South Alabama Jaguars College Football Pregame Quote, 09/23/2019

On ULM:

ULM is a very good football team, when you look at who they’ve played this year and how they’ve played them they have been in every game. They beat Grambling then took Florida State to overtime, and they played Iowa State ‚Äî who is a really good football team ‚Äî really, really tough for a half; they had opportunities early in the game to actually go ahead, they created a couple of turnovers in the first half but weren’t able to capitalize or else that game would’ve been much closer than what it was. If you look, they put up a lot of yardage and have scored a good bit of points, and against Iowa State they had an opportunity to do more; they are an outstanding team.

Their quarterback, who has been playing for a couple of years now, is a very explosive guy, he can hurt you with his feet and with his arm. They have a big back they can give the football to who is a very physical runner, they have a good offensive line and some weapons on the outside. Defensively they are a good football team, Coach [Mike] Collins — their defensive coordinator — does a really good job of changing their fronts and bringing pressure from all sides.

They are a good football team, but we’re excited about getting into [Sun Belt] conference play. We think that our non-conference schedule has prepared us to be able to start conference play. Everybody is starting off 0-0, we’re excited about starting this trek in the Sun Belt.

On what he learned about the team so far this season:

That we are a young football team. We’ve got a lot of guys who are playing extremely hard under some adverse conditions, a lot of which we created ourselves. The things that we focus on we tend to get better at. Early in the year I thought we played well against Nebraska and Jackson State, we did a lot of good things; we kept both under 300 yards and against Jackson State we rushed for over 400 yards. It’s there. Things that were hurting us in the first two games were the penalties and the turnovers, the last two weeks they have not been our issue. Now, we need to put points on the board offensively; we’ve played some teams that are really good defensively, but that is what we’re going to see in the Sun Belt each and every week. We need to find a way to make some plays against good people and we’ve got the people to do that, and we need to keep protecting the football. Defensively we need to get off the field on third down, we were good on third down against Nebraska and Jackson State but the last two weeks we have not been able to get off the field on third down and that’s big. We had UAB multiple third-and-sixes and third-and-eights, we had an opportunity to get off the field and didn’t do it. It could’ve made a difference in that ballgame putting ourselves in better shape to have a chance to win. I think we’ve made improvement in our kicking game, which was something that wasn’t as sharp earlier in the year. There have been some things we have focused on that we have gotten better at, now we need to keep coming along in some of the other phases to put ourselves in contention to beat ULM this week.

On making changes offensively:

We can draw up new plays, but it is still going to be about a little thing here and a little thing there. It’s not what we’re doing but how we are doing it. Obviously we need to get the ball to Tra Minter and make sure that KB [Kawaan Baker] gets opportunities. We need to get the ball Jalen Tolbert and Davyn [Flenord], and I like our tight ends ‚Äî Khameron Taylor and Zac Crosby are both good football players ‚Äî so we need to find a way to get them in the mix offensively.

On the team’s attitude:

The thing I told our guys the other day is that we are starting over, it’s a new season right now. Texas State and Georgia State played the other day, they are the only ones who aren’t 0-0. Every goal that you had in front of you is still there and very attainable. Adversity is a part of life, I talked to the team last night about how football mirrors life ‚Äî you’re going to have rough times. The only thing we can control is our attitude, so come to work every day and let’s get better. I’ve been here before, when you come out on the other side you’re a lot better from having pulled through the tough times. They say adversity builds character, but I know it reveals it. We have really good character on this team, we have a large group of guys who are battling and getting better. UAB is a good football team, we could’ve played a lot better so we need to make improvement to get to a point where we beat a team like that; we weren’t quite there yet last week. We watched the film last night as a group to show that if we do something a little bit better ‚Äî it’s not magic, or a guy needing to be 6-foot-8 or weighing 300 pounds or running a 4.29 ‚Äî and take a different step and do this a little different on the first drive we take it down and score. If we do things differently on the first third-and-six we get off the field and they punt. You have to show them the things were we are close, there were a lot of things the other day where we were very close. We’re going to keep chopping wood, keep getting better and pushing forward. We have a lot of young guys who are playing and getting better, going through the non-conference schedule that we had has helped prepare a lot of those guys for the conference schedule that we have coming up.