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MOTEL 6 CACTUS BOWL: WEST VIRGINIA VS ARIZONA STATEJanuary 2, 2016Dan HolgorsenSklyer HowardShaq PettewayPhoenix, Arizona West Virginia 43, Arizona State 42. THE MODERATOR: We'll begin with opening comments from Coach Holgorsen. COACH HOLGORSEN: Well, long game, good outcome. So proud of these guys. Proud of the seniors. Proud of our team. We were the underdog. We were the visiting team, foreign state, four hours away from home, playing against a team that's from here, their turf. Good football team, very competitive. They wanted to win. We found a way to win. Very proud of the guys. THE MODERATOR: We'll open it up for questions. Q. Obviously you were going to attack them through the air. Talk about your thought process on that, how much of their scheme you played into. COACH HOLGORSEN: Yeah, we knew they were good up front. I think they blitzed 100% of the time. We knew they would. They were going to try to fill gaps, take away our run game. We've worked hard on the passing game. We made a couple adjustments. Really proud of Skyler. I did a lot of yelling if you can't tell (laughter). That wasn't directed at him, it was directed at our receivers. We had a lot of guys open. He made throw after throw after throw. Those young receivers started making things happen towards the end of the second quarter and then the second half. I think it's only going to get better for them. Really proud of Skyler, the way he hung in there. He knew it was going to be a lot of heat. He knew he had to make the throws. Proud of him. SKYLER HOWARD: We knew it was going to be high risk, high reward. If we would hold up front, we would have shots down the field. I was giving those guys a shot and they came down with it. Q. Skyler, is that a fun game to be part of as a quarterback? SKYLER HOWARD: No doubt. It's the kind you dream about, no doubt. COACH HOLGORSEN: Except for all those hits when they blitz 100% of the time. That gets nerve-wracking back there. I give him credit for hanging in there. That's tough when you get hit. You know they're going to bring six, seven guys. This guy over here, Shaq, he got to their quarterback a couple of times, made a difference. Skyler being able to hang in there, I was really proud of him. Q. Shaq, we talked about your motivation going into this game last week. When you get that stop at the end, incomplete pass, you know it's over, what's going through your head? SHAQ PETTEWAY: Everything we've been through, it was worth it. This team, this group of seniors, we've been through a lot. We're fighters. When we're down, we're going to keep fighting. Q. What did you do to take No. 15 out of the receiving game in the second half? COACH HOLGORSEN: He's a good player. SHAQ PETTEWAY: We just switched up the coverage. That's about it. Q. Dana, thoughts on this game propelling you guys into the 2016 season with this victory. COACH HOLGORSEN: We don't consider this 2016. This is the end of the 2015 season. We had high expectations coming into this year. Started out pretty good. Caught four really good Big 12 football teams on four bad days for us, and didn't quit. Shaq was one of the seniors that was in a meeting that we set in there. We wanted to finish this one better than any West Virginia University Big 12 team had, and we did. That's something positive, something we can build on. We're going to enjoy this one for a while, then get back to work here in a couple weeks in January and start the beginning of the 2016. Anytime you can finish with a bowl win, the gives you some momentum moving forward, there's no doubt. Q. Shaq, you and Jared exchanged embraces, fifth-year guys. Tell us about what that felt like. SHAQ PETTEWAY: Me and Jared, we've been through a lot. Both with ACL injuries. Fighting back. To go out like this, no better feeling. We talked before the game. We were emotional all week knowing this was our last game together. We're friends, so after the game, the way we finished the game, it was unbelievable. COACH HOLGORSEN: I think it goes more than just him and Jared, though. There's KJ Dillon, Kyle Rose, Ricky Rumph played his tail off. This senior group is special. I've said it a bunch. This is the group that came in when I came in five years ago and went through coaching changes and conference changes. That's a big deal. Those guys had some bad days. Football is hard. Power 5 football is tough. No different than what the PAC-12 faces. They put our program in a better place than when we started. Q. Skyler, were you trying to attack No. 10 or was his guy open a few times? SKYLER HOWARD: We saw the matchup we had out there, then obviously we wanted to take advantage of that, take some shots over there on his side. It just goes to those guys being open on both sides. We watched a lot of film. We had over a month to prepare for this. We knew what we were going to get with that. We just took advantage of it. Q. Shaq, I know your defense has been beaten up a lot this year. A bunch of guys have gone down. When you lose guys in the secondary, do you look around and say, We don't even get relief in this last game, more of the same? SHAQ PETTEWAY: No, not that type of feeling. We've been through a lot. After losing Karl, our ultimate leader of the team for the last five years, it's the next man up in any situation. Q. Coach, how much more fulfilling or gratifying is this win knowing you've gone through so many losses in bowl games and disappointments throughout the year? COACH HOLGORSEN: Yeah, it had been mentioned. Shaq is one of the guys that played in the Orange Bowl. We have two of them, Shaq and Jared. They played in the Orange Bowl five years ago. For their career, we're sitting here 2-2. We wanted to even it out. More importantly than that, these guys wanted to win a bowl game as part of the Big 12. We watched the TV this afternoon when Kansas State lost. There was a lot of commentary about the Big 12 not doing very well in the bowl game. TCU came back and won down 31 points against a PAC-12 team. Then we go out there and win against a PAC-12 team as well. Wanted to represent the Big 12. We did. Wanted to get our first win in the Big 12, which we did. Q. You set records for touchdown passes, passing yards. Did you feel as the game progressed things were going like that? COACH HOLGORSEN: About time we did something on offense (laughter). SKYLER HOWARD: Like he said, it's about time it fell together. Our goal throughout this season was to get better each week on offense, keep improving each week. It finally started clicking. I think we had a complete game on offense, besides some misfits at receiver. But we got that squared away. Q. Were you a little frustrated at all the first quarter with three field goals? COACH HOLGORSEN: Slightly. SKYLER HOWARD: Slightly (laughter)? Q. You overcame it. COACH HOLGORSEN: Yeah, I think a lot of it comes back to having skill guys that are confident and will make that extra play. I was yelling at them pretty good. I reminded them where the end zone was, told them to score. So they started scoring. I should have said it before the game. That's just inexperience at receiver more than anything. We got better in the pass game. A lot of the guys from Morgantown, they know my frustrations with the passing game. I'm very proud of our run game right now. We didn't run the ball very good today. We knew we wouldn't be able to. So the emphasis was on the pass game. We finally did something on the pass game to warrant a win. Q. You dove onto the ground. What was going through your mind when you hit the ground? COACH HOLGORSEN: I don't remember. I don't remember. I guess frustration. Q. Skyler, I know you take things really hard when you lose because you care a lot. You said, It's about time. How much did you need a game like this? SKYLER HOWARD: Not that I needed it, but these seniors needed it. They needed to go out on a positive note because they earned it. They were the heart and soul of this team. They drove us this season. From Karl Joseph down. He didn't stop after the injury. To pull that out for them, I'm not worried about myself. I'm worried about them. I'm glad we got that done. Q. For all the passing yards, it was the run on the third-down play. Talk about the run and the call. COACH HOLGORSEN: It was third and 20. We finally got them playing off. It was the right call. Then he made a great cut. Wendell is a great player. He's going to make that play when we have the numbers to make that play. You're not going to win a championship if you get a team to be able to take one away. You can't execute the other one. It was a good play. He made the check, like he normally does. I want to go back to what was said. Skyler didn't need this. Skyler earned this. You talk about a humble kid that has taken some criticism, it's not fair. I mean, the kid battles. It's what it means to be a Mountaineer, play his tail off, earn the respect of your teammates, continue to fight, continue to work. That's what he's done. Things are coming together because he's getting better and the people around him are getting better. We got everybody coming back on offense. We should be even better next year. That's a humble answer because that's who he is. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, gentlemen. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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