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TOSTITOS FIESTA BOWL: OHIO STATE v NOTRE DAME

January 2, 2006

TEMPE, ARIZONA

THE MODERATOR: Turn it over to Coach Weis for opening comment.
COACH WEIS: My captains will be here shortly. Obviously, first of all, I would like to congratulate Ohio State, they were definitely the better team today. We got behind pretty good there in the first half and we rebounded it to get it to a one score game 27-20, but the bottom line is they still came up with the big play and we had a couple third downs there where we got the ball back and just tried to get it to a tie game and get it to overtime.
We have to compliment Ohio State and how they played. They definitely were the better team today and deserved to win. There's no reason to sit there and make any second-guesses or complain, because they definitely were the better team.
THE MODERATOR: We'll open it up for questions.
Q. Could you talk about how Troy Smith's ability to hurt you guys?
COACH WEIS: It was my biggest fear going into the game. Sure enough, here it is the first third down in the game, and he runs for a third down. That's one of the biggest problems we had in the first half and we couldn't get off the field in the third down.
I don't have the stats, but I think it was 5-5 on the third down. We're cranking it up to some 50 percent and they're 100 percent on the third down. That makes a big difference. That was my biggest fear going into the game. He didn't disappoint. His best football is ahead of him. He's definitely on the rise.
Q. I was wondering Darius had a very good first quarter and first half, got shut down on the second half. Can you talk about the Ohio State front four?
COACH WEIS: What I decided at halftime was I was not going to allow the tempo of the game to stay the way it was. It's very important as an offensive coach not to get stagnant.
We were lucky for it to be 21-7 in halftime. It very easily could have been a three score game. When it got to be the point where I needed to change the tempo of the game, where you go to a no-huddle mode, that really isn't him getting shut down. It was really a choice of a head coach coming out swinging to try to change the tempo of the game.
Q. Coach, can you talk a little bit about the play of AJ Hawk.
COACH WEIS: It's no mystery that AJ is a great player. He's got a great career ahead of him. He runs all over the field, and I think that he's got a bright future ahead of him. You know, he's a dynamic player who makes plays, and I have a lot of respect for him, and he definitely showed up tonight.
Q. Coach, were you thinking three wasn't going to be enough?
COACH WEIS: That's what I was thinking. In hindsight, I'm not big on second-guessing myself. When we ran the ball on the third down, and with 1 and a half and came up with nothing, we had a play we practiced where we felt pretty good about our chances of either scoring a touchdown or, in that case, not scoring a touchdown.
You can sit there, you know, and second-guess and say, well, should I have done this? It's easier in hindsight to say, hey, take the points, but we planned on going into the game and taking a lot of chances.
There were some chances that didn't present themselves, and we knew going into the game -- and the team understood the risk, because I explained it to them, this is how we were going to play the game.
Q. Brandon, what are you going to take away from your time on the team and time at the university?
BRANDON HOYTE: I learned a lot. The bottom line is the coaching staff taught me a lot about the game of football. I have great memories with them as well as our team.
Q. Coach, the play where they overruled the incomplete pass, how big was that in the game?
COACH WEIS: It was obviously a big play. There's nothing you can do about it. That's being done with the upstairs. I said, "I hope that guy is right. You better be right."
What am I going to sit there and say? They have all the different TV copies. I'm going by how I see it looking up on the big screen. I disagreed with it, but I'm prejudiced. I wanted it to be the other way.
That was -- what I said to the official up on the field was "I hope you guys upstairs was right because that changed the whole complexion of the game."
Q. What was it like to line up and play against that team, look across, and see the helmets and the whole entirety of the night?
BRADY QUINN: It was a great experience, something I always looked forward to. I knew it would have to be a bowl game to play against Ohio, but to have an opportunity to play the Buckeyes was big for me. It was better than I hoped.
Q. Coach, you talked about Troy Smith, but overall they had well over 600 yards in total offense. How disappointed were you?
COACH WEIS: I was disappointed in the number of big plays we gave up. There's a number of big plays, you know a lot of times when you look at statistics, if they're nickel and diming you, and getting 5 and 10, you can live with it and say they're physically kicking your butt, but when you give up that many plays that was disappointing. That was one of our big goals going into the game was this was going to be a game getting the big plays. That was disappointing.
Q. Charlie, talk about what happened your adjustments you were trying to make in the second quarter?
COACH WEIS: Like I said, I thought after that first drive, we continued to move the ball. I thought that we got stagnant in the second quarter. That's why at halftime we got ready for no-huddle, and halftime was a long time, that 22 minutes, and I just felt that we got stagnant and it wasn't giving ourselves a chance to change the pace of the game.
Q. Charlie, momentum seems to be a buzz word. How does this moment affect, if at all, the momentum of the program?
COACH WEIS: Obviously, it's a bit rhetorical. When we win the game, it has a much more positive effect than when we lose. I'm not going to say it has no effect at all. I think, a couple minutes ago when the game is third and 9, 3 and 11, you get off the field, and who knows, the game is tied, and then you're playing in overtime. That wasn't the way it turned out.
We lost by 14, but if we lose by 21, and we're not competitive, it's different than when you're fighting. You're fighting with two minutes left in the game and you still have a chance to win it.
Q. Brady, your relationship with AJ Hawk to the side, what was it like going against him in the game today, and how inspired was he playing?
BRADY QUINN: Obviously, he's a great player. He showed up today and had a great game. I'm sure he's got a bright future in the NFL. He was playing in the Fiesta Bowl and playing against Notre Dame, he was amped.
Q. You talked about how important winning this game was and how this season would be remembered. What do you do to turn this into a positive off the field?
COACH WEIS: They told me there's two ways you can go after a loss. One way is too sit there and feel sorry for yourselves, or you can take that bitter taste in your mouth and say "I don't want to have that bitter taste again next year." It's either one or the other, which way do you want to go. I told them they can count on me, I'll always be there for them, but they're the ones that have to make that decision because ultimately it really comes down to the players are players, the coach is coach. They know how bad this feels and how important that it is to them. They're the ones that are going to have to make the strides and take it to the next level. Obviously today wasn't good enough.
THE MODERATOR: Thanks guys, appreciate it.

End of FastScripts...

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TOSTITOS FIESTA BOWL: OHIO STATE v NOTRE DAME

January 2, 2006

Brandon Hoyte

Brady Quinn

Charlie Weis