Head Coach Bo Pelini Quotes vs. Purdue

Nebraska vs. Purdue
Head Coach Bo Pelini
Saturday, Nov. 1, 2014
Memorial Stadium (Lincoln, Neb.)

Opening Statement
“Like I just said to the team, I congratulated them on the win. There were some good things and some things we've got to get better at. Looking forward to the bye week to keep this football team working. Excited to be 8-1 at this point, but we understand that we have a lot to do to finish it off the way we want to finish it off."

On the status of senior I-back Ameer Abdullah
“I think Ameer just has a mild sprain and a little bit of a bruise on the side where he got hit. We're very optimistic there.

On the confusion of the unsportsmanlike conduct call against him
“I was confused, to be honest with you."

On what he was confused about
“That's between me and league office because I'll be talking to somebody here as quickly as I possibly can."

On if he got any explanation about the call
“Nope."

On what happened with the play clock in the first quarter
"That's another one that I was very confused on."

On if Abdullah could have gone back in the game
"If he could've, he would've. We were going to be cautious with him. We were going to do everything we needed to do to make sure we were doing the right thing by Ameer. He already had an MRI and we feel good about where he is."

On if Abdullah will be ready to play against Wisconsin
"I'm optimistic about that, yeah. But I can't say for sure, and I don't know that."

On his assessment of the offense
"Sloppy. That's about it."

On explanations about the problems with the snaps
"No, because it sure doesn't happen during the week. That's part of being sloppy."

On how much the offense missed Abdullah once he left the game
"Well in my opinion, he may be the best player in college football, so you're going to miss him a little bit."

On the two blocked punts and the performance of special teams
"I thought we played pretty well special teams-wise. We did some really good things there. We thought we could get a block and we did. I thought the execution of what we were trying to get done worked out well. They sure gave us a big boost. One of the things I didn't like is we had opportunities to really solidify early on and it didn't work out well. We had opportunities we didn't take advantage of. Missed field goal, getting stopped on the goal line because of a fumbled exchange. Things that are inexcusable. Things that didn't hurt us today but will hurt us down the line. We need to get them fixed and cleaned up."

On sophomore quarterback Tommy Armstrong Jr.'s interception thrown in the end zone
"We ran the wrong route. Same with the second pick."

On what he thought of the defense
"I thought we did a lot of good things defensively. I really did. They threw a lot at us. Their offense has been playing pretty good. The two touchdowns that they had were on short fields. The second one to me was inexcusable. We blew a coverage, which is a little bit unlike us. The first one a guy jumped out of his gap on a pressure. Things that will lead us not to execute well enough. But there were a lot of good things defensively in that game."

On who stood out to him on defense
"I thought across the board we played pretty well. I thought our up front played well. Our front four. I thought Zaire (Anderson) looked like he did a lot of good things. We looked really good on the secondary. Really challenged their receivers and made a lot of plays. I don't know what they were throwing the football. 18-of-46? I think that's a pretty good day in the secondary."

On if Abdullah being out impacted other players on the offense
"No. I mean if it did, then we're not mentally tough enough to get done what we need to get done. Heck, Ameer's a great player, but he's not superman. I don't think it affected our other guys. If anything it should make them want to rise up and play that much harder and rally around each other when a great player goes out. But you know, let's not read too much into this. At the end of the day, we were sloppy at times. We did some good things. We've got to keep improving. That's what the next two weeks is about for us."

On if the punt blocks were two separate calls
"Same call. Like I said, we thought we could attack their structure a little bit. And I thought we were able to do that. The one time where we did an excellent job on the outside on their gunners. And with De'Mornay (Pierson-El), when you get him started he's pretty hard to tackle. There were some real positives special teams-wise."

On if freshman wide receiver De'Mornay Pierson-El will be used in numerous positions down the line
"I would hope so. He was in the game a lot. It just depends on where reads take the quarterback. There are other ways we can get him the football. We used the speed sweep to get him the ball, get him the ball on special teams and he caught a touchdown pass. So there's not many more ways we can get him on the field. He's still a young player and there's only so much he can handle, too."

On if after two sloppy games he's happy to have a bye week
"To be honest with you, I don't know if I'm ever really happy. I always know that there's that much more out there for us. I watch the film and I know what I want to see. Myself and the coaches and hopefully the football team, I hope they feel the same way. You have to get a little bit of a sense of being a perfectionist and knowing that you have to keep pushing if you really want to reach your potential. I think that's a challenge we have over this last month. And that's what we need to carry us through. We've got a heckuva challenge ahead of us in the next couple of weeks, as with the other two opponents we have coming in. You just have to keep getting better. Believe me, I saw some really good things out there today. But there's still a long way to go for us."