Charlotte 49ers College Football Pregame Quote, 11/26/2019

Thanks to everybody for coming this whole year. This is the last weekly one and you guys have been awesome, through thick and thin. It’s been fun for me to spend Tuesdays with you. Secondly, an unbelievable win on Saturday. It was a great experience for our football team. We have had a ton of notoriety for our university, specifically Club Lit, and I think, slowly but surely, it is becoming cool to play football at Charlotte which was a goal of ours. Obviously, we’re not anywhere close to being done. We have a big game this week on the road, which the crazy thing about this league, and we’ve shown it as well, is that anybody can beat anybody on a given Saturday. We have to go play our best football game on Saturday against an extremely talented, well-coached football team and a team that’s hungry to win and backed into a corner. We know we’ll get their best effort. The guys have responded really well. I’m hoping, just finding a way to win six games is not our mentality. And it hasn’t been thus far. We’re excited about a week of preparation. And we’ll have our best week yet and try and go play our best game yet.

You heard Cam (Clark) say six is not enough, we got to get seven. Is that universal from what you’ve heard from the guys as you’ve come back to work this week?

Yeah. I was interested to see how they respond yesterday (Monday). The energy is really good. Obviously, the momentum we have right now and the excitement about this program, from our players, the morale is high. And that’s a great thing. You get to the last week of the regular season, and to still be playing for something, and for everybody wanting to continue to play, those are big obstacles a lot of people are facing right now in the last game of the regular season. What are we still playing for? Do our guys still enjoy playing with one another? Is our staff tired of one another? And we’re fortunate to not have those issues. There is something that is motivating us every day that we come in here and we enjoy being around each other. We get another opportunity to go play with one another. I think some of these seniors, with their last game being Saturday at home, every time they go on the practice field, they probably cherish it a little bit more. They get to step onto that field one more time. We have to make these days count and have a great week of preparation because it will be very difficult to win a football game on Saturday.

You mentioned ODU’s backs against the wall but they come into this week with nothing to lose, they may come in and do things they normally wouldn’t do. How do you prepare for that and make sure your players are aware of that?

I think that’s kind of our mentality, each and every week, anyway. Anybody, including us, can pull anything out of their hat to try and make a play. We’re prepared for it each and every week, nothing will change for us. It’s the last game of the season, so you’re right, you have nothing to lose and we’re going to play the same way. We’ll be the aggressor and go out and give it our best shot. We’re not going to sit back on our heels and wait for them to show us something they haven’t shown us. We’re going to go out and make sure we play our best football game yet. The biggest thing for me is the week of preparation. Do we beat last week’s preparation? Are we even more focused? I tell these guys each and every week, when you go on the road, you’re down 7-0 before you get on the bus. That’s the mentality we need to have and we need to play an excellent football game Saturday.‚Äù

You start the year 2-1, then you’re 2-5. Now, all of a sudden, you’re 6-5. Two things: what was the message? And how important was it to keep the same message, whether it’s the straight losses or the wins?

I’m the first one to take the blame for the four-straight losses. I think, in my opinion, I got a little sidetracked with we’re winning some games, the culture is where we want it to be, we got guys believing, we’re executing at a high level and let some of the culture pieces slide. It wasn’t at the forefront of all of our conversations. We didn’t start the meeting every day with something that’s culture building, that’s bigger than football. The process was just kind of, let’s go out and give it our best shot on Saturday versus what have we put into it to earn the opportunity to go compete and win? I really feel like my mindset changed the week of the Western Kentucky game. And then, I think our process changed and our culture changed really that week. We played ok the first half; obviously, didn’t get it done in the second. But just the energy around the whole football team, and the way we played ‚Äì how hard we played, how positive we were during that game, how well we overcame adversity ‚Äì to me, was changing. I felt a lot better about our football team after the loss to Western Kentucky. And then, you’re fortunate enough to get a crazy, come-from-behind win against North Texas. And now the belief and the morale starts to change and now you put your point home a little more and press the culture and the process a little bit more. I think that’s why we’ve made so many strides over the last couple weeks. It’s a lot easier to push your message and get guys to believe when you’re winning some games. But you have to give them a lot of credit for not tuning us out at 2-5. And I think that’s what has made them hungry and made them want to achieve success. We cannot forget how we felt at that time and have to keep the same chip on their shoulder to prove our doubters wrong and the us versus the world mentality.

You mentioned not starting your meetings with something that is bigger than football. What did those entail at the halfway point of the season?

Whether it’s a staff or team meeting, we start every day with what we call the fourth quarter. It’s 15 minutes of something other than football. It’s a lot of culture, leadership-building aspects. This week, we’re allowing the seniors to stand up and talk about their experience. Talk about what culture changes they’ve seen. What culture changes are going to stick with them beyond this year. Then I tell the teammates to tell them what’s made an impact for them, regarding that particular senior, which is as dynamic as anything we can possibly do. It’s interesting to see what cultural things they will take with them. It’s all about how I grow and how do I become a leader, voice my opinion, create consistency in my life, that is larger than football but could be pertained to football. We do this every Monday and Tuesday as a team and do this with their special position group meetings on Wednesdays and Thursdays. It’s been dynamic. Some of the guys explain to us things that are bigger than the game. I think we’ve become a tighter football team due to some of those things.

You mention culture changes. Which one are you most proud of that has seen a big change?

Just the way they present themselves. The confidence that they shake your hand, the way they speak. The perception they’ve given people about this program because of the type of people they are. A lot of reasons why the people around this community are excited about this program is because they’ve gotten to know our players and coaches. Our guys represent is program the right way. Watching them go up and introduce themselves to a new visitor at practice. I think we’re ok at it. We’re getting good at it. I talked today about it. It’s not a chore anymore; they believe in it. I think that is when things can be really special.

Getting the win on Saturday, becoming bowl eligible, how much different is that mindset as you get ready for Old Dominion? Trying to get win No. 7 instead of waiting on this game to become bowl eligible.

If anything, you can probably relax just a tad bit. All the distractions that happened last week are gone. I thought we were a tight football team in the first half last week. We were playing almost not to mess up. We seem to play a little bit better when we’re looser and we’re trying to be our best and trying to be at our best, instead of worrying about the situation around it. It should get us back to the basics. I think they’ve responded very well thus far. What gives you the best opportunity to win on Saturday? The message I’m trying to get across is that six wins it isn’t good enough, when a bowl game is a goal of mine. Winning every game is a goal of mine. So, we have another opportunity to win a game. We need to be better than we were a week ago to do that.

Where has the defensive turnaround come from?

The Western Kentucky game was a big week for them as well. Just watching them compete at the end of that game, I heard Jeff (Gemmell) on the radio talk to [730 The Game ESPN Charlotte] Bobby (Rosinski) and Walker (Mehl) yesterday that even at the end of the game, down 16 points, they were still excited for another opportunity to get a stop. When it went from playing on your heals a little bit, just hoping you don’t mess up, to realizing that you could be a good defense if we do the fundamental things we do every day. We do it at a really high level and we can get some stops. Enjoying the opportunity to get some stops then we have gotten a lot better. We have become more aggressive than passive. That’s where I believe it started, at the Western Kentucky game.

Just watching it on film, how good was Victor’s (Tucker) play on Saturday? It seemed like they just couldn’t cover him.

He played really well. He’s had a couple of those games. The nice thing about us offensively right now is that we’ve had a couple of wide receivers who had games like that. It hasn’t been Vic every time. He took it to another level on Saturday. We’ve really liked the matchup with him and Chris (Reynolds) was able to put the ball in the right spot. I believe that a lot of that catch was a want-to. He was going to will us to win and slam the door on them. It’s unbelievable concentration. He gets his helmet ripped off. To come down with it and that type of element, with that scenario, is a big-time football play and one that I’m sure he’ll always remember.

On the last drive of the first half, when you got that first-down catch and went down out of the pocket. Where did that come from? Did you tell him before-hand to slide?

We worked out a bunch during the week but you are constantly reminding them of what the situation is. How many timeouts you have and what is coming up next. That’s a great job of the offensive staff making sure he knew what to do. When you catch this, you need to get down so we can line up and spike the football. We executed it very well but we missed the kick. Great job by Vic, doing what he was coached to do.

We’ve seen for weeks now, Club Lit. We know what it is. But when you make history, what was the best response you received for doing the Lee Corso headgear celebration and every other move you made?

The one I heard from the most was my wife asking if this is going to continue to be a thing or if you are going to stop this at any point in time? It’s incredible the number of people that have reached out about our success. I think this week was a national story. We got a lot of publicity. I think it’s unique. Some people are going to love it; some people are going to hate it. But I think it’s us. That’s me. I love celebrating success. I love finding ways to make them realize how hard they worked for that success on Saturday and how much you need to enjoy it. I don’t think it’s a time to go in there and say, hey man, we did this, this and this, we must get better at it. We’re not going to talk about winning a game until Monday. We’re going to enjoy winning the game on Saturday and Sunday. I think it’s unique to us. I think our guys have really enjoyed it. It’s kind of a sacred place to them. It’s funny because when I came in, I had a Norm head on but I had my shirt on. Everyone who was just like, I guess Norm just got dressed. Took off his blowup muscles and he’s in there hanging out with us. When I took my shirt off and everyone knows my physique, I think it was obvious that they knew who it was. Then I threw the head off whenever I was crowd surfing a little bit. I knew it had to be something different. I thought coming in with my shirt off would be bland on a Saturday. Special win and I needed a special celebration. That’s an incentive to win now and it inspires future Niners to go here. How concerned are you guys going to be when you win a bowl game? How do you top that? Maybe you do it on the field and instead of the locker room? Put Club Lit on the field? I don’t know. I’ll come up with something.

At the beginning of the season, the run defense was critiqued a lot. You held Brenden Knox, C-USA’s leading rusher, in check for most of the game. What would you credit that defensive progression to?

I believe we’re getting better at defensive tackle, which is where that starts. Stopping the run is an inside deal. Timmy Horne has played a lot better. Demond Stewart has done some nice things. Having Tommy Doctor back is a great deal. We’ve been more difficult to attack up the middle. I think our linebackers are fitting it better. We’re fitting in the right spots and doing better in getting 11 hats to the football. We’re running better to the football. When you have some success, and show it on Saturday, what a good defense is supposed to look like, then you hope it can add some confidence. There was a stretch where it wasn’t a confident defense. Now you must build on that success. We have to show what you’re capable of doing.