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2009 JT Press Conferences

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NateG;1592035; said:
He worded his question wrong... He said that OSU makes it look easy but knowing that it isn't...tress interupts "you haven't been here long"... knowing it isn't how much harder is it for coaches than players to stay consistent like that?


Just came out wrong. He wasn't inferring it was easy.

Then another guy asked about the rushing the field.... JT avoided it correctly... "Ill let the bloggers deal with that."
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my bad, excellent catch. i was listening to the presser and it sounded like the same person. expecially with the questions being asked so close together.
 
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COACH TRESSEL: Someone described this month as tough, tougher and toughest. And we've battled through the tough and the tougher, and now we're excited about the toughest and there's just a special feeling about this week. Anyone that's been a part of it would probably agree and not be able to describe it that well, but it's an exciting time coming off of a tough football game with Iowa. Iowa is a very good team and you knew they were going to play to the whistle and to the final tick on the clock and then some and that's what they did.
Now we go on the road, on the road in the Big Ten, on the road to Michigan. So our people are excited about it. It's exciting for, I think, a lot of reasons. One is it's Ohio State /Michigan and there's nothing like it. And, two, it's your last regular season game and you'd like to think that you're going to be playing your best football in all phases, offensively, defensively, special teams, and we've certainly got a lot of work to do for that to be the case, but we're looking forward to a great week of preparation. Our kids are excited, and let's go.

REPORTER: Coach, I want to ask you about your running game, the last couple weeks over 200 yards against pretty good opponents, I assume it's getting guys healthy, offense, and Boom, what's been the biggest part of getting that going again?

COACH TRESSEL: I think when you do have your ability to practice with your guys, obviously it's healthy when Boom Herron is healthy. He's a competitive kid. He and Brandon give us a good duo there and we're very comfortable when http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660857http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660857Jordan Hall is in the game from a running back standpoint. I think our offensive line, because they have been healthy and have been able to work together is coming along. I think http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660713http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660713Zach Boren has been a good addition and as you watch him grow through the latter half of his freshman year, he has a greater understanding of what needs to be done and loves doing it and so hopefully we're moving in a direction that we could be a good football team throwing, running and all the rest.

REPORTER: Jim, whose idea on the staff, whatever it was, to go to the wildcat? Was that just some of that an evolution based on the fact that Terrelle was a little banged up? Have you been pleased with the way it's gone? Obviously it seems to be getting a little bit better the more times you do it.

COACH TRESSEL: I think the first discussion of it came up when Terrelle was a little banged and our tailbacks were a little healthy. All of a sudden you had three guys. There was a time in the season where you didn't really want to do that because you didn't have -- Terrelle was healthier than a couple of backs. And we look at it as if we've got four different runners and at the moment we worked it, the running backs were healthier than Terrelle. The good news is, I'd like to think we'll go into Saturday and all four will be healthy.

REPORTER: Terrelle said he likes anything that makes him -- he'd prefer to be the quarterback, but he likes anything that you win with.

COACH TRESSEL: Right.

REPORTER: Has he embraced it?

COACH TRESSEL: I think so. He's happy for us to throw it to him. You know how that is. He thinks he's a great route runner. I said, well, you've got to have somebody who can throw it. So I think he's reminiscing about when Todd was throwing to him. Todd's not here, so any little thing we can have to add preparation time for people to add pressure to our opposing defenses we think is good.

REPORTER: What will this week be like for Justin?

COACH TRESSEL: Justin's the kind of guy that focuses hard on what he has to do and he was fighting a couple weeks there in the middle of the season when he was banged up and when you don't practice, you just don't perform like you would like to. Fortunately he's healthy and, I thought, played one of his better games Saturday. I really did. I'm sure he'll be excited. I'm sure it will be difficult in some ways because he has great feelings for both teams that are going to be on the field and a lot of great memories up in The Big House with his dad and himself and all the rest, but his focus will be on what can he do to help his team.

REPORTER: Do you say anything extra to him or will you do anything special with him this week to calm him or help him through it?

COACH TRESSEL: Not really. Unless it looks like he needs it. If it looks like all of a sudden he's not himself, then what you try to do is find out what's bothering someone.

REPORTER: I don't know if you've had an opportunity to see much film yet on Michigan's defense.

COACH TRESSEL: A little. Not as much as a Tuesday, but --

REPORTER: They've given up a lot of points. I'm wondering if you can characterize why that is.

COACH TRESSEL: There's usually two reasons that you give up points. One is if your offense puts you in poor field position or if you give up big plays. Most defenses don't give up extensive long drives time after time and that type of thing and there was a stretch in the middle of their season where they had more turnovers than certainly they could afford and then there was a stretch in there where they gave up some big plays. But the interesting thing about watching Ohio State /Michigan film, getting ready for the Ohio State /Michigan film getting ready for the game is you're not really watching who you're going to play and it's -- maybe the schemes you are, but the people play a notch above so we'll study the schemes extremely hard. We go into the game assuming everyone's going to be in their gap and everyone's going to be in their zone and everyone's going to be covering their man and we're going to have to earn every inch. So I think you have to be a little bit careful. Very seldom do you go into this game and study the statistics sheet. That's just not the way it works.

REPORTER: Is the rivalry, is it starting to lose anything as it gets one-sided or if one team is really struggling like Michigan was last year and to some extent this year?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, not if you're a part of it. If you're an observer, perhaps, I don't know. But if you're a part of it and you've felt those feelings and had those experiences and just know what it means to both schools and so forth, that would never occur to the participants. You know, perhaps to someone from the outside, someone from, I don't know, Utah or something might not maybe jump on it because neither team is being talked about every day in the national scheme of things, but not with the participants.

REPORTER: How do you tell your players to keep Michigan from being taken for granted with that being said?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, there's a reality in life that if you take anything for granted, you're probably not thinking right. We talk about a lot of things that we shouldn't take for granted. Maybe some things that aren't even that real to us, but when you talk about the Ohio State /Michigan game, that's very real. So I'd like to think our guys don't take anything for granted, although I'm sure we all do take things for granted, but this wouldn't be one of them.

REPORTER: Do you place a lot of importance on the punting game? Are you a little bit concerned about how the punting game is going right now?

COACH TRESSEL: We've done a pretty good job coverage-wise and punt-placement-wise. I'm a little disappointed with our length this past weekend, but all you have to do is go two weeks back and a long, well placed, well covered punt set the stage for the beginning of a field position victory. So we didn't have our best punting day Saturday, to answer that, I guess, as directly as I can. We need a better one this Saturday. Their punting game is extraordinary. Their kid leads the league and the nation maybe, I'm not sure, but he's extraordinary and if you lose field position every time you punt you're in for some problems. So we need to, as I say, in your final regular season game, the goal is to be the best at everything we do, the punt, kickoff coverage, offense, defense. You know, everything we've got. And we certainly want to be better this weekend than we were last in our net punt.

REPORTER: Saturday you won the game with the special teams play but a special teams play by them got them back in the game.

COACH TRESSEL: No question.

REPORTER: How unsettling is that for you at this point in the season?

COACH TRESSEL: It's very unsettling because we'd like to win the special teams. We call them the special units and each of the special teams make up the special units and we couldn't say that after that game. We didn't win the punt game. We didn't win the kickoff cover game. Now, we can't diminish the one we did win with and that was extraordinary, that was great, but again, we need to be at our best in all of those. You can't go on the road and lose the special teams and win the game.

REPORTER: What's on the line for you guys this week? You've already got a Rose Bowl. You've got a share of the Big Ten. What's on the line for you guys Saturday?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, it's Ohio State /Michigan and I'm sure you could talk to some people who have participated in this game as a player or a coach and they could tell you that probably in the forefront of their mind of their memories of their time here, more so is the Ohio State /Michigan things that flow through their head than it is which bowl did you go to and where were you ranked and this and that, so what's at stake is Ohio State /Michigan.

REPORTER: Jim, you talked about your team playing a notch above in this game, everybody seems to.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you need to, yeah.

REPORTER: In your time as an assistant or head coach here, have you ever walked off the field after a Michigan game thinking, we didn't rise to the occasion, we didn't play a notch above, maybe they didn't seem as focused in? Have you always felt that for Michigan?

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know if I would go as broad as focused in because I've never seen a team, either side, not come into that game and be wired in. I didn't think we finished very well, obviously, in 2003. We got behind, but fought back pretty well and had our chances and didn't finish things, and we had a good team. We did not play -- you know, they had a good team obviously, but I didn't think we played equal to or above ourselves that particular day, that's for sure.

REPORTER: Jim, you guys are going to wear new uniforms for this game, one-time deal for the '54 team, do you like them and how did this week come about? How did you pick this week?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, it was a -- I think it was kind of a nationwide initiative that Nike was a part of with their schools. I think there are eight or nine schools that have done it already during the course of the year and they kind of pick the game for you and we were able to pick the team. We went through a group of -- actually I was out of town. I don't know if I was in Iraq or where I was, but I guess they gave us a bunch of different examples and so forth and we had a couple players and a couple coaches and administrators and whatnot and we got to choose which way we would go. And that seems to be kind of a thing that's done all over the place now. I'm a little old school, but even I'm trying to mature a little bit and embrace things like that, but to me, it's an awesome responsibility to play in the Ohio State /Michigan game and it adds a little bit more when all of a sudden you're wearing what the people did that were extraordinary in a given year so it will be exciting.

REPORTER: Do you like them?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: Does it come with an alternate coach's outfit at all?

COACH TRESSEL: If it does, I don't know. I might be wearing one of those trench coats and a little Paul Brown hat. Not sure. Throwback sweater vest, I don't know, with buttons in the front, I don't know. I don't know. Whatever they give me, I wear.

REPORTER: The fact that regardless of Saturday's outcome, you already know what bowl game you're going to, the fact that no player on this team has ever lost to Michigan, how much of a concern is overconfidence with your guys and how do you kind of keep them in check, so to speak?

COACH TRESSEL: I'm not worried about overconfidence because we've got enough guys that have played in this game that they know better than that, so if there's any inkling of overconfidence, it will get knocked out of their throwback uniforms on the first play, so --

REPORTER: Injury updates on guys like http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1383594http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1383594Mike Adams, I know Larimore has been back a little bit, Shugarts, can you give some injury updates on those guys?

COACH TRESSEL: http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1383594http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1383594Mike Adams probably could have played. We thought Jimmy Cordle did a great job against a great player. That Number 94 for Iowa is something now, and we thought Jimmy fought like crazy. Didn't win every battle, but we thought he fought like crazy and did a heck of a job and we just didn't see that the moment that we should have changed that because he was trying to get a feel for all the great things that kid does, but Mike could have played. http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1383745http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1383745J.B. Shugarts played a little more than I thought he might. You never know how those foot injuries and all that, especially early in the week, you're looking at him saying, man, I don't know if he's going to be ready to go and later in the week, yeah, he's pretty good, but we're not doing that much. So how do you know? So we decided, I think, on the third series we were going to have him go in, that way http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660858http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660858Marcus Hall will have gotten his nose bloodied a little bit and then we'll have J.B. go in and see if he can hold up. He went in actually and did a pretty decent job in there. So I would expect him to be even better this week. http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292Dexter Larimore played, I don't know, seven, eight, nine, 10 plays, I'm not sure. You'd hope he's even better this week. One thing is getting healthy, the next thing is being ready to get into the fray. We should sure use Dexter being at his top level.

REPORTER: How valuable was http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660858http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660858Marcus Hall's play? A freshman starting in a game that decides the title, what have you seen out of him as this season has gone along?

COACH TRESSEL: http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660858http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=3660858Marcus Hall is going to be a very good player. He's really -- our coaches really think for a young guy he's an excellent pass protector and that's usually the last thing that comes along. They say he's got a heck of a good punch and so forth. He hasn't had the experience handling all the different things. The one thing I felt going into Iowa was Iowa's not that fancy and there weren't going be to be confusing things going on, there was just going to be tough things going on, so I felt comfortable that Marcus would be able to bang in there pretty good and I thought he did. So it's been very valuable having -- we've had really five different tackles if you count Andrew Miller and Jimmy Cordle and Shugarts and Adams and Marcus, yeah, we've had five different tackles, which they've all played a lot now.

REPORTER: Would you go through this week with him at Number 1 there or if Shugarts could go number one big time --

COACH TRESSEL: No, I would think the fact that Shugarts probably had 50 plays would lead you to think that he would probably go. Now, this is Monday and we don't know -- haven't been out there yet, but if the game were today, I would expect it to be Shugarts.

REPORTER: One of the unique things about the Michigan rivalry is the gold pants and I was wondering just how unique you think that aspect of this rivalry is compared to the rest of the country, I don't know if anybody has anything like that, and number two, what do you do with your gold pants?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, I don't know what other people have in their rivalries and so forth, some people have trophies and all that stuff, but I just take mine home and give them to Ellen never to be seen again.

REPORTER: How valuable has http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059270http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059270Jim Cordle been? You couldn't have imagined him being the left tackle, he's been moved around so many places, just in summation, what has he contributed?

COACH TRESSEL: I think the way he came back from his injury/surgery so fast was an inspiration to the rest of the group because some people think, oh, he's going to be out a long, long time, but his passion to be back and his willingness to do whatever, center, guard, tackle if you need me the unselfishness of a senior, his favorite position is center, but that's what leadership is being all about, being unselfish and serve whatever the group needs, so to me he's been extraordinary. He fought like crazy on Saturday and that was a tough task and we've got another one coming up because there are some elite ends in our league, Scofield and 94 and 55 for Michigan, Brandon Graham, so he's going to need to keep fighting.

REPORTER: Jim, when you prepare for a team, Michigan's 5-6, they've faced the possibility of not going to a bowl for a sixth straight year if they don't win, obviously Rich Rodriguez is under pressure. How much do you figure in as you prepare for a team maybe the desperation factor of the other team, of let it all hang out type?

COACH TRESSEL: The nice thing of the Ohio State /Michigan game is it's always let it all hang out because this is it. I mean, this is what it's all about. And I think if you look specifically at Michigan, they could be at eight or nine wins right now with the ball bouncing this way different or a call being made this way different. I mean, that's the fine line in college football amend it's not going to get any easier. There's a lot of good football players, a lot of good teams and what we've got to focus on is feeling like at the end of this game we've played the best we're capable of playing. It's game 12. We're as healthy as we are, whatever it is and got all these experiences and learned all these lessons and did we play the best we were capable of playing? Making the assumption Michigan will do that, because most people do that in the Ohio State Michigan game, so all those other outside things, whether they're outside things in their world or outside things in our world, this week there's only one thing.

REPORTER: From the time you took this job, you made it very clear how important this game was. Is it difficult to maintain your edge personally when the series has been so lopsided in your favor?

COACH TRESSEL: No. No. I've known before I was even part of the series of the significance of the game and the excitement of the game. It's part of you if you like football and you're from Ohio State or you're from Michigan. If you're in the Big Ten. You just grow up knowing that we're fortunate to be a part of this game. It's extraordinary.

REPORTER: Rich Rodriguez last year was preparing for this game having never been through it. He'd heard about it from everybody but not experienced it. How do you think it might be different for him now that he has lived through it once now coming back for this, obviously you'd done it before, you were head coach, you'd lived through it, but do you think it will be different for him having done it?

COACH TRESSEL: Every team you work with is so different in every scenario and where you are on the road to your development is so different and every one of those experiences that gets you a little bit more of an understanding of what you need to do to get where you want to go is helpful. So I hope that us going into our ninth one is helpful. I'm sure going into a second one for a number of their players and their whole staff and those kinds of things, absolutely. The more you understand something, the better you can deal with it.

REPORTER: Terrelle came in here as the preseason Big Ten offensive player of the year and you talked about how the main goal was the post-season player of the year, where do you think he is? Is he a candidate for that?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, gosh, I don't have any idea about that, but I do know this. We always talk about quarterbacks in terms of where are we in the standings, and we have a chance to land well in the standings, so with that in mind, I'm sure as you look at your pool of candidates, you can't leave out the ones who have helped guide and lead their team.

REPORTER: How did he grade out last week?

COACH TRESSEL: Really good. Really good. What was the number? Like 78 or something. I mean, it was -- it was good, very solid.

REPORTER: 80 is a winning percentage?

COACH TRESSEL: 85. Coach Sis is a tough one now. Those young coaches, they're -- I guess I was that way back in the day, but very, very solid. There were some things we didn't get done that we needed to, but very, very solid.

REPORTER: Standing there now, do you feel like he really gets it as far as the quarterback and what you demand of that position?

COACH TRESSEL: I think he's getting more of it, but I don't know if you could only have played two seasons of college football and could ever sit there assuming, okay, I've got this figured out, just like I'm sure in the NFL, you're there 13 years, you can't say, oh, shoot, I've got this down because the world changes, scenario changes, but I think he's certainly -- I've said all along, I think he's progressing and I think he took another step.

REPORTER: Some criticism out there about the method that you guys won the game on Saturday, playing conservatively and this kind of thing. Does that argument, does it kind of apply to two facts, it is a game of offense, defense, special teams, your defense slammed the door in the overtime and you won the game on the basis of that, and secondly, Ohio State has been to more BCS bowls than any other school that's out there, eight times in 12 years, I mean, do the results just kind of back up the method? I guess, just kind of your thoughts about that.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, it's a little bit easier to back it up when we ended up winning. Certainly arguments, people take on statistics and whatnot and say, hey, if they would have done that, they probably would have come out better, but we talk a lot about the fact that we do want to make sure that we're a part of each other, offense, defense, and special teams. And our defense did come out and probably play their best three or four plays of the game and our special teams hadn't done great, but we had every confidence that we could do the normal stuff, nothing out of this world. I would have liked to pound it down there a little bit closer, but we didn't get that done and I don't know what it ended up being, a 40 something?

REPORTER: 39.

COACH TRESSEL: 39, which our guys will make 39 yard field goals. The object is to win the game. I guess the other sport is to discuss how it was done or wasn't done.

REPORTER: You got skewered pretty good, there were at least three national guys that skewered you and your guys pretty good, do you let that bother you or roll off your back?

COACH TRESSEL: Probably neither. A, I don't see it, and, B, I'm not on the air to say, hey, look at their record. So consider the source, probably weren't any of the current coaches.

REPORTER: After the game on Saturday, I think Tate Forcier said something that we're determined to get this team to a bowl game. I'm wondering in the tape you've seen, how much respect do you have for him?

COACH TRESSEL: I love the competitiveness of Tate Forcier. I've watched more of Michigan's offense than I have of their defense because as we've been getting ready for opponents, Iowa, Penn State, I'm trying to think who else we had in crossover, Indiana maybe, the guy loves to play, the guy loves to compete. There's no question about it. If he's got a pulse, he's going to compete and so that's -- I would think nothing else but for him to feel and say that because that's the way he plays. He backs it up with his play.

REPORTER: We know Mike Brewster has dealt with the ankle injury this year. What's it been like for him this season, kind of battling through that and where is he now both from a health standpoint and just in his understanding of the game now that he's had two full years as a starter?

COACH TRESSEL: I think he's way ahead of where he was a year ago this time, knowledge-wise. Health-wise, I think he's better than he was three or four weeks ago. He's learning what it means to be an offensive lineman at this level because you're always hurting. That's just the life you lead. Jim, how many surgeries did you have?

JIM LACHEY: Eight.

COACH TRESSEL: Eight surgeries. That's just the life they lead. And none of the surgeries do you have during the middle of the season, although Cordle was unusual. Usually you just play with it and then you get it fixed later when there's some time. So that's a new experience for him, but I think he's dealt with it very well.

REPORTER: Are you guys scheming things up differently up front on the offensive front than you were earlier in the year?

COACH TRESSEL: There's not that many things to do. You either man block, down block or pull someone, I don't know what else to do, draw block, I guess.

REPORTER: Are you embracing what you are offensively maybe now more than you were?

COACH TRESSEL: I think we're trying to get better at what we do and you embrace that if you do it well, but then if you do it well for a week, you have to do it well the next week and so -- there's not a finality in any of those discussions until it's over. And then once it's over you go back and you look at it and so forth, but our guys haven't stopped trying to get better.

REPORTER: Did you feel the wildcat you introduced a couple weeks ago, did it bring a little bit of excitement and freshness to the practice sessions, et cetera?

COACH TRESSEL: Our guys don't get all that enthused, "Oh, we get to run this play." I mean, we get up on the line of scrimmage and here's who we're blocking and they're more tuned into who they have to block, who knows, maybe those running backs liked it, they felt like maybe they were in command or whatever, but I didn't see -- that'd be a good one to ask our guys.

As a matter of fact, I think we've got Dane and I think we've got four offense and two specialists and then six defense, is that right? And are they placed? I don't see Lori here, we're going to have to go without Lori. Are they placed? Let's rock and roll. Thank you.
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I'm not worried about overconfidence because we've got enough guys that have played in this game that they know better than that, so if there's any inkling of overconfidence, it will get knocked out of their throwback uniforms on the first play, so --
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I love JT! :banger:
 
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A Rose Bowl teleconference.

Official.site

An Interview With: Coach http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059367http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059367Jim Tressel
GINA CHAPPIN: I'd like to welcome members of the media. Before we get started, unfortunately Coach Kelly will not be joining us on the call. We're having some difficulties getting him on line. If he happens to join, we will certainly alert you, but we do have Coach Tressel on the line. On behalf of the Tournament of Roses we'd like to welcome you to the Rose Bowl game presented by Citi BCS conference call. We will introduce Coach Tressel, have him make an opening statement, and turn it over for questions.

At this time I'd like to introduce acting president of the Tournament of Roses Jeff Throop for some brief remarks.

JEFF THROOP: Thank you, Gina, and welcome, ladies and gentlemen of the press. It is certainly a pleasure to be with you tonight. On behalf of the Tournament of Roses, we are delighted to welcome the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Oregon Ducks to the 96th Rose Bowl game presented by Citi. We are looking forward to a thrilling New Year's Day game and wish both Coach Tressel and Coach Kelly the very best in their preparation and planning for their trip to Pasadena. Thank you, and congratulations once again.

GINA CHAPPIN: At this time I'd like to introduce the head coach for the Ohio State University Buckeyes, http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059367http://www.ohiostatebuckeyes.com/Vi...743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059367Jim Tressel. Welcome, and thank you.

COACH TRESSEL: Thank you, Gina and Jeff. On behalf of all of the Ohio State Buckeyes, we first want to congratulate Oregon and their great football team and their outstanding coaching staff for that Pac 10 Championship, and it's going to be a tremendous honor to compete in the granddaddy of them all in the 96th Rose Bowl. I know our kids and fans and coaching staff and administration and all of the above are extremely excited to head to Pasadena. It's always one of the goals at the beginning of every football year is that you have a chance to play in that one. You can be assured you've had a wonderful season.

Our staff has been here for nine years, and we haven't had this honor up until this point, and we're looking forward to it, I can promise you that. We're getting ready to play against a great football team in Oregon, and our kids are entering final exams tomorrow morning, and we'll be focused on that for the next four days, and then we'll have a chance to get to work and have our preparations. We'll work here in Columbus until about the 21st of December, and then our guys will have a chance to go home and spend some holiday time with their families, and then we look forward to landing in Los Angeles and heading to our home site there at the Hyatt Century Plaza and preparing for the tremendous festivities that are in and around the Rose Bowl. Our band, I know, is so excited about being a part of that Rose Bowl parade. I think it's amazing just to see their faces light up and know that they'll get a chance to march in that extraordinary event. Everyone here is just extremely excited.

GINA CHAPPIN: Great, Coach, thank you. We will now open it up for questions.

Q. Does Oregon remind you of anyone you guys played this year or any teams that you would have played recently?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, it's difficult for me to say that at this point in time. Obviously we didn't know for sure who we were going to play until late into the evening after having a chance to watch the Civil War and see that extraordinary football game. You know, they play with such tremendous tempo and passion, and I know one thing, we'd better get in shape because they come after it and go hard. There have been times when I think back to Illinois with their fast paced offense and tremendous run game along with their great passing game, a year ago I know in the Fiesta Bowl as we faced Texas who spread it out and had fast tempo and just did a great job from an offensive standpoint, and defensively they come after you. They're an aggressive style football team. You can see they love to play the game.

It all gets tied together with their great skill and great talent and special teams prowess there. But we're probably not far enough into our preparation. This weekend we did get a practice session in or two, but it really wasn't honed in on exactly what we might be facing with the Ducks. And then of course we had our football banquet today and we're on to finals. Our coaches will be spending a little bit of time here early in the week on the recruiting trail, and then we'll have a chance to watch all of their films and get a handle on it. But I can promise you, they are lightning, and if you can win the Pac 10, I think top to bottom, the Pac 10 is one of the most balanced and good football conferences in America. And if you can win that outright, you have a great football team. We will obviously need to be at our best.

Q. Is it too early to break down how they run the ball and how you might defend that because obviously your rush defense and their rush offense are both very highly regarded?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, the thing that you know that they bring to the table is that at every level and every stage, you've got to defend it all. You've got to defend the running backs who have been extraordinary. The quarterback is a guy who can hurt you bad with his speed and his arm. The receivers do a great job on the quick throws; they do a great job on the deep throws. I think, and we've always felt offensively, if your quarterback adds the dimension of being able to add something with his feet, and their young man, he's scary, they bring everything at you you can possibly get ready for, and they do it at such a fast pace.
I noticed one of the statistics was they don't have an extremely large time of possession, and that's because they score so fast. So we're going to have to be in tremendous shape. We're going to have to have everything covered all the way from the dive to the quarterback to the play action pass to the drop back pass, and the quickness of his release is I can tell by watching TV is extraordinary. So it's going to be a great challenge, and our defense I know has done a good job all year, and I know they'll prepare hard.

Q. More than a month will have passed between your last game against Michigan and this one. A lot has been made of that in the past. Is it a concern that you have more than a month off between competitive games?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, it really isn't, because if you think back to when you play your final game of a season and then you play your opener, you have, what, nine months or something like that. Hopefully you work hard to get better at your fundamentals and you improve from one year to the next. Well, we don't have quite that length of time, 40 days or whatever it happens to be, and it gives you an opportunity to heal a little bit. We went 12 straight weekends in a very physical, competitive league, so hopefully we'll be as healthy as ever.

We'll have a significant amount of time to try to get a feel and an understanding for what Oregon brings to the table. And when you get out there in the game, maybe in that first little bit, the speed of the game, you haven't played it at top end for a month or so, but once you get into the flow of the game, it's going to be dependent upon what you do as the game progresses. So no, that really has never been a concern of ours.

Q. As you watched all the games starting with the Civil War and so many great college games over the weekend, was there a part of you that wouldn't have minded being a part of this weekend in the form of a Conference Championship game?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, I think that that's a positive thing, you know, to play in that, if that's the format you know you're going to be in going into the year and you build toward that and so forth. But you take the Oregon Oregon State game, that was a Conference Championship game, but it just happened to be the last game played in the regular season. It looked like a Conference Championship game. It was as exciting as any one of them could possibly have been.

There may be a day where the Big Ten has a Conference Championship game, there may be a day that the Pac 10 does. But I think you focus in at the beginning of the year as to what are the challenges and what's the schedule look like, and then you work every day to try to get better. If you've positioned yourself at the end of the year to have a chance to be playing for the championship on the last day, then in essence that is the championship game.

Q. You mentioned the speed and tempo of Oregon, how you guys need to be in shape to defend them. Do you go so far as to change your practice? I mean, do you add conditioning in preparation for this?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I think the thing that you need to do is always have a certain amount of conditioning in everything you do, but really the key to your conditioning is playing the game and trying to emulate in practice the tempo with which they're going to come at you and the speed at which they're going to hit you. They have speed everywhere, all the way from their people up front to the people outside and the running backs and quarterback and so forth. But I think it's more of just constant repetition and having a feel for things and trying to get to know and be able to anticipate a little bit and really have the understanding that once that play ends, the next play is coming at you in five or six seconds, so you'd better get lined up.
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COACH TRESSEL: We need an opening statement or what do we need? Opening statement, okay. We've been hard at it, that's for sure. Been on the recruiting trail for a couple weeks. We've had, I think, 16 or 17 guys visit our campus on their official visits and our guys finished their final exams, we'll find out this afternoon at 5:00 how our grades came out. We've had probably two or three padded practices and a couple in shells and I can tell you our guys are excited about playing in the Rose Bowl. They're excited to turn their full attention this week to preparation for a great Oregon team.

I personally have not seen that much film yet because we've been hard at the recruiting and also I had a chance to go to New York City and see Chris Spielman get inducted, which was special to the College Football Hall of Fame, but I can tell you that looking at their schedule, the Pac-10, I thought, was very strong top to bottom and when you play Boise State and Utah as well, they had a heck of a schedule. And obviously scored a lot of points. Saw them on TV a couple times.

Their tempo -- it's one thing to watch the film when I think the cameraman stops in between the plays, but when you watch them live and it's rolling, they have a heck of a tempo. They fly around on defense and so we've got a lot of work to do to prepare and we have a good, solid week this week. We went this morning and we'll have a lifting/video-type day tomorrow and we'll go again Wednesday, and Thursday will be like Tuesday, and then we'll go Friday, Saturday and Sunday and finish up on Monday, hopefully with a game plan set to go before we head home for the holidays, and then we leave on Christmas night, head to Pasadena and get ready for the great week at the Rose Bowl. Questions?

REPORTER: Jim, you said grades you'll know by this afternoon, is anybody in major jeopardy at this point?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, at 5:00 this afternoon, I'll know that for sure. I assume everyone's in major jeopardy until I see -- until their things come true.

REPORTER: How's the health of the team, Jim?

COACH TRESSEL: Pretty good. Haven't had guys out. Everyone's been practicing. Jamaal Berry still isn't back with that hamstring, he's been on the side a little bit. http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059293http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059293http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059293http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059293http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059293Aaron Pettrey's been back kicking a little bit. He expects to be ready to go, which he's a couple weeks ahead of schedule. I'm trying to think who missed late in the year. Who was out near the end? http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059341http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059341http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059341http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059341http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059341Jermale Hines? He's been practicing. Our guys had about 10 days in there where they really didn't have that much practice, so they seem to be in good shape.

REPORTER: http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059292Dexter Larimore, how is he doing?

COACH TRESSEL: Doing fine.

REPORTER: Every year it always seems to be an issue of the layoff, what you're doing bowl preparation-wise, whether that affects you or not,, is there anything you've learned over the years now, any constants that you try to adhere to or any new things you've learned in terms of preparation?

COACH TRESSEL: Every team is so different that it varies. I think the mindset that either goes the right direction or doesn't go the right direction over a length of time probably is more than what you do, more than how much you practice or how little or how much you hit and how little. I think you should hit a lot until there's one guy hurt and then you hit too much.

So you try to do enough of each. As I look at the little bit I've seen of Oregon and what I listen to our coaches who have seen more, they play with great speed, so you better be simulating speed in all that you do. So we've got to make sure we do plenty of that, but I think whether it's what do you do between your bowl game and the opening game because that's a pretty long layoff, or what do you do between your end of the regular season to your bowl game, I think it's -- most of it has to do with are you getting yourselves mentally prepared and do you understand their systems, do you understand their concepts, what we're trying to do against them, why we're trying to do them. We're not doing things extraordinarily different than we have over the last few years. We're playing a little bit sooner, we have a little bit less layoff. In fact, our coaches and players feel a little bit cramped. Really, it's amazing? "We only have this many practices left? I don't know how we're going to get --" So you know, January 1st, be ready.

REPORTER: With respect to the layoff, can Terrelle prepare for this game or can he develop during this time?

COACH TRESSEL: I think both. Hopefully all of our guys, because they do have a little bit more time to work on individual and fundamentals and so forth, whether it's the young guys who won't play out in Pasadena or the veterans who have to get ready, you have a little more fundamental time. When you get into the midst of the season, you have two days to game plan, that's it. So everything's teaching. Your fundamentals maybe slip a little. So I would like to think everyone can develop, Terrelle included, but also you need to prepare. Now, to me, the little tough thing about preparing for a bowl game is that you have all this time and you have all this film and you make all these assumptions. Well, they have all this time and all this film and they're going to do some different things. So you're really not preparing for what you don't know, so it's a little bit of each and you're going to have to be able to adjust in the course of the game because both teams are going to come out and do something maybe a little bit different than they've done all year.

REPORTER: You talked about scouting and you might take some time, as you look back on the season, where did you see things that you liked and what did you see that you didn't like? I know it's a general question.

COACH TRESSEL: The thing that you never like is when you miss practice time and I liked spring practice because we didn't have many guys missing. Preseason wasn't so good because we had a lot of guys missing for various reasons. And then early in the season, we didn't have as many constant, therefore I didn't see the improvement that you'd like early on. I thought in the back half of the season I saw a little bit of improvement and a little bit of being able to build on something they learned the week before that they learned the week before, and I hope this bowl practice, so far, knock on wood, we haven't had people down with this or that. We're trying to spread out or practices and trying to be smart about how much you hit and how much you do this and that. So far they're practicing really hard.

REPORTER: What did you see you did well offensively, Jim? Obviously there are some critics out there of this offense and its production. Where did you see you definitely need to make a stride in these four weeks?

COACH TRESSEL: Probably, I guess you can even look at it statistically, particularly in the back half of the year, we did a much better job taking care of the football and a much better job running the football. Therefore, we did a much better job winning, which if you'll do those things, you look at Oregon, I mean, do they run the football. And that's why they're right now one of the premier offensive football teams in the country because if you can't stop the run, you're going to be in deep danger. So I think what did we do better? I think we rushed for -- I don't have the numbers, but I'm sure we rushed for over 200 yards a game in the last month or so, so if you can do that, you're going to have a chance to be your conference's champion and that we are.

REPORTER: And then what did you see you need to definitely get better at over these four weeks, you talked about the passing game at the end of the year.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, I think we've got to be more efficient and I think we've got to strike when there's opportunities to strike. We had a couple chances in the last game where we could have hit a homerun and we didn't and I think you have to have that as part of your arsenal because then if you do indeed run it pretty well, you think back to the Oregon State/Oregon game, one of the key play his, although they ran for 103 some yards was the 76-yard play on the third down where they had people in the box and people were out there one on one. You have to hit those.

So I think we have to be able to hit homeruns when people decide they're going to put X amount of people in the box to stop your run. That's the balance you like to have and we've got to get a little bit better at that.

REPORTER: Talk about how nice it is playing in the Rose Bowl, now that you've had some time to prepare and sink in a little bit, what does it feel like that you're playing in the Rose Bowl, you personally?

COACH TRESSEL: It doesn't feel much different than most Decembers. Decembers are probably a most demanding month as we have, and none of them are real easy. December is just like you're flying. There's not enough hours in a day. We sat for a couple, three hours with our operations people doing the planning for the entire week out there and how we're going to utilize each moment and trying to find that blend of excellent preparation and great experience for our players being out there and so forth.

Of course you're involved heavily in recruiting each and every day and trying to find ways to get a few moments to work on football and then be in there practicing and so forth. So December, honestly, if you're in a bowl game, December's a blur, so you probably don't feel much because you're just going.

REPORTER: What do you remember about the last time you were there?

COACH TRESSEL: At the Rose Bowl? I remember we jumped offsides when it was first and goal at about the three, vividly remember that. We ended up settling for a field goal and then I think we lost by a field goal. But that's just the coach in me. I remember Cris Carter caught a bunch of balls. I remember we threw some interceptions, but outside of that, I don't remember much. I remember being busy out there. On the day we went to Disneyland, by the time we got in, kids rode one ride and it was time for a recruiting meeting, I remember that. Coach Bruce isn't here, is he?

REPORTER: How much responsibility, pressure, I don't know what the word is, do you feel, does the team feel going into this big bowl game and the last couple of years having ended the way they have? Does it feel any different this year as it has other years, I know you always want to win and there's always pressure, do you sense any additional responsibility to try to make it happen?

COACH TRESSEL: I've never sensed our guys didn't have a strong sense of responsibility, and our guys work hard and prepare hard and so I don't -- I mean, they're doing the same. Where are we right now? I think after, I don't know, five practices or whatever it is, and we've got however many more and then four out there, I think we're doing the things that we need to do.

But there's no doubt about it, in our guys' minds, they know we haven't won a bowl game the last three tries and they've known we've played three very good teams and I think two of them ended up number one and one of them ended up number two. And Oregon is a good team. They know Oregon is as good a team as any team in the nation. So they know the challenge and I think they also feel or know the responsibility, if you will, to represent their conference because guys want to have a 6-1 bowl record rather than a 1-6 because they're part of a conference and so forth, but our guys, I've never been disappointed with their sense of responsibility.

REPORTER: Against a speed team like Oregon, do you want to try to integrate Saine any more, like in Michigan, where I think Herron had more carries?

COACH TRESSEL: I'm not sure we've gone into many games thinking one would have this many carries and one would have that many. We love the fact if those two guys are healthy, that's really a good thing for us and who knows, they could both have 25 carries for all we know or they could both have 12. So I don't know that we'll consciously go in with the thought of Brandon more, but there's no doubt, when he's in there and when Boom's in there, we've got good backs.

REPORTER: Jim, Terrelle was dealing with the ankle after the New Mexico State game, it seemed like it really did affect him at Penn State, got a little better over time. How much did that affect what you guys did offensively in November? The tailbacks were more involved, he was a little less involved and where is the ankle now? How will that maybe affect his involvement in the game plan for the Rose Bowl?

COACH TRESSEL: I think for the first two games in November it was something we had to think about. Once we got to that third week in November, he was a hundred percent. He's a hundred percent now. We've got to make sure he stays that way. So if we can go in with all the folks ready to rock and roll and be healthy, hopefully we can create more problems for their defense.

REPORTER: You mentioned preparing for their speed? How do you do that, how do you replicate that in practice or get ready for speed?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, we always work hard to get ready for speed. The tempo that they bring, the number of plays, how quickly they run them and so forth, we try to not just put all that on the scout team because the scout team wears out after a while. So we integrate it really three different ways, one, we do it with the scout teams, we call it exchange teams. We do it sometimes with a kind of a group of the twos go down and really fire off some plays at them and then we do it when we go ones against one where we'll really go hard on the tempo and that type of thing. They do a good job there. They're, I think, fairly simple in how they attack you, it's just hard to tackle them and cover them and do all the things that they do, but they do it so quickly and they do it with a good feeling for what the next answer is. They can say, okay, I know how they're lining up to our -- when we go fast tempo, okay, so here's what they're going to do.

So we've just got to -- we've got to give our defense as many of those situations, and it's nice and hot in that indoor, and our guys have spent some energy now. So far it's been a good exercise for us.

REPORTER: End of the season, Brewster was banged up, his ankle, and Boren was playing with his situation, and Shugarts, what have you seen, has the line gotten healthier over the last several week and what have you seen in them the last couple days?

COACH TRESSEL: I think they got healthier the back half of the year, yeah, they had a couple ankles or this and that but it was than like they weren't out there practicing. They've all been in there practicing this week. I think you see a little bit more confidence in guys when they can practice and when they can reflect back to the fact they've done a good job when they've been on the right guy doing the right thing with the proper technique. I think they're coming along.

REPORTER: Is that what you saw at the end of the year? Did you see a group that kind of knew where they were going so to speak?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, and had been doing it together. There's not much communication that goes on out there and when you can be on the same page and be helping one another and you get to do that all day long in practice, so again, I don't feel any different than I did back in April. I thought it was critical that we be in there and get reps. We did. Preseason, we weren't in there together and didn't. And it took us a while to grow a little bit. Now, hopefully we'll stay healthy this bowl preparation and through the game and take another step with that group.

REPORTER: This could be a game that can elevate people in the consciousness for next year and stuff.

COACH TRESSEL: Sure.

REPORTER: Terrelle is a case in point. He was preseason offensive player of the year in Big Ten, barely got honorable mention in the post season, have you talked to him about what this game in particular could mean to him and do you sense him wanting to leave 2009 on a high note, so to speak? I know he does, but I mean --

COACH TRESSEL: I sense he wants to leave on a higher note just like our team does. That was a good note that they won the conference outright, but it would be a higher note if you could then go outside of your conference in a BCS bowl game and perform well and be successful and our individual guys feel the same way. I think that the reality that sophomores have is they look at this game as kind of like the midpoint of their career. They're no longer, even though everyone's been talking about them as a young guy, this moment is the midpoint of their career and now they're on the downhill side of their career.

So you'd like to be able to evaluate yourself as, I've grown a lot and here I am at the midpoint of my career and I've got this thing where. I understand what I need to do and now you're going to have to do it against a very good team and that's the challenge of it, but you know Terrelle, he loves to prepare and he gets excited about competition and so yeah, I'm sure he's excited about what a game like this could mean to him and to his team.

REPORTER: How much does Masoli present as a quarterback?

COACH TRESSEL: What does he present?

REPORTER: In the way of challenges.

COACH TRESSEL: To me, the first thing I always like to check out in a quarterback is does he have a good command of what they're doing and he obviously does. He knows when to make the throws, he knows when to hand it, he knows when to keep it. And Number two, he does a great job when things aren't just right, when the play breaks down and all of a sudden you think you might tackle him and he's an elusive guy that keeps plays going and if he needs to lower his shoulder on a fourth and two in a critical moment, he's demonstrated that he'll do that. Physical guy. You can see he loves it.

As I listened to one of the coaches that's played against him said, it just seems like whenever they need something, he delivers it, and that's a pretty good compliment.

REPORTER: How much of the offense at the end of the year, as Doug was asking, how much of that was running so much out of necessity to win that game, how much of it was that's what you like to do, in other words run until or unless someone stops you, or would you like ideally to have more of a balance?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, I think our tenth and eleventh game we were going to power run or pass. We probably weren't going to have the quarterback real involved. In the 12th game when we were back to good health, we were going to do whatever we thought we needed to do based upon how they decided to deploy and they decided that they were going to have a whole bunch of folks inside the box for the power run and so we thought we had some chances to hit homeruns, we thought we had some chances to do some of the zone-type read package and that came out that it was good.

So what would we do? What would we like to do? We're going to go in with the whole shooting match and find out how they decide to play us and I hope we never pound that square peg in the round hole. Sometimes it looks like you're doing it. So we better be able to run and pass because our offense is going to have to be at its best as is our defense and those special teams, you watch their returns, so we're going to be stretched in every phase.

REPORTER: You talked about taking care of the ball in November and obviously in the Purdue game you guys didn't do a good job of that. How much of it was in the game plan going into the week did you maybe take some things out and say we've done some things and put ourselves in some situations that led to turnovers, we're not going to do that or was it more about the decision making in the moment?

COACH TRESSEL: I think some of the plays we've had turnovers on we've run since and didn't turn it over. We didn't take anything out and say, we can't do that concept or whatever. We just, I think, did a better job of taking care of the football.

REPORTER: As you've looked at Oregon's defense what stands out about it? It looks like in many games they've given up many yards but they've made plays when they need to make plays.

COACH TRESSEL: They put pressure on you. They do a good job. They bring extra people and they come from all over the place. As I said, I haven't studied them like, well, not too many people have studied them too much because a lot of us have been on the road but http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059261http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059261http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059261http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059261http://www.buckeyeplanet.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=87743&SPID=10408&DB_OEM_ID=17300&ATCLID=1059261Jim Bollman has probably spent more time in town. As I listen to what he has presented to the group when they've practiced and so forth is that they're a speed team, they have to be a speed team to survive in the spring and preseason. They love to bring pressure. They want to exert pressure on you. And I'm sure they feel that way because if they just sit back all spring and summer, they're going to have problems against what their team does. They're going to make you handle the heat and they can run. I noticed in the TV game there in the civil war, a couple of those pass rushers got after it, 58 and 39 or -- I can't remember exactly, but they're going to bring it to you and see how you handle it.

REPORTER: As a guy that grew up in this culture, another Rose Bowl question, the rotation has sent you other places in other BCS games, championship game, would you have felt something was missing from your career if you didn't go to this game?

COACH TRESSEL: It's something that if you coach in the Big Ten or the Pac-10, it's certainly in front of you every day. It's a goal that you want to be a part of the Rose Bowl and would there be something missing if you never got to go? I guess so. I don't think too much about what's missing. I like to relish in the good fortune we've had. But it's a great feeling to go and go against a team like Oregon and, I don't know, we're like eighth or ninth in the country and they're seventh or sixth. I mean, this is a pretty neat deal and the fact that it's the Rose Bowl, I think it does add a lot more to it if you're a Big Ten or Pac-10 coach.

REPORTER: Jim, have you had a chance to run across Chip Kelly much?

COACH TRESSEL: I met him for the first time in my life the other night, we were at the national football foundation banquet and one of your fellow media guys, can't remember his name, I shouldn't do that. Wait a minute. From ESPN was standing there, chit-chatted as I was really headed out after the program and he introduced me to him and I said, Chip, I'm not sure I've ever met you, great to meet you. And he said, no, we've never met. And he's much younger than me so he can remember better. But we've never met and we got to spin some I-AA yarns and talk about that and talk about -- both of us talked about how we're looking forward to getting out there.

REPORTER: What's your impression of him? He seems aggressive.

COACH TRESSEL: From a coaching standpoint, offensively they get after you and defensively they get after you, so I would say that that would be a fitting label that they're an aggressive put pressure on you group. As an individual, he didn't seem that, but we were both in tuxedos and we were probably both on our best behavior. He didn't take me down and pin me or something, so he wasn't that aggressive. He seemed like a good man.

REPORTER: What's a good I-AA yarn? Going to places that are hard to get to?

COACH TRESSEL: No, we were talking about, hey, isn't this amazing, it's New Hampshire against Youngstown in the Rose Bowl and we were laughing a little bit about, who'd-a-thunk-it, that type of thing.

REPORTER: Have you submitted your list of players for the NFL scouts?

COACH TRESSEL: I've sent in about 10 of them, yeah.

REPORTER: Can you give me a list of any of the guys?

COACH TRESSEL: I'm sure you can guess who. All of them are starters. I haven't sent in any of the guys that are back-ups and don't have film to be studied and we haven't gotten any of the letters back on it. I've gotten a little bit of early indication and shared it with the kids. We tried to do that before they went home for Thanksgiving with the new rule with the December 1 agent thing and all that, so the NFL was good and got us some early things that way the kids could get home and talk a little bit with their folks.

REPORTER: Have you had discussions with Heyward about it?

COACH TRESSEL: No.

REPORTER: Not till after the game or --

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, no, usually what we try to do is before the kids break for practice, if they have any more data they need, we'll try to get on the horn real quick, what would be the latter end of this week and the first day or so of next week before they head home, if they wanted, but we haven't had any discussions.

REPORTER: In regards to recruiting, what's the target number you guys would like to land in this class? I know things can change with guys leaving early or transfers.

COACH TRESSEL: Sure. In the 20 range.

REPORTER: Low 20s probably?

COACH TRESSEL: No, like 20. The lowest 20 you can get.

REPORTER: Jim, do you grow tired about hearing about the bowl record the last few years or is it easier for you to rationalize because you know who you lost to and how much of that do you use as motivation during this preparation time for these players?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I get more weary when they talk about what we have done and pat us on the back than I do anyone saying something that we haven't done because it's the truth. If you get tired of the truth -- I get a little bit queasy, though, when they start talking about, you guys have done this and done this and done this and I know we've done nothing in 2010, haven't won a game yet and here comes 2010, that's what we're working to prepare for.

No, I don't get tired of hearing it. If someone said something that wasn't true, I suppose you would be tired of hearing it. If they said, hey, you've lost nine straight bowl games, you probably want to correct them on that. Hey, it's only been three, or four, I don't know. Three?

REPORTER: Do you use the truth as motivation during the preparation time?

COACH TRESSEL: Half these guys have maybe lost one bowl game and some of these guys were part of a winning bowl game. So, no. It is what it is. As I've said to you before, lots of things we don't have to bring up because we've got a cavalry of people that bring them up for us. So we can just work on breaking the film down and go from there.

REPORTER: Can you talk about what a good job Kelly did to get his team back on track after the calamity of the first game?

COACH TRESSEL: It's always difficult to deal with personnel issues because of how you feel about all your kids and when they error, it hurts you as much as it does anyone. And obviously they circled the wagons and game up with what they thought was in the best interest of the young person and everyone else involved and some people agreed with it, some didn't, but they -- you have to do what you think is right and obviously their team responded because the team had been pretty extraordinary and I think if your team's not on board with what is going on with maybe some individual personnel decisions, you might see that in your overall play and you can't say that you've seen that.

REPORTER: Can you talk about LaMichael James?

COACH TRESSEL: 21? Number 21? Fast. He's hard to bring down. Just a freshman. I mean, he's explosive. I forget, I heard someone talk about the number of plays over X amount of yards he's had. He's one of the system because you better watch the quarterback and you better watch the quick throws to the receivers and you better watch the downfield throws and you better watch the homeruns and by the way, you better stop those tailbacks.

So he's just a good part of it. It's not like any part of their game you could say, well, we won't worry as much about that, we'll go stop this. Well, you better stop him, the quarterback, et cetera, et cetera. So he's been an explosive guy for them and obviously when they were missing their starter, he stepped up and took advantage of the opportunity and now they're back to full strength with two or three guys that can carry it.

REPORTER: You talked about the guys being responsible --

COACH TRESSEL: He's not a big guy, but he's fast. Our guys aren't big guys either, but they're pretty good and he's a good one.

REPORTER: You talked about the guys having a sense of responsibility, the players, how do you keep them from sort of going negative with that, not panic, but they don't kind of just obsess about that responsibility? Are they so insulated from it --

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know about insulated, but they're focused in on what they have to do and they're really engrossed in their offensive or defensive responsibility or their special team responsibility and they don't -- they don't have time to sit around and think about all that stuff. When they're in the film room, they're in the weight room, they're doing all those things. Now, when they get some time to kick back and they're watching TV or whatever and someone says something about it, do they get a twinge? Sure, why wouldn't they? But they don't obsess. They don't have time to obsess.

REPORTER: After some movement in the coaching landscape, have any of your assistants interviewed? Was there permission asked to interview any of your guys?

COACH TRESSEL: We had one of our guys interview to a job that's already filled, so you know he's not the one, but outside of that we haven't.

REPORTER: You mentioned their running backs and they're good individually, but how much of the fact that they're different makes them that much more effective?

COACH TRESSEL: There's a little tempo change. One's got to be 245 pounds by the looks of him, and good. He's a 1000-yard guy. So you're going to have to handle the tempo difference. I've always been one that has liked having that kind of thing, Keith Byars or Beanie and Pittman or whoever, I've always liked to give that additional problem to a defense, so I think it gives an additional problem to the defense.

REPORTER: Looking into your running game in the end of the year, do you attribute that mostly to a better scheme, better blocking, better running by the backs?

COACH TRESSEL: I think we improved across the board. I don't know if -- we didn't do any different schemes, if that's what you mean. There's only so many things you can do. You can go this way or down and pull this guy or you can go straight ahead. There's not many ways you can block differently. So we didn't do much of new schemes, but we got better at what we did, and maybe we recognized better what our guys could do and maybe did a little bit more of this or that. I don't have a self-study in front of me, but I think we just improved.

REPORTER: On that self-study, from Terrelle's standpoint, after 12 games, where did he change or improve most compared to where he was coming into the season?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, his knowledge in general is just tremendously better. I think his ability to adapt. He had one set of circumstances in a whole season and then entered a season with a whole different set of circumstances, so you have to adapt. Made it more difficult to adapt early on because the same guys weren't in there to adapt with, but once we got a little bit better at understanding who we were and guys were in there doing it, I thought he did a good job of adapting to what we needed to get done. So I guess I would say knowledge and, oh, what's the right word? Probably where you can -- adapt was a pretty good word. Adaptability.

REPORTER: Everybody has team goals but they also have individual goals, how does he think about how he's played in this regular season when you've talked to him? Do you think he feels pretty good about it?

COACH TRESSEL: I've said to you guys many times, he's an extreme perfectionist, and so the only way he would have been happy at the end of the regular season was if we were 12-0, completed every pass and he scored 94 touchdowns and threw for another 100. That's just him. I think his ability to adapt and study it and learn what we need to do better and all that has grown, so he's not going to beat himself up that we're not 12-0 and he didn't throw 94 touchdowns, he has the ability to look and say, okay, here's what I need to do better. I'm sure he feels like he's had some progress, but not near as much as he would like to have at this point and going forward, he wants to get much, much better.

REPORTER: He was second team all Big Ten by your peers, the coaches, was that the play, do you think?

COACH TRESSEL: I think it was because Boom was missing so much. I don't know how many league games Boom missed, someone might know here. Three, four, at least half the Big Ten season, so half of those coaches didn't play them and then we didn't play two teams, so now you've got six out of 11 teams that don't know Boom from a head-to-head standpoint and B. Saine was in there pretty steady the rest of the year, so I'm sure it was a little bit from that standpoint. I think when we get our statistics sent to us, they're all games and Big Ten games. I'm sure the Big Ten coaches and media and everyone else look at a little bit more of their decision making based upon what did you do in your conference because this is an all-conference team and Boom wasn't up there in that list.

REPORTER: Did you go into this list not knowing who would emerge at this spot?

COACH TRESSEL: At running back?

REPORTER: Well, normally you don't have a committee, you have a guy.

COACH TRESSEL: We've had committees, I mean, Pittman and Beanie were a pretty good committee.

REPORTER: I just wondered how that played out, if you went in thinking one thing and another thing --

COACH TRESSEL: No, we thought both those guys would be good. Didn't know about the young guys, how they'd be, probably were pleasantly surprised with the way Jordan came along. He was healthy and if you're healthy you practice and if you practice you learn. So he stepped in there. So we were certainly hopeful that Boom and Zoom would come through and I think they did. One more question before we turn you loose on the other crew. Is Lori not here? Xia, do you have a question?

REPORTER: No, but what kind of things are you going to do when you go out to the Rose Bowl considering half of these players have never been to California and this is their first time going to the Rose Bowl?

COACH TRESSEL: There are some neat things planned for them. We have a chance to go to Lawry's Steakhouse which is always the traditional beef-eating contest that the Rose Bowl has. They get to go to Hollywood Improv. They get to go to Disneyland.

REPORTER: How many rides?

COACH TRESSEL: That was the coaches that only got one. Players probably had lots of rides. Coaches won't have many this year either. ESPN Zone is a big deal out there. They'll have free time where they can get a chance to run around and we're staying almost the whole day after the game because we're not in school.
In the past we've had some jump on a plane because school had started or we were four days into school or whatever so we're not leaving until about 7:00 at night on the 2nd, so our guys will have the evening after the game plus virtually the whole day the day after the game, the 2nd, to do a little bit of exploring and whatever they do there, Santa Monica pier or, I'm not sure where we're located, I'm not sure where our hotel is. I've been in places a little different than L. A. the last couple weeks. I guess I can't say where I've been, that'd be illegal. But anyway --

SHELLY POE: Home Depot. The Home Depot Center.

COACH TRESSEL: Home depot Center is where we practice.
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