Transcript From Tulane's Weekly Football Press Conference
Sep 13, 2011 | Football
Sept. 13, 2011
Watch Tulane's Weekly Football Press Conference
NEW ORLEANS -
Bob Toledo
Tulane University Head Coach
Opening statement
"Let me first of all say that we are extremely disappointed last week with our performance. There is no question that we did not play like we practiced. One of the things I always talk to the team about is you will play like you practice, but we certainly didn't do that. We played with a lot of stress on us and didn't perform very well. Again, I don't want to take anything away from Tulsa because they're an excellent football team. They lost to the No. 1 team in the nation the week before but you can see that they're a very, very good football team. As I keep telling our team, more games are lost than won. I believe we had our chances to make it a much better football game than the result was.
On Tulane's missed scoring opportunities last week vs. Tulsa
"We're on the 15-yard line going in, and we drop a pass. If we catch it, we make a first down for sure and possibly score. But we drop the ball and have to kick a field goal. We kick the field goal and make it 3-0. We get down again on the 31-yard line and we miss a field goal. That's very uncharacteristic of Cairo Santos. Then we get down to the 35 and we fumble the ball. Luckily we recovered it. We missed a block. We were trying to run a reverse and didn't get it off. Then we throw a fumble on the series. So instead of going down and maybe scoring again, we get nothing out of it. They take six plays and get in the endzone just before the half - about two minutes to go. It's 10-3 at the half and very easily could have been 3-3 at the half. Then we get started in the second half, they take the second-half kickoff, go nine plays and score a touchdown to make it 17-3. We're still in the game. We go down to the 27-yard line and miss a field goal again. I've never seen Cairo miss two field goals since he's been here, in practice or a game. Then we get down again to the 15 yard line. We have a chance to score again, we fumble the ball and get zero points out of it. We could have and should have scored more points, we could have and should have made it a better football game, but we didn't. That's the sad thing about the game."
On Tulane's defensive effort vs. Tulsa
"I thought we showed improvement. From week one to week two, I thought we showed a lot of progress - particularly in the signaling and getting lined up and ready to play. I thought we did a nice job. I felt we played really hard and I thought we did a good job in the first half. Unfortunately, we gave them too many opportunities. We got an interception. We got a fumble. We had two sacks, and I think we lead the league in sacks so we're doing a nice job of pressuring. They were only 4-of-13 on third downs. That was good for our football team. It got us off the field which is something we didn't do a week ago. They had four explosive plays and obviously the one quarterback run hurt us a little bit."
On Tulane's offensive production vs. Tulsa
"We regressed from the first week. I thought we went backwards. We threw an interception, which is uncharacteristic of Griff. We had two fumbles. We had three sacks. They put a lot of pressure on us. The first week, we didn't have any turnovers. This week, we turned the ball over a bunch. On third down, we were 5-of-20. We had a lot of drops and that took us out of drives. We only had one explosive plays - that's the one to Marfisi. The week before, we had seven explosive plays. So we just didn't perform very well."
On Tulane's special teams play vs. Tulsa
"We didn't get any punt returns. Their guy did a great job of kicking it high and making us fair catch it. Punting wise, Ginsburgh did a nice job. He averaged 46 yards per punt. Unfortunately, we (allowed) a return average of 11.5. We missed a couple of tackles on the ones they did return. Our kickoff return was okay, 17.8. Our kickoff coverage was poor, part of that was because of poor kicks. We had really poor kicks and that again was uncharacteristic. They averaged 27 yards and that put us in bad field position. Then we missed the two field goals like I mentioned."
Overall thoughts on the 31-3 loss to Tulsa
"Overall, I was not pleased that we were not a more competitive football team. I thought we were going to play well. I thought we were well prepared, I thought we matched up well enough to give them a heck of a football game, and it probably looked a lot worse than it really was. I just felt that we didn't handle the pressure very well. It was a big game, it was a league game, it was a division game, it was a home game and we let the pressure get to us. Maybe that's my fault for putting too much pressure on them. I'll take the blame for that."
On this weekend's opponent, UAB
"We've got Alabama-Birmingham coming up. They last to Florida last week, 39-0. Obviously, Florida - like Oklahoma the week before - is an outstanding team so you can't be deceived by the score. Florida is a Top 20 team. It is our second conference game. It's our first game on the road. It should be interesting. I think we match up well. We just need to play good."
On Tulane's game captains for the UAB game
"Our two game captains for this week are Harris Howard and Josh Smith. They're both actually from Georgia, but that's close enough to Alabama to make them captains. They've done a nice job, by the way."
On running out the clock at the end of the first half and to being competitive in the first half but not the second
"Maybe it's because in the second half we tried to throw the ball and do some things and it got us into more trouble. That's one of the reasons I didn't do it just prior to the half. We had a play and if we had made a first down and got better field position, I might have taken more shots. I just didn't feel that I wanted to give them another opportunity to score before the half. I'd rather go in 10-3 than go in 17-3 at the half. I felt we were in a good position to come out in the second half and play, and that's why I did what I did.
"The other thing is, we're always looking for answers too. Why did we not perform well in the second half? We're still a work in progress type of thing. I can't answer that now, but hopefully we'll find the answer."
On the offensive line having trouble providing protection
"We struggled, particularly our tackles. One of them is a sophomore redshirt and the other is a junior, and they both struggled. Their defensive ends gave us a bit of a mismatch. They were more physical than we were. We ended up having to chip guys with our backs. When you chip guys, you can't get them out in pass routes and then you have seven guys defending three. That makes it tough on you. It's a catch 22 and we've got to get better."
On if he is leaning to more of a running approach now rather than quick-pass offense
"No. I think we've got to do what we've got to do. They've got to get better. Depending on who we're playing, we've got to help those guys based on who's playing on the other side of them. We've got to pick out who the best guy is and maybe help that one guy. We can't help everybody. You've got to play football. We've got to just keep doing what we're doing and get better at it."
On if he's considering moving Harris Howard back to tackle, as he had during preseason camp
"We're trying to play the best five guys right now. We just don't have a lot of people right now. That's the problem. We lost three linemen in the offseason and that hurt us tremendously. They could have helped us depth wise and maybe played, but that's the way it is. We've got what we've got right now."
On how freshman safety Renaldo Thomas played in his first collegiate start
"He gave up a couple of explosive plays and he played a lot of plays for having not played for a while and being out a couple of weeks. But I think all in all, he's very athletic. He's got a lot of potential and a lot of ability. He's got to keep playing, learn from the mistakes he made and get better. He's definitely a really good prospect. What happens is you play veteran guys that have experience, then guys get hurt and you're playing a freshman again. Freshmen make mistakes but I think he's a talented guy. Hopefully he'll learn from those mistakes and learn rapidly so he doesn't make the same mistakes."
On if there are any positions that are up for grabs at this time
"I think the receiver position. We can't drop balls. At the receiver position, we've got to get open. We've got to get off jams and press coverage. That's a concern. At the other positions, we've got what we've got and we just have to get better at it."
On Tulane and UAB being similar programs
"I think they're at the same place we're at. They're desperate, like you said. They've had kind of the same record we've had the last few years. They're looking for a win. It's their first home game. It's their first league game. They're coming off a difficult game in Florida. They think they're better than what they showed, and obviously we feel we're better than what we showed last week. I think it'll be a heck of a football game. The one that wins will still be hanging pretty tough. The one that loses is going to get behind the 8-ball a little bit. There's a lot of football left. We've got 11 football games left. We're 1-1. There are a lot of teams that are 0-2."
On how much the lack of a running game hurt Tulane's ability to throw deep
"First of all, the thing that we did is we tried to take some shots early to get them off of us and then try and run the ball. We tried to take some shots - we didn't hit them - but we tried to back them off and then run the ball. Then you get behind a little bit and all of the sudden you get out of your plan and you do different things. Run game wise, again, we felt that we had some things we can do. If you look at the stats, it's not good because sacks come off of there. We had that reverse lost yardage. We were running off right tackle, reversed our field, ran all over the place and fumbled the ball. The yardage thing is deceiving, I think. You have to look at when you ran the ball and how efficient you were when you really did it. We did some good things. They're a good football team. Let's not take anything away from Tulsa because they're a good football team."
On if he felt the team ran the ball the way he wanted to in the first half
"We probably could have run the ball more in the first half to be honest with you. Again, we tried to take some shots early which gets you out of some sync. Instead of trying to make first downs you trying to score touchdowns. I think you can always run the ball better than what it shows."
On if he was disappointed in Ryan Griffin's performance vs. Tulsa
"I think if you ask him, he'd tell you he could have performed better. Like the little swing to Darkwa. We overthrew that and that's a first down. We had to punt the football. He was off a little bit. He's such a competitive guy and he wants to win so bad, he stressed. He was under pressure a little bit and didn't perform as well as he could or should, as well. He did miss some balls. I thought he felt some pressure up front and I think that hurt him a little bit. We didn't give him a lot of time to throw the football. When we gave him time, he threw it pretty well. Again, if you talk to him, he's not pleased with what he did. He made some mistakes. It's interesting but when you're in the stands, you see the obvious mistakes. We all see the ones that happen. But you don't see the mistakes that we as coaches or players see. We all made a bunch of mistakes that were uncharacteristic. Like I said, we didn't play like we practiced. That was the surprising thing to me. Why? That's interesting to me. Why?"
On how he would evaluate himself on his play calling
"We always self scout. Doug Lichtenberger is the guy that does it for us offensively. We looks at our formations, we look at the plays, what we called in what situations. We had a game plan and I tried to stick to that game plan as best as we could. We all sit in there together and formulate the game plan. I call the plays so I'm ultimately responsible. When they don't work, it's my fault. Coaches can't throw passes, block or run, but they can try and give the kids the best opportunity to win. Maybe I failed there because we didn't win."
On his biggest concern vs. UAB
"I think the big concern is us. We look at the game, we see Florida and we say, `Hey, they got beat 39-0.' We can't take anybody lightly. We've got to worry about us. We've got to perform. Like last week, if we would have performed and executed, that would have been a heck of a football game. I really believe that. Now whether we would have won or not still remains to be seen, but it would have made it a heck of a football game. We've got to worry about ourselves. That's what worries me. We've got to perform. We've got to do in a game what we do in practice. They've got to do what they've been taught to do, not different things. That really showed up. It was glaring during the course of the game. We had guys running routes. You ask them why, and it's, `I don't know, Coach.' We've got to go back and simplify or do something. Practice better, put less stress and pressure on them or something, because we just didn't perform well."
On how to avoid a hangover following a loss like the Tulsa game
"First of all, it's not to brow beat them to death. We've got to go back and say, `Look, this is what we did good, this is what we have to work on.' We've got to go out, practice with a purpose and then we've got to take it to the game field. We had a good meeting Sunday. Then we gave them yesterday off - that's our procedure this year, to give them Monday off - so I think they've got to come back today and work. We've pretty much got a plan in place already. We've worked on that. So now we've got to go and practice the plan, try and get better, and improve on the areas that we were deficient."
