not discouraging. It's disappointing.
Like I said in the original meeting, I'm very encouraged we have a very good football team but don't have a very good record. Learning and developing as a football team, we knew that we were rebuilding and, that's what we are doing, and doing it with guys that play hard and compete and have a great will to win.
If we can correct some errors, we can correct some big games. The guys that we had talked about coming into the season, having some guys on our football team premiere players in those positions in the league and that's happening.

Q. How good of a team do you think should you have, and is your record reflective at all of the kind of team that you have at this stage?
COACH HOPE: The record has not reflected the potential of what we can do. If we don't minimize our errors, then we can lose some more. If we reduce our errors and continue to play hard and continue to improve as a football team, we will win a bunch of games, and it's pretty simple.

Q. Coaches are always asked and have an opinion about moral victories. I guess one of your philosophies, and is there such a thing, as moral victories?
COACH HOPE: No. There's no such thing as a moral victory, like you're referencing, but I'm not one to dwell on something. I move on pretty quick. You have to, in order just to remain competitive at this level.
There's a lot of things -- there are a lot of things that get in the way anyway; what you have to do in order to play and coach division one football in 2009. There's plenty of things that you have to deal with.
So, we move on. We have to get focused up and get ready for the next game. So I can't relate to what you're talking about.

Q. Do you think this team and this program needs to learn how to win?
COACH HOPE: Well, I don't know if that's a loaded question, but obviously we need to minimize our errors so we can increase our chances to win. If we can do that, we can say, we learned how to win, we need to learn how to minimize our errors so we have a great or opportunity to win. It's not quite as dramatic and psychological as you would like to make it. It's more of an execution issue. We need to play a little better in certain areas, and it would impact our football team dramatically. There are little things that we can do; you look back on two of the games that we lost, a couple of things that we could have done better, that would have made a difference.

Q. What would you say to this statement: Purdue is the best 1-3 team around?
COACH HOPE: I haven't seen the rest of them. Best one 1-3 team I've had.

Q. Northwestern in a spread offense, is that what concerns you most about the wildcat? I remember that's a pretty big challenge for your defense, that spread.
COACH HOPE: They are a pretty good football team, all phases are very sound and aggressive. But their quarterback is a heck of a player, he's a heck of a player, he really is. He can beat you with his arms or he can beat you with his legs. They haven't chose to run him much, but you know it's there. So you have to prepare for a dual-threat quarterback.

Q. Right after the Notre Dame, you said your team got very good advance training. Maybe just talk about how you expect the competition you played in the non-conference to benefit you now?
COACH HOPE: Well, we have had to step up our game to play against some of the top-tier teams in the country if we want to have any chance at all to win, and we have done that. We just have not been able to get it done when it was all said and done at the end of the game. We were behind a bit point-wise, but we have had to raise our game, even in the very first game, we had not played together. It wasn't a veteran football team coming back.
So I think that the schedule and what we have been through through the first part of the season has been great advance training for the conference schedule. There's been loud places to play in the Big Ten and we have done that, and with the great players and all of the things that you have to do in order to compete in the Big Ten we have experienced some of those already. If you don't pay attention to detail on a couple of things, some of the margin for error that we have, you know, so I think it's been great preparation for our football team.

Q. How is Aaron Valentin better this year, as opposed to last year, and how is he handling all of the added responsibilities? Obviously he's been very productive.
COACH HOPE: He's done a great job and he's a great teammate, he really is. Last year, he didn't know a lot about what we were trying to get done and he was a new to the system and we had some veteran receivers, and sometimes you can get stacked behind them and not get the reps you had need to in order to develop as fast as you need to breaking into the scene as a first-year college guy at this level of football. Last year he was just getting broke in a little bit.
He's a much more complete player now in every phase of his game. He's a very confident player. He's got great work ethic, great teammate, will do anything for the team. He can make you this -- he's got great size and he's got some confidence, but he did a great job this past. Saturday after dropping the two-punch, very critical errors, came back and played with confidence and played with full speed; and he got that one on the hop and made a big play out of that. He's a player, and that's the difference between there and now and this time last year. Now he knows what to do, and we are thrilled about Aaron's play this season.

Q. You played Royce Adams a little more, have those guys come on or are the freshmen still feeling their way around?
COACH HOPE: They have come on some and they are older, and you know, they can help us right now. We have several guys that can play more right now that can help us. Playing Dan Dierking more right now could help us some and playing Cortez Smith some more right now could help us some and playing Titus (ph) could help us and playing Lindsay could help us some. We still have some other players on the field that could help us and obviously the young linebackers on defense, Antwon Higgs and Dwayne Beckford, playing them more and more that makes us better. That makes the other guys better, too, same thing with Mondek. So we have a lot of players that could be playing more, but the emergence of Waynelle and Cortez, really, they picked it up some. They can they can they are older and been around a little bit and experience, and the age showed some in the end and that's why they are in there.

Q. Obviously Greg man (ph) sounds like he will comeback in the starting lineup, the fact that Schmeig has a full game under his belt, does that perhaps compel you to settle a little faster because you are putting a relatively experienced guy out there?
COACH HOPE: He's played at all three spots inside and I can't tell you how many snaps he's had. Y'all probably know more than I do. I know what he does in practice. He's like a 1 in practice. He rotates right guard, left guard, center in practice, and he's always in there with the 1 and very seldom does he take reps with the 2s. So he's a 1 to me already, anyway, but it was already that way anyway. You get that third guy in each spot, well, he's a pretty good third, you can put him in there with very little drop-off.

Q. Can you talk about the job Kerrigan has done and what you've seen from him and what you need from him?
COACH HOPE: He's getting better and better. He's extremely talented. He doesn't really have any setback as a player from a potential standpoint, he's smart and big and good looking and fast and strong, he's Superman in a lot of ways. That's what the players call him, he is, he can be very, very modest, excellent worker, and he has great potential, great potential, he keeps getting better and better, he's playing with more and more confidence. He's had a great game the other day, was a physical player and a game that we need to be physical in. He likes that and I see him gaining momentum as a player.

Q. You mentioned Northwestern's offense; what concerns do they present?
COACH HOPE: They are really aggressive up front. They know how to line up. They don't miss a line very often. They don't make very many errors, and right now that's the difference-maker for us right now in some ballgames. They make very, very few mistakes, and they have a veteran secondary and they are very aggressive at linebacker against the run. We think we are a pretty good run team. They have a very good defense and we'll be challenged in a lot of ways.

Q. Offensively for you, you showed a pretty impressive balance, nationally, can you talk about the balance -- maybe more balanced than what you figured?
COACH HOPE: 50/50, that's about right. Yeah, we like to be able it do both and do both well. Sometimes circumstances will dictate more than another, but I think we are good enough to run it and good enough to throw it. If you do both, it gives you a chance to deep the defense off-balance some. That's the important part of our offense of attacking in a lot of ways; any kind of attack, for that matter.

Q. Just to follow up on Zeke (ph), how did he grade out and look to you on Saturday?
COACH HOPE: He looked good. He beat -- he played good, played winning football. You can play winning football and not win the game, but he played winning football.

Q. Just evaluate the team through the first four games, going into the new season now with the Big Ten.
COACH HOPE: Evaluate the team, well, I think we are probably at where we ought to be with the exception of the record.
I'd like to play a little bit better in a couple instances and have a better record but probably about where I thought we would be. I think we are gaining momentum as a football team and I think our play Saturday showed that.
We are getting some guys in the game now that are starting to play good. Keith Carlos is one of the guys starting to figure it out. So we are probably where we ought to be but we would like to have a better record obviously, and again, we have weathered some things, starting off with a tough schedule in the beginning.
We think it's made us stronger. So I like our team, and I like the potential of our football team.

Q. I think the three things you talked about going into the season, limiting mistakes, hitting hard, giving that effort, where do you stand in those three issues?
COACH HOPE: Well, I think we are a hard-hitting football team. Wish we tackled better. And I think that we make too many mistakes. That's a focal point right now. You know, it's not a defective character. It's teaching and learning and executing. So we have to do a better job of that. And I think it's very obvious that we are a team that never quits. We have the will to win every game. Really proud of that. I think that's our redeeming quality as a football team and how close we are as a football team. We have some drive and some ambition and we expect to do really good things this year as a team.

Q. Has there been an element that's surprised you?
COACH HOPE: No. No. The record, I thought the record would be better. I thought we would win most of our games. I knew there would not be much margin for error. A few, if we turned it over, if we turned the ball over, it's tough to win. It tough to win when you turn the ball over, so the turnover margin I guess has affected the record.

Q. And you're not just talking about the turnovers when you talk about the mistakes, you are talking about penalties and tackles?
COACH HOPE: Penalties had not been a factor until last Saturday. Don't anticipate it being a factor again, you know, but I'm just talking about guys going out there. You know, same thing that we throw a pass to Jaycen Taylor, he's wide open, runs into the end zone, that's somebody made a mistake somewhere.
You know, mistakes, teaching and learning and executing. We are not going to be perfect, but we have to strive to be excellent and we are not excellent right now with the alignment and assignment in some areas, our whole football team in some areas. If we correct those things, we win the game last Saturday, we win the game at Oregon, we win the game this weekend.

Q. What do you think of the wildcat? Do you like it --
COACH HOPE: It's already in. You just don't know it. It's like one of those things, you don't know what it is, it's something with a name on it, like carpal tunnel. (Laughter) It's always there. Just didn't have a name.

Q. So we will maybe see it at some point?
COACH HOPE: Well, it's in. It's in. It's in every offense. It's not near as complicated as putting somebody in quarterback and your quarterback is somewhere else, and we have done that around here. We've done that somewhat already. The substitute at quarterback, everybody has always done it; it's just people doing a little bit more of it now. It's got a name.

Q. If you get the ball down the field more, the vertical passing game what needs to happen? It's not just Joey or the linemen; is it a combination?
COACH HOPE: We have to call some more of them. That would help in some ways, if we felt the need to call a more vertical game. We dropped some of our vertical game this season. We got behind some and laid it out there and had a couple of games where we dropped some. I think Keith dropped one a couple weeks ago, and then we had an overthrow to Keith Carlos had one a couple weeks ago and then we overthrew Keith Smith right down the seam the other day.
So we have some vertical game and haven't connected on some. We are real close. I don't have any problem with plays we are choosing at all, whether they are short, deep or intermediate passes. I like the play calling; I really do. They have done a great job. We have three or four starters coming back.

Q. You played Beckford and Hays (ph) together, I noticed you could have done it before this game, but why was that an option?
COACH HOPE: That's the way we wanted to do it. There wasn't any magic involved with it or anything like that. Different groupings and formations sometimes dictate who you put in there, and then you want to get a guy in there, I don't know if they probably have any one of those guys out there at the same time.

Q. What do you determine when you're going to go no huddle? We have seen bits and pieces of it but not sustained?
COACH HOPE: Sometimes we do it as a pregame, pre-planned attack. We start off with that, you know, against North Illinois, that was part of it. We were going to try to keep them off balance and we were three and out and then that changed some things, but we can go in and out of it any time we want to, on a whim or a notion or a pre-determined plan.

Q. When you start conferencing, is it easy to wipe the slate clean?
COACH HOPE: It's a lot easier.

Q. Do you say you're 0-0?
COACH HOPE: Absolutely. I talked with somebody the other day when I was at Eastern Kentucky University, we have an unbelievably heavy schedule, a couple of them are on par with us and the rest of them are 1-A teams like Carolina State and Kentucky and we played some 1-AA, Appalachian State. So we almost always started off 1-3, 2-2, and competing against the top teams in our league. At that level you don't go to the post-season play most of the time unless you win your league or are runner-up. So the conference competition is critical. 1-A post-season play is based on your record. Some people schedule themselves in the post-season play and most teams don't get into conference play, so it's not big enough territory to have really challenging schedule of what we have to work with prior to getting into conference play.

Q. (Inaudible operator interference).
COACH HOPE: ... got it figured out, the player for us, and right now, he's doing extremely well and I think he's probably one of the top players at his position in our league. I think anybody would rather have Keith Smith; I don't care whose team you're on he's a great receiver, great receiver, brings many qualities to the table.

Q. Do you look at him as more than just a receiver?
COACH HOPE: He's one of our top weapons obviously. We have some good weapons, Aaron Valentin, I think he's No. 1 all-purpose yardage guy in the league and Ralph is right behind and Jaycen Taylor is a good player. We have some firepower. Our line is playing pretty good and Joey is getting better and doing some great things. Like I say I like where we are going. We have a chance to do some good things in the future no question about it.

Q. The rush the defensive front is getting, does that take awhile for them to get comfortable in their roles there and how happy are you with the pressure?
COACH HOPE: Well, they are doing a great job of coming off the football, and I can say, guys take their game to the next level. Talking about it for a long time now, those guys starting to take their games to the next level they can be a dominate player at this position and they can take their game to another level and be a winning football player; that's what you're seeing, some guys taking their game to the next level. They are doing a great job with that, and it's really important to our football team, that's what we are hanging our hat on, that happens all across the board.

Q. Did you feel that Joey made a leap in terms of his position-making last week?
COACH HOPE: Did he make a leap? I think so. There are different phases of decision making. You know, there's good decisions, bad decisions, early decisions, late decisions. There's a lot of different things that go into decision making. And he certainly did better on some, and there are some others that he needs to work on, as well.

Q. You mentioned that the wildcat had been around and just did not have a name; why are so many defenses having trouble with it?
COACH HOPE: Anytime people do something from a personnel standpoint -- the game has changed a lot. In the old days, you put 11 guys out on defense and they played defense. And the game has changed so much from a personnel and substitution and alignment standpoint, and how many things that you have to defend and also having that runner back in the backfield, it changes the game in some ways. And you can be an MG (ph) and still be great a running football team with no back in the backfield and that is part of people's offenses. Central Michigan does that a lot and people weren't calling them a wildcat.
It's nothing new to the game, but it's a great edge in some ways and people are looking at it saying, I've got another great player on my football team that I can put the ball in his hand some, too, without having to throw it to him. It's a way to spread the wealth around. It's a great tool, but what they are doing is nothing really new. It's the same plays; it's a personnel thing.

Q. We talked about the defense. Did you feel that the defense was better in particular in the second half last week than in previous games, made a lot of stops to keep you in the game; were you encouraged by the second half defensively?
COACH HOPE: I was encouraged by all of it, the effort defensively. We still don't tackle as well as we need to. We have to do better tackling, and we are playing against some really good people. Tate is hard to tackle. He's really a great player, we have to tackle better. But I thought we were more physical on defense last week and that's big for our football team and that was one of our goals going into the game Saturday was to step it up a level, physicality standpoint on defense. We are still not playing as physical as we need to, but as you see the light coming off of more guys, we will play more and more physical, and that's starting to happen so that's good.

Q. You mentioned about the punt return that Aaron Valentin took; do you hold your breath a little bit when he hits the ground and he scoops it up and goes? Do you encourage him to do something like that?
COACH HOPE: Well, any time you can make a play and you're confident making a play, I don't have any problem with it. You made your decision, where you're standing at, it looks like it's a tough field and where standing at, he looks like he can pick it up and go. He could have stepped out of the way; he was looking at it, like I can catch it or I can step out of the way, and he made a decision to take it and go with it.
So I don't really have a problem with it. If it had been spinning a different way or coming in at a different angle, he probably would have played the ball differently and played the play differently. But he saw the short hop coming at it and had a good beat at it and I have no problem with what he did, absolutely not.

Q. Have you had a chance to assess the Big Ten and look at the first week?
COACH HOPE: Not really. We have seen some Big Ten plays and we have evaluated film on opponents, and you know, obviously all of the media that's out there follows it. So we have looked at some but not to the point where we could do any type of predictions or give you an assessment of it, no, no way.

Q. How much feedback have you heard from fans after the first four games?
COACH HOPE: We get a lot of feedback because we are out amongst them a lot. We have the radio show and we have a TV show and luncheon that we go so. So I'm out around the fans a whole bunch. And had a lot of great responses and hear a lot of great things.
Obviously when you don't win, sometimes there's some unhappy fans, too, but there are a lot more happy fans about what we are hanging our hat on.
We went out this summer, last spring and the summer, and we did about 30 visits to places where we were strong as far as Purdue fans and supporters go, and those people know exactly what it is that we are hanging our hat on as far as the program goes.
They know what our goals are, the master plan that we have for the program and we met with all the Bowl (ph) in the nation. We did 30 events. That was a good thing because I think the people really believe in what we are trying to do and how we are going about it. I'm getting great reception from a lot of our fans, and particularly in the fashion that we are playing hard, and never losing the will to win. I think it's very obvious that everybody that comes to the game, they see that, and that's what our fans are looking for right now, so I'm getting great responses most of the time.

Q. How do you maybe handle telling people to be patient?
COACH HOPE: It's an irrelevant point to me. It doesn't matter what you do. Someone is going to have a problem, complaining somewhere. If we won them all, it wouldn't be by enough. I don't pay a whole lot of attention. You don't have time to focus on that, I promise you, you don't.

Q. You've been asked a little bit about the opening Big Ten play, do you see this as maybe a new opportunity for this team?
COACH HOPE: Absolutely. Absolutely. It's a great opportunity for this team, one we look forward to, and certainly one we have been working towards.

Q. Any thoughts on Homecoming?
COACH HOPE: Yeah, it's a great day, lots of fans here, lots of energy. Everybody loves Homecoming. It's a day where people that are proud to be part of Purdue come back, and it's always an exciting game and everybody loves Homecoming. I'm glad it's Homecoming. It's great for our football team and I think the timing of it's right; I wish we had it every home game.

Q. Just where is the psyche at of this team after three tough losses? How do you kind of regroup now with Northwestern coming in?
COACH HOPE: Well, we have already regrouped, and we know what we have to do. And like I said earlier, about correcting some mistakes, we are not that far off. We were a play away Saturday from one of the great victories ever, or a couple plays away from being 3-1 or 4-0. We have to minimize some mistakes. And that's it's teaching and learning and executing.
So we realize that we could be awfully good as a football team. I know we do. I can tell by their actions. Their actions speak very loudly how they play on Saturdays. So we are in good shape mentally. We are getting ready to play.

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