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CACTUS BOWL: KANSAS STATE VS UCLADecember 23, 2017Adarius PickettPhoenix, Arizona ADARIUS PICKETT: I think it had to be probably PlayStation or Cars. Q. What made you want to be a football player? ADARIUS PICKETT: I watched my older brother play. He started playing -- he played first and I usually went through everything he went through. So I used to be with his friends playing in the street, at the park, whatever, watching him play, that's really what made me want to play. Q. What's your favorite book? ADARIUS PICKETT: Monster. The playbook. Q. You guys just came in yesterday? ADARIUS PICKETT: We just got here. Q. Are you excited about the game? ADARIUS PICKETT: Really excited. Really excited. Q. What's it been like playing for half a staff coming in, half a staff (inaudible)? ADARIUS PICKETT: I mean, these primarily have been our coaches all year. We miss him, Coach Mora, Coach Mete, Coach Scotty, primarily been the same staff the whole year. Our graduate assistant Dalton has done a tremendous job studying film and delivering special notes to us what we need to know in the secondary. I'm pretty sure Kyle Weiss has done the same thing to the linebacker room. And you have leaders like Kenny Young and myself, and J.T.M. who have really done a good job of keeping the guys together, keeping guys focused. So I think we have a good leadership, the change's a little bit more, I wouldn't say difficult, but a little bit easier to handle. Q. What are your main impressions of the Kansas State offense? ADARIUS PICKETT: Kansas State is a team that's physical. And I think they're going to try to establish the run to open up the pass, what I've seen. And at times on film they're going to see we struggle with the run game this year. I think that's where they're going to try to hit us at, even though the last three games I think we did a tremendous job, especially against USC stopping the dynamic running back, Ronald Jones. And we stopped Cal's running back. And ASU, stopped a dynamic duo with Kalen Ballage and Demario Richard. We've addressed that. I think going forward, our younger guys have understood their running gaps and stuff more which has helped inevitably our run game. Q. What were the problems early in this year? ADARIUS PICKETT: I think it was a lack of experience in guys, the younger guys and "D" line wanting to make every play instead of understanding to make the plays -- make the plays that come to them. When you want to make every play sometimes you pop a gap. And that leaves another gap that's wide open for a cutback lane or something like that. And when everybody fits in that gap, it's pretty hard to run. Q. What do you remember most about the (inaudible)? ADARIUS PICKETT: Oh, my gosh, that was a phenomenal game. It was an exciting game. But I just remember at halftime Coach Mora in the locker room told us we were going to win by one point. He told us we're going to win by one point. He goes you're going to win by one point, come back. And everybody just gotta believe. On the sideline, that was my whole thing. Coming off the field with just believe, believe you're going to go out and stop them and get the ball back for the offense. So my job that game was to stop the ball, stop A&M from scoring in the second half as much as we could, catch all the punt returns so Josh can do what he do. And as you guys have seen, he did what he does a number of times. That's throw touchdown passes. Q. Were you with the team at the Alamo Bowl? ADARIUS PICKETT: Yes, I was. Q. You guys really jumped out to a big lead in that one. What worked so well for you in that game? ADARIUS PICKETT: Everybody was focused. Everybody was determined to go out there and win the Alamo Bowl. Brett Huntley did a tremendous job with the offense he had and his ability to scramble, his mobility was tremendous in that game. It opened up some other things for Paul and for Jordan Payton and stuff like that. So that was an exciting game. I was real excited, and it seemed like a home game for Kansas State almost. Their whole fan base was there. I know they're a really good team and they're well coached. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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