Nebraska Coach Bo Pelini

Nebraska Football
Weekly Press Conference
Tuesday, Oct. 19, 2010
Memorial Stadium (Lincoln, Neb.)
Pre-Oklahoma State

On the psyche of the team
"It's fine. They're ready to go. I think they are looking forward to this week."

On the sense of urgency to get back on the field
"There's always a sense of urgency."

On how much Taylor Martinez has to learn while facing adversity
"Every experience he has is a little different. You learn as you go through, and you have experiences, and it's part of the process."

On if Oklahoma State wide receiver Justin Blackmon is one of the best receivers the Huskers have faced this year
"Yeah, he's a good football player."

On how well he thinks Nebraska's secondary matches up with Oklahoma State's receivers
"I like our secondary. I think they match up good against any receiving corps. I have a lot of confidence in our guys."

On how dangerous the Oklahoma State offense is
"They have some talent. Obviously they move the ball, and they have good talent on that side of the ball."

On how he prepares for the Oklahoma State offense
"They've played half the year, so we've got that. We did some work in the offseason, and we've looked at what they've done in the past. You're always looking."

On how Zac Lee's performance on Saturday affects the quarterback situation
"It doesn't. I've said it before - we have confidence in all three quarterbacks. Taylor (Martinez) is the starter and the other two guys we use situationally. Nothing's really changed there."

On if there is a number two quarterback
"I think I just addressed that. It's situational."

On linebacker Will Compton's progression
"He hasn't played a lot of football yet. He was hurt, but I think he's ready to go now. He has more than just a week of practice under his belt and I think that helps the guy. I think he's about ready to go."

On if his status affects what Nebraska will do defensively
"No. I mean everything plays a part and I guess that's part of it."

On if Lavonte David is coming along at midseason
"He's coming along but he's still got a long way to go, which is to be expected. He's learning a lot as he goes. He's really active, he's tough, he's competitive, and he still makes a lot of mistakes. That's part of the deal when you're playing a young, inexperienced guy but I am seeing progress."

On if David's pace to set a school record for tackles in a season is overrated
"I don't know. It shows that he's an active, good football player, but there's a lot more to the game than statistics."

On if Eric Hagg will be returning more punts
"No, he hasn't been back there, he hasn't done that. I have confidence he can do it, he just hasn't worked back there."

On special teams overall
"I'd like to see our special teams keep getting better. At times we're really good and at times we've got to pick it up. I think like the rest of our football team, it's a work in progress."

On if playing on the road for the next game is a benefit, given Nebraska's recent success on the road
"Our next game is a road game, so we'll be ready to play on the road. I don't know if it's a benefit. It's a benefit if we play well. The game is going to be won if we execute."

On if playing on the road is less stressful than at home
"Well, we've played better on the road in the last year or so. I don't think it's ever a great benefit. I mean, you like to play at home."

On if due to the missed tackles in the Texas game, they will be doing more good-on-good this week than normal
"We always do good-on-good every week. We did a little more yesterday because that's the way the schedule sets up. That had nothing to do with the missed tackles, I promise you that. Missed tackles happen when you play with bad technique and lousy focus."

On how the team improves on penalties and missed passes during the week at practice
"You work at it. It's as simple as that. We continue to work on it and we work on it every week. You have to put it to work when you walk out onto the field, and you've got to execute. I've said for the last month there are certain things we need to do to keep getting better as a football team and keep working to get better at. And until we do that, we are going to be susceptible to what happened Saturday. We have to get things fixed and guys got to have a sense of urgency to get things fixed. It's as simple as that."

On the 28 missed tackles that he counted during the game
"It might be the worst tackling game I've been a part of."

On what's a normal number of missed tackles
"One is too many in my book."

On what they are doing to get the defensive line more involved
"Well you've got to execute around them. We haven't all necessarily done that. Our defensive line has been good at times, and they need to pick it up at times. It's a team game. Everybody's got to do their part. We didn't play awful defensively. If we would've tackled well, we would've been just fine. They couldn't throw the ball on us, and they ran the ball more because we missed tackles and blew assignments more than anything else. When you take care of yourself, good things happen. When you don't, bad things happen. It comes down to us executing our football and doing things the way they are coached to do it, putting their eyes where they need to be and playing disciplined team defense. That's when you play really good. When we do that, we are pretty good, we are really good."

On what the team's previous high missed tackles in a game was for the season
"I don't know. Nowhere near that. We've been a pretty good tackling team."

On why the team didn't tackle well
"I don't know. You look at a year ago, why do you have nine turnovers? Some things you can't really answer and I'm searching for that answer. It's not an easy thing to put your finger on. Is it a lack of focus? I don't know. Is it too much want-to? I don't know what it is. But it's something that comes down to you've got to be the same and you've got to be consistent all the time in your approach. I don't know if that's happening. Once again I'm looking everywhere to see what we can do to make sure that doesn't happen again."

On if he is satisfied with the team's leadership
"I wish that would happen more often but you always do. You always wish the team and the players would be more vocal. Leadership happens a lot of ways. You don't have to be vocal, it's not about that. A lot of guys lead by example. It depends on what kind of personalities you have on the team. Every team is different in that way."

On if Taylor Martinez saw things better in the second half on Saturday
"Yeah, he did fine."

On how much Texas' punts in the third quarter impacted the game
"It doesn't help. The punter hit some unusual punts to field. You get a roll punt and some of that's luck but it's good execution. It goes all the way across the field and takes the kind of bounces it did, it's not easy unless you have two returners back there. The fact that we could've centered our guys after the first one a little better and I think he got influenced a little bit too much by the roll and figured by the angle the punter couldn't get it back over there. Even the second one was more drastic than the first one. Like I said, sometimes you have to tip your hat to them. It was a good play by them."

On how Oklahoma State's strong special teams will impact the game
"I have confidence in our special teams, there's no question about that. We were in some good shape on some of the kickoffs and the one punt."

On if the team is in a different mindset, given not as high of a ranking and not playing Texas
"I don't see it any different. Everything we want to do is still out there for us to get done. It hasn't changed one bit."

On if the team was tense under pressure
"No, I don't think so. I think they were excited and confident last week. I think they are anxious this week to get back out there and play. Most of our guys are embarrassed by how they played because we didn't play like us. We didn't coach well enough and we didn't execute well enough. This Saturday gives us the next opportunity to get it right again. I think everyone's anxious to get out there and play again but you've got to earn it during the week."

On how impressive Oklahoma State quarterback Brandon Weeden has been
"He's a good football player. He's got a lot of weapons around him and he does a good job."

On if Taylor Martinez' confidence has decreased
"No, he's confident. He came out business as usual yesterday and actually had an excellent practice yesterday."

On if his expertise in secondary gives Nebraska an advantage against Oklahoma State
"No, they provide a number of issues. They can run it, they can throw it. It's well thought out. It will be a nice challenge for us."

On the pressure on Taylor Martinez
"We communicate very well. I'm not worried about that."

On how the team gets consistency offensively
"Execution. Not shooting yourself in the foot. Not putting the ball on the ground. Not false starting. Clean up our game. Don't blow assignments. It's the same thing on offense as defense and special teams; you have to perform and execute. We as coaches have to demand it and we have to get cleaner in that area. The things that happened on Saturday have happened up to this point, maybe not in the number, but you have to correct your mistakes as the season goes on. That's why we constantly preach it. That's why we constantly talk about cleaning up our game. If you don't, it's going to reach up and grab you, and that's what happened last Saturday."

On if the team was progressing the way he wanted them to up to that point
"No, but I never feel like it does. I always think you can get better, but there are certain areas we've been stressing, I expect to get fixed. I expect a sense of urgency to get it done and that hasn't happened."

On if the team has had a sense of urgency since the loss
"I don't know if it's lack of sense of urgency but I addressed this with the guys for the last few weeks. There's a difference between wanting something to happen and making it happen. Something's not going to get corrected by you magically wanting it to happen. You have to work at it. It has to happen. Or we as coaches have to find someone to get it done in that area. And that's really across the board. It's not particular guy or position. That's us as a football team, we have to get cleaner."

On his general thoughts on Oklahoma State
"It will be a good test for us. I'm looking forward to playing the game."

On how the receivers responded following a tough game on Saturday
"We'll find out Saturday. They're a prideful group. Everyone's going to get caught up in the dropped balls and that type of thing, but there were a lot of other areas that contributed greatly to the result."