Aug. 4, 2018
Ricky Rahne | Offensive Coordinator
Q. The offensive line for the last four seasons has been a point of contention and something you guys would like to see improvement on. How is it different this season compared to years past and how much will that impact the offense moving forward for you?
RR: Well, I think the first thing I would say is we've had pretty good offenses over the last two years. There were five guys out there who were blocking, so I think that the perception of our offensive line is probably not accurate. When you finish in the Top-10 in the country in scoring, we understand that we have talented football players carrying the football and throwing it and things like that but there are guys who are opening up those holes and doing those sort of things.
That being said, I think [offensive line] Coach [Matt] Limegrover has done a terrific job building a culture in that room. And those guys, they come to work. They are very driven and they help each other. They are talking ball all the time and those sort of things while still being able to have fun.
I'm really just looking forward to the consistency that those guys are going to bring, but also the competition within that room that is going to allow us to be better day-in and day-out, but also be better as the season progresses.
Q. Can you describe how [running back] Miles Sanders has assumed the mantle so far? I know it's only one practice, but since spring practice. Also, what do you expect from him and the rest of the running backs this season?
RR: I think the running backs are an extremely hard-working group. That's going to really help us out. They have done a nice job in pass protection and things like that, and [running backs] Coach Ja'Juan Seider is a very accomplished coach and he does a great job of teaching those guys just the little nuances of the game and big picture things and things like that.
The one thing I've seen from Miles that's changed is he's assumed a leadership role and that's been really, really good. I mean, he's a guy who has always been a little bit in the background for obvious reasons but I think he's stepped out and really gone into a leadership role. That's critical for our football team. We want as many leaders as you can possibly get. You can never have too many leaders.
So guys that are going to be positive leaders on our football team and in our locker room, that's always going to be a good thing.
Q. When you were watching [quarterback Trace McSorley] in high school and you were thinking about, okay, what could this kid's potential be? What were the things going through your mind at that point, and then seeing him develop, has he surprised you, blown away your expectations or could you have possibly conceived some of this a few years ago?
RR: Well, I think any time that you recruit a player, you see him being a starter and a championship football player.
I don't think he's necessarily exceeded my expectations or anything like that, just because I knew the type of person he was, the type of family he came from, and I watched him play a lot of games. He won a lot of football games in high school. I know I went to his state semifinal game and his mom told me I couldn't come back because he fumbled three times, and she was devastated and thought I would never recruit him again. But obviously that wasn't the case.
No, from the day he stepped on campus, he's been the same kid, very driven, very motivated. Great teammate. Great leader. So I've been ecstatic with him since the day he got here.
Q. With all this notoriety and hype and Heisman talk, it was just a year ago [former offensive coordinator] Joe Moorhead said, it's "asinine" the perception that people have of Trace, that he just throws the ball up. How has he handled those components as he's gotten more notoriety?
RR: He hasn't changed. I think probably the best person on the planet to ask that to is probably my nine-year-old son, Ryder. He couldn't tell you that Trace has changed one little bit, you know, since he's been six years old, till now. The kid is the exact same kid and that's what makes him great and that's what makes him who he is and what he is.
And quite frankly, I think that's a culture that Coach Franklin builds around our team. You look at Saquon [Barkley]. Saquon didn't change. So I think that's just part of our team. These guys, we not only are able to recruit great football players, but great young men, as well.
Q. When you look at the tight ends and kind of the development there, obviously you're limited in the spring. What are you hoping to see from a guy like Nick Bowers at this point in his career and getting it all together?
RR: I would say, first of all, they have had a major upgrade in coaching (laughs), so that's been a positive statement there. [New tight ends] Coach [Tyler] Bowen is a great football coach, scheme and technique. That's been a great deal for us.
But I told him the other day, we were sitting down talking, and it's always going to be hard to replace a guy like Mike [Gesicki]. You watch the clips coming out of [Miami] Dolphins camp right now and he's making all these one-handed catches and these guys are amazed. I wrote on Twitter the other day, "I don't know if that makes the top-20 I've seen." It's hard to replace that.
Where I think I can replace that, though, is a group effort. Every single guy who went in there yesterday, and as I can envision them going in there, I see productivity and I see guys who can play in the Big Ten. I think that we have a very high-level tight end group and I'm very excited about it.
Q. How do you keep your offense evolving with the loss of some of those playmakers?
RR: Well, I think every year that's the beauty of college football and that's one of the reasons why I enjoy it so much and a lot of coaches do, is every year, the team changes. You're losing a quarter of your football team every single year. So your team is having to evolve all the time. You're going to constantly be playing to the strengths of your team. Coaches, we're not just sitting around in the off-season doing nothing, so defenses are going to change and adjust and adapt, so you're constantly trying to adjust and change and adapt and anticipate those changes in the future of what defenses are going to do to try to stop offenses like us all the time.
We get the supreme advantage of going against [defensive coordinator] Brent Pry every day, so I'm able to see a lot of different things and I'm able to see what the next big wave, big thing is going to be, with one of the best defensive -- if not the best defensive - coordinator in the country.
Q. You lost about 160 receptions and you have six receivers with four years of eligibility. What's the competition been like in that group?
RR: It's been awesome and quite frankly, I saw a major step up from even spring practice yesterday with the receivers, the redshirt freshman receivers. I was extremely pleased with some of the things that KJ Hamler did and Mac Hippenhammer and Cam Sullivan-Brown. Those guys did some great things yesterday at practice. I was very, very, very happy about that.
You know, I think that the great part about this offense is the ball goes where it's supposed to go. There's going to be a lot of different guys who are going to make plays. You know, nine different guys touched the ball in the first 21 plays against Washington. So a lot of different people touched the ball, and were able to keep the defense off-guard, and it also keeps a lot of people involved.
Q. How have the quarterbacks behind Trace [McSorley] and Tommy [Stevens] been developing, and how important is that with the fact that Tommy sees the field in other ways?
RR: I think it's important for every player on our team to develop, and I don't mean to be aloof about that. Every single guy on our team needs to develop. So I was really extremely pleased with Sean Clifford. He approached the summer the way he should. He was very businesslike. He got bigger, faster, stronger, but based on what he did yesterday, and the questions he's been asking in meetings and things like that, he also took a very mental approach to the summer and made some major strides there, too, which I was very pleased about.
Our freshmen, Will Levis, he's a very talented kid. Obviously once you make the jump from high school to college, that's a jump up in speed and things like that. But I told him yesterday, my first day playing college football, I was given the kicker balls to throw because me and my other fellow freshmen quarterbacks could not throw a spiral, and our quarterback coach did not want me "scuffing the balls," so he's already way, way ahead of me there. So we're on a positive trajectory.
Q. What have you seen from [wide receivers] DeAndre [Thompkins] and Juwan [Johnson] in terms of leadership leading the young receivers?
RR: Yeah, I think those guys, they need to step up and be leaders and I think Juwan [Johnson] is a very good leader. One of the things he does a great job with is leading by example, but also being able to take the young guys aside and being like, hey, you should have done this and you should have done that.
The other thing that he does extremely well, is he's willing to admit when he makes mistakes. Yesterday he was like, I'm not sure I did that right and I was like, no, you didn't.
But he was like, 'okay, great, what do I need to do.' I said "this." Next time we ran the play, a period later, he got it exactly right. He's able to take those corrections and move on. And those young guys seeing that, that's critical. That's a major component of leadership and that's something that's been ingrained in that room from the guys in the past from Chris Godwin to DaeSean Hamilton and then to Juwan. So I'm very excited about that component of it.
Q. Another question about the offensive line. What do you expect to see in the competition for the five starting jobs and how many starters do you feel are going to be competing for this, these jobs, eight to ten possible starters?
RR: That's the beauty, that's the thing I'm probably most excited about with the offensive line is we do have eight to 10 guys that I feel could go in the game and play Big Ten level football, and that's huge from where we were the first year we were here.
So the recruiting aspect of it, the development that [offensive line] Coach [Matt] Limegrover has done, the development [performance enhancement] Coach [Dwight] Galt has done in the weight room and things like that, the hard work those guys have put in, that's been great.
I think that competition is going to breed success, and it's going to happen every day. Each guy knows, 'hey, if I don't bring my A-game today, you know, I may not get the reps that I need in order to be successful.' If you look around the country, the programs that have type of competition at every position, those are the teams that are consistently year-in and year-out, competing for the playoffs and beyond.
Q. Trace [McSorley] last week in Chicago discussed him being more involved with game planning this year, and I was just wondering, how did that come about? Did you broach it to him? Did he suggest it? And what can he offer when it comes to that, and how will it work?
RR: Well, you know, him being graduated, he probably has a little bit more time on his hands, right? (laughs) But no, I respect Trace, his football IQ, his football acumen, and his ability to understand this offense and see things that can help us win football games.
There's going to be times when he says something and I'm going to tell him, 'hey, that's a great idea; I don't feel comfortable doing it for this, this and this.' But I'm going to give him an explanation of why we are or aren't going to do it, and then there's some things I'm going to ask him. I'm going to say, 'hey, do you like this or this; or do you like this or this?' That's always been the case with Trace -- there's going to be times where it's like, 'hey, guys, this is a great third down play, the quarterback doesn't like it, we're not calling it.' I understand it's going to be open. He doesn't like the way it feels and he doesn't like the way he sees it. That's out.
Then there's going to be other times where a play that he really likes, maybe it doesn't fit as well as it needs to but it's going to be in the game plan and it's going to be called because confidence is the hinge on the door to success and if you're confident on a play, then the possibilities are wide open.
So right now, that's part of it. And another thing, he's earned that right. He's earned that right and there's a difference between somebody being given something and somebody earning it. There are very few players in the country, I would say, who have earned it, not only by their play on the field but their actions off the field and the work they put in, other than Trace McSorley.
Brent Pry | Defensive Coordinator
Q. At what point did you know that you were going to get [linebacker Manny Bowen] back and what do you envision his role being this year?
BP: It's been quite a process. Obviously I've stayed in touch with Manny throughout this thing, knowing him since his sophomore year in high school. Very close with Manny, and you know, it's been a process.
I don't know for sure if we still know exactly how this thing is going to unfold but we want to get Manny to a December graduation. You know, it's great to have him out there mentoring the young guys on the field. He's a student of the game. He's played a good number of snaps for us. He's coaching the heck out of some of those guys right now, not knowing what his role will be.
In my mind, I'm not planning on Manny Bowen right now. With what we know, the information we have, that's the way this thing's playing out right now, and if things change, we'll take another look at it.
But Manny had a laundry list of things to kind of earn his way back and gain some trust, and he did an outstanding job with it. To be honest, I'm not surprised. He's a very determined young man. So it's good to have him back out there, and got a lot of love for Manny. Support him and hopefully things work out really well.
But the most important thing to me is we get him to a graduation here in December.
Q. [Defensive lineman] Kevin Givens is a really versatile piece for you lining up outside and inside. With some of the losses inside, is he going to be more of a presence there and do you foresee him having that flexibility still?
BP: We love that flexibility. I think it was one of the keys to our success last season. Tight ends, it's a handful when they try and block Kevin [Givens].
Against some of those teams that put some bigger folks out there, I think it's something that we'd like to continue to do. It's going to depend on the development of the rest of those guys at defensive tackle, that's where that will be.
I think we're trying to recruit somebody like that each year, a hybrid-type player that can play end and can play tackle and can do a little bit of both and Kevin is kind of the model for that.
Q. Can you describe the progress that [linebacker] Jan Johnson has made last year, since this spring and how soon do you want to decide on the Mike and will everything fall into place after you do that?
BP: That's a really good question for a couple of reasons. No. 1, I'm a big Jan Johnson fan. You know, his story would be somewhat similar to Smitty's (former linebacker Brandon Smith). Jan is very physical, tough. Has done a great job of growing into the position. You know, he's certainly in the thick of things.
I'm not in a hurry to decide to be honest right now. I'm not sure at any of the three spots at linebacker how that is going to take shape. I know we've got some great candidates. I love the competition right now. I'm going to roll guys through different spots and you know, after a week or two, we'll take a closer look.
But right now, it's just getting reps and having a chance to evaluate these guys and continue to get them better.
Q. How valuable will it be for guys to be able to play two positions at linebacker? And I wonder where Jake Cooper, given his history of injuries, lines up in this competition?
BP: I personally place a lot of value in guys learning more than one spot. That was the case with Brandon Bell. That was the case with Jason Cabinda. With your limited scholarship numbers and with the way injuries occur, I think it's a good plan. You have to be careful where you do it. Certain guys can handle it a little sooner in their career and some guys, you hold off till they have got one position squared away.
So we've got a couple of guys that are learning two spots. We've got a couple of guys that are only concentrating on one position and then we've got a guy that's learning all three.
Jake's a guy that plays Mike and Will. He's got great intangibles. His injuries, as you mentioned, it's kind of set him back over the course of his career. But you know, he's one of those guys right in the thick of things that's going to play some Mike and play some Will throughout camp, and see if he can be in the two-deep.
Q. You guys have so many weapons on offense this year, with all that firepower on offense, your side of the ball seems to have the question marks heading into camp. Do you place extra pressure on yourself to kind of get those questions answered and rebuild this defense, when people are talking about this team as a potential to get to the College Playoff?
BP: That's exactly why I don't read the media much. Sorry, guys. I don't put extra pressure on.
We are going to do the same things each and every camp, ground up, evaluate these guys, mature them, evaluate weaknesses and strengths. I do feel very good about the group we have. I understand we lost eight starters off a pretty good unit but in my heart of hearts, I believe we have a heck of an opportunity to be better than last year's squad. We are very explosive. We run really well.
[Performance Enhancement] Coach [Dwight] Galt and his staff have done a tremendous job developing these guys, not just this summer, but through the winter and spring. I think we've got a group of guys that are really bought in and focused and as we all know, competition makes everybody better, and you know, all those guys want to play. They didn't come here to ride the bench.
So they are all kind of chasing each other's tail right now to get in that lineup, so we are excited about those guys.
I will say this: We took five magazine quotes about losing eight starters and no strength up the middle and can't be as good as last year and we got those plastered in our defensive meeting room, I will say that.
I didn't read them. (Laughter) I burned them.
Q. You had a lot of good things to say about [freshman Micah] Parsons, and you know the hype surrounding him coming into the program. Do you have to temper the expectations in the program and maybe outside surrounding him?
BP: He's an interesting bird, now. He loves that attention, so to temper it, I don't -- he's a great worker. He's so hungry. I got three texts on my phone right now. We just had a walk-through this morning and he's over there watching film.
He's very eager and he loves to compete. He knows -- he's a smart guy, he knows where he is and he knows this isn't going to be just handed to him. He knows he's got a lot to learn to have a chance to get on the field and for us to win with him. He takes coaching very well. I like the way the relationship is going, from recruit-turned-player, and I think that if he continues to trend the way he's trending, he's got a chance to help us this year.
Q. When you look at your safeties, what do you like there and where are you kind of at in terms of Lamont Wade?
BP: Again, I think the safety position is another area where we lost two awful good players, but we've got a good group of guys competing. Nick [Scott] is very experienced. When we look at the number of snaps Nick has played over the last two seasons between special teams and defense, there's a ton. You know, Garrett Taylor, his preparation has been outstanding. Ayron Monroe, coming off an injury, he's very talented. He's fast. He's athletic.
He, of all those guys, probably has a skill-set similar to Troy [Apke] as far as running and coverage skills. And then Lamont Wade is just a tough, explosive guy. The more reps he gets, the more he shows us at the safety position that it could be the right spot for him.
And then obviously, you know, there's some young guys there, [Jonathan] Sutherland and some guys that I think are pushing, and eager. I think we're going to like what we have there. I think we'll have three, possibly a fourth guy, that we feel like we can win with.
Q. What have you seen from John Reid coming back from the injury, and also, can you give us the status, do you expect Torrence Brown to be ready for the beginning of the season?
BP: Let me answer your second question first. I do not expect Torrence [Brown] to be ready for the season.
Secondly, John Reid, he's just the ultimate professional. He works every day to master his craft. He's got a great skill-set. He's got incredible maturity. To lose a guy like Christian [Campbell] and Grant [Haley] just makes you feel, to know that you have John coming back and then of course the year that Amani [Oruwariye] had and the experience that Tariq [Castro-Fields] gained last year, so we feel good about that spot.
We've got some young guys that are doing some things, too. Zech McPhearson, Donovan Johnson, we like to play a lot of those guys. I think we'll be able to again.
Phil Galiano | Special Teams Coordinator
Q. Given the fact I counted five kickers on the roster, how do you line up the competition for those guys and pick out the best man at the end of preseason?
PG: Well, I think it's super exciting we have those guys here right now and get a chance to evaluate them, and we have a rotation set up that we have them split of certain guys are on their own one day and other guys are on their own the next day.
Just like every position, we're going to compete in everything we do and put them in challenging situations and give them an opportunity for those guys to go compete and win the job.
Q. Nick Scott has been a core special teams guy for you for the last few years. Does his role change now that it looks like he'll be getting more snaps at safety, and who are some of the younger players who may be that dynamic leader on the special teams that Nick has been for you?
PG: Nick [Scott] has been. He's been phenomenal, and he still will be. How many special teams he will start on will be determined depending, on what his role is on defense is, like you said.
But he's still going to be a guy that's very, very involved.
In everything we do, even from a meeting and leadership standpoint. But we do have a lot of young guys that we're super excited about. You take a look back at last year and guys we are expecting bigger things from, like Garrett Taylor, Zech McPhearson, Tariq Castro-Fields, we're excited about those guys from a back end point.
And then some of the linebackers that we have: Jarvis Miller, doing a phenomenal job for us. Johnathan Thomas coming over and he's going to be a very big part of things that we're doing. I'm sure I'm leaving some guys out because there's about -- we counted about 13 to 15 guys right now that we feel we can go in with that are going to be major contributors on special teams for us.
Q. With the new kickoff rules, does this change what you would like to see? For example, somebody who is more safe or cautious with the kickoff or somebody who is aggressive and going to want to return every single one of them now that you have the option to not?
PG: You know, I don't think it changes what we are looking for to be honest with you, because the guy back there had to be a great decision-maker anyway.
There's a lot of things that go into being a kick returner, even before where the ball was landing at. Sometimes you have a certain return on; if the ball was caught in the end zone, it's going away in the opposite direction of the return -- the return, you would still like him to take a knee in that situation.
I don't think it's changing what we're looking for. What we want is a guy that every time he touches the ball can score, and a guy that we can trust that's going to make great decisions and take care of the football because that's the most important thing.
Q. Blake Gillikin is listed as a punter and kicker. Can he effectively fill both roles?
PG: Could he do it? Yes, he could. He's that talented and he's very capable to get that done.
Going into it right now, we talked about the kickers that we have on our roster, we are really excited about the young men that we have now and we are going allow those guys to go and compete and take those roles, but Blake is talented enough that if we needed we could move him over and ask him to do other things for us.
Q. How has Carson Landis come along since the spring, and how is he handling the new competition?
PG: You know, it's hard for me to say how he's come along since the spring because I'm not allowed to be with him and see him kick during the summer.
So that part is hard to say how he's come along, but he's like any one of our guys. He understands that there's competition in everything that we do and he embraces that competition and he's looking forward to it.
Q. Vlad Hilling, what are some strengths that you see from him and what kinds of things we have to do to get the job?
PG: Well, one of his strengths is he has a very strong leg, which was evident in seeing him kick the field goals and the field goal he made in the Big 33 game.
One of his other strengths is Vlad is a phenomenal young man, and he is a guy that's very comfortable and pressure doesn't get to him.
What I need to see from him is exactly what I need to see from the other guys, when they get an opportunity to go perform, make the most of your opportunity and those guys are going to decide who becomes the starters.
It will be very clear because somebody is going to separate themselves and win the job.
Q. Curious, you mentioned the setup with certain guys kicking certain days and that sort of thing. That process, is it something you've done other places or is it specifically because it's such an open competition, and what are some of the things or maybe the key statistics that obviously are a little under the radar that go into making this decision?
PG: Well, it is something that I have done before and Coach Franklin and I spoke about it, and we thought that it would be great way for the first week or maybe two weeks of camp, we are going to play it out and see how it goes.
But being able to have -- when you get special teams periods -- so we get a field goal period, for example, it may only be five minutes so we are going to do our best to get as many kicks as we can but in that five-minute period we may only get six kicks. Well, if you have multiple kickers kicking each day; if you have four guys or five guys trying to go, each guy is only getting one kick in that team environment.
Whereas, if we kind of set a schedule where two guys are going, and so they are getting that period; and then one of the things we do at the end of practice is a competition, a field goal or kickoff competition. It's able to isolate and get those guys a little bit more reps each day in a team setting, as opposed to when they are off on their own kicking and that sort of deal.
Q. You mentioned there were 13 to 15 players who could be solid contributors on special teams. What is it you see in a player and you turn and you're like, 'that's someone who is going to contribute a lot on special teams.' What are the characteristics you look for and is there one guy especially during your career that kind of really represented what you were looking for in that?
PG Well, I think -- and when I say 13 to 15, I'm kind of talking 13 to 15 guys that we call as part of our core unit that can play on all four special teams.
We may have other guys that only play on one special team and will dominate on that one special team. So it's more numbers than 13 to 15, but what I'm talking about, guys that I can see being on all four of them.
What we are looking for there is very athletic guys who can run and play physical and who can go out there and take the training that they are given on the practice field and carry it over into the game field and go make the plays.
It's like at any position, we're looking for guys that we can trust that we know we're going to go do the right thing and handle their business the right way on and off the field for us.
When I look at, there's been a bunch of different special teams guys throughout my career, but when I look at what Nick Scott has done for this program, to me, right away, even though I wasn't the coordinator last year, he's one of my favorite guys and most productive guys I've ever seen play on special teams.
Q. Do you still plan to have DeAndre [Thompkins] return punts, and are you looking at anybody else there? And as for returning kicks, who are you looking at right now there?
PG: We are still planning for DeAndre [Thompkins] to return punts. I think what he did last year is really good, and I think as I've said before, he's able to score whenever he touches the ball.
That's one of the things we're looking for. He's also a veteran guy who makes great decisions, and we know we can go out there and trust him. He's going to take care of the football and go make the fair catch when he needs to or run up and catch it so the ball doesn't hit the ground and we lose yardage. We're extremely excited about DeAndre. But it's like any position on our team. There's competition.
Before I got here John Reid was a punt returner who had done a really good job early in the season. We have a couple other guys, Mark Allen is very capable of doing it. We have a younger guy in KJ Hamler that we are really excited about. So we have a lot of options.
Mac Hippenhammer is a guy that's very sure-handed that can do it. I hope I'm not leaving guys out. We've a lot of options and like everything, we're going to compete.
Q. What about kick returner?
PG: Kick returner for us, obviously it's an open competition right now.
We have guys on our roster who have done it before: Miles [Sanders] has done it; [Brandon] Polk has done it; Nick Scott has done it; Journey Brown, see what he can do there.
So we have a bunch of guys and that's going to be the same thing. Those guys are catching kicks every day and they are charted, every catch: Was it clean; was it a good decision; and everything was charted and tracked. And not only are our coaches who coach them and give evaluations and opinions day after day after day, but we also have statistical value that we are able to go back and see, as well.
Q. You just mentioned Journey Brown. What excites you about him? The track background comes to mind.
PG: Sure. His speed, No. 1. He hits a crease, he's gone. There's no one that's going to catch him, so that excites me. And how physical and how strong he is. One of the things you're looking for in a kick returner that you're look is a guy that's able to hit a hole and break tackles, and he's a big, physical, strong, fast runner, which excites you.