Miami Hurricanes College Football Pregame Quote, 10/14/2019

It’s good to see everybody. Our team got back to work last night. We took Saturday off the big win Friday night. Everybody obviously feels good about the result Friday and the way that we played and the way we persevered. We found a way to win a game in the fourth quarter, which we had not done up to this point. With that being said, when we came back yesterday, we put that game behind us and it’s time to get to work on Georgia Tech.

We have been through the first half of the season. We have faced plenty of adversity throughout the games or even during the week, in between games. Now this is a week where, when you get an ‚Äòattaboy,’ you have to understand it’s still time to get back to work. You can’t sit there, because last week does not count for this week. We know that, if you watch any weekend of college football. We have a challenge in Georgia Tech. We’ll be back in our stadium and we’re looking forward to an enthusiastic crowd. As crazy as it sounds, we only have two more home games left this year, which is crazy for a guy like [Shaq] Quarterman and [Michael] Pinckney. It boggles the mind that we’re already there. I thought our crowd was outstanding and made a big difference for us in the fourth quarter Friday night. We look forward to getting in front of our people and having another great day on this Saturday at noon.

Before questions, pretty cool…just found out that Trajan Bandy was named ACC Defensive Back of the Week. Congratulations to Trajan, who has really been working hard and, I thought, played his best game Friday night.

On Trajan Bandy’s performance Friday night versus Virginia and where he has improved this year:

The number one thing that did Trajan did a great job with was his urgency. He played extraordinarily hard. When he was tested in coverage, he did a good job in coverage. For a team that has got to find a way to win the game in the fourth quarter, you’re looking for the guys that can make ‚Äòthe play.’ You don’t always know who that’s going to be and what role it’s going to be. How huge, when Trajan comes free on the blitz and gets a sack on [Bryce] Perkins ‚Äì a guy that’s so difficult to get on the ground. Obviously everyone knows that sacks on one-minute drill are drive killers, and they were out of timeouts. For him to be able to make that play in that moment‚Ķwe’re looking for guys that can do that. To have that competitive excellence helped carry us through in the victory.

On the possibility of redshirting freshmen:

We’ll kind of tackle those one at a time. Let’s put Sam [Brooks, Jr.] and even Jahfari Harvey in the same category. With the departures we know we have at linebacker next year and the potential departures that we’re going to have at defensive end, it’s important that those guys are still preparing every week that they’re going to play, because that’s going to give them a leg up in the competition next year, when we will be potentially much more inexperienced at both positions.

In terms of [Larry] Hodges and [Jeremiah] Payton, yeah, I think those are the guys that you’re still monitoring. We don’t want to give them snaps just to give them snaps, but if we can push them in a game, we will, and sort of see how that goes for the rest of the season.

On his expectations for QB Jarren Williams this week and if he will do more this week than last week:

Yeah, I would think so. He did a little bit last night [at practice]. Number one, it’s just having confidence in himself that he’s back and he’s got all his physical capabilities about him. And again, just getting back in prep mode. There was a great story that came out of yesterday with Sam Darnold, I guess had come back from mono, and he talked about how he prepared a week ago when he couldn’t play ‚Äì like he was going to play. Then he went in there and played very well yesterday and almost because he prepared for the game the week before. I would say that type of urgency of getting back would be what we’re looking for the most with Jarren.

On if QB Jarren Williams was available Friday night versus Virginia:

There was a package we could have used for Jarren, a package we could have used for Tate [Martell], a package we could have used for Carson Proctor. It was all dependent on [how] that game was going on and what we felt like we wanted to do.