Head Coach Doug Marrone Press Conference Trancript (Oct. 25, 2010)
“I appreciate everyone being here and taking interest in our program. It was a great win going down to Morgantown. It was a very difficult place to win. The kids did a nice job and we played very well. I am happy for (linebacker) Doug Hogue. He had some national recognition, but Doug would be the first to tell you that you don’t gain that without 10 other guys on the football field helping you achieve the ability to make those plays. We are very excited about that. We had a lot of people play well in the game. I don’t want to go and start naming names and leave anyone off. I truly believe it was a team victory.
“Again, you can’t get too high and too low. We have a tough situation coming up this week versus a very good Cincinnati team on the road again. So it doesn’t really get much easier for us as we go through this BIG EAST schedule trying to fight our way to our sixth win.”
On what this win means to the team:
“I don’t mean this the wrong way, but you have to ask them. And the reason why I say that is because I am focused on the next game and trying to get the next win. I answer this question the same way. A lot of people want to put labels and words on specific wins and you do that after the season is over. After the season is over, I am more than happy to comment on the season, what was a good win, and what really turned it. I really don’t know yet. Right now we are 5-2 and the only thing I am guaranteed at the end of the season is that we have five wins and that’s not what our objective is. For me I just look at the next game and try to get another win no matter what we have to do.”
On if (running back) Delone Carter will practice:
“Everyone is practicing today. The only people who I know may not practice are people with a flu or virus because we are still evaluating a couple people. And it’s been going around. I had right before the game, Coach Anselmo had it, and a couple of players had it. So everyone just make sure that they are hydrating their bodies and making sure they are getting enough rest.”
On if the last three weeks feels like a rollercoaster ride:
“No, not for me. Again, it goes to the individual. I try to not get too high or too low. I have been doing this thing long enough. I try to stay even keeled and keep pushing myself and keep working. When you win you work and when you lose you work. And, I don’t ever feel like I am up and down because that is our goal to not be that way. So that’s what you fight against. Our goal is to be a consistent football team and that’s what we are trying to get done. And the goal is to be a consistent coach in your demeanor and how you represent the game plan or represent your coaching style or yourself. Players will pick up on that so, for me personally, not at all.”
On regaining the Schwartzwalder Trophy:
“It’s great because of the meaning of it. It’s something that we worked on with our players last year, understanding that there is so much more. You say hey, we are playing for this trophy. But what does that trophy represent and we talked to the players about it during the week. We talked about how Coach Schwartzwalder was born and raised in West Virginia, played at West Virginia, and started his coaching career in West Virginia. Then, he retired here in Syracuse after coaching for 25 years and all the great things that he has done here at Syracuse University and, really, both schools. The award is great for both schools because it represents really what this country is and Coach Schwartzwalder gets a lot of publicity for when he played at West Virginia and what he did here as a football coach, but what everyone is losing sight of is what he did for our country and what type of man he was. It is important when you are playing for a trophy that represents a whole lot more than a piece or statue or anything and that’s what I try to get across to the players.”
On Cincinnati:
“They have a really good running back. They have a lot of good skilled position players and the quarterback statistically is the best quarterback in the BIG EAST. He is a winner. They have won a lot of football games there. They are playing well and doing a nice job. Defensively they may be young, but they are playing better and better each week. They have a lot of athletes on that field and they spread the ball out. Defensively, they attack the football. They get 11 hats on the football. So we are just going to have to fight and scratch and do whatever we have to do to win a football game.”
On development of Syracuse’s offensive and defensive lines:
“It is something we have been working on and goes back to the spring. I always try to tell people it’s not like you wave a magic wand and all of the sudden you say, hey get tougher and do this and that and they go out there and are able to execute it. It’s getting better. Myself, Coach Adkins, or anyone on offense, Coach Shafer, Coach Brumbaugh, we would tell you it’s getting better but it’s not where we want it to be and we have to keep working on it because those are the things that can help us and we where can become successful and have the opportunity to win more games. So we are happy. The players are doing a good job. They are responding and it was very important to go out and play that way, because if we didn’t go out and play that way we wouldn’t have a chance to win that game,”
On if Delone Carter’s injury was the reason for not going for it on the fourth down:
“No. What was going through my mind was that it was a 14-10 game at the time and I know we were short. I don’t know if it was have a yard or inches but I know it was close and my philosophy has always been don’t take the game away from the players. And I didn’t feel at that point and time that if we scored a touchdown that it was really going to change the momentum of the game. But if we were going to get stopped and they had the opportunity to go down the field and score I thought we would be in big trouble. We would be faced with a lot of adversity at that point. My situation was let’s kick the field goal its 14-13, if they score it’s still a one score game where we have to score and go for two and that’s how I was managing the game at that point.”
On if he was happy with only five completed passes:
“Obviously not. We want more than that. It’s funny and I never use this as an excuse but we lost a heck of player this year in (wide receiver) Aaron Weaver. It’s been hard for us to make up where he’s been and still do the things we want to do running the football and managing the reps. There are a lot of people out there who talk about injuries and I don’t talk about it and this will be the last time but I guarantee you, and I would put on paper, that we have more injuries than anyone. And the difficult part for us is that we have to manage this football team and get through it. When you look at the passing game I can tell you from the last game, I’ll be specific about that, is that people always want to put a label on one person or one thing that you are doing but we have breakdowns everywhere. We have breakdowns in protection, a breakdown in route, a breakdown in a throw, a breakdown in a read, so it’s something that we are working on to get corrected.”
On what it means now and for the future with the amount of freshman getting action:
“I do love what the upper classmen are doing for this football team. How they are handling themselves, how they are taking care of the little things, and some of our younger players are pretty darn good athletes. If our younger players don’t take the role of what our upper classmen are doing with them and teach them at this early age of how to conduct themselves as student-athletes, then you can get yourself in trouble as a program. I really appreciate the upper classmen, and senior leadership has been excellent. And that’s really what’s been helping us have the opportunity to win these football games. It’s really a credit to the players.”
On texts, emails, after games like this and on people talking about bowl games already:
“People can afford to have those feelings. That’s great and I am excited for them. I want them to feel that way and do that, but as football team we can’t. As a football team we have to go ahead and win a football game. We are not there yet. And that’s just a fact. I never mention that ‘four letter’ word. I just go back and put my nose to the grindstone and keep going. That’s how I feel about that but I am excited for people to believe in the program again. Good for them and I am excited for them. That’s our goal. We are trying to make them happy. We are trying to please ourselves by going out there and working hard and through all that hard work having the opportunity to win a football game. As far as texts and emails, I don’t know. I don’t talk to many people. I really don’t. I am not a phone guy.”
On Doug Hogue being singled out on defense with the national defensive player of the week award:
“My background has been when you play well as a unit, people will get awards. It’s great for Doug and Syracuse University. It’s great for our defensive coaches and our football team. But when people receive individual awards in this sport it’s because of what’s going on around them. Our players would tell you that. We will talk about that today. We give awards out to players and game balls and things like that, every school does and every person who receives something that will tell you that they couldn’t do it without the help of somebody else. But it’s exciting.”
On what people say about the class of the team on and off the field:
“People send those things in and I pass them off to Coach Brotzki and we try to pass it onto the players. As far as actual communication between myself and an actual person, that usually happens with the people who work at the hotels, the people who drive us on the bus, the people who are at the restaurant. We ate at a restaurant and I can’t even tell you where we were, because I don’t know, that’s totally how much I am concerned with where we eat, but when I was leaving a lady runs out and first she went to Kevin Van Derzee because she thought he was the head coach. And then he pointed to me and I am thinking what’s going on now, and she came out and said ‘I was there with my family and we could not believe a football team was eating here today and how the players handled themselves and what they have done.’ And that’s been pretty standard since we have been here. I hope it’s like that in all college football, I really do.”
On if it’s easier to get ready for another spread no huddle team in successive weeks:
“It’s harder in college to recall something two weeks ago. To give you an example, in the NFL at halftime or even between series, we were able to say, ‘Here is what they are doing remember two weeks ago and this is what you have to do,’ and the players will go out and run it, if you have the right players. In college, it’s much more difficult. You have school going on and a lot of things going on and you are taking things in daily, week by week, building up to the week. It’s more difficult but there is some recall for what you can do. That helps you, you have a philosophy you know what you do and then you have to make sure that you aren’t giving anyone an advantage by lining up like this and this is what they are going to play. If they line up in this formation, these are the three plays that they are going to run. You continually look at that’s where we kill ourselves as coaches because we work so much on self-scouting and quality control stuff to make sure that we are not giving away keys or tips away so we have a chance to play and win a game.”
On what you do after a win, like at West Virginia:
“I come back here and make sure I thank everyone from equipment people to doctors, trainers, win or lose it’s important that you do that. Then, I go home and have a bologna and cheese sandwich. That’s what I eat. I have been eating that since I was a little kid. That’s the one thing I actually do look forward to. And I drank about four Gatorades. I try to spend time with my kids but they are running all over the place and don’t want to spend time with Daddy. Then, I just put the TV on and try to get away for a little while because I know the next day when I wake up I have to go right back to work. I try to get a little family time.”
On (running back) Antwon Bailey’s ability to step in for Delone Carter (when he went out with an injury):
“Because we don’t have any issues injury wise this week, we realize what his role is and are managing his role. Did he step up and do well for us? Absolutely. I felt bad for Delone because I really thought early on that he was going to have a big day. Just by the way he was running and he had this look like not one person was going to take him down. When we lost him, then you get concerned because now you are down to two. Antwon stepped up big time. He played a lot of snaps and was very productive. He is that type of player. He is the guy who can do a lot of things for us. What’s hurting us a little bit is our lack of depth. We have injuries at that position so you can’t afford to lose any of those players back there. There are only three of them and we like to get two of them on the field at the same time.”
On special teams:
“(Punter) Rob Long was excellent. Protection and coverage were excellent. (Kicker) Ross (Krautman) did a great job in kicking the field goals. If you look at it and the things that are a little bit of an eye sore are when Max fumbled when he jumped into the air, and then kicking the ball out of bounds. Other than that, it was a great effort by our special teams. And there are a lot of young players out there.”
On thoughts when a player gets injured:
“Here’s what happens when you set up the game plan. We have all these different personnel groups and they are all backed up. They are all backed up by at least two injuries so you are going to get to the third, not all personnel groups, but on the ones that are on the core parts of your game plan so it’s not as difficult. I don’t know about other places, but for me it’s not difficult. When one player is out you scratch him off, you move the people around, and they practice it and know it and everyone knows where we are going. There is no sense of panic or what you are doing or when are we getting him back. There are little things one back likes something a little more than the other one but it’s in the plan. You can’t switch gears and start running things you haven’t practiced during the week.”
On if it is a relief to have (running back) Delone Carter back:
“Yes. I have been saying it from the beginning that we have to stay healthy period to have a chance. We cannot lose any players.”
