Q: Can you rewind back to the start of the fourth quarter and what the decision process was there? Was there any thought of trying to draw them offside? Could you just take us through that?
A: You're talking the fourth and one call? There was; I think my biggest thing that kept replaying in my mind was we were playing such good defense, and the reality of did we want to screw around here?
Did we want to put ourselves in a situation to either hurt us, because we're in a good pooch punt situation where I thought we could back them up. We were going into the student section. We made the decision coming out of the half to have them play offensive football in the student section in the fourth quarter.
I just felt like that was really the decision-making piece of it and I really didn't want to screw it up. Again, I think you can debate the heck out of it, because I have to be honest with you for the last 48 hours, but I still feel like with the flow of the game, what was going on, that's where I thought, you know what, we're not going to screw around here.
We're going to try to make sure we pin these guys back, give our defense an opportunity to play great defense, and get the ball back, which we did. We get the interception, and all those things were certainly positive from that.
It's like every decision in last Saturday night's game has gone through your head a million times of how could you be better from that standpoint? That's how I would answer that.
Q: From an overarching standpoint when you're making those decisions, who are you communicating with? Your analytics person in that situation? What's the process like when you get to that moment?
A: Again, I think that's where analytics goes out the window. Analytics is going to tell you to go for it. That's what it's going to say. We know that. I know what the analytics said. Honestly, there was conversation with D'Anton [Lynn] and Mouse [Taylor Mouser] a little bit about how do you feel, what do you feel? But at the end of the day, it comes back on me to make the decision.
I think there's been plenty of times where we have gone for that. I just felt like with the flow of the game, again, with kind of; I thought their strength was kind of in the A- and B-gap, and I just felt like situationally, I didn't feel like it was the right time and the right place to maybe panic and give them a short field and feel like they could have more time to get themselves back into the football game.
So that's the decision and that's kind of what I went through at that time.
Q: Wanted to circle back about the receivers, the lack of touches for really anybody except Chase [Sowell]. I know Brett [Eskildsen] had his targets that didn't connect. What would you attribute that to, the inability to get some of the other guys even some manufactured touches over the course of the game? What needs to improve in that regard moving forward?
A: I would say two things. The first thing is, we have to do better. It was not one of those; you know, I think hindsight is 20/20 and all these things, and we went back and reflected where can we be better? I think it has to start with myself, us as coaches. How do we give ourselves a better opportunity, better flow in the football game? Offensively, we just couldn't find a flow in the game.
I think part of that was how could we distribute the football better? How could we create more space? I think all those things are real conversations that we continue to have.
There were opportunities for guys to make plays, whether they didn't make the plays or there was, you know, I think somebody asked a great question about Rocco [Becht] after the game, and I'd say there were moments Rocco played really good football, and Rocco would tell you there's moments where, man, his consistency needed to be better in the football game as well.
I think you look back on all those things, and again, it's like woulda-coulda-shoulda. Part of that is you don't get the first down a couple of times, so that limits your opportunities to continue to extend drives.
When we did that, you saw the multiplicity of people touching the ball and connecting as we're moving the ball down the field on some of the drives we did have in the football game.
But I think it still goes back to getting the first down, getting the ball, spreading the football the width and vertically down the football field better, and it starts at the top. We have to do a better job of creating those opportunities, and we've got to do a better job executing in some of those situations, for sure.
Q: Want to go back to that fourth-and-one again. Why take the timeout coming out of the TV timeout?
A: I think coming out of the TV timeout, I was going to go for it, honestly. We had a play called. We knew kind of what we were going to do. I saw what their alignment was, and that was for me, I'm just like I don't think we have the advantage here.
I really, kind of thinking about it, I think I was 50-50 on going for it anyways, and I think when I saw what they came out defensively in, that's why I was like; and I didn't want to try to draw them offsides because I didn't want a situation where we could go offsides.
There was a couple of touchy moments, that fourth down there, where down on the goal line, they had the defensive offsides that they got called against them. The next play probably should have been defensive offsides too. They didn't call it and I didn't want to put ourselves in a crappy situation there.
That's really what I saw and it's why I ended up taking the timeout there and punting the football away rather than either taking the five-yard penalty or trying to draw them offsides.
Q: Regarding Rocco [Becht], it just seemed like he never got into a rhythm. What can you do to get him in rhythm? I know in the past, he's told us that tempo has been helpful in those kinds of situations.
A: I just think globally we, again, going back to our offense has always been best, and I know this sounds cliché, getting the first first down. We've got to do a better job at a lot of that. We weren't great on first down, period, in the football game on Saturday. We had not had that issue so far. I think that really extends from our end of it is, getting the first down and getting ourselves in a rhythm within the football drive.
Again, that's global standpoint, that's execution, that's detail, but I still think so much of that still falls on us as coaches doing a better job of creating those momentum opportunities to get the first first down.
Q: I think there were four situations where it was third-and-long and you ran the ball. After going through this game, do you feel like you guys need to be more aggressive offensively?
A: That's a great question. I think a little bit of the football game, you're playing with such a lead early on that you don't want to screw it up, and you're playing such great defense and you're putting yourself in such a great situation that you felt like the flow of the game, the turnovers, you just wanted to keep playing field position a little bit and continue to put yourself in a great situation.
Again, I go back to what's the head coach's responsibility? The flow of the game. It's like, man, I don't know if I did a good enough job as the head football coach conducting the flow of the game at times.
I think, again, that's a great reflection. Should we have pushed the ball down the field in some of those situations more? I will say a couple of those runs were close to hitting and I don't think those were bad calls by any stretch of the imagination. But I just think the flow of the game got weird a little bit in the football game.
We got into a good lead and then I think you were kind of like, man, let's keep playing field position. I think maybe some of that came back to bite us at the end of the football game.
By no means do I feel good about how we maybe played the second half of the football game from tempo, from how we attacked it, and I think some great learning lessons for all of us moving forward.
Q: You've talked about field position a couple of times now, three areas that impact that: Return game, kickoffs, you rotated some guys there, and then punting with [Nathan] Tiyce as well. How do you feel those three areas have performed through four weeks?
A: I think that's what gives you a lot of confidence. I feel like we've done a really good job in punt return.
Again, I thought Zay [Robinson] had two great (returns); you know, where you're just saying if you can get a first down, and some of those were huge opportunities in the football game.
Obviously, I think the turnovers all came in, other than Tony's [Rojas] was on the minus side of the 50, but still in midfield, and the other two are coming on the plus-side of the 50 yard-line.
Then you talk about, obviously, kick returns a little bit different, but I think Nathan has done a really good job pooch punting. The one that we're talking about was okay, but he came back on the next one and a great punt. Man, we had them backed up and did an unbelievable job putting us in a great situation to try to win the football game.
I feel like we're really growing in those areas and we'll have to do a great job in those areas when you talk about field position for sure.
Q: Now that you've had a chance to really look at the tape, the touchdown that Wisconsin scored that ended up winning the game, it looked like there was some pretty significant contact down the field. How did you look at that play? What are your thoughts on it?
A: I think what I said on Saturday night, and I use this term, we left it to chance. That's where flow of the game, man, you had them, you had opportunity to, there's like, man, there's so many; there's like these four situations that continue to go in my head.
You get down there and you don't put a touchdown in, initially. The Tony Rojas interception, and you go three-and-out, you punt them back the football and you don't get a first down and you don't score. Those are gut-wrenching.
Then defensively, it's third-and-13 and we let them off the hook. We have them backed up second-and-19, and we let them off the hook. Even that play is third-and-13, right? So those gray plays, we can make every excuse; man, there's bang-bang play, coulda-woulda-shoulda. We put ourselves in a situation where we left it to chance instead of taking care of the situations that we had the ability to take care of and executing when we need to execute.
That's how I would respond to it. That's really more my thought than it is, man, what do you think of that? I think some of those things are bang-bang things, but you let it get to a bang-bang thing instead of taking care of the things that you could control to take care of.
Q: What are your thoughts on playing four running backs in the first quarter Saturday night? What led to that? Do you feel like that gives you the best chance to win? Have you reconsidered limiting the rotation to two or three?
A: I think that continues to be a unique challenge for us a little bit. I'll be honest with you, I think we're trying to find somebody to grab a stranglehold of this and kind of be the front-runner.
Again, that's a global piece, right? It's what does practice look like on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday? What does the preparation look like to give you confidence? And then, obviously, what does the execution on game day look like? All those things matter.
I still think, again, there's gray in that room right now, and the ability; though I think James [Peoples] played a good football game in the game on Saturday, and I think he's starting to really play some consistent football, continuing to grow into the player that he can be and we need him to be.
I think we still have great faith in what Carson [Hansen] is. You saw Q [Quinton Martin Jr.] make some big plays and has got big play ability.
When you look at that room, in general, I think just continuing to find the best way to get the most out of those guys, and then we need somebody to separate, to be the bell cow, in some of these critical moments. I think we're looking for that.
Those are the honest discussions behind closed doors. I think the positive is, all those guys we believe in. I think the reality of it is, we'd love to see somebody emerge in that room.
Q: Looking at it big picture, when you watched the film and went through this a million times in your mind, do you feel like you came away with correctible mistakes? Do you feel like this was a look at maybe we need to tweak who we are a little bit after an upgrade in competition after the first three weeks?
A: I think from my end of it, the positive I take is, this was not an attitude and effort issue. This is not are kids playing hard? This is not, are kids laying it on the line and playing their tails off? I think a lot of these things are correctible issues where that can be coaching, that can be schematics, and yet that's also some detail in the players' execution that needs to be better.
I think there's not one; and here's what I really appreciate about our staff and I really appreciate about our kids. I don't think there's one person that left the locker room Saturday night and felt like, man, we've done enough.
How can we continue to raise our level of either preparation or detail, whether it's me as the head football coach, in terms of how we're practicing and preparing our team, whether it's the execution and detail that us as coaches are continuing to prepare our players, or our players' preparation process? I think all of those things are constantly growing early in the season.
Yet I think the gut check is, man, this is a game that you had the opportunity to win. You had every opportunity to go finish the football game and we didn't do it. I think it's more of that to me than it is this panic of, man, are we good enough or any of these things? It's a matter of how do we get ourselves to be our best for four quarters?
Q: While the locker room feels there's a lot left to be played for this season, it feels like sometimes one loss in today's college football is kind of a cause for panic. How do you handle that inside the locker room? What would be your message about the fact that you're four games into the season, there's still eight more to go, although you have suffered your first loss of the year?
A: I think it's a great question, and at the end of the day, it comes back to this theme: Everything rises and falls with leadership. To me, it's take accountability. We understand that it's a 12-game season guaranteed to us, and the reality is you have to, whether you win or you lose, you have to continue to be able to grow forward.
I think that there's plenty of great experiences over the last five years of teams that lost early, had the ability to use that loss, and had the opportunity to grow themselves forward. That's the reality of the world we live in. So, win-loss, it's not always about the result. It's about who we are becoming through this journey so we can learn from our mistakes and not make the same mistakes twice.
That's really my belief system and really kind of been our messaging in our locker room and certainly in our meetings. We have to take it. We've got to own it. Starting from the head football coach down, we've got to make the great corrections so we can play a better version of Penn State football next week.
Q: You talked a lot about the game flow being off on Saturday night. As you guys move forward if you're in a situation like that again, if there is a weird game flow, what's the key to wrenching it back in your favor? How do you work through that in the future?
A: I think one of the benefits is you have such a great knowledge of your quarterback, especially from an offensive perspective. How do you continue to lean back into what he does best and getting him into a really confident situation and also making the right in-game adjustments?
Like I said, the game flow, you felt like there were probably times in the football game where we were leaning into the flow of the game of what it was going to go into it to make sure we didn't screw it up early in the football game rather than maybe attacking in some areas where we could have done a better job.
Again, that starts on the head football coach, and we’ve got to do a great job there.