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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 2, 2011

Mike London

MIKE FINN: We welcome Virginia head coach Mike London. We'll bring on coach, ask for a brief opening statement, then go to questions.
COACH LONDON: Thank you.
Definitely having an opportunity that's presented to go on another road trip, play another conference team, another team that actually borders the state in terms of recruiting, all the other implications that it has.
We're excited about the opportunity to travel, but also hopefully an opportunity to play well, play consistent enough to take care of our opportunities that may be presented.
Maryland is a very good team. Played a lot of good teams, played well offensively. Know they have injuries defensively. But they play hard on tape. They have a lot of good athletes.
Definitely will be a challenge for us. But it's one that we look forward to.
MIKE FINN: Questions for Coach London.

Q. Mike, Randy said a little while ago he hasn't named a starter at quarterback. Obviously their two guys have different skills. What kind of challenge does that present from a preparation standpoint? Do you have two different defensive game plans depending on the quarterback?
COACH LONDON: I don't think so. I think more importantly is the system that they employ. First things first with that. Obviously each one of them brings something to the table in terms of their abilities. But when you look at them, I know that C.J. does a great job of adding the running elements to his game. It becomes another option for them in their running game. But he can throw the ball as well.
I know with Danny O'Brien, he's already had documented evidence of being able to run an offense and make plays. Because of his accolades last year, just the type of poise that he plays with.
I think for us it's not as much 'who' as the 'what' in terms of their offense. They're two very good quarterbacks. They have a great runningback in Davin Meggett. They have wide receivers that are explosive receivers. The ball is going down the field to them. There's other elements we have to make sure we take a good look at and provide a game plan that can attest to a lot of things that they have, but maybe not so much as to who the quarterback is going to be.

Q. Mike, obviously they laid out the scenario that you guys have a chance to control things if you do what you have to do. How much do you talk to your guys about that? Maybe some of them who haven't been in that position before, how do you think they might handle the opportunities ahead of them?
COACH LONDON: Well, that's just it. They haven't been in that position before. The position we're in now is a position to improve upon what we were doing from where we were last year, the position to have an opportunity to win another road game against a border school that we recruit against, implications, all those things.
With this group, this team this year, it's about playing better, playing consistent, putting games back to back together that can help us improve to where we want to be.
Maybe a couple years from now you talk about winning out, running the table, controlling our own destiny. That's for teams that have been there and done that. This is one that is improving, making progress. The next opportunity for us to consider what you just talked about is to take care of business this game which becomes our most important game.

Q. On the converse of that, do you kind of shut down any talk that maybe you hear among players or coaches of what's out there, just have them focusing on the opportunity that comes on the next Saturday?
COACH LONDON: Well, in human nature, people read, the talk, I'd be disingenuous if you told them the opportunity that presents itself with one win right now, what that would do. They know that, but we don't talk about that. For us, we talk about putting back-to-back games together. This would be another great opportunity for us, particularly on the road, a road game.
What you say is correct. Those elements and that information is out there. I'd be negligent to think that they don't know about those type of implications and opportunities.
At the same time for this team, where we are in building this program, the next thing's next for us, and that's to put two back-to-back games together where we play consistent and well in all three facets.

Q. Against an NC State team that had allowed 17 sacks, I don't think you had a single sack two and a half weeks ago. Last Thursday you had three sacks against Miami. How much emphasis was placed on the pass-rush after that NC State game?
COACH LONDON: Well, you always place a lot of emphasis on your pass-rushing. I think it's also a product of the style of the offense that the other team plays. Not to say we always want sacks or you want hits on the quarterbacks, you want hurrys and pressures. Some offenses are more inclined to use the shotgun, get the ball, throw the ball, so the ball is not in the quarterback's hands so much. So your opportunities to sack him don't present itself.
You always want to try to get the sack, to get the pressure, to hit the quarterback, to try to affect his throw. An accumulation of those couple elements I just mentioned, I hope they affect the day. That's the mindset of going into this game also.
They do a great job running the ball, but there are also opportunities they have through play-action pass fakes and obviously some drop-back pass situations, it's going to be important for us if not to sack the quarterback but affect the rush lanes, the throwing lanes, get our hands on footballs, make the quarterback move his feet, try to hit the quarterback as most teams do.
We always take a look at that in terms of trying to get the quarterback, the implications of when you do that, make him move his feet, provide pressures and hurrys, they can be just as defined in the game.
So you have two quarterbacks here that are very good at doing what they do. It will be important for us to apply pressure.

Q. Can you discuss the development of your offensive line. Seems to be one of the strengths of this team, how they've come together and grown up.
COACH LONDON: I think going into the season on paper you look at it in terms of size, ability-wise. I thought we could be fairly representative of being the strength of the team. Evan Marcus, our strength coach comes in. The guys start putting up numbers in the weight room that's indicative of guys that have size, that are that big. So the strength elements of it also started to look like the height, weight, size and ability of the guys.
As the season has gone on, I think they've gotten stronger. They've created new max opportunities in the weight room. Sometimes you lift for just maintenance, but other programs, different people do things when you lift, you get stronger. I think that's a little bit of what's going on also, the ability for them to continue to play strong and to be stronger as you go into the latter part of the season.
The best element of our team for us to have success, we're going to need everything they can give us. The development has been kind of neat to watch. But as we always say, you're only judged in terms of your next game. The next game is this Saturday. So there will be another benchmark to reach. We haven't arrived anywhere. We haven't done anything. But they know that the success of this team is largely due to the success that they have up front.

Q. You're playing a team that's right at the bottom of the ACC in rush defense. You've got to run the ball on a team that has trouble stopping the run?
COACH LONDON: I think when you look at the different elements going into the game, you take the strength that you have and you try to take the strength you have and use it to the best of your ability. I know they've struggled a little bit defensively with personnel. They moved guys here and there. They've lost a lot of guys. Randy is a good coach. I'm sure he's going to do things to shore up whatever he thinks they have to do.
But I think we have to still continue to try to be true to who we are. If the running game is working, fine. If not, go to the passing game. If the running game is working, every once in a while off the play-action passes, things like that, just not to become one-dimensional.
Most teams you do what you do, whatever is working you continue to do it. I think that will be part of the game plan for us. If it is the running game, it is. If not, we have to do something else to win the game, be competitive, we'll have to do that. But, as you say, the running game should be a strength of ours.
MIKE FINN: Coach, thanks for being with us. We'll talk to you Wednesday.
COACH LONDON: Thank you, everybody.

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