North Texas Mean Green College Football Pregame Quote, 11/19/2019

We’re excited to get back to work this week and prepare for a much-improved Rice team. You can’t look at their record because I think they’ve played one of the toughest schedules in C-USA. I think eight of 10 are bowl eligible and a lot of those games came down to the wire. They’re finding their identity under a new head coach. Bye week came at a perfect time for us. I don’t think I’ve ever had a season with this many injuries. We’re far from 100 percent, but it gave us an opportunity to get some of the minor stuff healthy and we can get some of those guys back and ready to go this weekend.

I don’t have to explain the situation with our team. They know we have to win the last two to get bowl eligible so we have a lot to play for. We have to have a lot of attention to detail this week to go out and have success. I feel very confident the leadership will get us there the right way and making sure we are doing everything possible to go have success on the road. There’s no room for regret when we come home from Rice.

On how the Mean Green will respond to loss at Louisiana Tech:

When you don’t have success and don’t play the way you need to to win a football game, it’s never fun. We have to battle back and they have to learn from mistakes and find a way to rebound and get the morale back together and make sure you don’t let the same team beat you twice. You can’t let that happen. We’ve had ups and downs and we have to fight through it and make sure our mindset is right going into this week.

On Rice getting a win last week:

They continue to play physical and hard. You see that every week on tape. They took La Tech to overtime and had a chance against Baylor and had opportunities in a number of other games. I think last week doesn’t surprise me. They can step in and beat anyone in our conference. They haven’t had the success they’ve wanted throughout the year but they’re an extremely physical team and they’re going to play hard.

On trying to get bowl eligible and looking to team captains:

Ladarius [Hamilton], Mike Law [Michael Lawrence], Mason Fine, there’s a number of guys. I have a tremendous amount of respect for this group. They came together and changed the culture and have won a lot of games. I want to make sure, and our team wants to make sure, we send them out the right way. Our backs are against the wall and there’s no room for error, and it’s important for us to prepare the right way to go win a football game.

On going on the road, which has been tough thus far in 2019:

You’re not going to have everyone on the road. It’s reality. You won’t have your fans. You have to feed off the other crowd and feed off each other. It doesn’t matter. Whether it’s on the road or at home, you have to go out and execute and perform. It is what it is. There’s a lot of teams that go on the road and have success. The focus is on going on the road and tightening up your focus and going to make plays.

On Rice QB Tom Stewart:

We’re going to have to do a great job. They give you a lot of personnel groupings and they want to first get that run game going and once you crowd the line of scrimmage, he’s going to play-action and get the ball over your head. You have to make sure your eyes are right in your run fits and outside you have to be physical and cover those receivers. They’re big, strong guys and they’ll throw 50-50 balls to them and they’ve gone up and made plays.