On defensive play against USC
“We prepared to play well. It felt like really there was two drives in the game we didn’t. And then we got a stop late in the game. I would say it was more than that. We needed one more play, one more stop. There’s no real consolation in playing good on defense and not winning. The objective is to win. We obviously knew it was a hell of a challenge and our players stepped up to that.”

On the secondary and pass defense
“I think we have very good players in the secondary. I think it’s a testament to those guys that play. Our guys do a very good job of executing the system and covering themselves in areas that they need to. I give credit to our players, we knew going in that we had a challenging system to defend, a challenging group of players to defend, and we wanted to make sure that they couldn’t figure out ways to figure out our coverages. They go to extreme lengths to try and figure out what we’re doing and so the system we put in place to make sure what we were playing and they couldn’t tell their quarterback, I think, is a testament to our players.”

On UCLA’s offense
“They’re running the ball. They’re really doing a really nice job running the ball. And that running game includes the quarterback as a designed runner. It also includes the quarterback as a scrambler if you look at the Penn State game. He probably had 80 yards and critical scramble yards. He scrambles on third down for first downs. He’s athletic as hell, tall, and fast. So, they want to run the football and that’s just really everybody we’ve seen this year, that’s been their mantra. That’s what they’ve been doing well. I think they’re averaging close to 180 yards a game rushing since they made the change in coordinator. We’re going to have to do a good job defending the run and knowing where the quarterback is when he drops back.”