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PURDUE UNIVERSITY MEDIA CONFERENCEOctober 15, 2013Darrell HazellCOACH HAZELL: Last week, I think the thing that we need to do obviously better are the things that matter, and the things that matter for us right now that are kind of putting us in a pickle are taking care of the football, getting off the field on third down and converting more third downs. We have got to punt the ball better and then we've got to find some more plays. We're not making enough plays on either side of the ball right now and those are the four things that are really hurting us. And especially you take a look at that game on Saturday, it's a 14‑0 game in the second quarter and there's an exchange of serves back and forth, back and forth. We're playing pretty good defense‑‑ and you know, that's the other thing. You watch the film, our defense was playing extremely hard and there's a lot of guys running to the ball and hitting and those type of things but you can't keep putting them back out on the field. 14‑0 in the game, there's an exchange and all of a sudden the ball is at the plus 47‑yard line and we have a little loss play and we put the ball on the ground and the next play it's a big play for those guys and it's a 21‑point game. So those are the things that we keep hurting ourselves and we have to get them fixed for us to be a good football team, because our margin of error is not very big and that's where we are right now. Our margin of error is not very big so we have to be able to eliminate those mistakes to give ourselves a chance to be competitive in the stretch. We'll go back to work today. What we said about the quarterback position, we have to narrow the package down; not because it's a knowledge thing but it's more about an execution thing, not only for the quarterback but for everybody on offense. We have to be able to execute better. We are seeing a lot more man‑to‑man coverage on third down and we are seeing a lot more blitz and we have to have answers for those things because we are going to continue to see those things. So we'll work at limiting the package even more and doing four or five things that we can do well. Q. You mentioned the turnovers, things like that. How much of that would you contribute to the immaturity of the offense, playing a lot of freshman, those kinds of things? COACH HAZELL: The big one‑‑ well, we had two in the first half. Danny throws a high ball to Yancey that led to‑‑ they had picked it off. Our defense did a good job and picked it off the very next play, but the next turnover we had, the critical one, was, you know, you had one freshman pitching to the other freshman. There was nothing wrong where the pitch. The freshman just took his eyes off the ball and dropped it and they were able to recover it. It's hard to put your hand on why we are turning the ball in those situations. It's a poor turnover. I don't really have an answer as to why that one is on the ground. Q. Is it just kind of ‑‑ with the freshmen that you have out there, how do you kind of rectify those mistakes and get them up to speed, especially with going through the rest of the Big Ten schedule? COACH HAZELL: Well, they have got to learn fast. There was 34 of 70 freshmen on our travel roster last Saturday. That's a lot of freshmen. And a lot of them are playing for us right now. So we have to do a good job of getting those guys caught up as fast as we can, and making sure that they don't make those young mistakes and hurt the football team. Q. After going through the pace, what did you think of the way that Danny performed and what can he do better other than breaking things down for him and simplifying? COACH HAZELL: Well, he has to be a little more accurate with the ball at times, but the big thing for Danny is to make sure that he throws the ball away in those critical situations. Some of our third down situations that we didn't convert were because we didn't throw it away and now all of the sudden it's second and 13 or second and 14. And those are hard for anybody to overcome, especially a young football team like us that's struggling a little bit throwing the ball. We've got to do a better job of throwing it away. Q. Can you just talk a little bit about, you know, you changed quarterback last week, you made a change on the offensive line, shuffled your receivers around a little bit. What more can you do at this point? COACH HAZELL: I think like I had mentioned before, I think we have to even limit what we're doing schematically so we can execute better. It's okay to know it, but you still have to go out and execute it. So that's what we have to do a little bit better offensively. Q. As a coach, how frustrating is it to watch the same things sort of happen over and over, whether it's the same guys or not? COACH HAZELL: Obviously it's frustrating. You put a lot of work into it and you want better results. So it's frustrating. Some of those things are frustrating. But you know where you are as a program. You're working through those things and the whole goal of the program is you have to continually try to get better at little things, and there's a lot of things that you have to get better at, and that's part of it. That's part of the growing process and our staff is working tirelessly to get those things fixed. And that's what they will do. Q. How much can you shrink the schematics and still be efficient? COACH HAZELL: You know, I think if you're doing a lot of things and you're just doing them okay, that doesn't help you. You've got to find three or four things right now where we are, maturity‑wise as a football team, and you've got to do them well. And you've got to be able to hang your hat on something, whether it's the inside zone or the power play or whether it's our three‑step game, getting the ball out of his hands, a mid‑range passing game. You have to find a few things that we can do. Also, you've also obviously got to scheme teams, so you have to find that balance to be able to do both. Q. And injury‑wise, how did you guys come out? COACH HAZELL: Really the only guy that left the game due to injury was Greg Latta and he had a slight hamstring but it's no worse than it was at this time last week. He should be fine. We'll limit his reps a little bit today in practice. But all in all, I thought we came out of the game pretty good health‑wise. We played a lot of people; we played a lot of people, a lot that you probably hadn't seen before. Q. The nickelback situation‑‑ COACH HAZELL: Ricardo is one of the bright spots of Saturday's game. I love having him down in the box. He's so active. He doesn't miss tackles. He's physical, and that's what we need out of that second level of defense. We had been a little bit‑‑ I don't want to say light or soft but we need more physical play out of that second line of defense and Ricardo brings that for us and he has done a really nice job of hitting the blitzes in the right spots and being able to tackle guys on the perimeter. I was very pleased with his play. Q. Do you have a sense of when Landon might be able to come back? COACH HAZELL: Landon is going to be practicing today. He's going to be in some individual drills today which is awesome to get him back, we need his leadership. He's the guy in locker room at half‑time that's speaking up now. He's the guy that's jumping on guys and trying to fire them up. We need his leadership desperately right now back in our locker room and back our secondary. So there's a good chance that you'll see him on the field for the Ohio State game. Q. I know the emphasis is you want to get the running game going and how do you do that facing the nation's best running game defense? COACH HAZELL: Our running game needs to get ramped up a little bit. It's funny, you watch the tape and they are getting hats on hats, our guys are blocking guys, but the lanes are so small. So we talked about doing some things with our splits and trying to create some bigger lanes. The guys are assignment sound. And you always wonder if a guy is missing a guy or cutting a guy loose, but that was not the case after watching the film. We need to create bigger running lanes and just a couple things to help our running lanes. In terms of their best defense in the country, they are good. Their front, they are very structurally sound with nine guys in the front. And those safeties are downhill, they are playing at eight yards, and they are screaming at downhill on the snap of the ball. So we are going to have to do a good job of neutralizing the safeties as well as being able to push the ball on the outside. Q. Up until a couple of games going, Michigan State offense had been struggling but the last two games, they really kicked it in gear. What kind of problems does that present now? COACH HAZELL: I just watched film the Indiana game before I came over here, and what you see with the Michigan State offense is a quarterback is really starting to play well, getting the ball out of his hands fast. But the more so than that, I see a very, very patient offense. They are playing behind their defense. They are not forcing the ball anywhere and if they have to punt it, they punt it. But they are starting to make some big runs because their defense is getting them lots of plays. That's when you see the maturity of their football team. Q. How high is DeAngelo's ceiling? COACH HAZELL: I think he's going to be spectacular. He's just scratching the surface right now. I think when you talk about trying to find playmakers on your football team, he's obviously one of the guys on our offense that's continually producing week‑in and week‑out. So we've got to find different ways to give him the ball. His ceiling is enormous. Q. Have teams started to roll things his direction? Do you anticipate them doing that now after the couple of weeks that he's had here back‑to‑back? COACH HAZELL: Yeah, he's had a lot of press coverage‑‑ a lot of teams will do that regardless but I think he's going to see more of it and we've got to be a smart staff and be able to protect him in those situations. Q. If you look at your third down defensive numbers, the numbers are startling in comparison so first and second down, especially Nebraska passing the ball. Was there something that you were doing systematically or schematically or something that was causing such a vast difference? COACH HAZELL: Well, we were 11 out of 21 or somewhere around those numbers which, you're right, it's staggering. We tried to get to them with a four‑man pass rush and you couldn't get home with him so you had to sit back and wait for some open guys. But then when you brought blitz, he was able to cut it loose and they were picking some guys and cut him loose. And the thing about it was, they were big chunks. It wasn't set and all of the sudden they pick up 23; it was third and nine and they pick up 18. It was the big chunks that were really hurting us. It wasn't so much the scheme as much it was we had to stay‑‑ get home when we had a four or five man rush and we have to stay a little bit tighter in coverage for some of those man‑to‑man for a little bit longer. Q. How do you feel like your offensive tackles are playing? COACH HAZELL: Solid, both of them were solid the other day. Obviously Kevin missed the block against a very good football player, No. 44. He missed one block, he gave up one sack but catching has been solid. There's been no issues on the outside there. Q. What do you feel like is causing some of Etling's inaccuracy at times? Does he feel rushed himself or have some mechanical things? COACH HAZELL: Saturday he had some mechanical issues in his drop. He was backpedalling instead of turning his shoulders and running out on his drop; he was floating to one side, which puts pressure on the tackle again. So some of those things were mechanical flaws that as a young player, when you're not feeling as comfortable as you should be, you lose some of your mechanics. Q. Do those three true freshmen defensive linemen you have playing, do they share any particular characteristics that you like in young players? COACH HAZELL: The two on the edges do, for sure. Those guys have big motors and they only know one speed, and that's what you love about those two guys. They are going to be great players for us. And we'll play those guys more and more and more each week. The nose guard now, he did a nice job in terms of holding the point. There was a couple times where we had the front go one way but he never got over to the gap. He never looked to the correct gap, which creates a scene. But he's going to be a good player. When they came to double him, he wasn't going anywhere. Q. Speaking with your true freshmen, Clark and Logan are two guys who got in the mix early, Logan maybe a little because of injury. But those are two guys you were high on from the start; why? COACH HAZELL: Clark is a tough guy. He's got a memory, he doesn't remember anything which is what you want in a corner. Very physical guy. He understands what we're doing, but the more and more he plays, the better he's going to get. He's going to be a great player, too. Q. And Logan? COACH HAZELL: You know, Logan is a guy that's starting to show what we saw on tape in high school, him being really a physical guy. He came down a couple times and really put a good shot on the running back. I think that's probably his best attribute. Q. We asked yesterday about 3‑4 and what it's going to be for the rest of the season and you said yes, but moving on past this season, do you start recruiting for the 3‑4? Is that a defense that's going to be part of your program from here on out? COACH HAZELL: You know, I can't talk about recruiting in terms of whether we are going to recruit the 3‑4 or 4‑3. We just need to get good players up front and we'll figure that out as we go. We are going to try to get the best players available that can rush the passer, stop the run and hold the point. Q. You talked about scaling back the playbook, but at some point do you just become so predictable or do you feel like you're there now? COACH HAZELL: No, the playbook was pretty extensive still last week going into last week's game. But we weren't doing anything exceptionally well or anything well. So I think we need to go and find three or four things that we do very well and hang our hat on it. Q. You talked about Michigan State's run defense, but just overall defensively, they ranked No.1 in the country just on yards allowed. What are you seeing beyond the defensive line that has made them successful? COACH HAZELL: Well, first and second down, you're going to get a nine‑man front every single snap. I mean, they are going to play a four‑man front; three linebackers and two safeties are standing at seven yards and they are daring you to run the football. They are going to put the corners on an island. The corners are playing separately. They have got their backs to everybody else and they are trying to shut down the wide receivers. On third down, here comes the heavy pressure then. They are going to play off‑sides to different blitz. They are going to three‑man blitz the back side, the running back side, and see if you can handle the pressure. They put a lot of pressure on you in third down in the passing game by blitzing but on first and second down, it's the nine‑man front that handles your run game. Q. And you saw plenty of blitzing last week; do you think it's going to be a different kind of blitz coming your way Saturday? COACH HAZELL: It's an overloaded blitz this week, as opposed to last week where it was not an overloaded blitz, so we have handle the overload on the blitz. Q. Yancey has been your most productive receiver to this date, but how many more do you need to really jump start this offense? COACH HAZELL: You need another guy to step up and we really do, to take the pressure off of him, to take the pressure off the quarterback, you need another receiver to step up. We as a staff, have to do a good job this week and weeks to come, of being able to cut those other guys loose by scheme, because right now, we are struggling beating man‑to‑man coverage and that's an issue. So we have got to do some things schematically to make sure we can cut some of those guys loose. Q. You and Mark Dantonio come from the same coaching tree; when you look at Michigan State, do you see a little of what you're trying to build here? COACH HAZELL: He's done an unbelievable job. He's been there seven years I believe. It's such a stable situation, you can tell the program, everybody knows their responsibility. There's a calmness‑‑ he's smiling more on the sideline. On the TV, he didn't use to smile his first couple of years and he's smiling more on the sideline which is great. He's done a remarkable job. His staff has been there for awhile. He's got a couple new guys but his staff has been there for seven years. I'm happy for him. Q. You guys didn't overlap at Ohio State but there's some Youngstown guys from that staff and Ohio State guys on that staff. Does your staff have a relationship with anyone on that staff? Do you know Mark D'Antonio? COACH HAZELL: Oh, I know Mark very well. Jim Bollman and I worked together at Ohio State. Mike Tressel is their lineback coach and special teams coordinator. Pat Narduzzi I've known for quite a while. So I know a lot of guys on their staff, yeah. Q. At the midway point in the season now, how would you evaluate your team? COACH HAZELL: Well, obviously you're not where you want to be. We've got to get a whole lot better. We've got to find guys that are going to really help this program going down the stretch. And we've got to‑‑ now that you're starting to play some of the younger players, those guys have got to produce for us. And I want to see us take care of the ball better. That gives you a chance, and I want to see us play better third down defense. If we can do those two things, I think you'll like the direction that we're going. Q. I think after the first quarter of the season, you had mentioned some of the goals; did you set goals at this point in the year or is it just six games in? COACH HAZELL: I think it's the sixth game in, you've got to make sure you're playing better. There's so many little things that you've got to do, and you can't do them all at one time but you have to pick and choose the things that you have to get better at, and that's from the head coach on down and that's where we have to start. Q. Are you ahead maybe in some areas and behind in some areas at this point than you thought you would be? COACH HAZELL: I think we're playing decent special teams; other than our punting unit, we didn't return the ball as well as I'd like in the kickoff return the other day. But I think we are doing okay in special teams. You'd like to be playing a little bit better. I think some of our freshmen are starting to emerge a little bit. You don't know how many you're going to play when you first come into the season. So that's always a hard card to play. Just watching, I was very encouraged on how hard our defense played, and again, they were put in tough situations. We punted the ball not as well as we could, two short field opportunities, but they stood their ground. And a lot of times you look at the final score and you say defense did, you've got to look at the totality of the football game and really what's happens during the course of the game. Those guys are being put out over and over and over again and sometimes the score gets lopsided. But I wasn't at all displeased with the effort of our defense on Saturday. Q. Cody Webster started the season offer very well‑‑ what's happened? Was it because he was so good‑‑ has he not been performing up to standard lately? COACH HAZELL: No, he's got to punt the ball better for us, he really does. He has to put the ball outside the hash where our cover guys are and he has to give us some more hang time to get down the field. It's just part of the whole situation where everyone has to do better in our program right now. Q. You said you needed to transfer the way you practice to games. What are you doing in practice that you aren't in the game? COACH HAZELL: I think we are executing better. Whether it's the people that we are going against in practice, as opposed to games might have a factor do with it, both sides of the ball. But we have to execute better on those critical situations, those third down situations, which allow teams to run 80 plays and 90 plays and us to run 60 plays. Those things, if you're able to call 15 to 20 more plays a game, you're going to be that much more productive, you would think. And that's where we have to execute better, and that's why‑‑ we're doing what we're doing with some of the young players in the game. Q. Where is Danny Anthrop in the receiving rotation? He didn't get his first snap until the second half‑‑ COACH HAZELL: He's a second Z right now and he'll play more as we go along. He's still learning. We're very high on Danny Anthrop. Q. Ryan Russell, he was supposed to be the next‑‑ inaudible ‑‑ of the defensive ends. What have you seen of his skill set projects to being a good linebacker? COACH HAZELL: Well, he's athletic. He's got to play a little bit faster and he's got to play a little more aggressive for us. We need more productivity out of Ryan. He's a good player that needs to be more productive. Q. What running back are you going to play that maybe you haven't yet? COACH HAZELL: We're going to take a look at Robert Gregory a little bit in practice and see if he can give us anything. Q. Because he showed you some things in the spring and then in training camp, too, right? He's physical‑‑ why do you want to give him a look? What is it about‑‑ COACH HAZELL: We need a spark in the backfield. King has done a nice job outside the tackles, he really has. He's done an excellent job on screens and some of the outside plays. And we want him to get better on the inside plays, the inside zone plays. I talked to him a little bit about this yesterday, being more patient on the power and on the inside zone and trying to find some of those back side A‑gaps. But we will take a look at Robert and see if he can help us. We'll know by the end of the week. Q. What do your receivers need to do better to have more success against man coverage? COACH HAZELL: Well, it's all about patience and technique. When you're playing against good defenders, you have to be able to have some patience at the line of scrimmage to create separation. You have to be able to create late‑‑ being able to get open late when the quarterback needs you; and not getting open early, because if he's not ready to throw you the ball, it doesn't do you any good. You have to be able to create late separations against defenders. Q. Chuck Ayres had a lot of playing time on Saturday. What do you see out of him? COACH HAZELL: Chuck been a road warrior for us. He's just been a steady guy that's inside. He comes to work and just practices extremely hard for us. He's able to step in for Latta. You'll probably see more rotation with some of those younger guys with Chuck going forward. Q. Like you just mentioned with Robert Gregory, do you see Dayln Dawkins with less playing time‑‑ the turnovers, does that take playing time away from him? COACH HAZELL: No, not at all. We want Dalyn to keep getting better. Dalyn is a very talented young back. If we took that approach, there would be a lot of guys not getting playing time at this point in time. But Dalyn is a very talented young back. We are still very high on him. He put the ball in the ground that one time, which was very critical; we can't have those things, but we are going to keep pushing him to get better. That's the whole goal. Q. Along with Brandon Cottom who carried for 14 yards, do you see him getting more playing time as well? COACH HAZELL: There's a chance he'll carry the ball more for us in certain packages. The problem is there's only so many footballs that can go around and you have to figure out which guys can do the best and most things, not only carrying the ball. But protection and getting into the release lanes and finding ways to check down, all those things, you're trying to find one guy who can do it all and maybe have some guys who can spell that guy and that's what we're looking for right now. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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