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AT&T COTTON BOWL CLASSIC: TEXAS TECH v ALABAMAJanuary 2, 2006Taurean HendersonJarrett HicksCody HodgesMike LeachFlercher SessionDwayne SlayDALLAS, TEXAS PETER IRWIN: We're joined on the stage at this time by Coach Mike Leach of the Texas Tech Red Raiders. Coach, would you like to make any opening comments about the game and then we'll take the questions? COACH MIKE LEACH: No, into questions. PETER IRWIN: Okay. We'll take questions directly from the floor. Q. I know you talked about the speed of their defense coming into the game, what did you think of your overall impression of their defense, seeing it in person? COACH MIKE LEACH: I thought they had good team speed. I thought that -- and I think it was a tightly contested game by two really good teams. But I guess that I felt like they out played us on all three sides of the ball by a narrow margin. They're a good team and they created a lot of our problems. I thought we missed some opportunities where we could have played a little sharper earlier in the game, especially the first half. And some points in the second half as well. Q. From a scheme standpoint, can you talk about what they did, if they did anything different than they had shown on film, what prevented y'all from getting into your groove? COACH MIKE LEACH: Well, they really didn't do anything. That guy was asking by my allergies, I guess they're kicking in. But they didn't do anything different. They out executed us. We needed to hit face. They challenged us. They said, here, try to run the past us, try to run inside us. And they were better at preventing that than we were than we were throwing and catching it. Q. Could you talk about Cody coming out of the game and then putting him back in the game and just what his status right now is and what he did to put him out of the game and then coming back to play. COACH MIKE LEACH: I don't know what his status is. We don't talk about injuries during the season or after. I think he's got a sore leg. Compliments of several fine Alabama defenders. And then felt good enough to go back in, so he did. Q. So much was talked about the offense versus the defense, but it seems like special teams pretty much was the key in the game. COACH MIKE LEACH: I thought that the first half Alabama dominated the field position. And I thought that they dominated field position, put us in a position where we had to move the long, the ball a long ways in order to score. We successfully moved it part of the way, we weren't able to move it all of the way in most instances. Q. Looking at film going into this game, did you think you guys were going to be able to do more on offense against them? Did you think there were going to be ways you could exploit what they do on defense? COACH MIKE LEACH: Yeah, I thought that they were really good. I thought they were really good. I thought they played really well. I wouldn't categorize this as one of or better offensive days. And not just based on the numbers, it took us an awfully long time to get in sync. And I don't know that we ever did. Q. You kept trying to hit those side line fades, was there something you were seeing that you kept trying to go that way? COACH MIKE LEACH: Yeah, the defender was right here (Indicating), there's a huge amount of grass right here (Indicating), and our thought was that if we would whip this guy's ass and throw the ball here (Indicating) that we would get some yards. And that didn't turn out to be the case all that often. Q. How much did their speed, their defensive speed maybe take away some of the things that you guys do well offensively? COACH MIKE LEACH: I think that it was significant. I think that just the margin of error, the speed impacted our margin of error. Everything coming faster, their ability to react, even when we got them in a bind they were able to react quickly. I guess if you're sitting in my shoes what you look at, which I'm going to, and I'm not going to spend a lot of time worrying about the other guys. We just need to play sharper. If we want the results to be different we need to play sharper. I was proud of our guys, I thought we played good through to the end but I thought we could have played sharper near the end. Q. Did the wind affect your play calling any at all? COACH MIKE LEACH: No. No. Q. How much did their time of possession in the second half slow your offense down, affect your offense? COACH MIKE LEACH: I think that was significant. I think that -- and I think that they really did a good job of that. We had capitalized on some things that we should have the first half. Then we wanted to get them off the field quickly, so that we can get the ball and try to move it down the field. Of course they knew that they needed to keep us off the field and all that stuff. I'm going to say it was a 17 play drive, is that right? And it ate up a huge amount of time in the game. I think that's a moment in the game where that first drive of the -- I'm not sure that the first drive of the second half isn't the most significant drive in the game in a lot of cases. That was a significant drive. That was a drive that, where if you dominate that drive you get the upper hand. They dominated that drive and they got the upper hand. Q. I'm guessing you don't like to see your quarterbacks run that much but I was wondering if you would talk about that part of Cody's game today. He seemed to be really gutsy out there and taking charge when he had to at the last possible second. COACH MIKE LEACH: I think for the most part the runs were pretty good. Not all of them. There's several I would like to have back and that I thought were ill-conceived. But I thought he really did a good job for the most part as far as identifying when to run. They're in man coverage, everybody gets run off, then there's a whole bunch of grass. He did a pretty good job of identifying than taking advantage of it, I thought. Q. Other than Cody Hodges running, your running game didn't get going much. What was the factor in that? COACH MIKE LEACH: I think the biggest thing was our own consistency. Alabama's high level of play and our consistency. I think that -- and I don't want to suggest that we misplayed or we played bad. I think we had two really good teams out there. But I think both these teams are better than a bunch of them in front of us. But the thing is, just our consistency. If you want to have more runs, be consistent. And I just think consistency. I thought we could have converted third downs better. We spent a little bit of time taking turns as far as not being real sharp. Just all phases of the offense not really clicking as sharp as we could have been. But then worse yet, I think it was like that for kind of a sustained period. But a lot of the credit goes to their defense and the way they played. Q. What were you thinking when the kick left Christensen's foot on the last field goal? COACH MIKE LEACH: It didn't look very good when it left his foot. I don't know what you guys thought. But I had high hopes for it not being good at that point. Did he make it? (Laughter.) Let's take poll. Raise your hand if you think he made it. (Laughter.) You guys are all on my side then. (Laughter.) Q. Did they do a lot differently in terms of blitz schemes? It seemed like they were really going after your quarter back, especially early on? COACH MIKE LEACH: I didn't think so. I think that they did a good job on their coverage as far as not allowing a guy to get open until late. And then I think that they were fast and even when we protect him well it's not going to happen forever. So I think that we needed do react a little more quickly. Q. Can you talk about their defense, especially in the secondary, Coach talked about the fade routes not working along the sidelines. Just kind of what you saw from your perspective? JARRETT HICKS: Well, I think that the defense was number two in the nation already coming into the game. So we expected something, a tough defense to go against. Early on it wasn't working too much for us, the play routes and different things in our offense. But I think that, like Coach said, it was more us not being consistent. So they came to play and we didn't capitalize on some opportunities that we had. Q. Fletcher, Number 33 from Alabama and another player came over and kind of hugged you after the game and told you something. What did they tell you? FLETCHER SESSION: All they told me was it was a good game. Told me to keep my head up and told me next year we would have our chance. Q. Fletcher, how tough was it trying to stop their running game and as tired as you guys appeared at the end, would overtime have been hard on you guys as a defense? FLETCHER SESSION: It was bothering us a little because every time they get down to the third and two or three and then like we just busted assignments up and then they get a first down. That's what kept the drive going so long in the second half on us. I didn't realize it was 17 play drive, I just knew I was tired a little. Q. Mike, I don't know where you want to go with this, but it looked like on some of the fades from the side line had some problems with the calls. There might have been some pass interference or something. COACH MIKE LEACH: I guess you guys would know, I can't address that. But, yeah, I feel -- I appreciate your words of support there. (Laughter.) But you know I can't address that. Q. Cody, just looking at you, how hard you worked all day long it appears, you can see it, but how disappointing, how disappointed are you in the fact that especially it didn't go your way and the fact that your special teams blocked the kick and it still went through. Just your thoughts on that. CODY HODGES: Very disappointed. Any time you get beat especially when it is your last game as a senior, nobody enjoys losing. I don't know, if anybody out here has played football or any type of sport, when you lose, you're not happy. It is my last game as a Red Raiders and I felt like I obviously could have played better, especially in the first half. We missed some opportunities, but I mean that's Alabama, a great defense, they played hard. We knew that was going to be the case. We just didn't make the plays when we had to. Q. Cody, it's been awhile since you had to run that much. In any game probably. Can you talk about just how much you were having to run and was that because guys were open or you just thought that was the better decision at that time? CODY HODGES: Well, with Coach Leach sitting there, I mean I'm always supposed to run when it's a good decision. They played a lot of man coverage and when teams do that I don't think Alabama really accounted for me running with the ball. If guys were covered down field, then I can pick up 10 yards and that makes them vulnerable to that. And I felt like it was my job to pick up as much as I could. And obviously we want to throw the ball first, run second. Q. Cody, you guys kind of seemed to be shooting yourselves in the foot there quite a bit with the false start penalties. But was that noise or just Russ or what? CODY HODGES: I just think it was guys trying to get too caught up in the moment. As an offense we have got to stay relaxed and stay within ourselves. That's the thing, we knew that we were going to have to get positive yards on first and second down. We would have a good play on first down and have a penalty on second down and now it's second and 15. Against a team like that, it's hard to get 10 yards let alone 15 yards to get a first down. Q. Cody, is there one moment in which your leg was injured or was it an accumulation of all hits you took and LSU? Was there ever any doubt you would come back at the end? CODY HODGES: No, it was just one play. I guess it was in the fourth quarter. We tried to run a screen pass to the left, to Taurean, he got covered up, I ran, whoever tackled me, just hit me on the knee with a helmet. At that point in time I really didn't think I could come back in. The trainer, our training staff is excellent. They taped me up, put a brace on and I just kind of relied on my faith to just pull me through for the last few minutes. Q. This is for Taurean and Cody. There's been a lot made about Alabama's speed, but how much different was it actually seeing tan having to execute what you do against it? TAUREAN HENDERSON: It wasn't very much different in the speed on the field as we saw on film. Earlier in the week we were watching it. Obviously I saw they were a very fast team and a very talented team on defense. And we just missed a lot of key opportunities of getting the ball and turning up field. That's what you have to do against a great defense. CODY HODGES: I don't know how to answer that question. They're very fast. We knew that coming into the game. Just watching them on film. They're exactly that. DeMeco and those guy, whether we ran the ball or through the ball, the lanes closed quickly. I think by far they're probably the fastest team we played all year. PETER IRWIN: Gentlemen, thank you very much and congratulations on a great see some. We're going to ask you to walk next door and we wish you the best of luck and happy new year to you.
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