Aug. 6, 2015
Penn State Football Press Conference
Junior Quarterback Christian Hackenberg Comments
Media Day -- August 6, 2015
Opening Statement:
Good afternoon. Thank you all for coming to Penn State media day.
I respect that all of you have a job to do, but I also have a job to do and it is to lead this Penn State football team. That being said, I would ask for you to respect the job I have to do and please refrain from asking me about questions regarding my future beyond the 2015 season. I am strictly focused on making this Penn State football team the best that it can be. I am excited to get started with practice later today. I am looking forward to a great year. I appreciate all of you being here today. Thank you.
Q. How have you put everything together [highs and lows] to prepare for this season and how have they prepared you for what is to come this year?
CH: I think you just need to learn from every experience and take the lessons that come from them. That's basically what I've done. I try to make sure I stay as process oriented as possible, and really focus at the task at hand. But at the same time, you also take those lessons and you apply what you learn from them or you build off of them, whether it was a negative experience or a positive experience.
Q. [Defensive coordinator] Bob Shoop was talking earlier about his relationship with you in terms of talking football. It's a little unusual -- quarterback and defensive coordinator -- how has that developed and what do you get out your relationship with him?
CH: I think as all of you know, Coach [Bob] Shoop is one of the best that does it in the business. So for me, having a resource like that and not using it would be a failure from my end. I've built a relationship with him to pick his brain about how he tries to attack certain things, and I try and talk with our coaches and use my knowledge to see how we can feed that. Just having that type of coach and how focused he is at what he does, and the knowledge he brings, I just try and pluck his brain whenever I can to make myself better and make our team better.
Q. You've had different coaches and different systems. What would you say are the benefits of everything you've learned here from all of the different experiences that you've had here?
CH: I think that is something that is going to happen to you in every facet of life. You're going to have to deal with change and make sure you still produce at the highest level that you possibly can throughout that, and not let it affect who you are and the type of player you are, in this case, or the type of salesman you are, or whatever it is -- the type of teacher you are. You just need to make sure that you do your end to make sure that this team is as successful as possible. That's what I have learned from it, and what I've taken from those experiences.
Q. Now that you have had a chance to look back at last season, what was the difference in your mind between how you played against BC and UCF and the other ups and downs you had in the other 11 games?
CH: I think there's a lot of things that go into it. At the end of the day, you learn to love those experiences - the goods, the bads -- and you get better from it, or you build off of it, like I said earlier. Last season as a whole, I don't really try to segment it. I just take everything I can from it and what I can learn from it and help this football team win as many games as it can.
Q. What did you learn from it [last season]?
CH: That there were a lot of ups and downs, you were going to face adversity at times, but you have to continue to make sure you play through it and stay true to who you are.
Q. Can you compare or describe the comfort level you have going into this preseason camp as compared to going into last season's camp?
CH: I think the comfort level is the same. You are always extremely excited about having a new season and having new opportunity. But there's things that go along with that. I'm a year older and I think this team is older in general. We're all very excited about it, and I think that this camp is a great opportunity for us to see what we're all about this year -- what we learned and where we got better.
Q. I just want to know about your work with the Elite 11 camp. How did that help you prepare for this year?
CH: It was just one of those opportunities where you can go out and pick the brains of a lot of people; guys I haven't seen in two years since going into it my senior year of high school. So just being able to pick their brains, see what they think, what I can work on. The biggest thing about that, I don't think it was necessarily for me to go out and prepare for the season, it was an opportunity for me to go out and work on some of the things that I felt I needed to work on, and at the same time, be able to help some high school kids who are in the same boat I was a couple years ago. I think that was the biggest take away from that experience.
Q. What have you noticed from some of the young receivers this summer, specifically Juwan Johnson? He seems like a pretty big get.
CH: Those guys are physically gifted. It's always an adjustment coming to this level and being able to come out and practice and compete at this level on a consistent basis. I think the biggest adjustment for them will be consistency. They look good, they show a lot of great promise and we're very excited about them being able to come in and compete with the guys that we have there. We feel extremely good about the situation we have at that position right now.
Q. When you look at last year's tape, how many times did you say to yourself, `if only I had just another half-second or second'? Maybe a play was designed to go deeper than it went. How often did you say that to yourself, and how excited are you to work with the offensive line now that you have so many returning starters back?
CH: I don't think I ever said that to myself. Hindsight is 20-20. You can go back and look at it, but there are a lot of things that I could have done to help them out that I didn't do at times. It is what it is, but I know that those guys have worked extremely hard this offseason, especially this summer in terms of the film room, the extra work. Ange [Angelo Mangiro] has done an excellent job with that bunch. I've worked on a lot of those things that I feel I could have helped them with. This camp, you're going to see a group that's extremely focused, playing with a chip on their shoulder. I'm excited for them. I think everything that they are going to do this year, they've earned it. I'm extremely excited about the opportunity that they have. It's going to help our football team, and at the end of the day, that's what it is all about.
Q. Where do you see yourselves in the pecking order of the Big Ten East and the college football landscape, and looking to make that jump to win a Big Ten title.
CH: Right now we're focused on Penn State and what we have to do to get better, and a week before the [first] game we're going to be focused on Temple. That's what we have to do. It's one game at a time and one day at a time. Get better, then let everything else play out.
Q. What's the effect and/or the importance of returning the same head coaching staff and essentially the same offensive system?
CH: I think that's huge. This is the first time I've ever been in a system for two years. Talking to some of the guys that I played with my freshman year, about how comfortable they felt after year two in Coach [Bill] O'Brien's system. Talking to how some of these guys feel this year how much more comfortable they feel in the system, I think that year two is always the year that you see some jumps in a lot of areas. We're excited and we're working as hard as we can to make sure that is the case. I know, ultimately, what you are asking is `do we feel a lot more comfortable about it'? We definitely do, and I think that's huge, having one year under the belt.