Army West Point Black Knights College Football Pregame Quote, 09/29/2020

Good afternoon. It’s sure not as fun to come in here after a loss. We are disappointed that we weren’t able to play well enough to put ourselves in a position to win the game this Saturday. I thought Cincinnati had a really physical football team and they are obviously well coached. Their kids were prepared and they did a really nice job. I was very pleased with our defense for most of the day. We got the turnover on the opening drive and then got the turnover shortly thereafter which put us in position to take the lead right off the bat. It was a great start to the day, we just weren’t able to capitalize on it. Offensively, we had some opportunities where we got the ball in decent field position a couple of times. We just weren’t able to finish drives. We got the ball down close and had the one field goal, which I thought was a great kick by Salyers. It was a tough snap and kind of got into the chest of Brooks Hosea who is the holder ‚Äì he got it down and the kicker stayed with it, really a clutch field goal to bring us within a score. As poor production as we were having on offense, we were still in the game. We had a couple of big plays that we missed and that probably could’ve made a difference to set up an opportunity for scoring position. Our guys played their butts off, they played really hard, but we just didn’t sustain blocks on offense and ultimately a couple of big plays on busted assignments and busted coverages which cost us. They had the one big play that set them up in the first half, which was a broken coverage unfortunately and then the second half they had two play drive they leaked the back out of the backfield. It’s just something we’ve got to cover more with our team and be ready for those situations. I thought our guys battled, we lost to a really good football team [that doesn’t make it feel any better] but I am encouraged that we’re going to work our very best this week to try and improve and play the best game that we’ve played so far.

On the biggest things the team can learn from Saturday:

There’s lessons in a loss. I heard Coach Sean Saturnio yesterday that you can make the L a loss or a lesson and we’ve just got to make it a lesson. And those lessons are to make sure that we don’t have lapses in areas that we completely control which starts with our assignments. There are things on both sides of the ball, and in special teams, where we just had mix ups on assignments or didn’t block/cover the right guy, whatever it might be. Against a really good football team like Cincinnati, we can’t do those things and those are hard lessons to learn. We’ve got to do a good job coaching our guys and our players have to work really hard to learn their signs. I have heard it said, and I believe it to be true, if a guy misses an assignment, we’re either not coaching it well enough, we’re making it too complicated or that guy either isn’t giving an effort or is incapable of learning. I think our guys are working hard and trying hard and they’re all capable of learning. We’ve got to work hard to make sure it’s not too complicated and we do a great job of coaching it, and ultimately that’s my responsibility. We’re all responsible, that’s not to take anything off of anybody or put anything extra on anybody, it’s just what we’ve got to do. There are things we can control that we’ve got to focus in on more than maybe we have in the past. Block and sustain blocks, and getting off blocks and tackling ‚Äì that’s the name of the game and we’ve got to do those things better.

On if he thinks that Abilene Christian views this as a similar experience to when Army plays big name opponents:

Well, I’m sure they see it as an opportunity and we see it as an opportunity, as well. We’re just so grateful to be playing this year with all of this stuff going on and to be playing at home. And don’t for one minute think that we’re not looking at them the same as we did for the first three opponents we played. It doesn’t matter to me what division they play in. They have an athletic football team and they have a terrific football coach. You look at their record and you see what Coach (Adam) Dorrel accomplished at Northwest Missouri State. National championships and undefeated season ‚Äì that guy knows what the heck he’s doing. And he’s got a really talented, capable football team. and If we don’t play our best, they’ll come here and beat our butts. They almost did that at UTEP a week ago. You look at their schedule and they’ve got Virginia later on in the year. They’re not afraid to take on anybody. They’ve got a lot of guys that have transferred from big time schools. Those guys have seen it before. They’ve played in big stadiums against big teams ‚Äì bigger than us. The team we played this past Saturday was physically bigger than we were and there are teams bigger than them. So these guys are accustomed to playing teams like that. I know they see it as an opportunity. I think they’re probably a lot like us ‚Äì glad to be playing and excited about football.

On what he sees in Abilene Christian:

Just a super athletic football team. I watched them against UTEP. We’ve watched some film of them from the previous season. They’ve got a very athletic football team, a lot of fast football players on their team and as you mentioned, clearly a commitment to the program. That is a beautiful new stadium. It’s a tremendous, small university there in Texas. People take a lot of pride in football down there as you know. They’ve got a lot of good football players and a good coach and a good staff. So we’ve just got to be prepared for what they’ve done and then really kind of speculate on what they will do. They’re very aggressive with special teams. They faked a field goal two weeks ago when they played UTEP and were very close to executing it. We’re preparing for every fake punt, fake kick, onside kicks ‚Äì all of it. We’re just getting prepared for everything that they might throw at us because it’s clear that they’re fine with doing that. They did it in a very close football game and a game that they had a chance to win.