Offensive Coordinator Shawn Watson

Nebraska Football
Weekly Press Conference
Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2010
Pre-South Dakota State

Shawn Watson
Nebraska Offensive Coordinator

On Nebraska's mindset going into the final drive of the first half at Washington
"We started at that point in the game. We had a lot of rhythm going in the running game. The big guys up front, when they get in a rhythm like that, you can continue to run the football. The backs did a great job, they were hitting the hole. We were making holes. I thought at that time, we could eat up the clock and drive it down and put it in. That's what we were going to do. We told them that before they took the field. They took the challenge and went down and did it. It was very pleasing to see that type of physicality and that type of mindset, because you need to have that to win championships."

On whether the offense if further along than he expected
"I think we always felt this was the vision of where we thought we could be. We have a lot of improvements to make. We look at the film. We get upset with the little things. There is so much improvement we can make, so many things in terms of detail communication, identification, communication and details. That is part of the process, which is part of what we preach in everything we do here with both sides of the ball and special teams. The guys are getting better and better and better. I think that is the pleasing thing from our standpoint. We're growing, have a lot of room yet to grow, but I like the attitude, the demeanor, everything the kids have brought to the table in terms of every day practice has been outstanding. We just have to stay humble, stay hungry and keep working."

On how hard last season was when the offense was struggling
"It's like I told the group, I didn't get stupid overnight. We were in a situation where we had to manage several different things. I think someday we'll look back on it. Two things we'll look back on it and say we managed it well. We're trying to manage wins. We're trying to play to our strong suit, which was a great defense and special teams and manage our situation. Manage our quarterback situation because Zac (Lee) obviously was hurt. We were trying to manage the injuries that we had on the offensive line and at tailback. It took everybody to do that. We had to lose ourselves. We had to lose our ego. I really believe this, had we gotten caught in our ego, we would not have had the year that we had last year. We had to die to ourselves so to speak, and we had to do what was right for the team. It was not going to be dramatic or pretty, and we knew that. I knew going in that the criticism would come because of that. That isn't why I do what I do. My job is to win football games and put us in the best position to win. When we chose to go that path, we went it. We went with all we had and tried to be creative at the same time within what we had. Then it was really good to get to the bowl game obviously where we were mended up, where we could put a team out there that we could go back and be us. It's been really fun this year because now this year we've been able to stay healthy, and we've also had depth and competition in depth. In the winter, when we sat down we really looked at ourselves, it really cut all of us, hurt us all, we took a lot of pride in it. We studied our football. We wanted to make sure we put a good product out there on the field. We knew we were capable because we knew what kind of players we had. Long answer, it was frustrating yeah, but at the same time those are some of the things you have to do."

On shifting the running game focus against Washington
"It had everything to do with the way they were defending us. If you watch the film, there were two or three guys who were really dedicated to the quarterback. Some of that I'm sure was not by scheme. Two of the guys were, sometimes the third guy, would get pulled over there and it opened up the tailback runs. Again, we were able to have a real good feel for how we may get played in that game based on how they played Oregon in the year before with a similar type of offense. We were able to go in with a plan."

On preparing offensively for the game
"We went in to find out what they were giving us. It was real easy to see upstairs. The first touchdown throw that Taylor (Martinez)had, it was real easy to see this is how they're going to play us. The adjustment from that point was really easy to be honest."
 
On the challenge the offense presents for defenses
"It's big because you really have to choose. The offense, when we're in the gun, is an option offense. You have to choose who you're going to stop. We can move from that. We have enough things in our package. We're not one-dimensional in our package. Whether it may be a quarterback tilt-back option, if we choose to give it to the tailback on every play, you don't know unless you really looked at the film and studied it and really knew football what we were doing. We have the multiplicity, and we built it that way. We wanted to make sure we had a plan that could handle all of the adjustments we may get from a defense."

On the durability of the quarterback in this offense
"That's why all along we've told you guys it's important for us to have depth at quarterback. The two and three guys are really important, and we're blessed with some really good guys there. The quarterback is going to carry the ball in our offense. You need depth because of that."

On what they do in practice as far as tackling the quarterback
"We don't tackle in practice, but we thud up. You wouldn't know it, our practices are very physical, and we go after each other, especially when we go good-on-good. We do that quite a bit, more than any place I've ever been. It's a good thing because we want that competitive edge when it comes Saturday. You wouldn't know it, our guys are very physical in practice, and our quarterback gets knocked around quite a bit. They don't have green, purple or yellow jerseys on. They have their jerseys on and we're playing football. That is important for them, though. That helps with the ball security aspect of the game. The guys have to get hit, he has to know what it's like to get hit or get the ball stripped in order to manage the football, ball security-wise."

On if they tackled in camp
"We were tackling in camp. We were after them in camp. Right now, we thud everyone up. You watch our thud-ups, our thud-ups usually end up being pretty good thud-ups. Guys usually end up being on the ground and getting thud-up pretty well."

On leading the country in yards per carry and rushing touchdowns
"I tell you, honestly, we haven't ever looked at that. That's the first time I've ever heard that. That is just the way we are, I don't look at that stuff because all that does is create softness in your mind. We don't look at that. Honestly the way we look at it is we look at all the things that could have been or we should be better at. As we approach every week of practice, there are things we need to get better at. One of the things I've really harped on with our guys this week, we left yards on the field. You're going to do that in every game, but we left some yards on the field this past week and you obviously did the second week. It stems from a couple of different things and we've addressed those in practice. One of those things being identification and communication. When we did it Saturday well we did it really well. We just need to be more consistent at it. There are yards out there and there are opportunities out there. Why? Because getting ready to go down the road here in the Big 12 season we need to be on the p's and q's. We're always going to coach perfection here, both sides of the ball, which is what we do. That is what we're striving for."

On if they show everything they have against South Dakota State this week
"Show up and see. We're going to keep stretching ourselves. We will never stay the same. The thing that we always want to do in every game plan, we're always planning weeks ahead in mind. We're going to keep stretching ourselves. The multiplicity because of the way we teach is enormous. We can look like we're doing something different, but really we're not. No one is changing, but the defense looks totally different. We'll continue to stretch the envelope like that and press our guys that way, too."

On if they work on certain things that way
"Every week is going to be that way. It doesn't matter who the opponent is, we're always concerned with us. It's just the way we do our business here."

On the Missouri Valley Football Conference
"It's a great league. What has happened since I was in that league, it used to be the Gateway Conference, now it is the Missouri Valley. I think the addition of the Dakota schools has really strengthened that league. I believe, it's just a personal opinion because I'm kind of tied to it in a lot of different ways, is it's the best league in the country that way. They have great competition, some very good schools. When they added all the different schools from the Dakota schools, it really strengthened the league and made it the best in the country."

On how big it is to score on the opening possession and get early points
"It's huge. It's really big. We talk about starting fast, we want to start fast and start quick. The way you do that is score. When we can score on the first possession that begins the rhythm and roll and momentum. We talk about that a lot. We practice that way to get it in their blood system so we can play that way on Saturday. Being able to put a score on the board is huge."

On what it was about Oregon's offense that intrigued him to try similar things
"We sat down, when you look at the game of football, defenses are really good today. It's obvious. We're going to run into guys like our guys who do a great job, and we better have a plan of multiplicity and diversity to it. If you just do one thing you're going to get stopped. Everything has to do with plan. We play that defense every day, so we have to obviously continue to evolve. In the scope of our offense, we wanted it to have multiplicity and formation personnel groups and schematically be sound and simple. What looks like a lot really isn't a lot. That's my background in the West Coast Offense in the passing aspect of it, basically what I've done is with the help of the staff and everybody who is on board, we've taken the same approach with the run game. I think one of the things that really makes this unique is we have that diversity and the multiple looks, but we're not doing a lot. We can tag who we read when we want to. We're going to read multiple people on the field, so not one guy is going to be able to practice they're reading me, this is how we're going to stop it. We read several different people. It has an enormous scope to it. We went and studied several different schools to see what they were doing, and we put our twist on it. I think the thing that has been really fun in our room, the guys have been wanting to go to work because the creativity. If you're a coach, creativity is huge. Creativity is at an all-time high. We continue to find new ways to do what we do better; it's been fun for everybody."

On the trend of NFL teams taking on the spread, and if that opens doors for someone like Taylor Martinez
"I think in the college realm absolutely. I think people who open up their box big enough to see the multiplicity and how this can add to the team, the explosiveness of it. You're going to want a guy who can throw it and run it. Guys like Taylor are those who are going to become the top priority for us in our recruiting. You need a guy who can do all facets, very important."

On Martinez's skill in reading the defense in the zone-read
"He's doing a great job. One of the things Taylor had to learn was how to detail his game. He is such a coachable player, because he has a lot of pride and obviously because of pride it is important to him to master that. He has gotten better with the footwork aspect of it. Once he has the footwork aspect of it, because that kind of sets the bait, then he has become very efficient at reading whoever it is. That kind of sets everything up for that read. Really the read becomes very, very simple. There are some things we do that help to aid him like our line splits, our formation structures. There is more than one piece that goes into it, there are several different things."

On if it was hard to come from the West Coast experience to the shotgun zone-read
"No, not at all. I saw right away, the multiplicity. I had a vision. I still believe the West Coast passing attack is the best there is. It is very simple for the quarterback. It's very fast. He doesn't get sacked. He spits the ball out on time. It's very multiple. You can teach a number of different personnel groups with formation, plug in the principle and bang, you've got a play. It allows you week-to-week a lot of different things. The coordinator you're facing is practicing against things he's probably not going to get, but we're doing the same thing. I saw that right away in the read game. I saw it right away. That has been our approach and how we've launched our approach has been in that direction. We're different than a lot of teams who run this. We're different. That is why we're different, because we want that multiplicity."

On the pressure on Taylor Martinez with getting sacks
"At times he can do one of two things. This past Saturday he had a run opportunity. Now he took several of those opportunities, that is the good thing about Taylor. I get him after every series. I told him after the first sack, 'Listen brother, you need to take it and use your feet. They're a match-zone team and you'll hurt them.' He did. After that he did a really nice job. That is part of the process where he is at right now. He'll continue to develop that. He wants to sling it around like any quarterback. You have not seen, he is a really good passer. He could be one of the better passers I've been around. He has such a fast trigger - very accurate passer. We haven't had to do that with him really the last two weeks. I think as time goes on we're going to need to do that, and you'll see his passing aspect come out, too. He's having to learn some of those things like not waiting for those receivers to get open, throw on rhythm, throw on time, trust your read, and if it isn't there check it out of the back and run it. It's that simple. We keep it that small for him. When he did it in the game, he hurt Washington with his runs."

On fullback Tyler Legate
"He's become invaluable to us because he does so many things for us. He is a guy we can move around. He is an adjusting piece of our formation package and personnel groups. We can be really multiple with him and teach him the things I spoke of earlier, how to plug in assignments. He is a very smart player. He has football instincts. Besides that he loves the game. He'll do anything we ask him to do. He wants to get on the field. He has an unbelievable role for us because he allows us a lot of multiplicity, allows us a ton."

On how much wide receiver Brandon Kinnie has improved this year
"BK came on last year toward the end of the season and you could see him really gain confidence. It really happened in practice, when I first noticed it, and then he put it on film in games. I saw little glimpses like in the Texas game, he made a huge catch on the drive to go ahead there. I could just see his confidence building. We got into spring ball and his confidence again, you could see it soaring. He has been and is a great complement to Niles (Paul). You can't just take Niles out of it. You have to deal with BK because BK is the same type of guy. He is a big, physical receiver. He has great catching ability and can run too. He can get away from people. If he gets a step he'll take it to the zone for you. His development has been really big for us, because now we have two guys who not only have speed and size but the ability to make plays for us."