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ROSE BOWL GAME: OREGON VS WISCONSINDecember 29, 2019Shane LemieuxPasadena, California Q. You were telling us the other night at Lawry's about your grandpa. He's passed now. SHANE LEMIEUX: Yes. Q. Tell me what that dynamic was about between you and him and how you shared the experience. SHANE LEMIEUX: It was always a big thing going over to my grandparents house on any football day, especially a big day like the Rose Bowl Game, we always go over there and watch it. He'd always have the hottest takes and his opinion about everybody. And he's now passed two years now. He's been a really big inspiration in my life. He's a father figure to me. He kind of taught me what it takes to be a football player because he played back in the day. He was a cowboy. He was tough. He showed me what toughness really was. And even to the day he died. He was tough as nails. I look at him every single day for that motivation because I know if I told him -- if I complained to him, it would always be a smart aleck comment back. It was a really big thing. And that's just another opportunity to be with my family, on those Rose Bowl days. He know he really enjoyed it. He would love being here. Q. What do you think he would say? SHANE LEMIEUX: He would be extremely proud. My redshirt year I redshirted, he didn't understand it at the time. Every single time I would come home: Why aren't you playing? Why aren't you playing? When I did start playing, he's like, how did you play? And I was like, yeah, I played all right. He's like, why not? He expected so much from me. And when we didn't go to the Rose Bowl, we didn't beat Washington State my earlier years, he would always get on me. He was very critical of that. So now, looking back, if he was here today, he would be on top of the world. Q. Was he helpful in your upbringing as far as -- you mentioned him being a father figure, about your production, how you became -- SHANE LEMIEUX: For sure. My parents got divorced at an early age. My mom was a single mom for a long time, and eventually I met my stepdad. It actually is my step-grandpa. And they both did a great job giving me a father figure growing up. I couldn't thank them both enough. I know my dad -- my dad would be really happy to have him here. Q. What's it like for you to end your career and represent the city of Yakima? SHANE LEMIEUX: It's awesome. Yakima is not really known for a football town, it's mostly agriculture, baseball kind of place. When I come home, everyone is extremely proud of me. It means a lot to me because when I walk out on the field not only representing my name and my university but also representing Yakima, Washington. So me, Cooper Kupp, guys like those guys that came out of Yakima, we're really proud to be from Yakima. It means a lot. It's a blue-collar town, and I hope to represent that and put that on my back every single time I walk out. So, yeah. Q. As you leave this program, what kind of shape will you leave it as far as the offensive line next year? Maybe talk about that and how you mentored some of those guys and what they look forward in the future? SHANE LEMIEUX: I look at Alex Forsyth, the guy that no one really knows about, as a brother. He's a brother. I think he's going to be a phenomenal offensive lineman here. I think next spring you'll see him coming up in all these articles and stuff, and you're like, wow, this guy is going to be a good one. We've been saying it ever since I got here, but he's a backup on a line that's very good. Our offensive line is very good. And any Pac-12 school, I think he'd be a starting guy and name brand football player there. Kind of just leave my legacy there. I noticed him, he follows me around. He knows exactly what I was doing at any given moment. What I'm eating, I'll look over at his plate, he's eating the same thing. It's that kind of stuff. I do the same thing with guys like Matt Haggerty and Tyler Johnson, just taking everything I can from them. And I noticed these last couple of practices that the younger guys are really looking at us more and noticing we're going to leave and getting any ounce of information we can from them because we're only here for one more practice. Q. You guys between Jake and Calvin, you guys are practicing, these Sunday drills, four straight years, has it hit you that you've got like one week left of this sport? SHANE LEMIEUX: It's the same -- like that 1 and O process we always think about, we never want to think about anything else. I mentioned to things to Coach Cristobal, two more weeks here, one more week here, and he's, ah, we've got a big one coming up. Don't even think about that. Yesterday, I got to admit, was the first day where I was like, okay, this is my last Tuesday of practice of my career. This is special, man. And getting done with that practice, walking off the field, I was like, oh, man, one more padded practice. So it's definitely hitting me now. Q. Did you have a bond with those guys as a true freshman, or was it kind of going through the page with redshirt freshmen, where it really came together? SHANE LEMIEUX: With Johnstone and those guys? Q. With Hanson and (indiscernible) and all those. SHANE LEMIEUX: Our true freshman year we were living together. We got to know each other really well. It wasn't really a bonded relationship until we were going through the struggle our red freshman year and just losing the games and having to talk to each other after the game how can we be better. And we're 19 years old at that time. So we're trying to figure out at the same time how are we supposed to get better and at the same time we're doing a good job helping each other up. Because if you had a bad game or something, we'd rely on the guys next to us to boost us up. Q. Did you guys realize at the time that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, or were you like: What's happened? SHANE LEMIEUX: It was tough because just the tradition, the history Oregon football has and we were losing games, and we were the starters at that time, and football coaches rely heavily on the offensive line, we thought it was our fault. And I'm sure a couple of those games were our fault. That was really tough. But at the same time, we had it in the back of our mind that our time hasn't came yet. And we worked to be the athletes we were going to be eventually. But at the same time we were struggling with that, at the same time losing games and having to prepare for games that it was tough defensive line, veteran. Like UDub, Washington had a great defensive line that year, and we were all freshman young bucks. They were probably licking their chops. We held our own and continued to get better. Q. What was the lowest point? Was it losing Greatwood or a certain game? SHANE LEMIEUX: USC, because I grew up kind of a USC fan. That was good. They were really, really good when I was growing up. And going down to the Coliseum and that big of an atmosphere and getting beaten pretty bad. And that was kind of like, okay, like, Oregon wins these games, and this is the Oregon team that I grew up watching, and we thought it was part of -- it was us. Q. Was it the four of you guys living together your freshman year? SHANE LEMIEUX: It was me, Jake Hanson, Brady Aiello, Calvin Throckmorton. Q. So you have four 18-year-old offensive linemen who are supposed to be growing. How did you fit stuff in the fridge? Was the house clean? SHANE LEMIEUX: You know, it was -- a lot of times it was looking through the fridge finding due dates, expired labels and stuff. There was a lot of expired stuff. The hardest thing was the kitchen, like the stove and that kind of stuff, just coordinating who is going to cook dinner and stuff. We got a lot of training table stuff here. So all of our meals were pretty much taken care of. It was tough. But we figured it out. Another hard thing was laundry. We only had one washer and dryer. So coordinating that. If someone left the clothes in the dryer, like: Whose is this? Because we all had the same clothes, just different numbers. It was fun. It was actually pretty fun. Q. How key was it that you guys stay together through all the hard times to not only leave a legacy that you said you got through hard times, but for the freshmen coming in during that time, showing that it's bigger than -- SHANE LEMIEUX: I think we definitely have added that 4-8 season to our character, the way we were able to battle back, the grit we play with. I think that's due to a lot of what we struggled with in the past, and it's really added to our character. And I think it's really added to our grit, like I said, and it's making us want it more. Q. Having three coaches in three years would break a lot of teams apart. How much do you think the fact that you guys lost, first of all, (indiscernible) and the school kind of set you guys on the right course? SHANE LEMIEUX: I came here for Coach Greatwood. He recently retired, phenomenal football coach, great mentor in my life. I came here for him. A lot of guys came here for him on the offensive line. Getting Taggart and these guys, I felt like us choosing Cristobal was a guy that we got to choose, another reason why we came to Oregon. If Cristobal was here at Oregon, I would have come to Oregon for him. It was one of those things. We knew having an offensive line coach would be really cool as a head coach, and that's not a lot of football programs. We were all aware of how good Cristobal was. The team had a lot of -- little bit of guys on the team had the knowledge that Cristobal was a good guy. So we had to spread that through the locker room, and everyone rallied behind us. Q. Last time in the uniform, does it feel surreal? SHANE LEMIEUX: Yes, definitely surreal. I love this program to death. I'd do anything for this program. I'd do anything for Coach Cristobal, I do anything for my teammates. And hopefully I can just -- not hopefully, I am going to leave it on the field. I owe it to my brothers and my teammates and I owe it for wearing the O on my chest. Q. You and the seniors have any conversations about how weird it is it's the last game? SHANE LEMIEUX: We've been saying stuff, the last few games. But it's "The Granddaddy of Them All." You've got to give it all for this one. And even if it was our last game or not, this is something that you have to sell out for. Q. Going into this game, it seems like Jonathan Taylor this, Jonathan Taylor that, you have your own rushing attacks, do you think CJ Verdell is getting a little underlooked? SHANE LEMIEUX: Yeah, CJ, all our backs are really good backs. I'm really confident in our offensive line and our running backs. They've got a great offensive line and great running back corps. We like to focus inside a lot of our program and really focus on us. So, yeah. Q. It's hard to kind of sum up what CJ has been and how good he's been for your program this season. He's coming off of an insane performance of the Pac-12 title. What do you think about that performance and how well he played? SHANE LEMIEUX: You know, it's something that's expected out of all of us, to compete our best every single game. And it just shows the big games CJ has played really well. And it shows an elite guy, elite athlete, elite teammate. Somebody ready to step up in the big game. Expect a lot of CJ this game and excited for him. Q. He plays with a chip on his shoulder. He told me likes to be the underdog. Do you see that as well? SHANE LEMIEUX: For sure, he's a small guy but doesn't play small. The way he runs, it's like the rest of our teammates. I think Justin plays with a chip on our shoulder -- we play with a chip on our shoulder. It's kind of the mindset we have on the football team. We embrace the underdog role and we like the underdog role, and we think that our bark is bigger than our bite. Q. So you guys have been together a long time. Offensive linemen are known for their sense of humor. Justin seems to be kind of a small-town boy in that regard. Can you give me any insights into how he handles the limelight and how you guys either help or give him a hard time? SHANE LEMIEUX: We give him a hard time. We can't imagine -- I think it was at the Lawry's Meat Bowl a couple nights ago, people were giving him balls and everything. He was trying to eat. I was like, oh, it would be hard being Justin Herbert. He said, yeah, he's like, yeah, they could hate me also. He has a really positive outlook on all of this. And obviously he's never been the guy that likes the limelight or anything like that. I think we do a good job of just kind of giving him crap for it but at the same time surrounding him with love when it gets too hard. Because with the media, you can have highs and you can have lows, and it's really where he does a really good job, just his mental preparation of staying level-headed and not letting the outside noise get to him. I commend him for that because a lot of people wouldn't be able to take that. Q. Can you give me an example of the kind of good-nature ribbing, any anecdote that comes to mind? SHANE LEMIEUX: Just call him Hollywood or something because we all know that's not him. He has to sign a bunch of balls, he's always doing interviews and he's always the first guy up for interviews and that kind of stuff. Calling him Hollywood. I always call him Hollywood just because that's not who he is he'll really get after us. He'll follow it up with a punch in the arm or something. We have a good time with Justin. Q. How would you describe CJ Verdell's running style? SHANE LEMIEUX: Physical. Not for his size. You expect that kind of physical play with a guy like Derrick Henry, a big, strong, physical back. He may not look like it. He doesn't have the tall stature. But he's physical and stout. He's been in the weight room this offseason. You can really tell. When he's running downhill, I think he's one of the best backs in the country. Excited. Q. Do you have a favorite moment from all the events you've gone through so far this week? SHANE LEMIEUX: Yeah, I would have really loved Disneyland, but I was in the first shuttle back. I was only there for two hours. I wanted to save my legs. I didn't want to be walking around. That would have been the best. But cutting the meat, the prime rib, at the Beef Bowl was pretty cool, man. That's kind of a cool little tradition there. And all my teammates had fun with me being in the chef suit. That was fun. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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