UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 7, 2004

Tyrone Willingham

COACH WILLINGHAM: That's always a concern when you're in a situation where you're starting a season without being successful in the first ballgame. But you quietly tell your football team that we look at every football game as being very important. There's not one that's more important when you look at it, but at the same time, you know where your big games are. That's something that just comes naturally. So we have to balance that. I have to keep giving the proper perspective and understanding that we are playing the nation's No. 5 team, depending on who you listen to or the No. 7 team, but somewhere in there, we are playing one darned fine football team. And we have to be prepared to go play our best game, okay, and be prepared then after that to take whatever else comes.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, that's why you look at your film very closely and you evaluate the film to see whether it's the scheme or individual breakdowns; and usually, it's always a combination of both. You're trying to get them in the right situation and you need them to actually make and execute the plays.

COACH WILLINGHAM: It's been floating a little bit, but it's not been very active or a lot of people haven't adapted to it. That was a surprise scheme that you don't see very often. What they did was try to position themselves where they can release as many people as possible to cover the kick, but at the same time, make it very difficult by placing basically a wall right in front of the punt.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I think you can. I don't think you can say that you can't get there, okay, but you've got to make sure that you hit all of the pressure points just right to get that done.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, if you noticed at the start of the ballgame, we were very fortunate -- well, not fortunate. But they deferred, which would have been our choice to see if you could start that positive spin on field position. But the key is when you get caught with bad field position, you have to understand how important that is and see if you can get those couple of first downs to maybe put yourself in good position, and then you don't have to be as dependent on your kicking game to bail you out if you don't have a spectacular kicking game.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think so. But at the same time, those are all things that you try to make sure they are very clear on. Coming into this ballgame, we knew that their kicker, going back one year, had done a great job of putting, I think it was two or three of them inside that ten-yard area. So what you are trying to get them to do is one, get Rhema to be aggressive, to have a very close decision-making process that you can field one and return it; then you really take away that weapon that they are trying to gain on you. And in the process of doing that, I think he was a little too aggressive in trying to make something happen.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I think we are all very disappointed because I felt comfortable in my belief that this would be a good, solid total offensive performance for us. And saying that, I still have great respect for BYU's defense. I think they were ranked in the top 20 last year, and I thought they were a better defensive team this year than they were last year. But still I felt like we would be able to come out and have an excellent performance and have a balanced attack and we didn't do it. I'm disappointed, not disillusioned, still confident that we can do some things offensively. But at the same time, really disappointed that we didn't.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I'm always a believer that you have to have everything in the right place to have a great offense. As coaches we have to put them in the right position and our players have to execute. We've got to throw, catch, run, block; and if you do those things, then you can get the job done. But if we don't put them in the right place, we're hurting. If we do put them in the right place and you don't get the execution, you're hurting. So it's all got to come together.

COACH WILLINGHAM: After looking at it, I think Brady did a good job for us. I think there are some things that he would like to improve on, some things that I'd like to see him improve on. And one of the things that's very dangerous about a quarterback and really forces his hand, is that when you get pressure, it's usually difficult to maintain that internal clock. Usually it speeds up on you; and therefore, you do things a little quicker than you need to be.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, when you constantly change the lineup, and that was what their scheme was designed to do, was make it very difficult to identify their personnel, who the linebacker was, when he was coming, which one would it be in the down line position, walking up in the line of scrimmage, and we didn't do a good job of that.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think they may be -- as I know SC has had a wonderful group the last couple of years, but the Michigan receivers may be as good as any group in the country. Of course, I watched a couple of catches, I think it was Edwards had against Miami and they are circus-type catches that just average guys don't make. You have to be very special to make those plays. So they are a very talented group.

COACH WILLINGHAM: No. I think what Brady will do is just go through his normal progressions. And I hate to, you know, try to cover somebody's conversations secondhand, first of all. But second of all, I think what he might be implying is that in relationship to what I just said, that internal clock; just try to be a little bit more patient. Tried to hold things a little bit over, not try to force things. I don't think necessarily ever forcing a pass is the right thing to do. But what I think we may be talking about is trying to be a little bit more patient, hold onto things a little bit longer in order to have things open up.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, if you had studied and followed our defense, you will know that really our two safeties are almost interchangeable, depending on formation, motions, adjustments that we make. Either one could drop down in the box. So we felt like to give us the best play and put our best people on to the field in this particular ballgame that he was included in that.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think -- and you can't go back and say with the exception of, you can't do that. You can't take those plays out, but I thought if you took out those three deep balls, our guys in the secondary basically held our own, because I thought our defense did a pretty good job.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I don't think we were pleased, nor were they, with the performance we had. I thought we were not as aggressive and tentative to some degree, which compliments the thought we had about the idea.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Maybe the reads eventually took it there. Maybe there were other combinations at a deeper depth that would have got the first down that weren't available; so therefore, you bring it down to that and you hope on that five yards he can take that extra two to make a play.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, the biggest challenge, and I will say this to any player, is not necessarily the physical aspect of it. It's really the mental component of trying to understand what to do, how to do it, what the adjustments are and the complications at the collegiate level.

COACH WILLINGHAM: In some cases it can be a real plus. But I would think right now that with our high school systems and the lack of funding in a lot of areas, you're struggling to get a lot of the detailed coaching that you need.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I gather from the first game, it's kind of been a pleasant surprise for me. I was once not necessarily in favor of that, but it didn't seem to create any undo problems. I think the officials did a good job with it and structurally it went well.

COACH WILLINGHAM: It does take time. It's like learning a new job. But at the same time, I don't say that in order to say that's an excuse for us not executing and performing the way that we should, because I have great confidence in that group in that they can do some very good things. But it does take time. You are asking for guys to change hands sometimes and change stances, which doesn't seem like very much. But when you've got a pretty good pass rusher coming off your right tackle, changing hands could be significant. So all of those little things go into it but it takes time. The communication takes time. But skill, that's not any out for absence of performance.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I thought we were tentative both in the backfield and up front. We did not sustain and we tried to get it to the right places, but sometimes we didn't.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Marcus has had an, I think, excellent winter. He has gotten himself bigger, stronger. He understands the scheme and the responsibilities better. We always thought that the strength of his game was his pass receiving and route-running ability, but he's also added the ability to be a much better blocker, and that's exciting to add that into the mix.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I would say probably the biggest thing was blocking.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think their program does a wonderful job. And comparing a question that I heard on somebody comparing that to the question we just had when you talk about keeping coach's programs in high school, they do a great job of having so many of their coaches right there in the school to where they can really help the kid all day long. And maybe there's some breaks that allow them to benefit that other programs don't have to help in their development.

COACH WILLINGHAM: No, I'm surprised. He should have been. I think we almost missed four or six of them I thought -- maybe I'm wrong. Did I see the wrong copy? You didn't have the copy I had then. (Laughter).

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, you always want to take what they can give you, that's No. 1. But you hope the option they give you is the one that you prefer in those situations. But we are constantly working every day, the times that you've been able to see us practice, you see that the down-and-distance markers are right there. So they are always practicing game-like situations, so that our quarterbacks, running backs and receivers have that awareness of knowing down-and-distance, third down situations, how it affects what you have to do, whether it's go an extra yard or not. You are always practicing those things. But if it's not there, then you give yourself your best option, and I believe that's what Brady had done.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, he's shown right off the bat that he has excellent vision. I think he can be a very fine runner. The concern that you always have for any back is his ability to integrate himself into your protection and route and running. So I think he's coming along fine, and I think in the future he's going to put himself in a position to play.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Not sure yet. So I would be ill-advised to say that. Then you would get on me about the depth chart.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, the first portion of that is probably the most difficult, is being experienced enough and comfortable enough and relaxed enough to see what's really taking place. And once you can see it and understand it, okay, when the real backers, Sam backer and the Mike backers both step on the safety and the back will step up and start to apply pressure; that they recognize it. Because so many receivers, you point to it, you talk about it, but they say it, but never see it. So therefore they don't pick it up; they don't make the adjustment. When you have guys that start to understand the scheme of the defense, then they can start to replace those with the spots we would like to have them fit into.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I think you can go back and say, very simple message: Two wrongs never make a right. When they are committing themselves to things they are not responsible for with the hope it's going to compensate for someone else usually winds up being a serious mistake in both areas. They have to be comfortable knowing that our guys with the exception of three plays I thought had some pretty good coverage during the course, and they will get better and we will get stronger as a defense. And if everyone does their job, we will be successful.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, the problem that we have is that we have struggled on offense, and that's probably been the biggest area of concern for me, talking about confidence and getting our team going. So that is my major focus. Defensively we have done some good things. But we as coaches have to provide kind of that boost for them, okay, that's more that you have to coach perfect, okay, to start that boost, start getting everything to trigger so that we can have the kind of success that we expect and anticipate.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I think they do believe, first of all. I don't think our team is devoid of belief in themselves. I think if you talk to Raymond McKnight, he will tell you, "I think I can get it done." As long as they don't try to do more than they are capable of doing and try to do too much or force the ball as I've heard someone ask about this morning, but just be confident and do the things and play within yourself will be my key and good things will start to happen.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, the latter part of that, no, I did not give any consideration to put him physically -- it was not the right time for him, and it probably would have adversely affected the rest of the season, and we don't want to do that. Do we miss or did we miss his experience and his ability? I think we do. But I still don't think that was the result of us losing a football game. It's still very much a team game. But Ryan will hopefully, when he returns, add something very positive to our group. He's an experienced runner, he's an experienced guy in the system in, understanding protection through the block, and he does have a physical presence.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, first of all, knowing him from high school, I think he is an incredibly poised and talented young man. I think he really benefitted from having a really sound core around him. He's got great receivers. They went back and stepped up and looking forward to him being in their system and they played great defense. I think when you have all of that around you, it makes that start that initial game a lot easier but he still performed very well.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Guys, gosh, I'm kind of surprised. Well Freedman is on there this week.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Right now he'll begin the week practicing as our No. 1 back, and we'll see where that goes. That may mean he may be in the lineup, or he may not be in the lineup. It just depends on how strong he is and how the injury responds to practice this week.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Because I think I can honestly say that I've seen it work. I think our defense has shown itself to be a pretty good defense. And yet, I've seen us have success against our own defense. So I think there are some things in there that will be successful. I have great confidence in our young men. I think I have a fine quarterback in Brady Quinn. I think I have a good receiving core in Raymond McKnight and Holiday and Anastasio and guys in that group. I like our tight ends. So I have a great deal of confidence in our group that we will be successful.

COACH WILLINGHAM: We will look at it. I am not sure right now.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think we tackled that every week in preparation for every team. We spend probably an overadequate amount of time, looking at blitz, analyzing blitz, practice blitz, taking on blitz, putting them in almost every conceivable situation we can put them in.

COACH WILLINGHAM: When you don't have success, it is amazingly disappointing, to our players as well as to our coaches.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, as you can imagine, recovering from a knee injury is a very difficult thing to do. We're blessed by the technology that we have today that's probably a little easier than it was 15 or 20 years ago. But Kyle has done a great job of getting himself rehabbed to be able to step on the field and play. Also what I have been most impressed with is his leadership. Sometimes it's easy when you have an injury to only focus on self and not be as strong in terms of leadership for the other team members. He has done a great job of maintaining both. His play Saturday I thought was very good.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, if you're going to be a coverage team in almost every coverage team I think I saw -- I think I saw Michigan give up a deep pass to Miami. And I think they think they have got one of the finest secondaries in the country with those two corners and the safety. So if you're going to play back aggressive and go against some of the receivers that we have, they are going to be someplace. What you try to do is limit them. We will we would have been a far better team Saturday if it had been one or zero or it had been two. You give yourself a better chance of. You hope not to have to -- but some of those are going to happen. I think they happen in pro ball.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I can understand your question, and I can see that from your perspective that would be almost an insurmountable task, but if I am correct, there are always constant reminders of an underdog overcoming what some may see as not being possible. I would probably say that as of recently, within the last month or so, there was a basketball team that we thought was fairly talented -- we'll say that.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Now everything has some flaws, but they were not quite as successful as they were, and somebody defeated them. So I think there's still hope for us as the underdog.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I would like to say -- I won't call him a new person, okay, but I think the experience that he's had in having to come back from the injuries, the multiple shoulder injuries that he's endured has allowed him to take a little different perspective, and that perspective that's been very positive in terms of our football team and his demands on himself. I think he has pushed himself even further than he had pushed before, and I think he's also responded in pushing others on our football team to be a lot better and be more demanding.

COACH WILLINGHAM: No, I don't think so. Well, there's some instances where you probably could get overhyped but I think for the most part that's very good.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, when you can do that, you take away really a defensive advantage. Because if you look at the percentages, if the defense can get you in that negative field position where you're starting from your own goal line, the percentages say that somewhere along the line, you will do something to trigger your own demise, and you can't do that. If you can break that pattern, then you really hurt the defense at a point where they don't think they can be hurt. So, we had a tendency I think to start some drives, a couple first downs mand then we had, one came to mind a holding penalty down the field that really took us back and then you had an off-sides or something of that nature. Those are the mistakes that defense counts on; and in tennis calls those, what I call them, unforced errors; and those are the kind of things you can't have because then you're defeating yourself.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, it puts more pressure everywhere. Because when you don't get those first downs and don't get positive field position, that now means that your defense is already in scoring position when they take the field and that's not a positive situation.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I would believe that because of the prominence of this game and the tradition that it's had and the success that the teams have had, that this game becomes extremely important, not just to the teams but to their fans. And therefore, there is a huge emotional level attached to this game, and any time when you have huge emotions, okay, when it's raised, there's a tremendous difference; and when it's lowered, there's a tremendous difference.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, I think in that year it added a great deal of confidence so that they can accomplish even more. So I think it did add something to our team.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think we would like to see Carlyle play a bigger role. For whatever reason, sometimes the rotation doesn't work out in one's favor, but that's something that we will be looking at to see if we can find ways to get Carlyle more involved in what takes place.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Then I'd have to say yes to that.

COACH WILLINGHAM: We had and did use several of our internal, what I call, run-with-misdirection plays, and we didn't have, I think, maybe twice we had some success with them. But for the most part, not much in our running game was very effective. So therefore, we didn't have the ability to kind of offset that pressure, but I think we attempted to, and not only that way was our misdirection, but in other ways trying to provide something to counter their pressure.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I will apologize because I will again say it's kind of all of the above. We didn't execute in any of the areas to the extent we needed to to be successful.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Well, he comes at you with a lot of energy. It's kind of like almost a little package of dynamite that's kind of exploding on the scene in a very positive manner. It would have been at our first team meeting when I had a chance to just visit with him for a brief second. He just gives you such a positive feeling about himself and what he wants to accomplish.

COACH WILLINGHAM: Trying to make sure I followed your question. Could you give it to me one more time?

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think it is a real plus, because what it does is raise the level of competition. And for competitive guys, they thrive on that. They thrive on being challenged to be their best. So I think it is a real plus for them.

COACH WILLINGHAM: That is more than fair. That is extremely accurate.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I think our guys were disappointed; that we didn't perform in the manner that we thought we would. I say that more from an offensive standpoint. I think the total team felt very much the same because the end result is trying to win, and we didn't feel like we accomplished that. But, again, there were some good things and we've got it take those and take the negative things and build on them and go get a win.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I'm one to just take one game at a time and I'm trying to remember that year, who did we play after that? Was it Michigan State?

COACH WILLINGHAM: Okay. Then you just focus on that game. So, no, I try not to get ahead of myself or behind myself.

COACH WILLINGHAM: I guess I'll say I'm surprised that Coach Carr has included us, but I thank him for doing so.

COACH WILLINGHAM: It means I thank him for including us.

COACH WILLINGHAM: You're welcome.