September 09, 2003
Coach Dennis Franchione and selected players met with members of the media on Tuesday at Cain Hall. Click the links above to hear what they had to say.
Here is a partial transcript of comments made by Coach Fran during the news conference.
Have you ever played at Virginia Tech?
"Never played, never been."
It's supposed to be a pretty tough place...
"That's what we hear, it's loud, noisy, great fans. That's my understanding. These guys are averaging 500 yards on offense, playing great defense, 36 first downs in one game and a whole bunch of first downs in the other, great punt returner, great kicking game team, they block punts like crazy and they're a top 10 ranked team. I don't think we could ask for a much tougher first road trip."
How long did it take you to see the big-play ability of Terrence Murphy?
"You could tell during spring practice that Terrence (Murphy) had athleticism and he was very conscientious about doing things the right way and making plays and always very assignment-sound. He had a few drops last year, watching the film, but we hadn't seen that much out of him out of him at camp. He's taking good care of the ball in that regard, so it didn't take too long."
What about with the kickoff returns? Murphy hadn't done that previously.
"We looked at him in the spring, and we narrowed it down as we started August camp, and he was the one that emerged who was probably one of the better four, and probably the best. "
On those kickoff returns, is it his speed or vision that are enabling him to break the returns?
"I think both those things. I think he's had some good blocks. We had four or five knockdowns on the kickoff returns that he sprung and so there's been some guys who made good blocks up front and then he read the blocks well. He's hitting it pretty hard and pretty fast, and making one guy miss, and then I think it's a combination of both those items you talked about."
How do you find that guy (that excels on kickoff returns)? Do you just look for the fast guy?
"That's where you start probably, you look for the athletic guys. You look for someone who is going to catch it, then you look for someone who has the ability to read blocks and make cuts and stay vertical, and Terrence has been excellent at those things so far."
How concerned are you with the snap problems (three fumbles in two games)?
"We're concerned. It's one to those things you can take for an assumption that its generally going to be OK, but obviously three times in two games we've had a problem with it-- two different centers in that regard. That could be a little bit of the problem, getting in sync with the same guy all the time, although Saturday night it was the same guy the entire time. It's a combination of the two guys. The quarterback's got to put his hands in there and let the center know where they are, and he's got to ride him and not pull out to quick. And the center's got to hit his top hand, and there's no excuse for it."
Did the fumbled snap in the third quarter hurt more than the fumbled kickoff return?
"They both hurt. I think we recovered from the kickoff, in the sequence of events and they missed a field goal, so then you put the defense right back out there, that hurt. The other factor is that we didn't get many plays ran, so that one hurt very badly."
Can you talk about the progression of the running game from game 1 to game 2?
"The statistics speak for themselves. I think we went up against as good or better front than we did the week before. The line did a better job up front, the backs did a better job of seeing seams, tight ends did a better job. I think part of that is the product of game one to game two. When you look at game one, if you go tight end to tight end, five of those seven guys most of the time, had not played much game football, so game two they have a hundred percent more experience. And I think that was as big a reason as any that there was more production. I think Utah was a good defensive ball club, and they tried to put enough people in there to make it difficult to run at times, and we still had some success."
Have you seen separation as far as quarterbacks Reggie McNeal and Dustin Long go?
"Obviously we started Reggie and there was a reason for that in last week's practice, but the separation is still a very fine line. I probably would have put Dustin in the third quarter Saturday night, but when you only run a handful of plays, that kind of changes your plan. I told Dustin in the first half, that we had 21 points and had played pretty well offensively and I didn't see a need to make a change. We were getting into a pretty good rhythm. Third quarter you don't have very much and then you get concerned about making a change in the fourth quarter, so that's kind of how Reggie ended up playing the entire ball game. But there's not a great deal that separates those two guys yet. We'll watch the week of practice, and see how they do."
Will the decisions you make about the linebackers be about as big of a decision as you've had to make so far this season? Even more so than quarterbacks?
"Yeah, I'd say so. Well, at quarterback, you've got good answer and good answer, so there's not a downside, both of them are capable. I'm not saying there's a downside at linebacker either, it's just when you lose a guy like Jared Morris, you've lost a senior, a leader, a guy who was very committed to his senior year. He worked very hard at practice, I think he was a stabilizer out there for our defensive guys. Scott (Stickane), I think, will be a lot like him in that regard. His intangibles are very good. We're going to look at a lot of different combinations this week. I think the advantage of open week is that you can look at how Archie (McDaniel) does in there, TaTa Thompson, Blake Kendrick. We can look at different mixes to see exactly what will be best, and in what situation. Coach Torbush has been doing that a lot already through August and the first part of September here, but I think this week he'll put them all a little more to the fire."
Would Andy Matakis be a candidate to move back to linebacker?
"Andy (Matakis) has been slowed by a hamstring and a knee and I don't think he's back to full speed. But I don't think right now moving him back would be a great answer, since he's spent all of spring and all of when he has been able to practice, where he is. I think our young kids are a better answer at this point in time. They've been repping there."
Has Jared Morris made a decision on whether he wants to pursue a sixth year of eligibility?
"I haven't asked Jared. I saw him on Sunday at the hospital and I haven't seen him since. I'm sure he would like to. Sixth years don't come very easy. They're very unusual circumstances normally. I don't want to paint a picture that it's real optimistic that he would be granted that. Although I do see the NCAA being a little more understanding in 6th years here recently than ever before. Jared wants to coach, I think that's what he's thinking a lot about right now, so I think he may help us coach through the season here now when he gets a little more mobile. He can graduate here before long, so I think there are some decisions he needs to make on that. I wouldn't want to be overly optimistic that the NCAA would grant him that."
Were you surprised to see a guy the size of Jont? Buhl coming up to make that big tackle (game-clincher vs. Utah)?
"DBs have to do those kinds of things. I will say this, Jont? has played very well in his two games, and has been impressive physically in the plays he's made and in the coverage plays he's made. I think our coaching staff has talked about gaining a lot of confidence in him at this point in time. That was a quarterback he hit the other night, but it was a good hit, there's not doubt about that. He came up and made a big play for us."
Do you have an update on Jami Hightower?
"We should know some direction on Jami in the next 10 or 11 days, possibly. (Will he be able to immediately step back into the lineup?) It's probably going to take some time because he has not practiced for quite a while, so it's not going to be an overnight thing."
Have you made any decision about some of these walkons receiving scholarships?
"I can tell you a couple of them. We have been able to award (wide receiver) Tim Van Zant and (linebacker) Scott Stickane scholarships at this time. (Would you have more to offer?) "We might have one more."