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ACADEMY TEXAS BOWL: BAYLOR VS VANDERBILT

December 26, 2018

Matt Rhule

Houston, Texas

HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: First of all Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everybody. Thank you very much for being here. We've had a wonderful time so far. Want to make sure I thank the Academy Sports + Outdoor Texas Bowl. Everything's been first class.

We've had a tremendous, tremendous time so far. Had a chance to have Christmas. Had a chance to partake of all the festivities and all the Bowl week schedule that they have provided for us.

It's an honor to be here with Vanderbilt, Coach Mason, a team that I respect, a coach that I respect, and we're excited now to get down to playing some football.

We have four really special young men here, Ira Lewis from here in Houston, senior, college graduate. We have Clay Johnston in the back, middle linebacker. We have Blake Blackmar starting right guard and also pit master barbeque du jour, and then Charlie Brewer getting his first official media time that I took him out somewhere. Getting him ready for the future.

Very proud of the guys and very proud of our entire football team, and very proud of the fact we are I think second in the country, amount of college graduates on Bowl rosters; 24 guys in the game tomorrow will have their college degree, and hopefully that speaks very much to not just what we're doing, but how we are trying to get it done. That's my opening statement.

Q. What impresses you about Vanderbilt?
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: Well, I think that they are, No. 1, you can tell they are extremely well-coached team, disciplined, tough, physical, and they lost to Notre Dame by four points, playing the College Football Playoff.

Kyle Shurmur the quarterback, as I said before, Clay played with him in ninth grade and he's son of a coach, dad, Pat Shurmur, head coach of the Giants. He's smart, intelligent. They are going to be a huddle team, break the formation. They will be different for us, and you need a quarterback to run those kind of offenses who can get you in and out of plays and Kyle does it at a really high level.

Defensively, they do a lot of different things. They are going to challenge you schematically, but at the end of the day I just think they are a well-coached team and they complement each other really well and you can see that when they play.

Q. You mentioned they are a huddle team and will go slower. Is that an adjustment, when you have to practice against so many teams in the Big 12 that don't care that the play-clock exists?
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: Yeah, I think if you ask the guys on defense, they like the fact it's not tempo and they can catch their breath in between plays, and also provides challenges for Clay. I mean, he's going to call a blitz to the formation. They are going to shift and move and trade, and it requires everyone being on the same page.

And you know football is football, and it comes down to blocking and tackling, but it does present some real challenges. I've had fun this week because my role has been like taking the second offense and running some of Vanderbilt stuff, which is maybe more of how I was raised in football; so trading and shifting and getting in the huddle; hey guys, this is how to get in the huddle, so that's been fun for me.

But it will come down to at the end of the day which team protects the football, tackles well. Bowl games usually come down to those things, and I like the way our guys have practiced. I think that they have taken the challenge on and it will really come down to have a Verkedric and Clay, their ability to make sure that we are all on the same page.

Q. You look on paper and the turnaround at Temple; here at Baylor, you missed just one year of Bowl games, but how much different has this turnaround been, with everything that you've been through with this program and to get to this point?
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: How much different?

Q. Than when you did it at Temple to where you are now and where you have this program now.
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: This one's been way harder to be quite honest, because I didn't know these guys, and so I had to earn their trust.

You know, Temple was easier because I had been there as an assistant coach and recruited everybody and left and came back, so there were more that knew who I was and the program didn't really change.

These guys walked in, I was the third head coach in three years, so when you enter that situation and you change the way things are day-to-day and change in football is not good or it's bad. There's a million different ways to do things, but when everything is different and you're not having a tremendous amount of success early on, it's really hard.

These guys, the freshmen that are on our team now, they are going to see guys get drafted this year. They are going to see guys get their degree. They are going to see guys in graduate school and they are going to see us in Bowl game and not going to know anything different. These are the guys that had to act on faith. These are the guys that had to sit there and say: I don't know if this is going to work on not, but I'm going to do it anyway. That's why I'm grateful to them.

That's why I expect to have more success moving forward is because our guys, once they see, this does work, not just team-wise, winning, but more importantly when they see guys having success personally, (phone ringing) so embarrassing.

Q. That's a fine.
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: That is a fine, but I think in a press conference, I'm okay, (chuckling), I'm not sure.

SO I think that's the biggest deal is when they see, hey, this works, it makes such a difference. And so that's what's been harder about it, but it's been -- because it's been a little bit harder, it's been way more rewarding. Because like when Ira leaves after this game or Blackmar leaves after this game or Lawrence or Chris Platt after this game, I love those guys, and we've been through highs and lows together, so we just want to hopefully finish on a high.

Q. I guess this is also fun for you that you get to play defending as you see an offense that likes to run first. Can you talk about a running attack with Ke'Shawn Vaughn? They say he's healthy now.
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: Yeah, he's a tremendous back. They run pro-style offense. They run a lot of, you know, outside zone where they get you running and then they do a tremendous job of cutting the ball up.

It presents a challenge for us because that's not really, other than Oklahoma, that's one of their key runs. Not many teams in the Big 12 lineup and run that play and not many people run it like they do.

I know Clay, he's worked really hard, because it really falls on the linebackers, the D-Line and linebackers have to really be in sink to defend this running game. The things I think you'll see, the thing I respect about them is they are going to stick with the run. Like they are going to pound you and pound you and try to wear you down, and that's not really the way it's done in the Big 12 quite as much. Some teams are that way; Kansas State.

But they do a good job. They have a good scheme and they have a great back, and most importantly the quarterback always has them in the right play. That's why just as a fan of football, it's fun to watch.

Q. How important is it to carry this momentum you've carried at the end of the season now over to the spring, and even some of the guys that are returning, that they can experience a taste and say, you know what, we know about this, now it's time to take this and make it a yearly event here.
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: You know, I told the team, I expect us to make a jump from this year to next year. I expect that every year. This was an opportunity, this Bowl practice to make another jump of four; we have the off-season jump and no matter what happens tomorrow, I think we've gotten way better in a short amount of time.

And I see young guys, I mean, I see young guys catching the Bowl, guys that are red-shirted, R.J. Sneed, Bralen. I see all these guys making huge steps because of the extra practice and not just the extra practice, but the extra meetings and time together, like just as a team. We went to the Rockets game and the shootaround, as a team. No one's late to anything. No one's missing things. They are just all really growing up and maturing, and that's what this Bowl week has done.

That being said, it's really important that we go out and play our best game. It's really important that we go out and show that we know how to win versus an SEC team and I hope we make that jump. But I think the real progress has been made over the last month, and I'm real proud of the work the guys have put in.

Q. You've both, Coach Mason and you, have called this a business trip in a way to win the football game. What's the balance of the time off, holidays, practices and travel and figuring out how to stay sharp if you can?
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: Yeah, I expect us to come and have fun. Like I think about my own kids, right. Like how much my family and our coaches' families sacrifice time with us to allow us to be in these positions and so I want them to have fun.

You know, I want them -- so the key to me in Bowl games is, as I tell the players, when we go, we go, to like just be in the moment. When we're at practice, be elite at practice. When we're in meetings, be elite in meetings. When you go out at night and there's a late curfew, go out and have fun. Just do everything at the highest level.

We go to events, I don't want see guys on their phone while we're having an event. I want to see guys competing in the Rodeo Bowl. I want to see guys doing a great job with the kid at the Children's Museum.

So it's just a balance of just wherever you are, be there, right and that's hard in our society now with phones and we're always kind of somewhere else but that's been the key, and I have a lot of trust in our team.

Like I let them -- you know, we didn't work during the week, and we'd come back on the weekends during recruiting, we'd practice and they would practice really well; and we practiced six days in a row and they practiced really well and we let them go home for three days and show back up at the Bowl game.

So the level of maturity by those guys to practice when we're supposed to practice, to do those things, has been high. That's what it comes down to because one unique thing about this Bowl game is both of us weren't in the Bowl game last year, Vanderbilt and us. Both of us want to be here, and a lot of Bowl games come down to who wants be to here. We both really want to be here.

The key for us now is to be really locked in on the game. We had a lot of fun. All the events are fun. After this luncheon, it's time to get ready to go play the game, and I have a lot of confidence our guys will do that.

Q. You're without Jalen Hurd, who is extremely efficient at getting first down. How do you replicate his efficiency and who needs to step up offensively?
HEAD COACH MATT RHULE: Jalen is an outstanding, outstanding player, right. He's going to get drafted and go play in the NFL, so it's hard to replace that.

You know, I think in the last game when he was banged up even guess Texas Tech, Chris Platt stepped up. Denzel Mims has had an amazing month. I've seen him grow as a receiver.

I think what we're looking for is Josh Fleeks, Tyquan Thornton. R.J. Sneed because of the new redshirt rule, he's probably going to play in the Bowl game and still have this count as a redshirt year, which is awesome.

I think those three guys. Fleeks has been waiting his turn, gets in against Kansas, has two touchdowns, kind of bits and pieces here and there. It's time for those guys to go step up and be starters and really catapult themselves into the future.

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