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RUTGERS UNIVERSITY MEDIA CONFERENCESeptember 5, 2011Greg SchianoCOACH SCHIANO: Got a great challenge this week in the University of North Carolina Tar Heels. Going down and playing in a great setting for a football game, and we are looking forward to it. It's a huge challenge. Try to answer any questions that I can. Q. Inaudible? COACH SCHIANO: They are very, very talented. They have a lot of NFL talent. Butch does tremendous job of recruiting and gathering talented players. Yeah, there's really not a weak spot on their football team. Q. Desmond? COACH SCHIANO: Desmond, he's nothing broken, nothing torn. So we'll see. Hopefully he can play. We are not sure. Q. Will he play against North Carolina? COACH SCHIANO: I hope so, but I don't know if that's going to happen or not. Planning not. Hopefully he'll surprise us. Q. With Betim feeling -- COACH SCHIANO: Yeah, we mix it around, Betim would get some time. Not sure right now how we are going to do that thing at the O-line. Kind of work on it this week. Q. Was the other quarterback that sharp in the opener or was it that he just didn't get much pressure? COACH SCHIANO: No, he was incredible -- no. JMU is a good football team, good defensive team. JMU had their chances -- I tell you what, he's as good as I've seen, that kid. I've heard, you know, over the years how talented that he is, and just I guess -- he's playing behind a guy that really knew their system, but this kid is something else now. They are calling him -- I read somewhere they call him "Baby Brett Favre" but I can see why. He's mobile and he can make every play. Not a ball hit the ground on Saturday, which is -- I don't know if I've ever seen that in a college football game. He's good. Very good. Q. How about their two-headed backfield, they both bring dimensions; 26 is a bit shiftier. COACH SCHIANO: They do. 32 is a big, athletic guy, and he really brings a thump. 26 is a guy that we recruited who is an exceptional running back. I mean, really, really good. In high school he's as good as there was in America. We didn't really get very far with him, I didn't feel, but we sure liked him. So he's from St. Thomas Aquinas, great high school program. He didn't play last year but their program plays in games that are like college games as it is. He is a threat. And you watch him, you know, they did split carries and he had 60-something yards, but you can tell he's a threat to score at any time. He's a hold-your-breath back. Q. The coaching change down there, does it change, does it make it more difficult for you since it's only one game of tape this year? COACH SCHIANO: Offensively, their offensive coordinator has been there, you know, the whole time. Defensively, the head coach was a defensive coordinator, so imagine that there's going to still be a strong -- and what it showed on tape, was very similar. Now, who knows, maybe for our game it will be different. But I think they do what they do and they are good at it, so why would you change. Q. Is it too early in the season for this to be a barometer game? COACH SCHIANO: Oh, I think we are just a team that's trying to get better. I don't know if I would call it a barometer game. They are a good team. They are definitely -- they are a very good team. We are taking a huge step up in competition this week. Q. Just to find out where you might be? COACH SCHIANO: Yeah, we are playing a good team, so let's find out how we stack up against them. And this is a team that's, talent-wise, you know, one of the better teams in America as far as talent goes when you look across the board. Their defensive line and their offensive line, there's probably none better. I mean, the offensive line is really good, and the defensive line, you know, 90 is as good a player as there is in America. He'll be a second or third pick in the draft I think. You are looking at guys that are NFL players and then they have some young defensive linemen that are really good, as well. Some of these guys were forced into action last year because of some of the suspensions, so now they have a little experience. The linebackers run very, very well. The secondary has some experienced guys back there, big corner in Boston, No. 10; so there's some really good players on defense and they run extremely well. Reminds me of some of the Miami teams athletically on defense that Butch together down at Miami. That's the kind of talent there is. Offensively, I told you the offensive line is tremendous and the quarterback, which was the question mark to the outside, which I kind of knew what kind of athlete he was, so it wasn't that big of a surprise to me. It wasn't any surprise to me. But you can just see, he can break a game open. The two running backs like we talked about, very, very good. And then the wide receivers, which we have not mentioned, the 83 is as good as there is. He will really a big-time receiver, and then his supporting cast is good, as well. Tight ends, they lost their tight end but he got hurt last year and so some other guys got experience and they are going to use the tight ends. It's a challenge. Q. It's about narrowing down to the 15 best -- is this one of those games where probably 15, if you can control 15 on each side will play and there won't be as much liberal substitution? COACH SCHIANO: Defensively, I can't say that, because I don't know how much of a difference there is after a couple guys, you know. So we may play more people on defense. Health may have -- Marvin Booker is a little banged up. I don't know what he's going to be able to do. You know, a lot of this will unfold during the week. We'll see. Q. Have you pared down the running back situation yet? COACH SCHIANO: No. Not really. I think we'll work on that during the week. I thought Rocket -- in watching the tape, De'Antwan, he ran very good, very well. Savon did some good things. They all did. I don't know, you know, we'll have to see. Q. Did Jeremy Deering come out of the game health-wise okay? COACH SCHIANO: He did. That was a test and also something we are excited about. So now we'll try to give him a little bit minority. Jeremy is one of those guys that's a hold-your-breath guy, too, when he touches it, as good as we have seen. He can go the distance. So hopefully we'll try to get him a new more touches. Q. How did Bujari, how did he grade out, stepping in for Wynn? COACH SCHIANO: He made some mistakes, as you would anticipate, his first real action in a college football game. But overall, I think he did pretty well. He plays physical, which is something that's going to be critical this week. You're talking about a defensive front seven as is as good as there is in college football. So, we'd better play physical. Q. You mentioned Booker. How happy are you with the defensive ends? COACH SCHIANO: Work-in-progress. They are all new, every one of them. You know, again, the step up in competition, this O-line, I don't want to, you know, overdo it, but this O-line is as good as we'll face. They are huge, they are athletic, they are experienced. I don't know what they are not. They are very good. So we are going to get -- we are not very big, so it will be interesting. Q. All summer -- you thought you would be going against Butch again and that he's not there -- COACH SCHIANO: Odd is not the word. I'm really disappointed. Butch and Tammy Davis are as good of people as there are in college football. I know Butch and the way he runs a program and I'm just -- I feel so bad that he's not doing. That I feel bad for their players. I was reading an article, the players, the first thing they wanted to do was give a game ball to Coach Davis. And I can see that, because Butch cares about kids and he does things the right way. I know there was some issues down there but that can happen anywhere. I feel really bad that he's not coaching. It's odd -- I don't know if that's the word. It's just a bad deal. Butch is a man of integrity and he's getting -- I just feel like the record needs to be straight on that, but you know, people can make decisions. That's their business. They run their programs. That's not my business. But as far as Butch Davis as a man and as a coach, I'd let him coach my kids. Q. Quarterback in high school -- do you have a target in mind where you would like him to be completions-wise? COACH SCHIANO: Yeah, I would like him to be over 60 percent. That's a challenge but that's where you want him. Never under 50 percent. I would take what their kid had -- what was that, 90-something percent, right? Q. Would he be over 60 if there were not drops? COACH SCHIANO: You always look at that, yeah. You can't control drops. I'm with you on that. Q. What do you see out of your secondary against NC Central that makes you confident going into UNC? COACH SCHIANO: You know, Duron obviously had some real productivity. David, although he did a very good job, did everything right. He didn't really have very many opportunities, so I'm anxious to see David take opportunities when they are presented -- cornerback play, steady but not spectacular. We need to play better at the cornerback positions. We need to make some plays at the cornerback position. Although we made a couple, we didn't make as many -- again, that's a position I coached as an assistant coach and I think at cornerback especially, you can do your job all night. That's expected of you. But you only get, maybe three or four or five opportunities, and if you make two or four, that's not a very good night, right, you're 50 percent. Baseball you would be an All-Star. Corner, you're not going to play very long. We need to make the plays at the corner position when they are presented. And you said it, no knock on North Carolina central, but the level of competition we are going to be going against is going like that this week at the wide receiver core that they have. They are big, they are fast, and they really understand the system. John Shoop is a tremendous coordinator. He's been there for several years, Butch's whole time there and he knows exactly what he wants to do. There is no question. When you watch the tape, you can see how he systematically picks apart defenses. So these receivers understand that. Q. You had some issues on special teams last year, a couple in the opener, is that an area that you have to win to win on the road against a quality opponent? COACH SCHIANO: Yes, it's critical. We had some issues, too, though. That's the problem. But yeah they had a freshman punter who dropped a snap, but he's got a tremendously strong leg. To beat out the Feagles kid, who is a New Jersey kid, who is a very good punter, to beat him out, this kid must be really good and I read the coach's comments, very strong leg. I think he can be one of those spectacular punters. So I think he probably had maybe some first-game jitters or something. But their runner No. 5 is another freshman, who all I hear is raves about his talent. So they have some very talented guys in special teams it appears. And the kicker, the veteran kicker, he split his leg -- indiscernible -- he did the place kicking and some other kids did the kickoffs. But they are solid on special teams and I think we have been solid. But last year one of the big plays in that game was a blocked punt. We have not very many blocked punts around here. That kills you. We see ourselves as punt blocker, not as a team that gets our own punt blocked. That was a critical play in our game last year. We'd better be on point. It's interesting, to go on the road and play a quality opponent like North Carolina in a great venue like Kenan Stadium is going to be quite a challenge, one that I'm anxious to see how our team responds. Q. Is Manny still working his way back? COACH SCHIANO: Manny played quite a bit. He is going to play even more this week. You're right, he was in on a short week of preparation because of his injury, so we'll hope that he can do a little more. Manny is a grown man. And you need -- you need men out there when you're playing on the road against an opponent of this level, not that you're not going to play the young kids but you need some men out there. Q. You're talking about their receivers, and the last few years you've seen some pretty good ones -- are they on that level? COACH SCHIANO: Yeah, I think so. I think 83 especially. I think 83 is going to be another first-round pick. He's that good, he's fast, he's big, he's very strong. You watch him go up in a crowd for a football, there's not many that he doesn't come down with. Just being there ain't going to be enough with this kid and that's what I talk about when we talked about the corners. Just being there is not enough. We have to make plays on the football, because he does. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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