Matt Rhule
Nebraska Head Coach
Post-Spring Game Quotes (April 22, 2023)
Opening Statement
“Let me start with a couple of things. First of all, I want to make sure I express my gratitude for all the people that came and watched us play today, especially all the little kids in that tunnel walk or around. I saw our players and they're like, you never know, kids, what they're going through and dealing with, how many times have a chance to come see us. We don't know the situation, so I was really proud of our guys, to see them dap kids up, sign autographs, go around and shake people's hands. I’m proud of our guys for that, really grateful for all the people who came and watched us play. It wasn't the warmest day, as you guys all know, it was warm in the box, but it wasn't on the field. I think it speaks volumes about our team. And then the second thing, my second takeaway was, I think these guys have done everything I've asked them to do. They’ve gotten better and better and better and like to play football, even down to the very end, trying to go down the score, give them some of those reps. No one's looking at me, no one's complaining. They like to compete. I think this summer is so crucial to our team. The ability to focus for three hours – we saw some walls in there with the ball on the ground and all that – that's really the next step, when you have the ability to focus for three and a half hours straight. I liked the progress we've made so far.”
On the summary of how they executed today
“I have so much film to watch. When I'm out there, it’s so hard for me, like if we hit a big play, I'm upset with the defense. The offense scored and the crowds cheering, and I'm over there like, what the heck is wrong with us on defense? I thought we ran the ball well at times with the first group. We tried to put a lot of different things on tape. I’m disappointed we couldn't push the ball through the red zone early. The turnovers and the balls on the ground bothered me, obviously. We had some missed tackles, but tackling didn't look atrocious. The quarterbacks did a nice job of moving the ball – ran a little bit of the option game early. So I thought there's some good things there – the kicking game, Timmy (Bleekrode) knocked that big one early. Obviously, that left something to be desired later, we missed a couple of kicks. There's probably lots of work on both sides, but I'll get really granular with it as I watch it.”
On Jeff Sims operating the offense
"That was good. Sometimes, you know when you split guys up, guys sometimes have to play separate wide receiver positions, so once or twice we struggled and had to get lined up for motion, but I thought the motions and the checks, all that – I didn't see any bad checks that were out there. Jeff (Sims) is really cool and calm out there. I like his demeanor and feel. He’s played a lot of football, so I thought he thought he looked pretty good.”
On if Jeff Sims has looked like that all spring and his physicality
“I can't tell you the final numbers, 9-of-13. I thought it looked like it was on time. I thought it looked like - he's a passer. He's a passer who runs 4.4, he's not a runner that throws. He's a passer. I think he does some things with his legs, extending plays, you know, the one he spun out, so that's really what we're looking for from him. We weren't able to get the big, explosive play that we wanted, but he hit the glance to Marcus (Washington), which was really good. I only stand up there just to sort of see what it feels like to get that opportunity. And I thought it felt pretty good when he was out there.”
On seeing newcomers making plays
“Yeah, I mean, Cameron (Lenhardt), Princewill (Umanmielen), Maverick (Noonan). They play like older players. You bring those guys in, especially the positions – Cam has this unique ability, like his hands and feet don't stop. He's able to push pockets and get pressure on the quarterback. Princewill has a unique ability to get off of blocks. He's really great with his hands. Maverick’s been so versatile. The whole spring they've kind of fit in and they've gone with the ones and they’ve gone with the twos to play different positions. There's no entitlement, they're really tough, team guys. I think the future is really really bright. On defense, some guys that played a lot of football last year weren’t out there and we have all those guys, young players, out there playing and doing some good things. It was great always, and the very last play, when Gage picked the ball off.”
On if he can see those guys playing right away as freshmen
“Yeah, I don't think there's any reason not to. There's a lot of time left, there's a lot that has to happen. For me, everything goes in stages. I talked about in the winter, earning the right to go to spring ball. In spring ball, you talk about earning the right to be excited about the spring game. So we have a lot of work to do this summer – really the spring and finishing school, I believe there’s several weeks left of school. I would see no reason why those guys wouldn't be fighting to start, play, any and all of the above. As I've said, especially on the front of the defensive line, we're going to play two hockey lines if we could, if not three, keep guys fresh. We have a lot of young talent.”
On ball security and the fumbles
“To me, on offense, there's no excuse for fumbles. No excuse. I can live with an interception here or there. It will result in not playing, to be quite honest. Now, we're not here to play in fear. It’s not one time and you're done, but you have to have the ability to protect the football. And it looked like, you know, I looked up on the Jumbotron, and they kept going over to review them. I think one of them, the other gentleman said to me, hey, had we reviewed that, it would have been an incompletion – the one on (Heinrich) Haarberg that was a touchdown, it was an incomplete pass. I knew we were gonna play a lot of plays today and I didn’t want to be out there for four hours watching replays, so I just said hey, let’s play like it's 1985 and you’re making the call. We can't have those fumbles, but I love the fact that they got their hands on the ball. That's really, really important. If we can take the ball away – what I talked about at halftime, it’s not that you're not that you're playing badly, it’s just that you start with the ball on the 30-yard line because your offense keeps turning the ball over. You always talk about situational football and complimentary football, people say that. That's what happened. The fumbled snaps and all that, I'd have to go back and look at it. You'll rotate a lot of guys through there, but we don't make excuses and that just can't happen. If it weren't for 66,000 people I would throw my headset on a normal Saturday, because that was really frustrating to me. But you know what, it's also important our guys learn to keep their composure and play through it. We kind of fixed it and moved on.”
On having Frank Solich at Memorial Stadium for Spring Game
“My wife did like an event last night for the moms. All the moms and the players on the team. And halfway through, I got a text from coach (Solich) and he’s like, ‘Hey Matt I'd love it if you and Julie would come upstairs to the event,’ that he was having that had former players there. And that was special to be a part of. I don't know how I got to be a part of it. But it was special to be a part of. It was really special because at the end of the day, you know, we all come and go as coaches, but you know, the impact he's had on his players was really, really important for me to be reminded of and to see and so I'm just really really grateful for him as a man and as a person as a coach. He's someone I've always looked up to, he's been so kind to me and so to hand the ball off to the fullback the first play and be able to hand the ball to him, it's kind of a bucket list item for me."
On whether Janiran Bonner can play in the fullback role, and then position in general
"Yes. I think the thing with modern football, not that you know it wasn't before, but just the thing with modern football is having guys like, sometimes I brought up (Kyle) Juszczyk and those guys, like guys that can do multiple things. They think you’re in 21 personnel, but you're really in 11. Janiran can play every position that's out there for us right now. I think he has a real chance, depending on how he continues to develop. I was talking to Coach (Solich) yesterday, it's going through the weights of the fullback, sometimes they were 218 to 222, and then sometimes they 240-pound guys, and we’ve got some guys like (Braden) Klover and (Trevor) Ruth and those guys who go block the ISOs and the powers. But Janiran gives us a guy who can run it, and we're still running power with him and ISO with him, and he goes in there, and then he runs option routes on third downs. So, he's really a weapon I believe."
On what his biggest takeaway from the Spring season is
"Well, I'm grateful to the players for how hard they've tried to buy into what we're asking them to do. This will be so much easier for them next year. Like every day is hard for them because it's hard for the new coaches because everything's so new, you know, when I say like, ‘Hey, we're gonna do this drill,’ it's like they don't know what the drill is. Next year they’ll know what to expect. I've said that a couple of times, but even you know, we’re flipping guys from white to red. At the end, I said, ‘Hey guys, do you want to take a knee?’ and the offensive guys were like, ‘Absolutely not.’ So, it didn't really make sense what we were doing. I thought Chubba [Purdy] did some really good things out there, and I wanted to give him a chance in the two minute to go down and move us and he got us right down, you know, to the opportunity to do so. So, I just really appreciate that part about them and they're going to just get better and better and better."
On the fake punts
"You’re not going offense vs defense, the danger of red versus white. And you start turning the ball over. Like this side has 50 snaps and this side has 30. So, I desperately was trying to get the red offense more plays, and so I was like ‘Can you throw a sideline warning?’ I wanted to play the game. So I said to [Brian] Buschini, ‘Hey, bro, if they all cover, pull the ball down and run.’ And so he's got a great arm, we say this, but they didn't work out. I was just trying to get a first down to keep them on the field just to keep the reps even. You know, I wouldn't want to have the integrity of the game, and I went for it on fourth down a couple of times, just try to get those guys more reps, and we were able to kind of balance the reps out and get it to where hopefully everyone got enough reps."
On the offensive line depth
"I don't think there's getting any more depth, right? I mean, we have the players we have and we have some guys coming in. We're going to coach them, so we're not we're not thinking about anybody other than the guys on our team."
On the usefulness of the upcoming week
"Sometimes I talk to the players that played at other places, and they said, ‘You know, we've gone three or four years and I've never sat down with their coach.’ We’ll do it after every season after every spring. We'll sit down with each player. We'll talk about what we say see in their game, talking about what their role would be if we played today. We don't predict the future. We say if we played today, this would be a role. So the younger players would talk about some long-term things in terms of development, and then we talk about their commitment level and off-the-field stuff, and then we ask them to speak their mind to give us give us their part. So that's this week, they’ll do it with their position coach and coordinator, and they’ll do it with me. And, you know, they all have a right to not only understand where we see it, but a lot of times you sit down with these guys and you say, ‘Hey, I see this and they say, Coach, you're missing x-y-z and they're right. So it should be a dialogue. So I'm excited to do it."
On single-digit numbers
"In preseason."
NU Athletic Communications