Marshall Thundering Herd College Football Pregame Quote, 11/09/2021

Really big weekend here in our community for a lot of reasons. Obviously we are honoring to me what is pure, and true about our sport of college football and the remembrance of the ’75 game. To me, these are the type of weekends and events, acknowledgments, ceremonies and honoring, that is why we love college sports. An event that happened years ago that ultimately changed the course of history for not only the University and the community, but all of college athletics. What was done in the wake of the plane crash ultimately allowed Marshall to continue playing football, but it also changed a rule about freshman being able to play and creating opportunities for others. So this weekend we honor all the men and women who sacrificed so that we can be in the seats that we are in. I told the team yesterday that obviously the plane crash was an opportunity to show the strength of this University and this community, but the young Thundering Herd, because of them, because of the rebirth ‚Äì we’re able to sit in the chairs we’re sitting in, I’m able to stand in this position and we do not take that lightly. I’m excited to be a part of this weekend, a part of this game, a part of this weekend ceremony and what it means not only to Marshall and this community, but to all of the country. A lot of people know, respect and cheer for Marshall University because of our resilience, because of our commitment to pressing forward.

It’s a great opportunity for us this weekend and I told our team the way you honor someone or a group is through your performance. The way you honor your mother is through your performance every day as a son or daughter. The way you honor your wife is through your performance every day as a husband. The way you honor your country is through your performance every day as a military member. I think the way that this football team can honor the 75 is through our performance on Saturday. We are very excited about the opportunity, excited to also be playing the Conference USA champs ‚Äì and until someone dethrones them, that’s the title they’ve earned, and that’s the title and the respect we will give them. I know Coach [Bill] Clark I know obviously from being in Alabama, has done a phenomenal job with this program, with his players, his coaches. He’s an upstanding guy and I’ve respected him from afar being at the University of Alabama for what he was able to do and continue to do at UAB.

Very good team that’s coming in here ‚Äì phenomenal defense and very stout against the run. I’ve got a lot of respect for all their players, I think Noah Wilder, their middle linebacker, does a phenomenal job and you can tell he’s got unbelievable leadership skills ‚Äì his play speaks for itself. They are probably the best run defense we will play this year up until this point. It’s going to be a challenge for us ‚Äì going to be a challenge for us because we pride ourselves on being able to run the football and they pride themselves on being able to stop the run, so it’s going to be a challenge.

Offensively, as a running back coach, you’ve got to have respect for how they run the ball, how their running backs run, how physical they are. Unbelievable body and balance control breaking tackles and as a team you can see they thrive on being able to run the ball efficiently throughout the game. It’s going to be a challenge for our defense. Obviously we pride ourselves, most defenses in the country, you’ve got to be able to stop the run. Being able to stop the run is going to be huge. Obviously our fans, the community will be behind us as we do everything we can this week to prepare so we can go out and get the results we are looking forward to this weekend.

On last week’s performance:

I’m really proud of how our guys fought. Going down to a hostile environment, the weather was great ‚Äì a little different than Huntington, but we brought some of that back with us. Going down to a hostile environment and playing as a team ‚Äì I think the last couple weeks the one consistent thing that we’ve done, although there are things to clean up, is we’re playing really good complimentary football right now. Offense, defense, special teams, no side is perfect, but we’re all making plays when we need to make plays, or at some point we’re all able to make plays. Special teams obviously started it off with a bang ‚ÄìI’m not going to lie, the original call was for Jayden Harrison to shut it down, so we could see what kind of formation they were going to run to make sure our blocking schemes are consistent. When he took his first two steps, I said ‚Äòwhat the hell is he doing? ‘and three steps later, I said ‚Äòrun!’ All of those things are great ‚Äì things we worked on in practice showed up in the game.

Defensively I thought as the game went on, we kind of settled down and got into a groove. Another week in a row our defense has done a really good job of playing consistent bend, but don’t break defense. I think it’s unrealistic to think we’re just going to every play three-and-out, three-and-out, three-and-out, but what we’ve got to do is we’ve got to be consistent. Our red zone defense is really good right now, we’re forcing teams to kick field goals, and if you multiply by seven and they multiply by three, you’ve got a chance to be really good. We’re minimizing our missed tackles, although we had some early in the game, but as the game kind of settled down, we were able to tackle with a lot more consistency, which got us off the field. We were able to create some pressure on the quarterback, I think we had six sacks, so again, affecting the decision-maker, making it tough for him to distribute the ball, and I think he did a really good job of creating some plays with his feet. We’ve still got some things to clean up, they got a couple of guys, I won’t say behind us, but they got some deep balls that they had position on, our guys were in position, or some of the balls were overthrown or dropped. But again, it’s improvement ‚Äì four weeks ago or whatever it was ‚Äì App State, those were penalties for us, so although, no I don’t want guys behind us or places where guys are counting on a guy to drop a ball, I want our defenders to play with a lot more technique, which I think we are starting to see. Those penalties that were turning into big first downs a couple of weeks ago, so our guys are getting better.

Offensively we’ve minimized, I’m pounding the table to eliminate the turnovers, but we’ve minimized them. We were a lot more explosive, but we’ve got to clean up some penalty things ‚Äì I think we had two penalties that took points off the board, which changes the game drastically, but we were able to bounce back, move the ball and get some explosive plays and come away with a victory. There’s a lot to learn from, but I’m pleased with the progress I think this team is making, I think we still have got to continue to harp on the things that ultimately help you be successful long term. These coaches are working their tails off, these players are working their tails off and we have got to focus on the things we need to do this week to have success.