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PURDUE UNIVERSITY MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 14, 2010

Danny Hope

THE MODERATOR: Before we get started, I just have a statement to read real quick. Fifth year wide receiver Keith Smith will miss the remainder of the season after suffering torn medial collateral and anterior cruciate ligaments during Saturday's game. The tears were confirmed by MRI. Smith will address media members after the regular interview sessions at practice on Tuesday.
Okay. Coach, if you just want to give a statement in regards to Keith, and then we'll get ready to go with the regular press conference.
COACH HOPE: Well, we kind of thought that's the news we would get, but we wanted to make sure we got it officially from the doctor first, the official news. It's unfortunate and certainly a setback for our team until we get some other guys ready to go.
You know, Keith's a great player, and he's not easily replaced. We have some other guys that are really good players that will do very good with the opportunity, but it is a setback for our team. He's an excellent leader. We've met some the last couple of days, and he'll still serve as a great leader for our team this year, but we won't get a chance to watch him play.
THE MODERATOR: Pete?

Q. Dan, I guess in timing with that, who needs to step up for you from a receiver's standpoint now?
COACH HOPE: Well, all of them do. We have great potential from a passing game standpoint offensively. We haven't even tapped it all yet. We've been pretty good. We've thrown for a 70 percent completion percentage this year.
Really like the progress and the potential of guys like Justin Siller. He's just now starting to figure it out. He can get better and better and better. And the same with Antavian Edison. He's a guy we wanted to get more touches to anyway, want to get the ball to him more anyway. He's one of our better players. And certainly our quarterbacks have to step up some because they're great athletes as well.
And the same with Cortez Smith and the same with O.J. Ross and with Gary Bush. We still have a lot of good players and some guys that have been working hard and will do very well with this opportunity. But those guys are the ones that come to mind right off the bat.
You know, our tight ends have been playing very well. They're always a big part of our passing game, and they're very sure handed. Obviously, we like the development of Gabe Holmes as well. He's a very good receiver as well. So we have a lot of guys that can pitch and catch with, and our quarterbacks are doing very well. I've seen great promise for our football team in the catching part right now.

Q. And then, Keith, how is he handling it emotionally with this type of situation?
COACH HOPE: Well, he's done great. Somebody had mentioned earlier that they talked to him and he seemed like he was doing very well. Keith's still a lot smarter than most of us. So I'm not surprised. He's mature and certainly has a great handle on it. Always has a plan. So he's doing very well.

Q. And then from an opponent's standpoint, your thoughts and concerns about Ball State.
COACH HOPE: Well, they're a physical football team. So, obviously, the physicality of the game is going to be an important part of it. They're coming off a tough loss. So we can certainly expect those guys to try to rebound and certainly can expect their A game. They're a physical, running football team. That's good for our defense right now. To have to prepare and defend that type of offense because we'll see it later in the season as well.
So they're a good team, good players, very talented at the running back position, very well-coached up front on the offensive line, physical on defense, strong at the defensive tackle positions. A couple guys that have a leverage advantage, 290, 300-pound guys that are 6 foot tall that are good players, very athletic at defensive end. A lot of good players, good football team.
THE MODERATOR: Doug, go ahead.

Q. Hi, Danny. Now that we know Keith's status for the remainder of the year, what light can you shed on the sixth year chances he has, and how will that process unfold?
COACH HOPE: Well, that's something that he'll have to research, you know, and also have to sit down and make a decision what direction he wants to go in. He has a lot of things that he has to deal with, you know, from a futuristic standpoint, his degree program, NFL football, potential eligibility, you know, a lot of big decisions that he and his family have to sit down and talk about.
So they have to do that part first, and then actually when he does that, we'll sit down and talk about the possibility of getting him back for another year of eligibility. I don't know enough about his medical record to elaborate on it. I just know that he's got some decisions that he's going to have to make. He's done very well in school and has some great opportunities professionally as well that's coming up pretty soon for him, again, in football and outside of football. So he's got some decisions to make.

Q. But if he would decide, he would at least have a realistic chance, right? For those of us that aren't that familiar with how you qualify for sixth year and things like that.
COACH HOPE: Like I just said, I haven't looked at everything that happened to him -- he was here way before I got here, and he's had a lot of surgeries. So I don't know. I haven't looked at his medical record. Wait and see what he wants to do first.
I always let those guys make the decision, do what's in their best interest first. So we wait and see what he wants to do first.

Q. Is one of the challenges now with him out sort of to lift your team spirits? Because, you know, he is such a leader on and off the field. I mean, is that the challenge you and your coaching staff now face to -- you know, because it was probably sort of like a punch in the gut, was it not on Saturday?
COACH HOPE: Any time that you have a teammate that gets hurt, you know, it's tough for everybody that's on the football team. And then when you see -- when one of your top players and one of your great leaders go down, you know that it could be serious, you know, it's always tough. It took away some things from the win after the game. The team was very quiet on Sunday after a win, and we don't usually have that happen. We always try to make the most of a win regardless of the score or who it was against because it's so important you do win, you have to have some fun when you do.
But Sunday was a different Sunday that we've had since I've been back at Purdue, and a lot had to do with our concerns for Keith. Obviously, we have a lot of great players left on our football team, and we're right where we need to be at as a football team, developing-wise with the nonconference games that we have on our schedule and the open week coming up. There's no change in the plans or the goals.
So we'll go out there and practice hard today. We have to because Ball State will come here on a mission to try to make a difference in their season with a win against a big ten team, and we have to recognize that and get ready to play.

Q. Another one of your challenges this week, guarding against overconfidence, knowing what transpired in Muncie last week?
COACH HOPE: I don't think that this football team is at the point of -- risk of being overconfident. We had a lot of good things Saturday but a lot of areas we need to improve in and a lot of guys that could step up their game in some ways that would really impact our level of play, and I think that's where their focus is at. I think they realize we can play a lot better than we need to in order to beat anybody.

Q. I know you liked how the schedule broke, you know, coming off the Notre Dame game. Now with these next two games, is it even more important that you get some answers -- because, let's be real, Smith gave you a lot of production in a lot of different ways. You need to find those answers, do you not, in the next two Saturdays?
COACH HOPE: I think we have those answers. I really do. I think we're getting better at the things we're going to be good at, whether Keith was at the receiving end of it or not. He was a great player, but we don't have to change play calling. We have some other guys that can get in there and get open and catch the football.
They may not be as good as Keith right now, if ever, we don't know. But they have some talent, and they'll cash in on their opportunities. We don't change game plans at all. That's not the focus of what we're doing. We lost a great player, but we have some other guys as well. We don't have to change the game plan.
I think we already know some of the things we have to get good at. I think our quarterback improving the way he did from game one to game two is huge. You may not see it numbers-wise because he didn't throw an inordinate amount of yardage on Sunday, but just overall because his pocket presence was like it's been every day in practice. That's the best, pocket performance-wise, and the most blitzes he's had come at him.
So him stepping up in that phase of his development as a quarterback was huge for us, and getting the ball out of his hand in a hurry. They did a great job with that on Saturday. It was a huge step for him. I see us getting better every day we go out there and potentially being great in the passing game with or without Keith Smith. I think we're going to continue to grow and develop.
It's unfortunate any time you lose one of your best players. It's a setback, don't misunderstand me, but we're not changing the game plan.

Q. And the last thing from me. You talked about numbers-wise, when you look -- I know it's only two games into the year, but you're near or at the bottom of the league in scoring offense and scoring defense. Is that cause for concern or not that big a deal at this stage?
COACH HOPE: No. I think it's where we're at. Again, I think we have great potential. We were playing a lot of young people, and we're playing without our top two running backs, you know, coming into camp. Well, potentially our top two. You know, I don't know that Keith Carlos would have been ahead of Danny. I don't think that's a true statement, but he's certainly a really talented player.
And we're playing without Keith Smith right now. So we have room for growth and development, and I think that's what's going to happen. The next couple of weeks, we're going to get better and better. I'm not concerned where we're at from a statistical standpoint right now. I see happening what needs to be happening.
We went into the opening game against Notre Dame with a center who never played in a football game or never played center before, to a quarterback who hasn't played in a football game in two years, and the right tackle hasn't played any football at all, and a year in the spring after a position he never played. And a brand new secondary. Anybody who played hardly at all was Albert Evans a little bit. So I think we're doing very well with our growth and development as a team. I think we have excellent potential.
There's some things that have to happen. The light has to come on in certain areas, and it did for Robert Marve in a couple of areas. We earmarked these areas for our players. There's some things that our defensive tackles have to be able to do better this week and next week and three weeks from now in order for us to be a great football team. There's some things that our quarterback has to be able to do better, and they're earmarked, they know what they are, and we go out and work with them.
So I'm not concerned with the statistics for that right now. I think we have great promise as a team potential-wise, but we've got to make it happen. We're a work in progress. But we've got something to work with.

Q. Coach, you mentioned Antavian Edison. I see he's at the top of the depth chart, and you mentioned you've been want to go get him on the field more. Can you talk a little bit about him and what it is about him that makes you want to get him out there more.
COACH HOPE: In the recruiting process, the very first signing class that I had, we had some serious personnel issues at running back and the corner and wide receiver. We had lost eight receivers off the 2008 squad, and you can see how developmental we are right now. Like our talent level, we're very young secondary-wise, and you can see we're still very shorthanded from a personnel standpoint running back-wise.
When we recruited Antavian, we thought he was good enough to play all three. He certainly was on film. You look at film, and you see guys that are good players, and you look at Antavian's film, and you said, wow, what a great play. The word wow come up a lot watching his film.
And we got down there to recruit him, and he wasn't the most impressive looking guy. He was a little undersized, you know, but had a great presence about him. He's gotten bigger and stronger even though he's still a little bit slight of build. He's much bigger and stronger than he was when he first game here. I don't know if he was 140, 150 pounds when he came here or not.
So he's got some good size to him. And he's a good football player. He's physical when he runs the ball and very, very quick, and extremely light on his feet. He's like a water buck in some ways like, when he runs, he doesn't hardly make a print in the grass. He's very light on his feet and quick, and he's a player. He's a player. There's some guys that are players, and he is one. He's a player. O.J. Ross is a player. I think Al-Terek McBurse is a player.
They still have to work on some areas of their game, but those guys are players to me. He's a player.

Q. Dierking obviously had a big game. Has he improved significantly since last year, or is it just a case where he has more of a stage right now and we're just seeing what was always there?
COACH HOPE: Probably some of both, you know, he played behind some awfully good players. Ralph Bolden is an awfully good player, one of the top three or four running backs in the league coming into this season, based on what he'd already proven he could do. He played behind Kory Sheets and Jaycen Taylor a couple of years ago, and those guys were awfully good football players. He's gotten his opportunity and done real well with it.
He has a lot of redeeming qualities. He's a very physical runner. I think he's kind of an old school buzz saw kind of guy where he's hard to tackle, and, you know, he saws you down when he blocks you, and he's tough. He's a really tough guy. He has a great motor and really good stamina. You know, a guy that's probably worked harder than most guys from a physical training standpoint in the last five, ten years of his life.
You pull his shirt off and look at him, he hasn't wasted any of his time. He's really worked hard to be the player that he is. So he brings a lot of redeeming qualities to the table. He's a good leader, and regardless of the circumstances, whether he was a third string back or a first string back, he always gives his best, and he's always there with a smile on his face ready to go.
So we're really happy for him because he's very deserving, but he's a good football player, really good football player.

Q. Obviously, with Keith Smith that was a disappointment, but obviously maybe a bright spot with McBurse and a big run late in the game. Pretty happy to see that, and does he look close to 100% to you?
COACH HOPE: Well, they get banged up in the game, and you never can tell exactly where they're at until the latter part of the week. But I was glad for him to go out and make some plays, make some big plays, make people miss, and look like he was playing fast. I didn't think he did in the first game. He hadn't had a lot of reps. Don't know how confident he was in the strength he had back in his knee. I think it showed some in his play in the first game, but we didn't give him many opportunities in practice.
A certain amount of guys in a certain amount of reps in certain roles preparing for Notre Dame, and he wasn't available practice-wise to get a lot of that. Otherwise had done a good job so, he had a limited role going into the Notre Dame game. He had an extended role going into last week, thought we could establish the run game and how important it would be for us to do that. And he's a good player. He's a good player, and he's good with the football. He looks much faster and better to me than he was a week before.
He's important to us. We don't have many backs in our stable to develop. We've got to get Al-Terek rolling.

Q. Last thing from me. Concerned about the inability to complete the deep ball or stretch the field a little bit at this point?
COACH HOPE: No, because we've got the arm strength to get it all the way out to the back of the end zone and in the next county. It's not like we can't get there. We've got the guy that can get it down there. If you look at the film, how far those guys backed off the ball, we needed to stay on the field, complete passes, you know, get some rhythm with our quarterbacks, and they gave us some things last week, and we took them.
They played way off our guys a bunch, but not concerned with that. We've taken a few shots, but we've got a guy that can get it down there, and I think we have the people that can get behind him from a speed standpoint. Again, some new guys and some young guys getting on the field bringing some speed to the game, I think, is going to help us be more explosive downfield-wise, but I think we have what it takes to do that that part of the game. Haven't done it much, but I think we've got it.

Q. Are you pretty happy with the production you're getting from the tight ends? Are those two guys guys that could see their production increase, especially considering you can stand them both up sort of in the slot a little bit and make some good yardage?
COACH HOPE: We're real comfortable running anything out of our offense just about. Anything on our offense with Kyle or Jeff. They're good players, and they've been around. They're tough guys, and they're really good players on the line of scrimmage right now. They were ahead of our -- a lot of our offensive linemen as blockers two or three weeks ago. I think our offensive line has really improved in the last eight, nine days.
They're starting to show some continuity. They've played together -- these five guys have been together for 29 days before the Notre Dame game, two games and ten practices. So we've got about 40 days together with hardly any alterations in the lineup, and it's just now starting to show a little bit. Guys that are playing better together.

Q. Talk a little bit about Josh Johnson. He seemed to get more reps as the game went on against Western and seemed to give you some pretty good snaps out there.
COACH HOPE: He played very well Saturday. Again, when that light comes on, all of a sudden a guy takes some steps as a player and starts doing a couple things on a more consistent basis that you've been waiting for him to do for a while now, and Josh did that. He's a strong guy. He's very similar to Brandon King in some ways from a build and a girth standpoint and be able to play with leverage and be able to put his hands on people, and we've been waiting to see him do more of that, and he did a lot more of that on Saturday.
He was really, really good on special teams. We got really good special teams out of a lot of guys on Saturday that stepped up speed-wise and tempo-wise, and he was one of them. But he was playing well, and the better he played, the more we kept him in there. So he did very well Saturday. He took some big steps. He came out of the game on Saturday as a guy that we feel certainly played winning football.

Q. Certainly it didn't matter in the outcome of the game or the score, but you had a couple of opportunities where you could have kicked long field goals like 59 or 60 yards. What goes into the decision making? Sort of score and just general feeling?
COACH HOPE: A lot of things. I think he was primed to do it. He hit them well in pregame, and the wind was, I think, right. It wasn't a big wind or anything like that, but it had a little bit of breeze. The ground wasn't quite as dry as I would like, but where we were at on the field and how much time was on the clock and not wanting to give, you know, the other team the potential to have life.
You know, momentum's a funny thing. Those guys came down here on a mission to do something very special with the opportunity that they have. So you get their A game. They come down and play very emotional. To have missed it and give them the ball at that point in time on the field I didn't think was the best thing for our football team. Had they taken it and scored and gotten ahead -- I don't know what the score was at the time. Gotten close or whatever it would have been, I didn't think it was the best thing for our football team momentum-wise. That had something to do with the selection process.
If there had been a minute left on the clock or time-out or whatever it was, I would have taken a shot. But I didn't think I needed to here.

Q. Can you tell us about some of your other injuries. Cortez went down with what he thought was a high ankle sprain. Brandon Taylor out there for a while too.
COACH HOPE: I think everybody is going to be okay. The most questionable guy might be Brandon Taylor because it's an ankle, you know, and he's going to be just fine. We hope he's just fine this weekend. He got a lot better from yesterday to today. If he stays the course, he'll probably be ready, but we won't know until the latter part of the week.
Everybody else, I think, is going to be just fine. We went into the game last week without Brewer. He hadn't played a whole lot, but he's a pretty good prospect. He banged up something in the middle of practice last week, but we get him back this week, which is good, because he's a guy that backs up two or three guys across the offensive line, and he's a pretty good prospect. Glad to get him back. Don't know if we'll get Brandon Taylor back or not.

Q. What intangibles will you miss from Keith Smith?
COACH HOPE: You know, timing in life is really important, and he has a unique way about him from a timing standpoint of knowing when to get their attention. He really does. He can tell about when it's time to jerk them all back in line.
You know, over the course of the summer, we had a lot of guys here for summer school. They don't have to come workout. The rules say they don't have to come workout, but they need to. And at a certain point in time during the course of the summer when some guys weren't showing up enough, he set a time for them all to be there, and they were there. So from a timing standpoint, he knows when to step up, when guys start lagging behind a little bit, the day they start dragging in camp and he didn't see us gaining momentum. He has a great sense of timing of when to step up as a leader.
Lots of guys try to lead, but sometimes they miss it, they miss the timing part of it. He does really well with that.

Q. Obviously, you can still rely on his voice.
COACH HOPE: He's going to be there with us. He's still on the team, okay? It's an injury. He's still with us. He's going to be part of the team and a big part of it. He's one of our better leaders. We met yesterday and talked about it. Like I said, he's doing very well. He's a smart guy, a mature guy. He's got a plan and a great handle on it. He can still help our football team from a leadership standpoint, no question about it. He'll be there with us. Just won't be getting to make the catches in the games. That's the only difference.

Q. How do you anticipate defenses playing you now without Keith?
COACH HOPE: Probably the same. They've still got to line up and defend that person we line up over here they can throw it to. Whether it's Keith or whoever it is. If they don't, guess what? We'll throw it over there. They'll have to defend who we line up, where we put them at, whether it's Keith or not. I don't see it changing a whole lot.
He's a big play guy. He's a really good player. It's like losing Ralph. He's one of your better players on the football team. You have some other really good guys that you recruited, some guys that can step up and do a great job, but they may not be quite the same impact player that Keith or Ralph is, but I don't see a whole lot changing from how people would line up to defend us. I really don't.

Q. Back to Al-Terek, I didn't get a chance to see it because I was down on the field, but his run, when he started, he rolled over a defender and didn't hit the ground and then continued on his way. What about him, his athletic ability, allowed him to make that kind of play on Saturday?
COACH HOPE: He's a great athlete. He really, really is. He's very, very smooth and has excellent balance and body control. There's a lot of times that we've looked at him and thought he might be one of our better receivers. He would empty out and do some things on perimeter. If you take a running back and put him on formation on the perimeter and run some routes, so we take the running backs down and do individual routes, when we throw individual routes with the receiver. They get in line and run the same routes the receiver runs, and he looks really, really good.
So we're not surprised to see him step up and do something very athletic. We think he is very athletic. That's why we keep trying to get him on the field. So I wasn't surprised to see that. He's an excellent athlete, great balance and really good speed. He's just not full speed right now yet, but he's getting closer.

Q. Is that something, when you watch film with the team, that there's a little hooting and hollering about that?
COACH HOPE: Oh, yeah, any big play. The special teams, we had a lot of fun with this week. A lot of big hits special teams-wise, and Al-Terek's play. The offensive line stepped up somewhat from an aggressive standpoint, and those other guys were aggressive too. They had a good battle and had a lot of fun with it. So there was a lot of whooping and hollering in the meeting.
There's usually a lot more when you win. Whooping and hollering even when you lose, but there was a lot more Saturday.

Q. Just the way you executed basically the two-minute offense at the end of the first half -- I think there was about three minutes to go, but it was a 14-play drive. Just how did you feel about what your offense did in that situation?
COACH HOPE: Well, that's one of the things we wished we'd have done more in the opening game. We don't do it all the time. We don't major in it like a lot of people do. Sometimes it's hard to tell when we're in it and when we're not. I think we do that very well.
We didn't utilize our no huddle, or our hurry-up offense, either one, much against Notre Dame because we wanted to stay on the field and eat the clock up some and not have their offense out there so much. They're such a big play oriented offense. We had a young secondary, that we didn't use our hurry-up offense much in the first game.
When we did, we had some successful drives. So we used it a little bit more this week. I like it. It's very efficient. We like to huddle up some too. We feel like sometimes from a leadership standpoint and everybody being on the same page and a rhythmic standpoint, geting in a huddle and having everybody looking at each other eyeball to eyeball and having the quarterback taking charge brings a lot to the offensive drive and series as well.
So we sat down and had conversations in the past whether or not we'd be exclusive no huddle or not, and we're going to huddle up some. That's one of the reasons why. But I like our hurry-up offense. It's good.

Q. Now, Ball State used two quarterbacks last week in the game, and it's unclear which one they're going to start on Saturday. But just talk about each one and what do you think the strengths of each quarterback is on their team.
COACH HOPE: I haven't spent a whole lot of time watching their quarterbacks. They've been certainly a more run-oriented football team. You know, I spent most of the time looking at what they do from a run game standpoint.
You know, one quarterback was a starter last year, I believe, and got hurt for part of the season last year, and he's the guy that has the most experience. But most of my effort is in watching their run game, which is really good. I don't know which quarterback they're going to start or play. I don't see them changing their offense a whole lot.
They're really, really good at the power run game. They're exceptional at it. They've got some horses in the backfield. They have really good running backs. They're very physical runners, and they're fast, and their offensive line is athletic and has a really good tempo and motor about it. They've got an aggressive offensive line.
So I don't see them changing their offenses -- their offense, regardless of which quarterback they go with.

Q. One of those running backs is a Ft. Wayne kid, MiQuale Lewis. He hasn't done too much this year, but he's number three all time on their rushing list. They're kind of spreading it out this year, but have you seen him specifically?
COACH HOPE: I've seen all their backs. They're very good. A couple of years ago he was one of the top backs in the country and had a tough injury, similar injury to -- I don't know the official prognosis or diagnosis, but he had a -- you know, like Jaycen Taylor, when you come back the next year and you're still a good player, but there's still some hurdles that you have to get past.
And they've recruited and done well from a talent standpoint at the running back position, but he's a very good player. One of the great players in the country a couple of years ago, and they got a sixth year of eligibility out of him, and he can help them win, and he's a very good player.

Q. You had mentioned on the radio show last night that you also got injured your senior year in college?
COACH HOPE: Yeah, I did. About the third game and was a captain. We sat down and talked about it, and he expressed, you know, what he thought his role would be if the news wasn't good, what his plan would be. I explained to him that I had a similar situation. So we can relate to where he's coming from.

Q. What was your injury?
COACH HOPE: A lower extremity injury. A hip thing.

Q. Seriously?
COACH HOPE: If I told you now, you guys wouldn't know what to think. I never tell you what the injuries are, just for fun. You can call my high school coach.

Q. What was the toughest part just from the mental aspect then for you kind of going through the rest of the year?
COACH HOPE: Not getting to play and not being with my teammates. That's the -- senior year, you know, is a really special year for a guy, you know. So a guy like Keith that's captain and all, it's a very difficult thing. So not getting to play, not getting to be with your teammates when they played and won.
But he'll be with us. He's do some of the same stuff that I did, pretty similar role, I assume.

Q. You had Cody Webster handling punting duties for a little bit in the first half there. What have you seen out of him, and are you looking to get him more involved?
COACH HOPE: The situation in the first game was really a struggle, you know, for Cody because the wind. You know, high wind, and we got some bad field position early to punt with. We knew, if we went in there, it was going to be a struggle from a weather standpoint or a condition standpoint. We were going to go to Carson. So he didn't get to punt. I believe he didn't punt any in the first game.
But we want him to. I believe he's a really talented punter and can knock it a long ways. He needs to be more consistent, but he can be a great punter while he's here. He can be one of the great punters to punt at Purdue. He has an excellent leg. He's a left-footed punter, which is important. I don't know if you realize it, but most of the punters, or a lot of the punters in the National Football League are left-footed punters, a larger percentage than are left-footed people in the world.
So there's some method to the madness. The ball spins a different direction, the flight's a little different. So he has the ability to punt it a long ways. He does it now in practice. I thought he did good in the game the other day and was glad to get him some.

Q. Would you like to utilize more of Robert Marve's mobility, maybe even calling run plays for him?
COACH HOPE: We don't have to call them for him because he takes off and runs with it enough on his own right now. So I was scared to call one for him. He'd probably throw it. He's unbelievable competitor, unbelievable competitor.
One of the things we came out of the game with was the third area that he grew and learned some this week was not take quite so many hits, you know. He manufactures some on his own, which is not a good thing if you're in control of it, and I think he saw the film and realized there's some times that he's got to duck and dodge and slide and get out of bounds rather than prove that he's the most manly guy on the field, you know, and finish every run like it's the last play of the game. So that was a big step for him as well, and that's important because we need him to stick around. He's got potential to be really, really good. So him taking care of himself is important.
No, we haven't -- we have plenty of run plays for Robert Marve, and we probably won't invent any new ones.

Q. You brought Gabe Holmes' name up before and he's got some snaps on special teams. Is he somebody, perhaps as the season goes forth, who gets a look on offense?
COACH HOPE: We hope so. He is, I think, a very special prospect. If you look at him and didn't know anything about anything, you would think he's just about the way he looks. He's very tall. I think he's about 6'6". He was a neophyte to football to be a starter at St. Thomas. At Aquinas down in Ft. Lauderdale, they'll have 20 guys sign I-A scholarships on any given football team.
I remember going down and watching Gabe, and he had just started football and didn't know much about it, but I saw him play basketball, and he was 6'6" and by far the quickest guy on the court. He showed real speed and real quickness. As soon as you walked in the door and looked out on the floor, he stood out like a sore thumb just from a quickness standpoint. Once you realized how large he is, you knew he could be a great prospect for football.
He did a great job from the physicality part as a guy who hasn't lined up at tackle on the line of scrimmage so much. In practice he has. He's not afraid to come off the football and throw his face in there. He's still got to work up at fitting up better and finishing his blocks and being a more physical player like our senior tight ends are, but he will use his athleticism, and he will use his speed and accelerate into bodies with courage and fit up on them. So that's a good sign because he has speed and he has a big body.
So I think he's going to be a great, great tight end. I really do. And he can help us right now, you know, as a blocker and as a receiver as well. Not all the blocking scenarios. He wouldn't fare as well against a guy like Ryan Kerrigan as maybe a 22-year-old senior might, but he's athletic enough and tough enough and quick enough and coachable enough to go out there and play with some now.

Q. You often talk about how your depth chart can change on a practice-to-practice basis. You have four guys playing pretty similar amount of reps, and it would just seem like you could start any of those guys because they're all kind of playing pretty well.
COACH HOPE: A lot of our team has been that way. Now I think we're a little more solidified with the offensive line and who the backups might be and all that. I don't see the secondary position -- it may not change for a while because as soon as one of them gets nicked or dinged up, it will shuffle around again. So all those guys could play. All of them are like starters to me.
I couldn't tell you, winning the game last week, who was going to be out there. Two of the four corners would be out there. But grouping and personnel, to me, they're almost all the same. They're all guys with ability and can learn what to do. If we keep it simple, they can go out there and execute well enough for us to win. So, yeah, I see it changing frequently back there, or potentially it could.

Q. That's kind of a spot where in the past couple of years Purdue has had two guys who have been on the field the whole game. How nice is it to be able to rotate those guys? Because there's obviously a lot of running involved.
COACH HOPE: Well, it can be a difference-maker for you, but we certainly have to learn to play with more confidence because we're young. Before, you had four guys that had been out there for a bazillion starts and played together. So it was hard to pull one out. It's like a great offensive line that's been together for a long time. It's hard to pull one of those guys out.
And the guys we had behind them last year, most of them were much further away from being ready to play than we have right now. It was a much bigger drop-off from one to two last year. I don't think our ones where our ones were last year because we don't have near the experience. They have some great potential, but the guys that are behind them, there's not that much drop-off, and in some cases, they might even be better. It wasn't the case last year. Huge drop-off between Brandon King, David Pender, and our third corner last year. Right now, first, second, third, fourth corner are all very similar.

Q. And one other thing. You had said not too long ago you might get Kevin Pamphile back before the bye week? How far off is he?
COACH HOPE: We think we may have a chance to get him back this week. A lot is we haven't done anything for a long time. What we need for him to do, he can come in and do for us some. He's a big strong guy that can line up and come off the football hard. He can do that.
But he hasn't done hardly anything, so it depends how sore he gets trying it out in practice. If he gets real sore and he can't go for four or five more days, he won't be able to go. We can't just run him out there Saturday and haven't looked at him in five or six weeks. We don't want to do that. We've got to test him out first and see how he holds up. We'll know probably the latter part of the week. We'll test him out some this week in practice scenarios. He'll put his pads on, come out and practice some. We'll see how he does or how sore he gets or not. That will be the key.

Q. How do you think Rob Henry's played so far through two games?
COACH HOPE: I think he's done real well. Wasn't the prettiest of passes that he threw last week, the one that hit the dirt in front of O.J., but other than that, I think he's done very well. I remember it was kind of a joke around here on the staff that first year I was here with Coach Tiller, we had the bubble screen in, and Billy Dicken had to throw one in the dirt every game, and he did. We were sure glad to get that out of the way each game.
Rob threw one in the dirt the other day, and I'm glad to get that out of the way. He's improved a lot as a passer since he came to Purdue. He was new to the quarterback position in high school, even though he was an excellent quarterback in high school, great athlete, great person. But he's new to the drop -back passing game, so he's developing his skills and his rhythm and all that. He still has some work to do. I think he's come a long ways since he first came to Purdue, and he's worked really hard over the course of the summer on his own, throwing and catching with all the receivers.
So he's our number two passer, and we like his development. I think he's done very well and wouldn't hesitate one bit to play him in a game or to go into a game with almost the same package that we have for Robert, maybe a little bit different, and run our offense. He's a heck of a football player, and he's done a great job, and we're very comfortable with him.
You can trust him. He doesn't make many mistakes. Got a good head on his shoulders, sees things in front of him, and they haven't been able to slow him down in practice, the defense hasn't. He's been exceptional in practice.

Q. How well do you know Stan?
COACH HOPE: Not that well.

Q. My final thing is, Danny, how --
COACH HOPE: Why?

Q. Well, I think -- no, he's been -- he was at Wabash. He has ties to the area.
COACH HOPE: I've known of him for years, but I don't know him all that well personally.

Q. My final thing, Danny, haven't had a chance to ask because of the timing, but how did you and the staff and players enjoy the first Boiler Bridge Walk?
COACH HOPE: It was really good. I'm glad there were a lot of people there. We've done a lot of things, our football team, Chamber of Commerce, and the players trying to connect, you know, and grow and develop our relationship with our fan base and Tippecanoe County and the whole bit. So I was really excited that they came out and met our team, and the price was right. It's free, and the players are there. It's great. They get the little ones around them.
We had a great turnout for that, and that's something that can really make a difference. You know, football Saturdays in West Lafayette are a difference-maker through our community, from a revenue standpoint and a million other things as well. So it's something that we all need to get involved in. So it was great to see Purdue doing something and the community doing something. That's exciting.
And then I was really thrilled with the turnout that we had for the Meet the Boilers. We had thousands of people that showed up for that, and I've gotten a ton of e-mails. We did a thing before spring ball, when we had the Kids Fest out there. So we've done several things in the last year, and I think that was a sign that there's some good things going on.

Q. Thanks, Danny.
COACH HOPE: Thank you.
THE MODERATOR: Do we have anything else?
Thank you, Coach Hope.
COACH HOPE: Thank you guys.

End of FastScripts

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