Postgame Quotes
Nebraska vs. USC
Saturday, Sept. 15, 2007
Memorial Stadium (Lincoln, Neb.)
Quarterback Sam Keller
On the balance between passing and rushing (Audio)
“Our plan was to be completely balanced. We did not want to be predictable at all. Before the games take shape you have to favor one over the other. We would have liked to have more success rushing, but given that we didn’t, we had to throw it a lot and we did pretty good. They posed problems and had good pass rushing and really athletic guys, but we were still able to throw the ball pretty well against them I thought.”<?xml:namespace prefix="o" ns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office"?>
On the team’s fight (Audio)
“We can take positives from this. Nobody’s going in the tank, nothing’s going to happen. We’re going to go back, we’re going to fix it and everything is going to be fine. I’m just proud of the guys for not going in the tank. We just kept fighting until the final whistle was blown.”
On the positives of the two late scores in the fourth quarter (Audio)
“The game is four quarters long and we’re going to put as many points on the board as we can, so of course we can take it (as a) positive. We have guys with character. We’re not going to stop fighting. We don’t care what time is left in the game. We’re going to go and try to score on every drive that we play.”
On season improvements (Audio)
“We’re not worried, we just have to go back and fix the things we can fix. Obviously there is stuff going wrong, but we just go back and fix them. We got enough guys with character and we got enough guys on the team that want to fix it, so we just go out and fix what we need to fix.”
Linebacker Bo Ruud
On the loss to USC (Audio)
“It’s beyond disappointing. It feels terrible right now. This was really bad performance from our team and I don’t think it shows at all how we expect ourselves to play.”
On Coach Callahan’s reaction (Audio)
“He was disappointed in us. We are already dissapointed in ourselves. He knows we are better than that and I think that’s what really hurts him. He knows that we didn’t play our best game. We could have won that game but we didn’t perform. It’s on the players. We did not do a good job, especially on the defensive side of the ball. The offense did a fairly good job, except for the turnovers, but the defense did not show up today."
On the team’s improvement (Audio)
“We are going to watch film and see what we did wrong. You can’t go in the tank after a game like this. You have to have the mind set to improve off this and get better and win out or you go in the tank and call it a year. I know our team is not going to do that. We are going to do our best to bounce back and try to improve as a football team.“
Offensive Lineman Carl Nicks
On the problems the USC defense was giving the offensive line
“It was not really the (defensive) line, it was more the fact that they were blitzing with the linebackers. I have to tip my hat to them they did a wonderful job.“
On <?xml:namespace prefix="st1" ns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"?>Nebraska's struggles to run the ball
“That’s a good question. I can't tell without really looking at the film, but I can just tell you that will never happen again.”
On the strengths of the USC defense
“They were just really fast. It seemed like some plays they knew what we were doing. To me it wasn’t like they wanted to hit, they wanted to play the ball. The linebackers did an excellent job, three of the best in the nation.”
On what this does to the team’s confidence
“Anytime you lose by this much and don’t perform in the run game, it's going to hurt any team, but we will bounce back, look at the film, figure out the mistakes we made and fix them.”
Lance Brandenburgh
On USC running with success
“I do not really know, it was unexplainable. We all missed a lot of tackles. If we want to beat the No. 1 team in the nation, we obviously cant miss that many tackles. We were in the right positions, we just did not finish. It is all about being in a good football position and making a sure tackle and not going for a big hit. We all need to work on that."
“They a very physical team, but I think it was a winnable ball game. We just have to execute our defense and make sure tackles.” “We just could not stop the run and that’s what killed us all game.”
On the game
“We feel like we are right there. We felt like this was a winnable football game. You can't let them come in and let them run the ball.