CHEEZ-IT BOWL: OKLAHOMA VS FLORIDA STATE

December 26, 2022

Alex Atkins

Camping World Stadium

Florida State Seminoles

Press Conference

Q. How did you feel about practice?

ALEX ATKINS: I thought the effort was good. I thought guys showed they want to still work together. We have to clean up on some details. This defense does present a lot of challenges with looks, pressures, and he understands how to leverage the football. He knows what you are going to attack by what calls he makes, so we have to make sure we are on point in the execution of the details.

Q. What's the difference from going from Tallahassee to going down here to Orlando, what goes into schematics?

ALEX ATKINS: Not a difference of schematics, you just try to control the distractions. There is a lot to be distracted. Just like [when] you go on the road, different practice environment, different locker room, different schedule, different time, more family in town, things like this. We have to make sure we are controlling the distractions that when the work starts, it is about the work.

Q. You have Pittman in the Cheez-It Room. Did they make the right choice?

ALEX ATKINS: I bet you he is loving it. You are probably going to see a vlog on it, not too long. Just be ready. He probably got his own private camera crew in there 24 hours.

Q. What has allowed you to be successful running the football in the second half of the season?

ALEX ATKINS: It start with the quarterback position. Run game is all about services, looks, safety rotations. The quarterback has done a good job of handling the run checks, getting us in good plays, getting us in the best possible looks and not just running plays on a bad look. First thing is Jordan.

Next thing is continuity in the line. We had the same guys pretty much out there. So, not too much they had not seen. Then, Trey Benson, I think he leads the country in broken tackles and elusiveness and yards per carry and things like that.

When you do have a bad look or things are not blocked correctly, you got backs' breaking tackles, so it is a combination of all those things. Whether you are in the right play, you are blocking up the looks and nothing confuses you and you can maintain blocks, and also you got guys that can make you right when you ain't right.

I thought our running backs have done a great job of breaking tackles and running through things and making it difficult to tackle. I think all those things combined gives you a shot to have a pretty good run game.

Q. We have been hearing from the head coach and several players the importance of focusing on the individual, how important that is, keeping the guys together. What kind of experience have you had with that, and what are things that you're telling the guys to keep going, especially for their goal to win the 10th game?

ALEX ATKINS: When you say focus on the individual --

Q. Personal development --

ALEX ATKINS: Ah, being the best version of yourself. You play a team sport, a lot of times especially in football, some guys' mistakes are not magnified more than others because you can hide a little bit when you have 11 guys out there, and some positions where you can't.

I think what it is saying is just be your best; the results will come. That is what Coach preaches from the day he got here to today. Even at practice to today, nothing has changed. It is all about the growth. Wherever you are, be a little bit better today, and everything else will take care of it.

It also comes from accountability, because one of the hardest things to hold yourself accountable to what you know. Like at the end of practice, he said basically it is not about the result, it’s did you play your best. And only one person knows that, and that's you. If you can lie to yourself, then we got a lot more development to go on in all other areas.

Q. Having played Coach Brent Venables, you've seen what his defense does, it's obviously a different team with Oklahoma. What kind of challenges does his brand usually bring?

ALEX ATKINS: You have two great defensive minds with the defensive coordinator with Coach Roof and Coach Venables putting together a lot of good stuff.

The good thing about Coach Venables is he is multiple. He will present you with multiple looks, but he also knows the vulnerabilities of his defense. He knows what you are going to get. He knows what you are going to try to attack and what you are going to try to leverage. So, those guys play fast and react to it quickly.

We have to be ready to be detailed. Just because we think we have got a good play and we know what is coming, they know what they vulnerable at. We have to be even more detailed to execute where we got to look.

Coach Venables has done a good job. He been calling defense for a long time. He's going to be prepared and well prepared, and he's going to know what he want to take away. We just got to be on point to make sure we're disciplined and we're not going backwards and making sure we're in the right place.

Q. Are you proud or thankful that so much of this team is enjoying this Bowl process and willing to play the game? In this day and age, there's so many teams that are playing in these bowl games that aren't going to be at full capacity. How does that make you feel as a coach and competitor?

ALEX ATKINS: I'm blessed to be around a group of guys that want to be around each other. So many times -- she brought up a good question about the individual. The way you create a good team is when the guys want to play for somebody else. I don't want to let you down.

I think we got a lot of that. When you talk about true brotherhood, every coach talks about brotherhood and teammates and love and family. And all that sounds good until you have to make a decision that is greater for the team than it is for yourself.

I think we see a lot of that now. We are also going to protect them from themselves, too. It is our job to monitor and make sure they are doing a good job and make sure we are giving them the best possible things for their future. But, you want it where you have to protect them from themselves because all they can think about is not letting their teammates down, and that's a blessing to have.

Q. How nice has it been throughout the whole season going against the defensive line and how much does it help your offensive line, the competition? We get to see it during practice, and it gets violent. How much has that helped?

ALEX ATKINS: It creates that I got to be on point or on the bench mentality. I tell high school players the biggest jump from high school to college is every practice is like a game. It is graded the same, evaluated the same, and the pressure is the same.

What you learn in college is the games get easier for the player, because there is so much pressure put in to every single rep from individual to team, eyes are always on you. It creates that ‘all right, I got to get this done or there is a consequence’ mindset every play.

Coach tried to use this phrase every day, it is fourth and one. I think that competition level, I have to be on point just raises yourself more. Now, we don't have a ‘dog eat dog’ mentality, meaning, hey, I'm going to throw it out there and whoever comes out. No, we want to teach and develop and put you in good situations to have success also, but you have to be on point to be on that field at Florida State.

Q. The brotherhood with this team, every program strives to have that. What have you done that's allowed it to come to fruition?

ALEX ATKINS: We have been through it. Sometimes you never know why you go through, but you got to go through to get through. We have to make all the past experiences, all the lessons learned, all those guys -- we had pretty much the same staff and same group of guys since we have been around.

I think about guys like Maurice Smith, Darius Washington, Jordan Travis. I think about guys that have been here and fought the long fight, Treshaun Ward, guys that have been in it, been in the fight, McLendon, that's seen. And then now you have the guys in the locker room: Hey, guys, I have seen that side, I've seen where that leads to; this is what I know works and what's been pushing us forward.

So you have got guys that can warn guys when they are going down the wrong path, and also praising, be thankful for the things that we're having now because we learned from the lessons we went through earlier in our time here.