Head Coach Mike Riley Quotes

Nebraska Football
Weekly Press Conference
Memorial Stadium (Lincoln, Neb.)
Monday, Oct. 5, 2015
Pre-Wisconsin

Nebraska Coach Mike Riley
Opening Statement
“Before we get into the elephant in the room about the other side of the game, I just wanted to start out by saying I need to mention some things that were better, some things that we did better and some guys that played well.  I think defensively, we made some steps.  We had five 3-and-outs, two great fourth down stops and eight tackles for losses, and they were 7-of-20 on third down.  Maliek Collins had a monster game, with (1.5) sacks and maybe, from when it occurred, people didn’t realize the impact that that made right before the halftime when he was the one that chased (the ball carrier down), that was a great hustle play, so we really appreciate that.  Chris Weber continues to play really well, we charted him for 17 tackles in the game and that’s doing a great job. Dedrick Young came back and had a good game. Byerson Cockrell had a good game. Kevin Maurice had a good game.  Unfortunately, Kevin is hurt.  He’ll be in a boot for probably four weeks, so that (defensive tackle) position is interesting.  Jack Gangwish came back and made some good plays. Antonio Reed, he’s a true freshman guy that is doing a nice job for us and I think on defense will be a good player one day, but he’s doing a great job on special teams. Andy (Janovich) had another really good special teams game. Drew Brown continues to be consistent, and Sam (Foltz) was named the (Big Ten) Special Teams Player of the Week.  He did a great, great job.  It’s good to have him back and healthy.  That was just a clinic on punting, I thought, both into the wind and against it.  The snapper (Jordan Ober), who’s a freshman, is doing a nice job.  Offensively, Alex Lewis had a good game.  The problems that we had, still the big play is a real nemesis for us.  We gave up two glaring pass plays, for sure.  The uncovered first touchdown and the big play in the fourth quarter at the end.  The big run right before halftime was unnecessary, we had too many people in better position to make that play.  Offensively, we were very disappointing.  We’ve been at least productive, and we weren’t at all.  We had no rhythm, and when I say that, it really has to do with what the last two weeks hasn’t been very good, and that’s third down.  You don’t get to have any identity-type plays in the game.  It felt very hit-or-miss.  It’s the 3rd-and-mediums that were the ones that were bad, this time.  At least we converted our 3rd-and-1’s.  (Our third down offense) really gave us no chance to sustain much of anything, all it did was give Sam a chance to be the player of the week in the league.  We missed some real opportunities in a game that had some adversity with the wind, we still had some chances to make something happen and of course we didn’t.  As the game went on, those opportunities came back to haunt us.  The big question at the end of the game, there’s lots of different thoughts on that third-down play, what you could do.  In retrospect, it would’ve been much simpler just to give the ball off (to a running back), my thought and my idea, so it was a bad idea, was that we would run the quarterback on a bootleg, but it’s a bootleg sweep play and we’d maybe gain some yards but we’d eat more clock.  Obviously, that was not a good thought and so that’s my responsibility.  (Tommy Armstrong Jr.) just reacted like an athlete.  Someone got in his face and he reacted.  You can’t blame him that goes back to my training of the quarterback.  That’s really what that was at that time and it’s just disappointing thinking about that.  That’s kind of how I would sum that up.  Wisconsin, now we are on to them, thankfully, believe it or not.  It’s fun to go work on someone else.  This is a good team, defensively they’re good.  They run out of the 3-4, they’ll get into a four-man front.  (Joe Schobert) is a special force off the edge.  He has nine sacks (on the season, which leads the nation).  He’s a special player that you have to make note of.  He’s caused problems in every game.  As a matter of fact, I don’t know the exact stat on this, but when Alabama got to third down, they would run the ball most of the time (against Wisconsin on Sept. 5).  It was interesting.  This is a good defense.  (Vince Biegel) on the other side is a good player.  Their secondary is good, their corners I think are all-conference players.  They have nice variety with what they do, whether they’re playing in their quarters coverage or man-to-man.  They have their zone blitzes mixed into that stuff.  Their special teams are disciplined and well-coached, and they actually use a spread punt formation, which is the old gunners and wings, which is actually kind of nice to see; they still use that.  Offensively, they shift and move people, try to gain an advantage on the edge, a lot of zone running up front, whether it’s an outside zone or an inside zone.  They’re also a power team and a sweep team, where they’ll pin and pull people and get to the outside.  They use two different tailbacks, I think (Taiwain Deal) is a bigger one (6’1”, 220 lbs).  They’re obviously a good running team with a variety of stuff that they do and the quarterback (Joel Stave) is operating at high-efficiency.  This is a good football team, we’ll have to play really well to beat them.” 

 

On the public reaction to the 2-3 start
“Well I can understand (fans) being nervous.  We have the people that care the most and the greatest fans in the world, so obviously they’re going to have feelings about this and certainly where we are; I understand that, totally, I get it.  What we have to do is play better and win some games and then go from there.  That’s the nature of this thing and I get it.  Most of the time I think people are involved in any way because they care, and that’s the beauty of it.  I wouldn’t want to trade that at all.  We just have to do better.”

On if he would like to have stuck to the running game more on Saturday
“We probably should have.  Yet when we did, like in the very first series, we actually ran on third down and didn’t get it.  Then the next one, we thought we’d get a high-percentage pass on what we’d been doing, I thought pretty well in preparation, to Jordan Westerkamp.  It was 3rd-and-4 and didn’t get it again so we went two in a row like that.  Probably, as you go, you want to take some shots, so early on, we had a great double-move by Jordan and he’s open by 10 yards and we miss it, and then you get into a deal where it’s 2nd-and long.  I think, as we examine it again, that we certainly could’ve run more, absolutely.”

On the state of the defensive tackle position
“We’re looking at all sorts of options, with the outside one, the one we like the least of pulling (freshman defensive lineman) Carlos Davis off the redshirt. Kevin Williams is not yet ready.  Vincemt (Valentine), we had an optimistic report on him last night, so we’ll see how he does.  This is going to be a deal where he hasn’t done much for a while, so as he goes through practice, we’ll get a better idea, and the idea (of moving defensive end Greg McMullen to defensive tackle) is real.  Greg is smart, versatile and has that kind of size too that he could be effective in there.  With getting Jack back and the way Freedom (Akinmoladun’s) been playing, we could look at that.”

On the confusion of the third-and-7 play in the fourth quarter
“Well, normally that play is a pass play, it’s a bootleg pass, but we tag it when we want the quarterback to run with ‘run’.  It’s basically ‘Chill Bronco Run.’ Now we did not get in the right formation.  It was a mess.”

On whether quarterback Tommy Armstrong Jr. thought the play was a pass or run
“Like I said, I think we reiterated that it was a run.  We called it a run and like I said, I don’t blame him, I blame myself for the training of it.  He just reacted.  He had a guy too fast in his face and just reacted like that.”

On the amount of carries the running back with the “hot hand” receives
“The one thing is that we have recognized that those guys (Andy Janovich and Devine Ozigbo) should play.  Devine being a true freshman is, frankly, still learning the ropes.  He’s in there because we think he’s a pretty good player and he deserves to be playing and we probably came on getting Jano involved too late.  We’ve always had the fullback in the past, at best, be a “curveball” for us and not often used.  Finding out what this guy is, more and more, that’s why we’ve developed it to the extent we have.  He played some as the tailback, so the thing that will have to come up with it is a good plan for how we’re going to rotate that thing through.”

On the evaluation of running backs in practice without contact
“The running part of it is not necessarily as big of an issue as when protections are involved and how they basically can pick that up and them being in the passing game is involved.  You can absolutely see how that looks.  We’ve just added that trap play a week ago for Jano (Andy Janovich), so like I said, we’re learning more about that as we go.  Devine (Ozigbo), we’ve been training and coaching since camp, and his growth has been good.  We recognized his ability, that’s why we didn’t redshirt him.  We wanted to get him involved in special teams and he is basically, through his growth in the whole offense, not just running the ball, he’s earned more time and I think can provide us the kind of depth that we will like at tailback.”

On third-down struggles throughout the season
“The simple way to say that is the execution of the play, whether it is the route, the read or the throw.  I don’t know that there’s any one thing.  On the very first one, probably a little more patience with Jordan (Westerkamp) would’ve been OK.  But (Tommy Armstrong Jr.) went off to the secondary guy fast, and the good thing is he knows where people are, and he knows if this is getting squeezed and this is a good play.  That’s an issue, and it’s usually the other way around, and you throw protection into it and that’s a factor, too.  Yes, we are examining all different forms of what we might do to really focus on third down and help our players that way.”

On Alex Lewis:
“I haven’t [had a chance to talk to Alex Lewis], so I’m not going to say a lot about that. Obviously, we’re really disappointed. It’s not a good reflection of what we want to be.”

On what type of player Tommy Armstrong is:
“You’ve got a guy here that will break the pocket and for a first down, right? And we applaud that. One of our biggest gains was him doing that the other night. I think that when anybody has a quarterback that has that versatility, that question always comes to that quarterback or that team about the opportunity or the ability to decide in a good manner when do I pull it and go, how long do I hang in there to make the throw.  We did not have a good game the other day offensively, but for the most part over the long haul and the body of work, I think he has been a good decision maker. At Miami, I think the type of ball was the issue there. Had he put some air under that ball and made a play, we’d all have been excited about it. So you can’t take that opportunity away, but when it looks like that, then he is going to use his ability and then he’s got to make a good decision with that. When he’s out of the pocket because something isn’t working exactly, then where do I throw the ball? Do I run? It’s all split second stuff. I would say for the most part in how we’ve seen this thing develop from the very beginning in spring practice, he’s a diligent student and I think he’s making the right reads and a lot of good choices.”

On if he took for granted that Tommy knew the situation of the final third-down play:
“I’ve learned to never take anything for granted.”

On Alex Lewis being suspended or disciplined:
“I’m going to talk to him today. They had the day off yesterday, so I didn’t see him and haven’t seen him yet today. That’s not unusual. They aren’t due in until 2 p.m. Like I said, I don’t really have more to say about it until I talk to him.”

On the physical challenge that Wisconsin presents and if he’s reviewed any of the previous games:
“Yes I have. I looked at last year’s game this morning as a matter of fact. What you said is what I see and what I already know. I know the coach there pretty well so I know style-wise. We have played Wisconsin ourselves when I was at Oregon State a few years back, unfortunately that was the year they got Russell Wilson. But style-wise and approach-wise, what they did then and what they’ve been doing appears to be right on track with their Wisconsin identity. They’re going to be physical, you better be able to handle the run. They’re going to have some good play-action stuff, whether it’s bootleg out-of-the-pocket stuff or what they do in the backfield with the quarterback faking the run. That’s their game so you got to be able to handle it physically upfront and then be sound and in good position in the secondary. A lot of double-move deep play-action stuff.”

On the importance of the Wisconsin game, since both teams being 0-1 in the conference, the loser of this game will be 0-2 in the West Division:
“I’ve thought about it and I know probably that they have too, so it’s definitely an issue.”

On Kevin Maurice’s injury:
“It’s a foot [injury]. A stress fracture as a matter of fact. He couldn’t even tell me for sure when he did it; he didn’t know. It just bothered him after the game and then they looked at.”

On if the defense is built to go against teams like Wisconsin:
“Well you would hope so. I think the strength of our team has shown to be defensively upfront and we’ve been pretty good against the run. We have to prove it against a team that is good running the ball and knows how to run the ball.”

On preparing for Wisconsin philosophically to exploit the weaknesses of the defense:
“We’re not going to go into a game and say, ‘They’re really good at this, so we can do that.’  For instance, to think, ‘Well they’re really good upfront, so we’re not going to run the ball,’ that would be a real mistake for us to make. We have established through last night and this morning, establish what we think are going to be our best base run that we’re going to emphasize against them and then with that we’ll have our play-action game that goes with that and some, but not too much early-down, drop-back passing that we would hope would be high percentage.”

On how he thinks they did against Illinois with that game plan:
“Not good enough, because we never really established what I would say was an identity run that we could repeat in the game because we didn’t do it, like you already mentioned, often enough.”

On the Big Ten’s statement that they messed up on the third/fourth down play and how he saw the situation unfold:
“I think we were the ones that alerted them to it, because we do [have someone that keeps track] and I noticed it right away because they fooled me.  We were going to go defense stay on the punt instead of putting our punt-return team in because of where the ball was, so I started on the field to [tell the] defense to stay, and they said it was third down.  So I had Brian Stewart check it and he was saying, ‘this was fifth down.’ Then that’s what started the ball rolling to them looking into it.”

On why he wanted his timeout back in that situation on and if they should have given it back:
“Because I asked for it and I wouldn’t have ever called timeout if we didn’t think there was an issue there. They were not reluctant about giving it back.”

On how often he’s run into a situation like that:
“Not very often. I don’t know if I’ve ever really run into it like that.”

On the importance of good leadership after tough losses:
“I think it’s a real big deal because these are young men and it’s very emotional for the. So as they look around, there’s going to be some examples set by the leaders on the team. Everybody has their own thoughts and stuff. For me, my message to our coaches and it will be to the players today, we have got to first of all talk to players right now and then focus on the best teaching, the best preparation, the best plan and get everybody’s mind going forward on a positive thing.  All the bugs crawl out at times like this and it’s just a great, great mental test for everybody.  There can be great growth out of it if you let it. I’ve been in it long enough to also have experienced all those things. My wife reminded me the other day, she sent me a text about it, she had to talk me off the cliff in Winnipeg because we had lost seven games in a row. Normally when you go through a season like that, you don’t always have a chance to coach the next year, but we did and we won the championship. You’re going to, if you stay in it long enough, you’re going to have some hard times, but the test is not physical right now, it’s mental.  It’s all about the approach, so the coaches have to set the tone with just really good teaching, preparation, and plan; this is how it’s going to work and get everybody’s physical energy going that way, coaches included. [There’s] lots of different opinions as to why or what or what could have been done. In our world, when we’re working, we’ve got to push this team forward and then we need good examples on the team to do that, because it will be, as we come out of this, it will be good for them to have found a way to fight through a really bad, hard time. We know that’s the case. It’s more mental than anything and it’s really about everybody kind of batting it down. It’s not about speeches, but everybody just going to work and the coaches have to lead that with good teaching and preparation.”

On the execution issues being related to all of the change:
“I can’t use that as an excuse. This is football and had we won those games it wouldn’t be the topic as it is here today. But those are real things and it’s like I told the team after the games we won, ‘you can’t overlook in a win what you would not overlook in a defeat.’ The fact of the matter is we’ve also had a string of games like I’ve never seen. Our losses have all been down to the end.  It causes more to me, a lot of reflection as to what we might have been able to do differently and then it amplifies for everybody those issues that we have in those situations and that’s pretty natural and e own that. That’s what we have to do. Just like I said, that whole last play, however you cut it back, it’s the training of the people in that situation that we have to do, I have to do a good job of.”

On De’Mornay Pierson-El’s performance on Saturday:
“I’m glad he got to play. I had the thought before the game that we should let Jordan (Westerkamp) catch the first punt.  Bruce (Read) and I talked about that and that was my thought to him, and he said that he had good pre-game and he’d been doing it during the week and obviously his experience is good. After the punt return and after the first one and after you could see the conditions, I thought it was probably not a return game, it was going to be a catch-the-ball game and Jordan’s been doing it all year and we’ve had all different punts that he’s had to catch and there’s nothing like doing it in a game.  I know he (Pierson-El) did it, he’s fantastic at it, we intend to get him going at it, I just thought because of the kind of game it was, that we weren’t going to get to use his return ability anyway and Jordan has already caught a bunch of balls so let’s let him do it. Jordan did a great job of catching the ball in tough wind conditions. That was all good and our intention this week is to get De’Mornay more involved and offense more involved in the return game.”

On how his communication plan has adjusted since the beginning of the season:
“I don’t know that it’s an adjustment, because I’ve been doing it for so long, but I think reacting and being thoughtful in the reaction in a situation to a new group of kids that really don’t know me. That’s been interesting. We rode a roller-coaster at Oregon State, there’s no doubt about it. We kind of encountered all of the situations that you could, so I understand that, but I think understanding the values we want, the program, the way we want to be and then the football that we want, you know, it’s new. So my thought’s basically go to, ‘how to get this established, with this team, for the long haul.’ So that’s probably the biggest adjustment. ”

On going up against his friend Paul Chryst this weekend:
“Yes it does [add a little spice to this week]. I’m excited about it and I’m sure Paul (Chryst) is too. It’s a pretty unique situation for as long as we’ve known each other.”