September 16, 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.
There seemed to be a lot of upsets last Saturday. Do you use those as examples to your team?
"I think you always use what happens week to week for analogies with your team, because getting to witness it firsthand or watching it on TV reinforces the messages you're trying to send to your team."
Can you talk about stopping Virginia Tech's running attack?
Virginia Tech has good receivers and they've probably been a little more balanced than they've been in the past. I think they are a team that their starting point is the running game. If you can get them in bad down and distance situations, then you have a chance to dictate the flow of the game a little bit more than they get to dictate the flow of the game. They're a good running team. They have a good offensive line. They've got a good tailback. The quarterback is a good runner that can pull it down and get good yardage for you. They're not going to go away from the run, they're going to keep trying to have the run established in their offense. They are throwing the ball well and very efficiently right now. I always believe that efficiency in the passing game is tied directly to the rushing attack."
Are you concerned about the time of possession? Is there a magic number you're looking for?
"The magic number I like the best is one more point. If they have it for 59 minutes and we have it for one, I'll take that. I am concerned. Our defense has had to play a lot more snaps than our offense. We've been hot and cold offensively. When we're hot, we're hot and we had some big plays and cashed in and gotten points. Turnovers have hurt us. They've come too early in drives. We had a turnover on the first play of drives three or four times. We put the defense right back out there. The best defense is the one that's not out there on the field. It is concerning when we're getting just 50-60 snaps a game offensively. We need to up that. Keeping our defense fresh is pivotal."
Describe Reggie McNeal's leadership skills...
"Reggie is a natural leader. Our players look to him. They recognize him as a good player, a committed player. They recognized him as a playmaker. Anytime Reggie steps into the huddle and illustrates leadership at practice, I think that gets everyone going. He makes a keen impact on the rest of the offense especially. He's done a good job in the last three weeks of being a leader. I think he put more focus into that and taken on more responsibility and he understands that he needs to. The key thing about leaders is that they accept responsibility for deficiencies too and Reggie has done that. When we dropped the center-quarterback exchange the other night, you can always say the center didn't get me the ball but he took the responsibility for that. I think teammates appreciate leaders who accept responsibility and don't point fingers. He has not done that at all."
Do you lick your chops when think about what Reggie McNeal is going to be like in a year or two years from now?
"You look at Virginia Tech's quarterback and last year he wasn't bad, but you watch him this year and you can tell that there is a guy playing quarterback that is in command. He understands what is going to happen next. He is comfortable. I think he's able to orchestrate more plays into positive plays if it breaks down. He executes far better. You can tell he's playing with a lot of confidence. Reggie's confidence grows everyday at practice. I can see that happening with him right now."
Talk about Archie McDaniel's transition from strongside linebacker to the middle...
"We've been training these linebackers to play more than one position for quite a while now. It's not like we're asking him to do something he's not capable of doing. He is capable of going in there and doing that. Archie is a little bit like Reggie; he's going to have to grow up and lead a little bit now."
Have you gotten a feel for how good this team is?
"No. Not really. I think we're still learning a lot right now about our team. We're improving. We made improvement from game one to game two. It didn't look like it in every area necessarily. This team is going to have to grind and fight for everything they get. We're not going to go out on the field and always have a pretty four quarters and win the game. Virginia Tech has had two games with some pretty four quarter efforts. Ours have been much more spotty than that. We have some inexperience, so this team is going to continue to get better."
Has the possible bad weather been a distraction to your preparation?
"We get a weather update everyday, but unless they're going to cancel the game, and I don't think that's going to happen, we just have to be ready to go play. I talk to the players all the time about mental toughness in situations whether that's weather, hostile crowds, road trips, bad officials, bad luck calls Å you have to be ready to overcome them. If you're a mentally tough team, that's what you do. If you're not, you don't. If we go on the road and it's raining, then you have to adjust your game plan a little."