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TEXAS TECH UNIVERSITY MEDIA CONFERENCEOctober 10, 2009Mike LeachBrandon SharpeQ. Brandon, just kind of rank this as far as best defensive performance you've ever been a part of, can you? BRANDON SHARPE: You said rank it? Q. Yeah. BRANDON SHARPE: I mean, there's not a rank to it. You know. We're just going out there, having fun. Being excited to play, play the next play. It's all starting at practice, you know, just go out there with excitement. Q. Coach Leach, could you talk about Sheffield tonight and the way he performed? And do you have yourself a quarterback controversy here? COACH LEACH: I thought he played really well. I didn't think there was a controversy there. I thought he played really well. The best thing he does is he's decisive. He is a really good presence out there for the entire offensive unit, and I think he has a lot of presence for the whole team. I thought he was a real inspiration to everybody. And I thought he played really well. I thought he did the things, you know, you really want a quarterback to do. He played decisive, and then worked the pocket really good. And he made some things happen with his feet, not just recklessly running around, but getting himself in position to make additional plays, which, you know, were routine plays, but used his feet to get himself in position to do it. Q. I think you guys held Daniel Thomas to under 50 yards, and only 15 came after that first series. Could you talk about what you guys did against him, and if that was a focus coming in? BRANDON SHARPE: Yeah, like I said, it starts all the way from practice, you know, three-and-out, three-and-out, you know. Just keep plays. Everybody just thought as a defense to stay together, you know, the whole defense works as a team. Jamar Wall said in the meetings, you know, D-line, get the seven front, the front seven. Get it up front right, and he's got the back. So we just all connect with each other and just got at them. Q. Were there any areas of your team's play tonight that you were not pleased with? COACH LEACH: Just I would say the only ones that come to mind are the personal fouls there during the one drive. Then the other would be, you know, our interception. Tried to make a little too much happen. You know, we're going to be in a pretty good position for a shutout. But then offensively we gave up that score and let that fellow pick it. Q. Can you talk about what you do on kickoff coverage and keeping Brandon Banks in check? COACH LEACH: I thought they did a good job. I thought kickoff coverage was really good, because, you know, he's a handful. I thought our kickoff unit, you know, had a real committed week of practice and really did a good job taking up the challenge to stop him. You know, there was a point in the middle where there's a few kicks we'd like to have back. But other than that, I thought really good job. Special teams was a big part of our win tonight. Q. Is it nice to see all three sides of the ball coming together for a full 60 minutes? COACH LEACH: Yeah, and I thought that was a really critical thing for us to take and build on because it was all three sides. I thought our sideline did a great job. So four from that standpoint, and I was really proud of our guys. Q. Did you have any inkling that the team was going to put it all together tonight? Is that something that you just don't realize until it actually happens? COACH LEACH: I thought we were on the threshold of it. I felt like we've been on the threshold of it a couple of times. And then just let off or relaxed or somebody gets to it. I tell you what, I was starting to get sick of was some guy get depressed and mope around because he made a bad play. We've been having too much of that guy acts like he's ready to go, and they get the little moping face going, and then, yeah, we don't have time to sit and wait for that: We didn't really have big problems with somebody, you know, sometimes a guy gets over exuberant if he makes a play and it takes a series or two to get them back. We didn't have a problem with that. Somebody would make a mistake, and then everybody else was going to wait on him to mope about it for a series or so. And I thought there was too much of that. But I thought that, you know, we had said the guys that we elected captains this week I thought did a great job as far as really bringing a lot of energy to our practices which I thought was really important and everybody was just excited about playing the next play. Q. Against Rice, you had seven touchdown passes and tonight Sheffield had seven. Does that show you can have anybody back there that can throw for seven touchdowns in a game? COACH LEACH: That may be against Rice and tonight. But there were some in between there that we weren't that precise, I know that. Yeah, we're just going to try to be steady, try to be consistently steady. Just, like I say, try to take this and build on it. Kansas State's a good team. There is no question about it. Had a real good record coming in here. Have a highly respected defense and, quite honestly, a coach that I respect as much as any in America, you know Bill Snyder. There's a lot of good things going on there I was really proud of our players being excited about the opportunity to embrace this thing. Q. Talk about the overall play of your defense and how you would rate that? COACH LEACH: Thought it was really good. Wish we would have gotten out of the blocks the first drive a little bit better. But after that I thought they played really tough. We came close to getting even more turnovers. Would like to have seen him get those, but got some and I thought that was good. I thought where we kept them out in four downs down there. I thought that was really impressive. That was something else. Q. What about what he did against Thomas? COACH LEACH: I thought that was good. He's a great player, you know, a point of emphasis this week. So they need to feel proud that they, you know, stopped a guy that is really good and is really a good player. You know, folks got together and you do it together. I thought that was good. I thought some contributions by our young guys, the overall excitement by the defensive side of the ball, I thought was really good. One thing I thought was really key, although we didn't capitalize on it offense quite how I would have liked, was defensively stopping them the first series of the second half I thought was really important. Q. You mentioned earlier about Sheffield moving around well in the pocket. How much of that was this offensive line and playing better tonight? COACH LEACH: Well, there's no question they played better. They played significantly better. I just thought the whole offensive line unit played well. I thought Lonnie Edwards stepped up, and had the best game that he's had. I thought they played good. I thought all five of them played good. Oh, and also the confederate played good, Keown. He's from South Carolina. So (smiling) but he played good, I thought. Q. How hard will it be or will it be hard to choose a starting quarterback after a performance like tonight? COACH LEACH: Well, it's not just hard. We'll get together, talk about it and figure out what we're going to do, you know. Q. Are you leaning one way or another right now as far as that goes? COACH LEACH: We'll see, you know. Just you'll have to stay tuned, I suppose. That's what makes sports exciting is it always changes. End of FastScripts |
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