Transcript From The September 30th Ohio State Football Press Luncheon – Ohio State Buckeyes
9/30/2003 12:00:00 AM | Football
Sept. 30, 2003
Windows A/V Press Luncheon
TRESSEL: Welcome, Tim, Ben.
ANDERSON: Coach.
TRESSEL: This week’s schedule, Sunday and Monday, the guys had off and then today we’ll spend most of our time in the film room and the weight room. We’ll have a shorts-type workout tied in with that. Then Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, we’re going to go three good practices and then give them the weekend off. And as Steve mentioned, Thursday after practice, if you could get a list of guys that you’d like to visit with, I think that’d be the best time. We’ll know a little bit more about Wisconsin at that time, as opposed to this afternoon.
As far as this past weekend’s game, it was great to get off to a 1-0 start in the Big Ten. It was great to see our defense get a shutout. I think whenever you get a shutout, you can trace it back to a number of things, one of which is playing excellent defense and not letting any big plays out. Two, you can trace it to special teams that create field position. Our kickoff coverage unit did a good job. Mike hit a number of them out of the end zone. One time they fielded the ball on the 3 and stepped out of bounds. Our punt unit dropped a couple down in deep into the territory. And when opponents have to start that far away from their goal line that they’re heading toward, it’s tough to move on a good defense.
And then I think lastly, offensively we didn’t have any turnovers back in our end of the field. We did have one turnover right before the half, a little bit over midfield which was disappointing, but our defense rose up and stopped them. And that’s how you end up with a shutout.
Offensively, I thought we did some good things. We got a few more guys to have a chance to play, did a few more things. It was good to see Branden Joe get back into the flow, and hopefully we took a short step offensively of which we hope to take a long step here in the next two weeks.
From an individual performance standpoint, we had nine guys on defense grade a winning performance. We had six guys on the offensive field grade a winning performance. And all three of the specialists, long snapper, Kyle Andrews, punter, B. J. Sander and kicker, Mike Nugent all graded winning performances.
So it was a good solid number of guys, and if we can keep our numbers up there or higher, we’ll have a chance to compete every week.
The players of the week, the special teams player of the week was Kyle Andrews. He did an excellent job with his long snaps in the punt game, his short snaps in the field goal and PAT, and does a good job of covering when it’s time to do that on the punt unit.
The offensive player of the game was Ben Hartsock, with us today, and Steve Snapp is beginning a campaign, Air Hartsock, meaning that he’s flying through the air making catches, I think, is the way it is. But Ben graded 94%, which was darn good, as many times as a tight end is at the point of attack and the difficulty of what we ask that position to do, a 94% grade is outstanding. He had five catches for 50 yards and was our offensive player of the game.
Then our defensive player of the game was Tim Anderson, who’s also here today. Tim did a great job, played both inside and outside, with Darrion not with us for the week, injury-wise, he had a chance to get out there and be on the edge a little bit, and he did a good job with tackles and tackles for loss and sacks and quarterback hits and so forth, and continues to do a great job leading on the defensive side, just like Ben is doing a great job leading on that offensive group.
The offensive lineman of the week was Nick Mangold. Nick continues to gain experience and keep playing well and have more experiences that when you’re in center of that line, a lot goes on and a lot goes on quickly, and he does a good job of making calls and making decisions, and thank goodness we have a guy Nick Mangold’s caliber, when you lose a great guy like Alex Stepanovich for a couple of weeks. It will be good to get Alex back in, and we’ll have that luxury of Alex playing both center and guard, especially the way that Nick Mangold’s playing.
The attack force player of the game is kind of an unusual one. Just like sometimes Ben Hartsock has been the offensive lineman of the week, which you think might be strange for a tight end, but our attack force player of the week this week was Will Allen. Will Allen is a guy we played so much nickel, and he’s a nickel back, and spends so much time up in the box versus the run, fitting in, and making sure we can do a great job against the run. Will Allen had a number of tackles and assists, he even had a quarterback pressure. And Will Allen has done a nice job of working with a young group of guys at the safeties’ and linebackers’ position and he’s been the glue that has kind of kept them together, and he’s helped them grow, and Will Allen was the attack force player of the week.
We have three nominations for the Jack Tatum hit of the week, of which the voting will be this afternoon, be the first time we’ve been back with the team. So we’ll let you know once that voting — I think there was two special teams, one by Tyler Everett, one by Nate Salley, I believe, Bryce Bishop had a big hit that seemed to qualify for a Jack Tatum nominee.
Scout teams, which we talk about and talk about and talk about is how crucial they are for our development. The scout team special teams player of the week was John Kerr. John’s a young guy that came over from Indiana and is sitting out and he’s a Cleveland Saint Ignatius guy, and he’s done a great job jumping in where we could use him. He’s done a great job not on just the special teams but on the scout teams as well. He won the scout teams special player of the week. Curt Lukens, a young player from North Canton-Hoover, who’s going to be a great player. At this moment he’s in a red shirt development mode. As long as we stay healthy, we think that’s the way that will go. Great speed. Great desire to play the game. Does whatever you could possibly ask of him. And Curt Lukens was the scout’s defensive player of the week. And Mike D’Maria was the scout offensive player of the week. Mike did a good job last year on the special teams and, in fact, worked his way onto the starting punt belong unit as last year went on and did a great job on the scout teams and this preseason, unfortunately, had one of those ankle sprains that took three or four weeks and he missed countless practices and is just now getting back to the point where he was in the last fall and in the spring and did a great job of emulating the Northwestern running game, and Mike D’Maria was the scout offensive player of the week.
We do think that we made some progress in some areas. We’ll have a chance to learn from that today as we show the film with our guys. We also know the difficulty of the task that lies ahead. Making sure that we get better and better and better, when we’re not playing a game, is going to be important. Wisconsin gets to play a game. They get to get better by playing Penn State. They get to experience something this weekend that we won’t get to experience. So we’ve got to make sure that these four days that we work, today and then practicing in pads Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, that we improve. There are some areas that we think we are making some improvement, but there are also some areas where we feel like our improvement needs to accelerate if we’re going to meet the challenge of what lies ahead in Madison, Wisconsin.
We’re looking forward to going there. It’s a great atmosphere. Playing there at night, I’m sure, will be even more fun, and we’re going to go to work this afternoon to prepare ourselves for that great challenge.
REPORTER: Do you take the opportunity that you have to devote an extra day or two to Wisconsin-specific preparations or do you prefer staying in the routine that you have throughout the rest of your schedule where you just have one week or each team?
TRESSEL: We will do both. We will work hard on ourselves, but we’ll also work on Wisconsin. I think you always do that, especially in a mid-season-type off week. Sometimes if your off week is like ours was a year ago, where we played one game, then we had an off week, we kind of went back to almost a training camp-type process. Now that we’re in the midst of our conference schedule, we’ll work hard on ourselves, but we’ll also work on Wisconsin without a doubt.
REPORTER: Coach, why did Shane Olivea sit out the first series?
TRESSEL: That was a coaching decision.
REPORTER: Was he disciplined for something?
TRESSEL: It was a coaching decision.
REPORTER: What’s the status on Craig right now?
TRESSEL: If we had a game this week, Craig would, in my mind, be playing. Now, I haven’t heard a doctor say that. But the doctors thought he was very nearly ready this past weekend. And if we had a game this week, I’m relatively certain he would play.
REPORTER: How much is he going to practice this week?
TRESSEL: He’ll practice significantly. He threw a lot in pregame. In fact, someone said somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 to 60 good, hard throws, and didn’t seem to have any ill effects. He was in Sunday watching film and so forth and said he felt fine. So he would have liked to have played last Saturday.
REPORTER: You mentioned that Wisconsin has a chance to get better by playing. Craig will not have played for a month by the time he plays at Wisconsin. Is that a concern or a guy of his experience level, then, it shouldn’t make much difference?
TRESSEL: Well, gosh, I don’t know the answer to that. There’s nothing we can do about it. So he’ll practice like crazy, and he has had a lot of snaps playing 14 games, and then playing a lot of the first three games. But I sure hope he’s not rusty.
REPORTER: Coach, could you give us an update on both Darrion Scott and Alex Stepanovich?
TRESSEL: Alex Stepanovich, I think is, what, 90, 95%. I mean, he’ll be going this week.
Darrion Scott, I don’t think that he’ll practice a whole bunch this week. Again, I don’t make those decisions. But I don’t think that he’ll practice a whole bunch this week, but I would expect him to be ready.
REPORTER: Can you talk a little bit about how you see your offensive line now with Stepanovich back in the mix?
TRESSEL: Well, I see it deeper. We didn’t have Alex going into last week, which made us significantly less deep and less experienced. I think when you bring Alex’s experience back into the game, then all of a sudden you’re one person deeper there. We’ve been really pleased with what Mike Kne has been able to do. He’s played a little tackle. He’s played a little guard. We think he can play either side guard. We think we’re getting a little deeper experience-wise. And sometimes injuries make that happen. You don’t root for that, but some guys got to play a little more. Adam Olds got to play a little more, Andre Tyree got to play a little bit Saturday. So we think we’re getting a little more experienced.
REPORTER: Will you let Craig start taking reps with the first team tomorrow?
TRESSEL: Sure. Today.
REPORTER: Workout today?
TRESSEL: Yeah, we have a short workout today. I’m not going to line him up with the scout team just because he’s missed the last two weeks. He’ll jump right in there with the first huddle.
REPORTER: You’ve got the nation’s longest winning streak, does this enter into this at all? Is it something you’re proud of, 19 wins in a row? Is there any pressure at all?
TRESSEL: It’s not a factor if you don’t get 20. We’re working on the next game and, I don’t know, I don’t think about it. When it’s brought up, you acknowledge it, that’s what it is, but really what’s important is the next one.
REPORTER: In a related manner, of the four divisions in NCAA, Ohio schools have the longest winning streak in three of them. Does that speak to the fact of what Ohio football is?
TRESSEL: I think that’s a feather in Ohio’s cap. I didn’t know that. I assume it’s Mount Union and —
REPORTER: Dayton.
TRESSEL: — and who else?
REPORTER: Dayton.
TRESSEL: Great. Yea, Ohio! That’s great.
REPORTER: Does this bye come at a good time? Do you like this bye this week?
TRESSEL: Yeah, we knew it was going to be this week. The only one I haven’t liked was the one we didn’t know was coming, and that was the week of 9/11. Every other bye, you knew what your schedule was, you knew what was leading up to it and that’s what your schedule was. I think this could be good, we’re right at the beginning of school, which will give us a chance, I think, to move forward there. You know, we’re right at the beginning of our Big Ten schedule. We know a little bit more about ourselves right now than we did last year’s bye. We played last week’s game. We know a little bit more about ourselves. We’re in the thick of the Big Ten now. I think it’s a good thing.
REPORTER: From an injury standpoint, though, especially in Craig’s case?
TRESSEL: Well, I think especially in Darrion’s case. Craig would have played this week, I think, had we played. Alex would have played this week, had we played. I don’t know that Darrion would have. So I think from Darrion’s standpoint, it’s important.
REPORTER: Jim, as you try to figure out your rushing problems, how much more will Ira Guilford have opportunities this week and next week as you prepare for Wisconsin?
TRESSEL: He’ll have significant opportunities this week because you get to practice and practice and practice. So this will be a good week for him because he got in the game and he knows what it’s like and, you know, he got excited about it, and he knows he can do it, and I’m sure he wants to come out and compete. So this will be a good week for him.
REPORTER: Did you see some things on Saturday that said to yourself, hey, we’re going to give this guy some more opportunities in Madison?
TRESSEL: The biggest thing I saw was we had a pass protection situation where it was one of the most difficult reads that a tailback needs to make. It was a backside linebacker coming through a frontside gap of which he needed to take care of and he needed to have his head on a swivel. It was not something that was that simple. Bang, he picked it up. That was the most encouraging thing I saw was, you know what, even the things that take time to learn, he’s progressing. We know he can run fast and run hard and run well, but you need to do it all, and it was great to see that.
REPORTER: Was it enough to bump himself up on the depth chart a little bit, do you think?
TRESSEL: Oh, I don’t know. We’ve got six good practices, six padded practices-type thing. The depth chart will be more determined on that than what I think today.
REPORTER: Jim, you guys were last in the Big Ten in total offense, basically in the bottom 17 in the nation. At this point, is that embarrassing? What are you all thinking about, I guess, in the offensive room right now about trying to change things? Or what’s going on in there, I guess?
TRESSEL: It’s probably very similar to do you sit around and think about having 19 in a row? You don’t think about winning 19 in a row, nor do you think about that you’re 117th right now in total offense, you think about what can I do today to get better and you are what you are and you work hard to get better at what you’re trying to do. You don’t have time to pound your chest about 19 in a row, and you don’t have time to get embarrassed, you just have time to work.
REPORTER: Will you do any experimenting though, maybe, with offense this week?
TRESSEL: Oh, sure. Absolutely.
REPORTER: Any certain areas or any —
TRESSEL: Can’t tell you that.
REPORTER: What about Troy Smith, might he get some more time practicing or —
TRESSEL: Well, Troy really does a lot of things for us right now. Obviously he plays quarterback, plays slash, plays on a lot of our special teams, and we now have to go to a 64-man travel squad for the first time. If we would have played an away game out of the league, we could have traveled with 70. But we now, by league rule, have to travel with 64. So there’s going to be a lot of competition for those 64 spots, of which Troy has added a lot to his value, if you will, because of moving in from a special teams standpoint, quarterback standpoint, slash standpoint. Does a great job of emulating movement, quarterbacks against our defense, which puts pressure on them, which you need to do. So Troy is doing a good job.
REPORTER: Are there ways that you would expect Wisconsin to challenge you in certain areas that you have not either been challenged or been challenged to the degree that Wisconsin will?
TRESSEL: Absolutely. I don’t know that anyone has challenged us running the football straight ahead like Wisconsin will. I mean, Wisconsin, they pound you straight ahead, they pound you with the stretch, the zone play. They do a good job with their cutback plays. Lee Evans, he might be the best receiver we’ve seen. I don’t know, I’d have to think back. He probably has more big play ability than any receiver we’ve seen. Defensively, they challenge you with knowing more about you than anyone else we’ve faced to date. Northwestern obviously knew a little about us. But Wisconsin will challenge us, perhaps across the board, better than anyone has challenged us this year.
REPORTER: Using Chris Gamble on offense, is that still down the road some, or is that coming?
TRESSEL: I think this will be a good couple weeks for Chris Gamble. He got banged up a little bit, had an ankle, had a sore shoulder, that type of thing. And two things will be good for him, I think having a little bit of rest; and, number two, as the temperatures cool off, it’s a little bit less of a problem playing lots of plays, and so he may have a chance to move into the fold offensively a little bit.
I don’t think you can discount what Drew Carter has done. I think Drew Carter has stepped up and said, hey, I can put pressure on defenses, I can take them deep, I can catch things under, I can run with it after I catch it. I think Drew Carter’s blocking has been extraordinary. I think he’s done a great job downfield blocking, which goes a little bit unseen unless you get to play it back about 10 times. No, he really — I don’t think you can discount what he has brought to us.
REPORTER: Jim, barring anything crazy happening this week, given what you’ve said about Craig, do you right now have him pencilled in as your starter?
TRESSEL: Oh, sure. Craig Krenzel? Sure.
REPORTER: Did you give us an update on Angelo Chatham?
TRESSEL: Angelo has got an upper spine, probably something that’s been there for a long time. And from what we’re told is that it will be a career-ending, unless someone from the medical field has a different opinion, it will probably be a career-ending situation, unless some other specialist says, no, it’s not, and we’ll clear him. But I don’t foresee that.
REPORTER: Is he in pain? I mean, you probably have some empathy for him as far as that situation?
TRESSEL: Oh, absolutely. There’s a guy, I don’t care who it is, has played football his whole life, and been through some ups and downs, and usually guys aren’t really all the way back to feeling good about who they are until they get to go out there and do what they like, and all of a sudden, he doesn’t get to. So that’s a fork in the road that everyone faces as a football player at some point. He’s just, unfortunately, going to have to face it that his days are over much younger than you’d like.
REPORTER: Jim, your defense is only giving up 43 rushing yards a game. Why is that? Can you tell us, why is your defense so good against the run?
TRESSEL: I think it starts with Tim Anderson. By the way, there’s two guys here that I’d love to have you talk to.
But it starts with those guys up front. Every time I hear our linebackers and secondary asked questions, they’re quick to point out the fact that we’ve got eight, nine, ten guys that rotate in there up front that do a great job creating havoc, putting pressure on quarterbacks, making things happen. It starts up front like everything does.
And then I think the thing that’s been impressive to me is even though we’re very young in the linebacker corps and very young in the defense, safety and so forth, we’ve had very limited missed assignments. A lot of big plays you might see on Sports Center come because of blown coverages, but I haven’t seen all that, which I think is another reason that it’s hard to get a big play against us by error. And you add all those things together, I think our defensive staff does a good job working with people. They do a good job adjusting in the course of a game. And they constantly follow that will old adage that football’s a game of pressure, and they put pressure on you.
And, you know, I think that’s why we’re good on defense.
Tim, why would you say — I’ll ask the questions if you won’t. Tim, why are we good on defense?
ANDERSON: I guess, obviously we have great coaches that — I mean, they prepare us well for the game. We have a real good idea going in what they’re going to do and what they’re going to try to do. They make great half-time adjustments so we can come out and stop things that were successful in the first half. I think it comes down to us, and I think whenever you see a tackle, you see four or five, six, seven guys at the tackle just about every time, and we’re always running around.
Our practices are upbeat, and Coach Dantonio, you know, he gets on guys if they’re not running to the ball. And I think that’s a big reason. Even if one guy misses a tackle, he has three or four other guys that are there that are going to make it even if he doesn’t. That’s a big reason why.
TRESSEL: Ben, why do you think we’re good on defense? You face them every day.
HARTSOCK: I think we’ve got a huge amount of talent. The guys on the defensive front, I know I dread every day going against those guys. But it’s one of those things where you get better going up against them. I think a huge part of the success of — you talk about A.J. Hawk having huge success, Tim and I were just saying that our defensive front, I think, are eating up a lot of double teams. I think they’re taking on a lot of blockers and keeping those linebackers, freeing them up to make plays, and it’s just a matter of them going out and making the tackle. I think our defensive front is one of the best in the country.
You see the past couple weeks —
No problem, Tim.
— you see what teams are trying to do, they’re trying to slow down some of the pass rushing stuff, running draws, this and that. I think the defensive front has done a great job of adjusting to that and stopping that to keep pressure on those quarterbacks.
TRESSEL: I think, too, to cap that off and go to the next question, I think the guys all know how important the other guys are. You know, Robert Reynolds and A.J. Hawk and Mike D’Andrea and Fred Pugac and Bobby Carpenter know that their life is a lot better because of the guys in front.
The guys in front know if they do their thing, the linebacker is going to be there. And the secondary knows, as long as they stay deepest and make the plays they need to make, the defensive front is going to pressure them, the linebacker is going to have the coverage. And I think there’s a good understanding of where each other are, and a good appreciation of what each other bring to the table. And when you put that all together with a staff that does a nice job, you have a good defense.
REPORTER: Tim, can you talk about what makes the tight end so good at Ohio State.
HARTSOCK: Next question.
ANDERSON: Are you being serious or —
HARTSOCK: Next question.
ANDERSON: If you look at Ben, you wouldn’t be expect him to be able to catch a football, because that’s what I used to think as well, but he does have some good hands.
And obviously, on a serious note, I’ve been thinking about it, I think Ben is one of the better blocking tight ends probably, not only in the conference, but in the country. And it seems like a lot of times when you look at tight ends, they’re either really good at one thing and not so good at the other. I think it definitely helps that Ben can make those big grabs, which he’s obviously made a couple of them, a nice diving one on Saturday, which was kind of nice. But I think the ability that he can do both things. Plus we’ve got a lot of guys there. You’ve got Louis Iz — Iz — Wow!
HARTSOCK: Irizarry.
ANDERSON: Yeah, thank you. Along with Ryan Hamby and Stan White. And you know they can rotate them guys through. And all four of them guys are pretty talented.
REPORTER: Coach, you talked about the strength of the defense. Move to offense, what do you see lacking there?
TRESSEL: I don’t think by any stretch of the imagination we’ve been dominating up front. Whereas, I think we have shown signs of that defensively. Now, you still have to do it the next day. But I think we’ve not been quite as consistent from that standpoint. We’ve probably lacked a little bit of opportunity to be intact, to become better in the run game.
When you think about our preseason, we never really did have the running backs in there and spent most of our time in nonreal situations. I think we have made a little bit of progress there. I think we are in pretty good shape from a tight end standpoint, as Tim mentioned. Ben Hartsock is a guy that I don’t know that I’ve seen anyone block at the tight end position like he does. It’s good to see him doing a good job catching the ball, so I think we’re progressing there.
And from a running back standpoint, I think Lydell Ross is coming along and is showing signs of getting ready to break out, and obviously that’s a real plus for us. And it was good to see Ira Guilford in there. I thought he added a little different gear, at least from where I was standing, and I think that will be good for us.
REPORTER: Coach, can you talk a little bit about — I’ve noticed him watching several games, Ohio State’s games in particular, but also Arkansas against Alabama, multiple games this year, officials do not seem to be calling holding on the offensive line against the defensive line. It seems to me, most plays I look at out there, Ohio State’s offensive linemen are getting mulled.
How do you deal with that as a coach? Do you send in tape? Is it something the coaches have talked about, something they’re talking about with the referees, the Big Ten officials?
TRESSEL: Well, the first thing we tell our defensive linemen is being held is no excuse, because you’re going to get held, and you better understand that. I hope our offensive linemen don’t feel as if they need to hold. I don’t know that we’ve gotten a whole bunch of holding calls. The officials study the game film every week.
I think it’s one of the reasons why I’m not a real instant replay guy is, if you’re going to worry about whether a guy’s foot was one inch out of bounds, how about the arm drags and the jersey pulling and all that stuff that happens play after play after play, are we going to have to go back and replay those? And if no, well, then don’t replay any of the stuff that’s not called properly.
We do get held a lot. We get held a lot on special teams. The officials train hard and work on their thing and they get evaluated just like — you can say that we do a lot of things not as well as we should. So I’m not saying that I want to go train the officials. They’re working hard to become as good as they can, just like our guys are working as hard as they can to become as good as they can.
I think that’s why I’m not a big instant replay guy. If you can’t go back and see if every play was a penalty of any kind, then I don’t think we should go back on selected ones.
REPORTER: In a minute I want to ask —
TRESSEL: A minute, we don’t have that long.
REPORTER: Well, how do you, in terms of as a coach, how do you plan to deal with all that? Is there anything you can do?
TRESSEL: Don’t get held, get away from them.
REPORTER: And as a player, Tim, how do you deal with that?
ANDERSON: Actually, like coach said, being held is not an excuse, and we don’t use it as an excuse. We have hands and arms just like they do, and if we do our techniques properly, like we’re taught, then they shouldn’t be able to hold us.
And when you talk about whether they’re calling it or not, as long as it’s fair both ways. As long as they’re not calling them — you know, if they’re not calling our guys, fine. But once they get to the point where they’re calling it on one team and not the other, then I think there’s a problem. But if they’re not calling it either way, then in my mind they’re just letting us play, and that’s fine with me.
REPORTER: As an offensive lineman, quote/unquote, do the offensive linemen know that? Do they take advantage of that on purpose?
HARTSOCK: I think one of the biggest techniques of an offensive linemen is getting your hands inside. Coach Bollman, our offensive coordinator, you get your hands on a guy before he can get them on you and get them inside. Once you get inside hand position on anybody, offensively or defensively, whoever gets their hands on first and on the inside generally is going to win the battle. And I guess a small advantage of that is once you’re on the inside, if you do grab a little cloth, it’s never going to get seen, and it’s almost become part of the game. I don’t think you can expect many guys to block with their fists or however you think. When you get your hands on the inside, but whenever you see somebody get their hands on the inside of a jersey, start pulling down shoulder pads and stuff like that, that’s when it gets pretty obvious.
But in the same sense, when you do go out as a receiver, you go through the same kind of thing with a linebacker trying to get you from getting a release, to keep you from getting away from him. So it’s something where the techniques, you’ve got to become — you see Tim Anderson ripping a lot with his hands to keep those guys from holding on to him, and we do the same thing when we try to get out of a cut, to make sure to chop that linebacker’s hands down so that he doesn’t get a hold on us and keep us out of our break.
REPORTER: Ben, how much does the offense miss Maurice Clarett?
HARTSOCK: I think Maurice Clarett brought a dynamic to the team. It’s hard to deny that. He oftentimes could take a play that wasn’t blocked perfectly and maybe take it for a little bit longer. But we can’t allow — we don’t and can’t allow ourselves right now to dwell on things like that. We’ve got very capable running backs, a stable of them. And right now we’re just trying to get them experienced, I think, and get them comfortable and confident with the offense and get the offensive linemen confident in them that they’re going to produce on the field.
REPORTER: Jim, could you address that also? How much do you think the offense misses Maurice Clarett?
TRESSEL: Maurice was an outstanding running back, no question about it. Just like the question about do we like the fact that this is the open week; this is the open week. This is the situation that we’re in. Not to discredit Maurice. Maurice is an outstanding back, but we don’t have Maurice. We don’t usually spend too much time thinking about what we don’t have.
REPORTER: What stands out right now what you all are doing well?
TRESSEL: Probably the thing we’re doing best is scoring enough points to win the games.
Secondly, the category that we’re probably rated highest in the league, it’s really kind of shallow, because we haven’t played a whole bunch of league games, but we lead the Big Ten in red zone offense, which isn’t a bad category.
You’d like to lead it in lots of categories. But I guess those would be the two things that I would say that I like best.
REPORTER: A lot of running backs feel they get stronger the more carries they get. Is it time for you to pick a number one tailback and give somebody more carries than the other guys?
TRESSEL: I don’t see that right now.
REPORTER: Do you see that as a benefit, if somebody gets 20 carries a game?
TRESSEL: I guess it depends on who the somebody is. But right now, for a few weeks there, we felt as if we would be a better team if Lydell and Maurice shared the load, which was probably nearly 20 apiece. I don’t know what their numbers are.
It’s kind of nice to see that Ira might be able to be added to that group, and we’ll just have to see how it emerges, who’s healthy, who’s doing what, who’s performing? We can’t make those decisions before we’re out there.
REPORTER: Is Lydell okay, by the way?
TRESSEL: Yeah. In fact, the trainers said this morning that they thought he was great.
REPORTER: Jim, are you looking for Branden Joe, now that he’s back in a position battle with Schnittker at fullback, or we saw him some at tailback Saturday, is it exclusively a short yard situation, or do you plan to —
TRESSEL: I would say right now he and Schnittker will be battling it out for football opportunities. And also Branden is a guy that we think can become a short yardage-type guy.
REPORTER: Jim, is there a feeling, though, you’re probably going to have Craig back for Wisconsin, like you said, Branden Joe is back, Stepanovich, which was your best total offensive lineman is back, is there a feeling that maybe things are moving back in the right direction, so to speak, personnel-wise?
TRESSEL: I think that. Also, I don’t think you can discount the fact that some other guys have gotten to play, so that makes you collectively a little bit better. Now you’ve got to go out and see if you can make the contribution that’s most important to the team, which starts with making sure we do a great job not turning the ball over. And that was prior to this past weekend, probably the poorest thing we were doing. Got a little bit better last week, but it needs to get a lot better if we need to beat a team like Wisconsin in Wisconsin.
REPORTER: Coach, Game Day had some questions on overtime —
TRESSEL: Who’s Game Day?
REPORTER: From ESPN.
TRESSEL: Oh, okay.
REPORTER: — about strategy, play calling in overtime, does everything get ratcheted up a notch? Do you like playing overtime?
TRESSEL: Oh, yeah. You still have a chance to win if you’re in overtime. I think it’s exciting because the ball’s down by the end zone and the defenses don’t have to back up at all, the offenses know the goal’s right there, I think it’s great. The way the college system is, it’s great, because the red zone is tough territory. That is tough territory. So I’m a proponent of our style of red zone or overtime.
REPORTER: Having won the championship in overtime, does that make you more of a fan of it?
TRESSEL: No, I’ve always liked it better than, A, when there wasn’t overtime. Prior to, what, ’94 I think was the last season there wasn’t overtime. I think. And then as you look to what the alternatives were, you know, put it on the 25. Or do it like the NFL does it, where I think they kick off again, don’t they? I think there’s no comparison between a tie or that style with what we do. That’s personally.
REPORTER: Do you like the ball first or second?
TRESSEL: I like the ball second. That’s why if you win the toss, you pick defense.
REPORTER: Always?
TRESSEL: Yeah. I mean, I’m trying to think of a time when you wouldn’t. Probably always.
REPORTER: Are those games more taxing on you —
TRESSEL: Clay, these can’t be your questions.
REPORTER: You don’t like the questions?
TRESSEL: Are they more taxing? There are more plays. We played 4 hours and 17 minutes against North Carolina State. That’s a lot of football. Especially the last 45 minutes of it was crashing into each other around the goal line. So I think it takes a lot more out of you physically and emotionally.
But, again, compared to the alternative, where you kick off and start over or call it a tie, I’d still vote for it.
REPORTER: I’m finished.
REPORTER: Jim, are there some anxieties where you have a team that hasn’t been on the road yet, just because you don’t have control over everything that takes place?
TRESSEL: I would have preferred to have an out-of-league game, perhaps, on the road. But on the other hand, it was nice to play five in a row and not have those travel situations. We were originally scheduled to play San Diego State away, and it was best for all involved to play it here.
I don’t worry about Tim Anderson or Ben Hartsock, or guys that have traveled before. You worry a little bit about a guy who’s never been on a road trip with us and doesn’t know exactly what we expect and how much more difficult the task is and so forth. But I don’t know that we have a whole bunch of those guys. I haven’t had a chance to really look at who might be on the 64.
But I think every one of our guys that’s ever been to Madison, Wisconsin, which is a lot of them, because we were just there a year ago, know that it will be a tremendous atmosphere, and it will be a tough place to play, and forget about hearing the cadence, forget about being able to communicate. You better do it visually. We’ve had 104,000 every time for us. And, now, I don’t know how many tickets they’re giving us, but I’m not sure it’s going to be a whole bunch.
REPORTER: What’s the scheduling, 3 out of 4 in Madison?
TRESSEL: I think they rotate things every four years, and I assume we’ll have to face them here sometime.
REPORTER: Jim, is Camp Randall more of a challenge than playing in the Big House, as far as space is concerned?
TRESSEL: I don’t know the difference between any house. But I don’t know — Ben, which place, is Camp Randall tougher?
HARTSOCK: I think they each have their own kind of identity. I think both places have great tradition. They’ve got great energy once you get there. I think when you get to a stadium that has the traditions that both of those have, I think it’s hard to distinguish between the two. I don’t think — they’re both loud. Once you get to a certain point, loud and obscenely loud, you can hardly tell the difference.
We know we’re going to have to go in and really be focused. I think communication is going to be one of the big things on offense, to make sure we can still do that on top of all the noise, because that’s been an advantage in our pocket this early season, playing at home, is being able to hear the cadence, being able to hear audibles, things like that, so it’s going to change this week.
REPORTER: Jim, is there any special preparations or anything you’ll do, or are you looking at because this is not just a road game but an 8:00 p.m. Central road game, 9:00 p.m. Eastern road game?
TRESSEL: Well, we’ll practice with noise, which has nothing to do with time of day, which we always do. We won’t practice at night or anything. Sometimes we may go indoors a little bit, because it’s the same surface, our indoor has the same surface that they just put into their stadium, so we may go a couple workouts in there. Outside of that — we’ve played at night, and I don’t think outside of that we will change anything.
REPORTER: Is the 9:00 p.m. kickoff for you guys, does that border on the extreme?
TRESSEL: I think it’s 8:00 Central and 9:00 here, you know. You say does it border on the extreme? Well, playing Wisconsin at Wisconsin borders on the extreme, so you know that’s coming. So let’s go and let’s see how we do.
REPORTER: Ben, what do you think about with Craig and Alex coming back and Branden already being back a week, do you have a sense the offense could be about to take off again?
HARTSOCK: I think so. I think the guys that are coming back are all guys that have had experience, and I guess a lot of the problems, I think we’ve had, is just coming from consistency. We’ve had trouble moving the ball. But then when we are moving the ball, when you think of the opening drive of the last game, and then the first drive out of the second half, as far as being in a huddle, it seems like those drives — I don’t know what was different between those drives and drives where we stalled. It just seemed that things were flowing. Things clicked. And it seems like offensively, once we get things moving, once we get a six or seven-yard gain and then a couple short routes down the field, things just really start moving. And when we get guys back that have that experience, hopefully they can bring another little bit of a spark to maybe have a little bit more consistency.
TRESSEL: All set? These guys didn’t have a lot of questions, they shouldn’t have to stay? Sorry guys, 10 minutes.
