Sept. 16, 2008
Q. Can you compare this Temple team to the last two Temple teams that your team has seen?
This is the best Temple team I think I've seen in a while. We played them early when I first came here when [John] Rogers was coaching down there, and when Wayne Hardin was there. They should have beaten us one time down in Philadelphia when Wayne punted the ball every down almost.
But this will be the best team we've played so far this year. They're experienced and extremely well coached by Al Golden and a couple other Penn Staters on that staff. They're disciplined and they do a lot of really good things. Nothing fancy.
They have a heck of a quarterback (Adam DiMichele). That kid had committed to us, and then he wanted to play baseball. He went someplace down south. I'm not sure where he went, but he's a really good quarterback.
This will be a really good football team on Saturday. When I say really good, I mean solid and in the right position and not going to beat themselves, that kind of thing.
Q. Could you evaluate Jared Odrick's play at the tackle spot through three games? And I was also wondering if you're concerned at all about freshman Brandon Ware's weight?
Well, the second part is easy. Yes, I'm concerned; concerned for his own health and everything else. He's almost 370 pounds and he ought to be about 325 or 330 pounds. He has a tough time losing weight. He went down to 361 and he was very proud of himself. We keep urging him to go further.
He goes up and down, so I am concerned about that. I think he could be a really good football player, but irrespective of that, he's going to have a problem the rest of his life if he doesn't start to get control of his weight.
Jared has played very well. He's a very, very good athlete for a man his size. He doesn't have quite the stamina that you would like for him to have at this stage, but that's because he's lost so much practice time because of injuries. But he's doing very, very well.
Q. I was just wondering if you're getting a handle on your team yet and how good you think you can be?
I don't really know yet. I hate to be evasive, but everything has gone our way so far, so you like to think you're pretty good. But until we get into a good football game where we can't get some easy ones...and that's what I think we're going to find Saturday against Temple. They'll make us earn everything, because they line up properly and hustle, they do all the fundamentals well and tackle well, and they catch the ball. They're experienced. I think at least 20 of the 22 kids played against us last year.
I think you've got to go step by step from now on in. I think we're going to have to earn everything we get. Not that we haven't earned it. I don't want take anything away from the kids that made the big plays for us, because that's not fair. But still, it was a little easier than it's going to be. I hate to say, "Hey, this is good, that's good." Let's see what happens in the next weeks.
Q. You referred to Adam DiMichele, the quarterback from Temple, earlier. How does he stack up against the quarterbacks you've played so far this year? It looks like he has to pretty much do it all for Temple's offense.
Well, he's the leader. He's the guy that runs the show. He makes the plays. He creates the tempo of the ballgame.
The kid from Oregon State didn't have much of a chance to do much, but he would be the best I think we've played so far. In fact, I know he's the best we've played so far.
But there again, what you give to one, you take away from the other. The other kids that we played that I thought were pretty good, really didn't have much of a chance to do anything. They were down so far so quickly.
But this kid is a good football player. I liked him in high school. I don't know how many football scholarship offers he had. I watched him play football, I watched him play some basketball, and I said, "let's go get him." He's also a good student.
I would probably have to say he's the best we have played so far.
Q. Is it a concern that any of your starters haven't had to play a full four quarters yet, or do you prefer they're not getting banged up already?
Earlier in the year when we were talking, I said I was concerned about depth in certain spots. I wasn't quite as concerned about depth on defense. Maybe in the secondary, but up front, I wasn't.
All of a sudden we lost (Jerome) Hayes and we lost (Devon) Still. We had to do some things with a couple of kids who were a little bit out of line. Our line depth, is the one place that bothers me the most because of the way the game is played today. Your down guys have got to constantly keep pressure both on the run and the pass.
They've got to put their ears back and go on every play. They've got to chase people and do a lot of things over and over again. So if you watch, and Larry Johnson does a great job, the substitution pattern that we have, you don't see a lot of substitutions except on the defensive line.
Now, the wideouts, maybe when we go from two wideouts to three wideouts, and at times we will play with four wideouts. But we're moving the down guys in and out of there.
I don't think we'll ever get to the point where we want to play one set of down guys. We are pretty much comfortable we could do that with the rest of the team.
Q. I'm sure you've seen it before, but what are some the characteristics of a team that's looking ahead, and what do you do this week that if you see those things you can put a stop to them pretty quick?
Well, talk, rant, and rave, that's what you do, and threaten. You can't. I've been pleased with the attitude of this football team. I think they have been all business. I'll be surprised if after they look at tapes of Temple that they would be careless with them.
I think if they look at tapes of the way Temple plays and the way they hustle and the things that I mentioned that they do well, I think they'll be ready to play.
Q. Do you have any more of a feel yet for how serious Mike Lucian's injury might be? And also, as to whether Evans and Koroma could practice, if not play this week?
I don't want to talk about the second part of your question because it's not going to be helpful any way I answer it.
But I think Lucian has got a chance. He didn't practice yesterday, but he's going to try to do a couple things today.
Q. What did you think of the way he (Lucian) did play on Saturday?
I thought he did very well for a guy that had only been there a little bit. But he had played defense in other years. He likes defense and he's a smart kid and a smart football player. He picked up things very well, so I thought he did well.
Q. You've had a number of players or assistants that have gone on to be head coaches with Al Golden being one of them. Having coached against some of them, do you see any similarities in the way they coach to maybe the way you coached them or coached alongside them?
Well, I don't think that would be fair to Al. To be fair, Al has always been a bright guy and he was always independent. I think he's going coach the way Al Golden should coach, not the way Al Golden thinks Joe Paterno would coach his team.
I think Al is fine. I don't see any similarity in the way he coaches and the way I coach. I think it's a good thing for Temple.
Q. Do you take any extra pride when a guy like Josh Hull (former walk-on) becomes a starter and an important contributor on defense, too?
I think if I were him and I came into a situation where I started almost at the bottom of the pack and worked my way up to where I am one of the leaders of a pretty good football team, I think I would take a lot of pride in that.
Plus, the fact he's an engineer, an excellent student, and handles it all together. I think he should be able to walk away from college football and college feeling very good about himself, because he's earned it.
Q. Along the lines of coaching against former assistants, how do you prepare for that mentally knowing that you once coached this guy and you have to now line up against him on the opposite sideline?
I don't really think we look at that and say, "We're coaching against that coach or coaching against this coach."
You get into that and you get yourself all fouled up. You've got to look at the players you're coaching against and you've got to look at match-ups. You've got to look at whatever style of play that they've showed on the field.
Not necessarily what you think might be behind this or try to read a motive in or something else. I think you look at what you can be sure about, and you can be sure about the players that are going to play the game.
With all the tapes we have now and it's not a question of looking at them for one week, you're looking at them all summer and in the spring. You look at what the schemes are, what they want to do offensively, what they want to so on defense, what's their third down tendencies, those kinds of things.
You don't say, "Well, what's he doing? Where is the coach? What's he doing?" Maybe some other people do, but that's never been the way we've done it.
Q. On Saturday you were able to get Pat Devlin in the game pretty early, and he immediately had success and took the team right down the field. What do you think that may have meant for his psyche in terms of the kind of kid he is?
You don't know Pat, do you? Pat's a very positive and very confident quarterback. He's a good quarterback. You've got to remember how much success he had in high school. He's been doing really well in practice. I said to them before the ballgame that I was going to get Pat some minutes and that it was not going to be a reflection of whether Daryll was playing well or not playing well.
I just think that Devlin is a guy that can play. As I've said, I'm repeating myself, we have three good quarterbacks. We could win with any one of the three. And I thought Paul (Cianciolo) did a good job when he was in there.
So I wanted to play Pat, and I made up my mind after Wednesday, after watching practice, that I was going to play him. When I was going to play him, in the back of my head I was hoping I could play him in the second quarter, and it worked out fine.
Q. Deon Butler said earlier today one of the advantages of the lopsided wins is that the starters are very fresh because they aren't playing deep into the second half. Do you see it that way?
I think they should be. It's a luxury if you can give people a break and have them ready.
My only concern with the amount of time they're playing, is that this is ordinarily when you would play your team into shape. They could get into the game and play 65-70 plays maybe. Our offensive line played a lot of plays last week.
You've got to be careful that when they don't do that, that you don't go out and start practicing and try to make up for it by saying, "We've got to condition them. They didn't get enough plays or they didn't do this." Then you end up with a tired football team going into the next week.
So there again, it's a little tricky. But, obviously you should be ready to go in the fourth quarter if you only play two quarters and you sit around in the third quarter and something happens in the fourth quarter.
Q. Some of the players have said that the preparations every week are the same regardless of whether you're going to play Coastal Carolina or Temple or Ohio State. That sounds like the right way to go, but these are kids and human beings. Is it possible to keep the motivation level the same on a week to week basis?
I think so. The fact that we have a procedure -- Monday we do this, Tuesday this, Wednesday this, Thursday -- I think it's good, because kids can anticipate it and you don't have to spend a lot time on the practice field.
One thing I've said many, many times, is the worst thing you do is waste their time on the practice field. That's when they get bored.
Each week is a little different. Not the procedure, but the organization of the practice will be the same. We'll say we're going to go 12 minutes to "teach run" to the players, but the defenses that they're going to face will be different. Maybe not completely different, but there will be some defenses that are different, so they have to get themselves ready for that. That's a challenge.
But you don't want to go out there and spend 22 minutes "teaching run" when you only need 12 because you've got a bunch of kids that have gone through it and know how to do it and have done it. You get in there and have a little fun with them and do it and get them out of there.
So that's not a very clear explanation, but I don't think that's a problem.
Q. How important have Williams and Butler and Norwood been to the success the last couple years?
They're big. I said two things (in 2004). I said I had a great coaching staff, and I said that we had to get one or two guys. (Deon) Butler was not one of the two guys, neither was (Jordan) Norwood. Butler was a walk on. Norwood, I don't think he had another Division I-A scholarship (offer). I liked Norwood because I knew the family and because I watched him on television be part of the State High basketball team, and I've seen some things on tape on a football field. I said, "He's a player." I don't know what, maybe a corner or something.
Williams and Justin King were the two guys that gave us the impetus. One guy, Derrick Williams, called attention to the fact that where were not going to...we still had some prospects as far as being a good football team. And King was the say same way. They were two of the most sought after kids in the country. But there's no question that the end result with Norwood, Butler and Williams and a couple other kids made a great big difference in the program, because we made some plays.
Nobody gives Mike Robinson the credit he should have got. I think he had a heck of a year (in 2005). He was the outstanding player in the Big Ten the next year, 2005.
I kept saying, "we've got to get a quarterback." And Jay Paterno said, "we're okay." I was not a big Robinson guy (as a quarterback in 2004). So, it was a combination of things. But you knew you were a spark away from being pretty good.
But those three kids, obviously. They're awfully good.
Q. You described the quarterback situation as a fluid situation at the start of the year. Would you still describe it that way?
There again, I hate to say something that I'm not sure about. I don't know what I'm going to do yet. I felt after Wednesday and looking at enough tapes that I wanted to get Devlin in the football game. And if I could, I wanted to get Paul in the game.
We've had one practice this week. I've got to get a better feel for it. And I haven't had enough time to look at Temple tapes to get a really very confident opinion of what we should do yet.
I know you guys think I'm being evasive, but I don't know sometimes. I don't like to tie myself down to something when I don't have to. I'm not ready to say we're going to go with a quarterback. If the three quarterbacks came in and asked me the same question, I would say, "let's have a good week at practice and we'll talk about it later in the week."
Q. What's the strategy behind sometimes you'll have Derrick Williams back returning punts, but deep in your own territory you'll have Scirrotto. What's the strategy behind that?
Williams was hurt a little bit Saturday, and Scirrotto has been, until that bad play Saturday, a very sure handed guy. (Scirrotto is deep if) It doesn't look like you're in a return situation, field position and things like that. Maybe to give Williams a little blow once in a while, we'll leave Scirrotto in there.
If we get into a situation where we're not quite sure where they're going to punt it, they're kicking the ball from their own 45 let's say, you're not sure what's going to happen. So, I like a guy back there because they may throw the ball, fake the punt.
Michigan State really beat us on a fake punt last year. You're trying to get the best people in there for the situation, and Scirrotto obviously, being a defensive safety, would be better at reacting to passes and things like that. Plus, he has good hands.
Q. Given that he fumbled a couple times, is there any thought about making a change there? Having Williams back, or someone else?
We haven't talked about that yet, but I would doubt if we would make a change. Remember, underline doubt.
Q. Maybe I misread this, but it looked like when you guys called timeout the first time at the end of the half that maybe you didn't want that.
I wanted it.
Q. What's your philosophy on when you have a big lead and that kind of thing?
Field position obviously has a lot to do with it. As I recall, Syracuse had the ball inside their own 30-yard line. If they had made one or two first downs we wouldn't have called timeout because they would have obviously had an opportunity to make a drive.
But once we had them, and, in fact, I think that third down play was a pass, we stopped the clock. We still had a couple timeouts left, and we had enough time to take it down the field. We did, and we got the field goal.
I call the timeouts in that situation. The official is right there. If I'm not right next to the official I yell at (Tom) Bradley, "get the timeout!" and Tom will call a timeout because you can make a mistake. You know, it's bang, bang, bang.
I can't tell you exactly what we would do every time. Once we get them in the position where we have enough timeouts, that if you get the ball back in decent field position, all right, even if you don't have any timeouts left.
If we had used all three timeouts and they punted the ball, I think we would have 50 something seconds as I recall. And we were moving the ball pretty well. We've spent a lot of time in that situation as far as two minute drills. I would have done the same thing: make them kick it. We might have blocked it and we might have run it back.
If they didn't make a first down, I wasn't going to let them get up the field with no time left in the game.
Q. Do you have any memories of Al Golden, Mark D'Onofrio and Matt Rhule when they were here?
Not too much of Matt because he was never a real strong player. Al was captain of our team in 1990 (1991), I think. And do I have recollection of D'Onofrio? Do you have two hours and can we get the ladies out of here so I can use some language? Firey guy. Firey guy, Mark. Good kid.
You hope things go well for them. Not this Saturday, but they've had tough losses. In that Connecticut game, they kicked the ball down to the one or two yard line and got a bad call.
Connecticut isn't a bad football team. People don't realize that. Connecticut beat Virginia 45-10 on Saturday. And Buffalo is a good football team. We played Buffalo last year, so we know their personnel. Pitt had their hands full with Buffalo.
That Hail Mary beat them. No, they're doing a good job. I'm pleased.
Q. I was wondering what your thoughts were on President Spanier's decision to invite Michael Madeira to speak to a group of about 200 freshman athletes about staying out of trouble off the field?
Well, he's the president of the university. He's got to be concerned about everything. If he feels that maybe there is something that ought to be addressed, I think he should do it.
I don't know what was said or done and why. I don't even know if there were any football players in there. They probably were invited, but I'm not sure they were there because we were practicing.
He's got a responsibility to the community and a responsibility to the university. He's got a responsibility to the townspeople. If he felt that that would be a good move to get Madeira to talk with them, I think that's his call.
Q. Could you assess the progress of your linebackers, especially Navorro Bowman and Bani Gbadyu?
Again, I go back to the coaching staff. Ron Vanderlinden is doing a really good job with them, because he has done it since he's been here. Bowman and Gbadyu are both really good athletes. They're not quite as comfortable, Bowman more than so than Gbadyu, about a whole a lot of things they may or may not see for the first time.
But they're tough and they can run. They've got to have a little bit more anticipation of what's going to come from a certain offensive set so they can play just a step faster. We've got some other kids that are going to be good players.
The local kids (Josh Hull and Nate Stupar) are going to be good football players. I think this is the best (Tyrell) Sales has ever played.
I think it's a good group. The two kids you mentioned have potential all ahead of them. They're not anywhere as good as they're going to be.
Q. I wanted to ask you about something that's rarely brought up: long snapping. How tough is it to find kids that can do that? Is it tough to find guys that can do that? Because most people really don't want to see to get their head caved in.
I think most people don't want to get their heads caved in, even coaches, verbally or physically.
I think that's really a good question, because sometimes you don't have one (long snapper) and you've got to make one. The kickers and the quarterbacks and the centers go out 15 minutes ahead of everybody (at practice). There'll be five or six guys practicing a long snapping.
The quarterbacks and the centers will be working on the quarterback center exchange, the shotgun snap, while the other kids are sitting around the locker room. We don't want everybody out there.
So you spend a lot of time with them. Every once in a while a kid sees an opportunity to make the football team like (Larry) Federoff. Federoff is a kid that transferred here and wanted to be a fullback. He wasn't quite good enough, so he made up his mind to do that (long snapping), and he's doing a really good job. For a while he was shaky, but he's worked hard.
They go out there, and Bill Kenney will have four or five guys out there. There will be a guy snapping here, and two or three guys over there. Every time he snaps the ball you give him a shot.
He puts his head down, snaps the ball, and boom. Try to make it as close to a situation you're going to get in a game.
But sometimes you get a kid who comes in and he's a natural and he's really good. So, if you don't have a long snapper you've got some problems that you've got to address right away. Even in the recruiting sometimes.
We have two walk-ons that are going to be doing the long snapping (Andrew Pitz and Federoff). When they decided they wanted to come, we didn't think they were good enough athletes so they come in here as a long snapper and we have some insurance. But I think that's an important part of the game obviously.