2010 Weekly JT Press Conferences

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JT's weekly presser.

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COACH TRESSEL: I think I would start by acknowledging the fact that Wisconsin played a heck of a football game and I don't want to discount that in any way, shape, or form. I reflect back a little bit between the last two contests we've had with Wisconsin and it really clarifies what's important in the game of football a year ago, they turned it over and we ran two of them back for a touchdown and we ran a kickoff back for a touchdown and all the rest, and then this particular year, we let a kickoff go for a touchdown. We didn't create the takeaways.

I think the one thing that isn't as glaring to the casual observer is that first down and your success on first down is so critical, and you look back a year ago, we did a really good job of putting them behind the count. We had some early down sacks on them and put them second and a mile, and this year I think 17 of the 27 first down plays that they had resulted in more than four yards, and then all of a sudden if you're ahead of the count, it's playing offensive football is a whole different thing. I think we were 14 out of 29 where we had four yards or more, which, you know, isn't dominant by any respect, but I think that first down situation, we talk about every play as being a different situation, how did you do on first down, how did you do on third down, how did you do kickoff cover versus kickoff cover, punt cover versus punt cover and so forth. But I thought a significant part of this game is that they did an excellent job on first down.

I think the other reality is that the Buckeyes never quit. The Buckeyes played and played. I thought we did a good job of putting ourselves in position to have a chance to get back in the game and perhaps take over the game and, again, to their credit, they put together a nice drive which was keyed by a couple key third-down conversions that they did a nice job with and those really are the realities in the football game.

The atmosphere was everything we had hoped it would be. It was not such that we couldn't do what we needed to do and it did create energy and so forth, and I think it would be something that our guys and our fans that went and so forth will always have in their memory bank as being one of those special nights of Big Ten football. And then I think as you move forward from any tough loss and really from any win is you have to make sure you have things in the proper perspective, which is, you know, sometimes difficult for young people because their numbers of experiences aren't as great. When you've been through lots of losses or lots of wins, you have a little bit more experience at it, but I think the thing that we've always tried to talk to our guys about is that one of the realizations that you always have to have is the difficulty of your challenge and I think our guys, as they come to Ohio State, don't necessarily choose Ohio State simply because they know it's a difficult situation to live up to the expectations and so forth, but that's real.

And you have to have in perspective that the challenges are tough and there's going to be days when it doesn't go exactly as you would like it to go, and what is really the measure of the person is how they deal with that adversity. And sometimes it gets a little philosophical with young people and you talk to them about the fact that you will really appreciate the fact that when you do have adversity and handle it, that will be something that you'll feel real good about.

One of our former managers, a young guy named Pat Stewart who was a field manager for us, set up the dummies and ran and did everything that you could ever ask a youngster to do, went and became kind of an assistant director of something or other at Temple, and his last year there they were 1-11, and then he got a job with the New England Patriots, and his first year there, they were 18-1, so he went from 1-11 to 18-1. And he happened to get ahold of me on Sunday and he said, you know, he said, it's really interesting the experiences I've had, he said, that 1-11 was hard, he said, but that one that we lost, one out of the 19 games at New England, that hurt more than the 11. And he said, it's funny how that works. And he said, but the good news is this, now as I reflect -- and now he's acting like he's old or something. He said, but now as I reflect, what I probably have as much joy from as anything is the one at Temple, because I know how hard we had to battle and the adversity we went through. And he said that is something that I'll never forget. And that is a little bit of reality.

Now, is that something that our guys could relate to? Not necessarily because they haven't been on both sides of the spectrum. But to them, the one that they got this year is hurt. And if it doesn't hurt, if it didn't hurt, you'd be disappointed because our guys do have those expectations. Our guys do have that passion to please people and they do love the fact when the fans are excited about things going the right direction and their families are excited and their friends are excited and then when it doesn't, the disappointment is deep. And so one of the great teachable moments we always have is adversity.

To me the key will be, what kind of students are we, because if you're being taught through adversity, how well are we learning from it, and that will be the fun of attacking the practice field. Because what's interesting is Purdue really doesn't care about the difficulty of the challenge or the adversity or the disappointment of maybe letting someone down. Purdue has had their own adversity. They lost their quarterback early. They lost a running back in preseason. They lost a great receiver. And to their credit, they just rolled up their sleeves and have gotten better and better and better and find themselves by doing so, sitting at the top of the Big Ten, 2-0, playing well, young quarterback coming in and the staff, I think, is doing a great job with that young quarterback. He's a very, very good runner and a very good passer. I think they're doing the things that conceptually he understands and keep adding a little bit as he goes and in terms of our situation, Purdue doesn't really care about our adversities, they've dealt with their own, they just care about getting better. And what we have to make sure when we take the field this afternoon is that we're most concerned with getting better at what we need to do. Our players and coaches spent just as long on Sunday watching the film together as they normally do, and someone asked me on the Big Ten call, well, how were our guys this week. Well, Sunday they were tired. They were sore. They were disappointed, but they went to work and went to do what they had to do. Yesterday was their day off and there were lots of them roaming around the building, watching more film, lifting weights and doing all the things they do on an off day, but in my mind, the measure of how we confront that adversity and what kind of students we are of adversity will be determined by how we hit the practice field and how we take the field on Saturday and, you know, life is tough.

I remember our homecoming, we probably had about 2300 people and theres wasn't a whole lot of hoopla. We get to take the field on Saturday with 106,000 people and quite a bit of hoopla and a Big Ten game and we're playing the leaders of the Big Ten and we get to have pregame meal with about 50 former captains who all, I'm sure, weren't undefeated. They might sometimes act like it, you know, but they know that they went through some tough times and that what's important to them is the Scarlet and Gray, and so how we approach the great challenges we have and the things that are in front of us will be the mark of what kind of students of adversity we are and we look forward to it.

Injury-wise, I was telling someone, Ken, I think, at lunch, the only guy that really concerns me, Ross Homan is going to be out. That concerns you. He'll be out for a couple weeks probably, but his thing will be fine. A little bit concerned about Christian Bryant. He had an infection last week and we thought we had it under control and he played a little bit in the game and then he had a not very good reaction to it on the plane ride back once we finally got on the plane, and he's been over at Ohio State Medical Center trying to get it under control and I don't know all the whys and the wherefores and whatnot, but it doesn't look like he'll be out of there until late this week and just want to make sure that we get that calmed down, you never know with infections and whatnot, so obviously he won't have a week of practice. I'm trying to think of who else was out of the game. Ross will be out for a couple weeks.

REPORTER: Orhian Johnson played, but he looked like he was getting banged up.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, he got dinged a little bit, but he seems fine. Seems like he'll be ready to roll today. J.B. Shugarts, his foot hurts and is going to hurt, but he was able to go through it. Was there anyone else, Shelly, that was out of the game?

REPORTER: Is it an ankle with Ross?

COACH TRESSEL: It's a foot. Yeah, it's a foot.

REPORTER: Are you talking about like a staph infection with Christian?

COACH TRESSEL: No, no, don't be starting to spread rumors. I did not -- strike that from the record. I did not say anything about that word. He has an infection. I don't know.

REPORTER: I want to ask --

COACH TRESSEL: But I never heard that word brought up by anybody, so --

REPORTER: Are you ready for questions?

COACH TRESSEL: I'm from Cleveland. I just want to make sure we're clear.

REPORTER: I want to ask about your defensive line. In years past, Coach Heacock has rolled guys in and out. In that 19-play drive, Johnathan Hankins was the only guy that came in. In past situations, he would have put four new guys in to stop the tide. Do you not have the depth there? What is the assessment of where that's at now?

COACH TRESSEL: I can remember many times we've talked since last February that one of the concerns was that five of our eight in our eight-man rotation were graduating or going out early, one of the two. So, yes, we were concerned about would we mature to the point where we could get into an eight-man rotation. Johnathan Hankins, I think, has been a guy that's come along. We think Adam Bellamy's coming along, Garrett Goebel's coming along. What you get into in a ball game like this is, you know, is it the right time and the right place to put someone in? Obviously the conclusion that was drawn in that drive in particular or in that game was that certain guys played, certain guys didn't, but that's probably been something we've talked about as much as anything is that if we were going to progress to become the team we would like to be, we have to grow fast with some of the younger guys and that's still our goal and -- but are we as deep and can we rotate as much as when we had -- you know, you had Thaddeus and you had Lawrence Wilson, you had Doug Worthington, you had Todd Denlinger, you had Rob Rose. Those guys all were the rotators last year and, you know, they're rotating elsewhere right now. But that's where we are. Don't get me wrong, I don't think Jim would tell you that he's disappointed with the progression of Adam or Garrett or Solomon Thomas or anyone, but he just, at the moment, felt like that wasn't the best decision.

REPORTER: Jim, as you look at your defense now, though, are you all more built to take on teams like Oregon or Miami or whoever than you are the anomaly almost that is Wisconsin now, the team that's built to just kind of run you over if they can? Have you all been looking at that even this weekend?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, yes and no. You take Oregon, they're going to rush for 275 yards on you. I don't know what Wisconsin was, how many yards did they rush for?

REPORTER: Hundred and -- I forgot what it was.

COACH TRESSEL: 180 or something, but it wasn't like it was some outlandish numbers. You have to be ready to go against the whole gamut. That's why we try to give them as much of that whole gamut as we can. I don't think you can discount the efficiency of their pass game. That's why I started with acknowledging Wisconsin. I thought Tolzien did a good job and you guys know I've been a fan of his since he came onto the scene. He was very efficient. He hit a couple key passes. He hit the bubble passes right on the mark. He was very efficient. So they did a good job, you know, but the one thing, the more you watch our defensive performance, the one thing our guys never did was stop playing and they kept banging and it wasn't -- we gave them seven points, so I don't know that they scored some outlandish numbers of points against us, and we didn't score enough against them.

REPORTER: It's just as you watched it, it looked like at least early, of course, it was relentless the way they sort of just mowed down the field.

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, I think the one that probably hit us, that gashed us more, we use that word sometimes when we're talking about eight- and nine-yard plays, was the one right after our poor punt coverage where they got the ball out about mid field and they were already up 7-0, and that one, to me, looked very different than we've ever seen. Outside of that, they had their moments and they made their first downs by a bit and -- but you have to be built to stop all that stuff because the next week you might face that and that's just part of the deal.

REPORTER: It would stand to reason that after what happened a year ago that Purdue will have the full attention of all your players, I would take it, right?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, absolutely, and what you hope you have full attention of is what you have to do to get better, more so than it being Purdue, and that's who we have to have full attention as to what they do. But full attention really is, in my opinion, has always been what do we have to do to become the best we can be. Let's face it, in this day and age, the single hardest thing, I think, for anyone is to keep the focus on the task that's going on right this second. The world isn't built that -- we talk about how offenses and defenses are built. The world isn't built that way right now. The world is so -- even now you get -- someone said, oh, run the table. Run the table? Wait a minute, we've got to play this game, you know, and so that to me is your biggest challenge and our guys will have the full attention of Purdue.

REPORTER: Along with Rusty was saying though, if you were on a winning streak and you had beaten Purdue handedly last year, would it not be a little more difficult than -- having lost to them, I would think no matter what happened this last week, the guys would remember that.

COACH TRESSEL: You would think, but I've been doing this a long time and I've never pretended to know what every individual is thinking. We talk a lot about what we think we should be collectively thinking, but what each individual is thinking, I can't promise you I know, but the answer to your question is, you'd think so, but that's not real strong.

REPORTER: Jim, the defense altogether has eight sacks through seven games. Was it a matter of rolling in some of that youth and having some injury concerns bouncing around or are teams attacking you guys a little bit differently?

COACH TRESSEL: So what you're saying is that's a low number compared to --

REPORTER: Well, last year you had 30 through 13.

COACH TRESSEL: Through 13 games?

REPORTER: I guess if you were to equate that out, that would be --

COACH TRESSEL: Half as many. Yeah, I was a math guy. Why is that, are you asking me?

REPORTER: I mean, does it have more to do with just some of the injuries and some of the youth that you're having to bring in, as you mentioned Garrett and Adam and some of these other guys?

COACH TRESSEL: If I had to bet, like most answers it's probably a little bit of lots of things. The one, though, that might be the highest would be if I were Wisconsin, for instance, getting ready for the 10 game watching the 9 game, I'd say I'm not going to do anything where I'm going to have that kind of sack situation and my quarterback hit like that, so I'm not going to throw when they think I'm going to throw or when I need to throw. So I better not be second and 13 a whole bunch. So I would say probably the fact that people are not putting themselves in situations like that, plus just -- you didn't give me the question in advance, nor did I give you the question which happens sometimes, but we probably haven't played as many quarters of football in seven games as maybe we have in seven games before with our guys. We've worked hard at getting extra guys in in those games where we could and that type of thing. So I don't know that the numbers are spot on exactly with the situation, but I think you could probably come up with three or four good realities as to why. And I know this, if there's a guy like Cam, you might give him a little extra attention from a chip standpoint or from leaving an extra guy in, those kinds of things, but I'm sure there's lots of answers to your question.

REPORTER: Jim, on the kick coverage, when you went back and looked at it, was the breakdown Saturday similar to the issues that you guys have had earlier in the year and what else can you do to address the kick coverage at this point?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, there aren't any other issues, other than being in your lane and taking on blockers and everyone being where they're supposed to be. So, yeah, they're the exact same. What can you do? You can try to grow to understand that it just takes one guy -- we always talk as a kickoff return team, make them be perfect because if there's only one guy off, you have a chance. If you have a guy that can find that seam. You know, we had -- we had probably two or three problems on that first kick. I don't know that our number 10 guy folded and hit the crease with the velocity he should have. Our Number -- I guess it would have been seven or eight guy went around the block. Our number five guy got grabbed and tackled. I mean, there were a lot of things that were a part of that, but the bottom line is that when you're covering kicks, there's no excuses, they don't care if you get pushed in the back, grabbed, held, thought you should have gone around it, thought the ball was going here or there, you have to fit. And just like when you're playing defense, you have to fit. Kickoff, you have to fit from 70 yards away. Defense you have to fit from the line of scrimmage. We just didn't fit. But that's really nothing new as to when you err on kickoff return, it's because of poor fit, and when you fit it up right, you usually can get them on the ground normally in relation to the depth and height of your kick. Sometimes you may say, I've got the 29 yard line, that's too far. The kick landed on the 12, that's pretty good. The kick landed on the three, we want them right around the 21. If you let some creases happen, I think the average start after we kicked off for them was the 44 yard line because they had one at the zero and then the other ones after that. But our consistency with our fits and our consistency with our kicks, I mean, you guys have been there, haven't been what we need.

REPORTER: It looked like that one guy, the number seven you were referring to, just got steered right out of his lane, I mean, is that accurate?

COACH TRESSEL: Uh-huh, yeah.

REPORTER: What do you reinforce with that one particular guy this week?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, with Coach Haynes who was in charge of the unit and the three or four coaches who assist him is they are constantly talking about you can't go around a blocker in that, you have to -- you have to take on blockers square and two gap and so forth. As soon as you go around them, you think, well, I can go around them, I'm going to catch him. Well, you're not going to catch him, not when you're going a million miles an hour that way and he's coming this way, it doesn't happen. So you're going to stress fundamentals, and I don't want to -- please don't paint the picture that us having the kickoff taken back lost the game, because we still had -- we still had 59 minutes and 48 seconds, so we had plenty of time to make up for that, but we've got to get better at that.

REPORTER: But following that, were you disappointed as much about your offense not being able to immediately answer, too?

COACH TRESSEL: Sure.

REPORTER: I mean, obviously, what did you all talk about Sunday or whatever with the team just about, I don't know if that even came up, but just you've got to be able to answer.

COACH TRESSEL: We didn't watch the film as a team and say, okay, we didn't fit this up and so forth, now, offense, we needed you to answer and, hey, punt team, we needed the ball kicked over here and we needed a tackle, we didn't do that as a whole team, we'd still be there. There's rules against that. But, you know, you could take many junctures of the game. Okay, we had a kickoff return against us, okay, offense you didn't answer, okay, we had a punt team, you didn't answer when you were called on the punt, you didn't change the field. Defense, you didn't answer when they got the ball where they got the ball. I mean, you could go back and forth between every series, that's our job is to answer. I think you have to go and you have to get a little bit more -- there is a large emotional part of it, but yet there is a -- you can't get all caught up in the big picture and not take care of your gap, so, yeah, there were lots of things we were certainly correcting, after the interception, you know, we need to go down and get some points. Seven preferably. And we got zero. So where is that moment in the game that could have shifted it, and, you know, you've got to give this to Wisconsin, they didn't let you shift it. You know, we took them back to 21-18. They could have not answered. But, you know Wisconsin answered and Wisconsin's a good football team.

REPORTER: You did a couple of things differently, we saw some pistol and some option we haven't seen this year, what went into the decisions to try some of those things particularly early or maybe you knew if what you normally do would be successful?

COACH TRESSEL: I guess you're your practicing and your study of your opponent and the way they lined up and you thought that was the best way to attack. That's always the flip of the coin. We could be sitting here saying, why did you run those same old plays you always run, they knew you were going to run those plays, why didn't you try something new, because that's what we decided.

REPORTER: You've had your share of injuries on defense this year and losing a guy like Homan who's your leading tackler, are you going in right now thinking you're not going to have Bryant?

COACH TRESSEL: Christian Bryant? No, we won't have Christian Bryant.

REPORTER: He won't play?

COACH TRESSEL: No, he's going to be in the hospital, I'm told, until Friday.

REPORTER: Who goes for him?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I don't know the answer to that question. I do know this, if we were playing Purdue of yesteryear, you would have had a nickel guy in the game every snap. Purdue of today is -- does more things, which everyone thought Purdue is this ingenious group, well, heck they lined up the same way every time, just threw it every down, but you had the same guys on the field. Now they do a lot of different things. So you're going to have your base people in the game a decent amount, but you're going to have your nickel situations as well. Without having sat in the defensive room and talked about it with them, you have a couple different ways you can go, Jermale Hines has played a lot of nickel, which would probably put Gant in the game. Nate Oliver was your number two nickel all spring and all season until he got hurt, and he's back healthy. He played a little bit of special teams Saturday, so he's obviously an answer to that. Or you can do what Iowa does. Iowa plays nickel with their base people and that's what Miami Florida does. Miami plays their nickel looks with their base people, so I'm sure there's a number of things you can do.

REPORTER: Does Newsome give you that -- if he plays in place of Homan, does he give you that flexibility?

COACH TRESSEL: He's pretty good in space. Now, he's young, and you'd probably need to limit the things you do, but that's one option.

REPORTER: What's your depth chart there, is he now the guy in place of Homan?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, Andrew would play inside and Johnathan finished the guy at the Sam and without having a depth chart in front of me, I can't think of that many more options.

REPORTER: Jim, Ryan Kerrigan really gave you guys fits last year, can you talk a little bit about him?

COACH TRESSEL: He's a good player. I think our league has some outstanding defensive ends. You think back last year with Graham, and Odrick, the big D lineman at Penn State, and of course Cam Heyward and J. J. Watt, and Ryan Kerrigan, we've got some good ones. We've got some guys that you better understand that they're everywhere. So, I mean, he did some real damage against us a year ago. And so we've got to -- we've got to have an answer for that one.

REPORTER: Can you talk about the evolution of quarterbacks and all players, but did last year's Purdue game change Terrelle a bit more dramatically than other games?

COACH TRESSEL: I think anytime you survive, it's maybe a little harder to learn than when you don't survive and we didn't survive, he didn't survive. That gets your attention sometimes dramatically. I didn't see, like, a whole different player. I saw a more refined guy and those kinds of things. He methodically has been moving along and with every new adventure comes a new amount of information you gain and experience you gain and he's a competitive guy now, but, yeah, I think that was -- I think that was -- if you asked him, name the three times you thought you were doing the best and he'd name whatever they were and, hey, name the two times you thought where you didn't do so well, chances are he might bring that up because to him, winning and not winning is the measuring stick and the fact that that was not a win, that's paramount to him.

REPORTER: What about Saturday, I mean, how hard does he take Saturday at Wisconsin, and your assessment of how he played and what you want to see from him this week?

COACH TRESSEL: I think he played extremely competitively. I thought he did some real good things in both the run and the pass. I thought there were a couple of things that obviously he would have liked to have done better and we would have liked to have him do better, but as far as competing and wanting to do anything he could do for the good of the team, he would have gone down to cover kickoffs if you let him, that's just his nature. Another good experience for him. Fun atmosphere. Hard to communicate at times. And still have to keep the focus. And, you know, we had a ball or two dropped. We had a ball or two that probably weren't delivered where we needed them. I'm sure he'd like to have that last throw back because we had a chance with it. Dane was breaking open over top of that linebacker and didn't get it done, but he competed. I don't know what else you can ask of a guy as to leave it on the field and he left it on the field.

REPORTER: One loss and people get desperate around here and think --

COACH TRESSEL: You think? I haven't noticed that.

REPORTER: What do you tell Ohio State's fans that say it's still out there, that you could still accomplish, that you still have it left?

COACH TRESSEL: Gosh, we spend -- even though you don't think so, we spend a lot of time with the media and I don't know if we tell anyone anything, but we give our viewpoint and I don't know that that's changed anyone's thinking, so Earle used to always say -- is Earle here?

REPORTER: He's not.

COACH TRESSEL: "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." People are going to have their opinions of whether the world ended or it didn't and all that, you know, I'm not going to get in the telling business. We've got to get better today, and I think the people will still get excited about their Buckeyes and there's a lot of good Ohio State football ahead, but I'm not -- I'm not going to get out beyond what's going to go on this afternoon or Saturday, because that's all that we need to concentrate on.

REPORTER: Jim, when you -- you've talked a lot about the way you guys hung in there, but especially the first two drives offensively in the second half, what was it exactly you thought just was working better than the first half when you guys maybe didn't --

COACH TRESSEL: Well, we scored obviously.

REPORTER: I know, but it seemed like you got some things going with Boom.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: Did you feel like you changed a lot of what you were trying to do or did you just execute things better things you'd always do in a game?

COACH TRESSEL: I would guess they may have thought we were going to be a little more pass oriented and I can't speak for them, you know, because we were down 21-3. And I suppose conventional wisdom, had we run the ball and got stopped, man, people really would have been, man, you're crazy, we're down 21-3 and you're running up the middle and all that, you know, and I thought our guys executed well. Up front offensively, I think for the most part, our run blocking was pretty good. I thought our pass protection, in general was pretty good. We had one or two where 99 got around us that one time that pushed our field goal back that I think really hurt us. If I had to do it over again, I think I'd have thrown a ball that was -- had quicker rhythm as opposed to a full drop and giving him that chance to run the corner. But I thought for the most part up front, we competed. We held our own in there, but I just thought we executed better and I think anytime you can run the ball in there and mix it in with your pass, you're going to have a better chance to move it. I thought that 90-some-yard drive was a good one. It did a lot of things. A, it finally got us some points. And, B, it kept our defense on the bench which -- the best defense you have is on the bench. So it did that and gave us a chance to -- I don't know how many minutes that drive was, but it was pretty significant.

REPORTER: Earle also used to say that after a loss, he always took the back roads home, the back streets home because people were after him.

COACH TRESSEL: I took the back road home last night, I couldn't get out of the parking lot, that Obama event, oh, my gosh, you could hardly get home. But I didn't take the back road, but it was hard to get home.

REPORTER: Is there any difference to how people react to you and the questions you get, things like that on your radio show, things like that?

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know, I haven't had a radio show yet.

REPORTER: But you've had losses before and --

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, I see, just in general?

REPORTER: Yeah. Do people --

COACH TRESSEL: I mean, nothing surprises you. You guys get the same emails I do. They're all copied to you, so nothing should surprise you. But, I mean, sometimes we take pleasure in being someone's outlet.

REPORTER: Was there a time on Saturday night when you were sitting there waiting for the charter which didn't look like it was ever going to show where you kind of go, this is one of those days? Do you ever compartmentalize? And will you be changing charter companies? But go ahead.

COACH TRESSEL: That decision's made way above my office level.

REPORTER: I would think you have input.

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I've never gotten caught up in, hey, boy, were we lucky today, you know, because you can always look at some things you did well, nor have I ever been caught up in I guess this just wasn't our day because you can always find a whole bunch of things that we could have made it our day. If the third down pass that was just barely completed when it was 21-18, if it was knocked down or we got to them or whatever and we got the ball back, who knows what we could have maybe had the momentum to do. So, no, I've never -- you know like Rusty said, this is not one of the places where you're allowed to have one
of those days, so, therefore, you might as well not think you have one.

REPORTER: Did Dorian Bell make the trip?

COACH TRESSEL: No.

REPORTER: What's his status?

COACH TRESSEL: Right now, yeah, he's hurt. Who did we play before Wisconsin? Indiana. He got a concussion in that game and hasn't been back.

REPORTER: Does that impact you on special teams?

COACH TRESSEL: Every guy that was a starter on your special teams that you don't have is no different than not having a starter on offense or defense. It's a guy that has had the reps, it's a guy that has had the experiences in the games. So, yeah, everyone you -- you lose your holder, it's an impact.

REPORTER: Along those lines, obviously the next guy always has to step up, but with Christian now, that's the third guy in that secondary group, just how difficult does it make it when you just have to move down the depth chart that much when it's one area?

COACH TRESSEL: You answered the question in the beginning. Someone's got to step up. I mean, who cares how difficult it is, on a scale of one to 10, I don't know, regardless of how difficult it is, it's got to -- we've got to have someone ready, that's why you get to practice Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and have walk-throughs on Friday. If you want anyone to care that you've had three guys in your secondary hurt, you're coaching the wrong sport at the wrong school because we've got to be ready.

REPORTER: What about Kline, did he not play as well?

COACH TRESSEL: He didn't play. I don't think he even played on any special teams. He's been banged a little bit. Probably could have gone, but wouldn't have been anywhere close to a hundred percent. We're hoping that this week he can get back to that. Dionne, you get -- Natalie bailed on us? No excuses. This is not the place for excuses. Dionne?

REPORTER: You've talked a lot about the maturity of this group earlier in the season, how important will that be heading out of this and where do you tangibly see that from a coaching perspective?

COACH TRESSEL: I think, as we've always talked about leadership and maturity that it's not really tested until those adverse moments and you get adverse moments in training camp and training when people want to stop and talk that, but not like in real games when all of a sudden now you have some adversity and you can't have that game back. So I think you'll see a good demonstration of our level of maturity and leadership and so forth and I have confidence, we have the right kind of people. All right, Lori?

REPORTER: Both Illinois and Wisconsin came out hard charging out of the gate and I'm wondering if there was a common denominator in those games, are those experiences something you could learn from that would help you be more productive earlier in games?

COACH TRESSEL: You mean not get behind?

REPORTER: Are teams coming at you, doing a better job coming at you with something you don't expect or --

COACH TRESSEL: I don't think so. I thought Illinois had a couple nice little wrinkles offensively. They had a week off and so forth. I thought Wisconsin had some good things and I thought defensively did some good things. They kind of shifted coverage-wise a little bit on some things that we hadn't seen, but still there's answers to everything and so I don't know, I mean, again, that reality of where we reside is that you're always going to face a team that looks better the day you play them than they did on the film. They're going to play better than they ever have. We told our guys countless times that there are 10 teams that want one thing for sure and that's for Ohio State not to be the Big Ten champions and that's real. So that's what you signed up for. That's what you know. And now let's see how you can handle it and we'll get a little glimpse of that on this afternoon's practice, but the real look at it will be Saturday and then the following Saturday and the following and following. But, you know, that's the fun of it. That's the fun of the challenge.

 

[BB73]

Today's presser.

Official.site

COACH TRESSEL: Well, the Buckeyes are 6-0 and Paul Keels is 1-1. It's good to see Paul back and we missed him, but glad he's feeling well and the Ohio State Hospitals could be there for him.

It's good to have a homecoming. I think anytime you're really anxious to get back out on that field, it's nice that it's your own field and I thought our guys prepared well after, you know, a significant disappointment the week before and we were most interested in trying to get better. And I thought we had a good week of practice. I thought Purdue helped us by kicking it out of bounds, and that just is another reminder of the impact that the special teams have, not just in the simple field position, but in the emotional flow of the game, gave us great field position. Now we're in a situation where we're 60 yards away from points rather than maybe 80, and I think your percent chance of scoring is, like, maybe 20 to 25 percent higher just between those two field zones. And then they had the error on their punt return and all of a sudden it was 14-0, and we were at home and they were young and they had been through adversities of their own with injuries to their great receiver and their quarterback and tailback, and then I think later in the game the quarterback got banged a little bit, so it was an adverse situation for them and a situation that turned out such that we could play some guys and, again, get a little bit more depth built and see if we can enter this final third of the regular season with good health and good play and momentum.

And now we need to go on the road and play better than we've played on the road. We head to Minnesota and it will be the first time for any of us on our team to ever have seen the stadium let alone play in it, so that will be exciting for us. And it's an evening primetime game, and our guys will get excited about that. So now we've got to go back to work and understand that we're facing a veteran quarterback in Adam Weber. We had him in youth camp. I thought he was outstanding then, and 10,000 yards later I think he's still outstanding. And I think the school career passing record for us is a little over 7,000 and he's got 10,000, just to put it in perspective what he's been able to accomplish and he's a heck of a player. He's a competitor. He's a senior. You can just hear in his comments that he doesn't want to hear about coaching transition or this or that, this is still the 2010 Minnesota Golden Gophers and still the same team it was at the beginning of the year who has a passion to get some good things done, and through his leadership, you can be sure that they'll never stop, and that's the kind of leader that you want to have. And he leads a young group of receivers who I think are getting better and better and they've done a good job of giving you a lot of different formation looks, a lot of different personnel groupings.

It will be a good challenge from a linemen assignment standpoint, to begin with, for our defense, and they've moved the football. I think they had 27 first downs last weekend. Normally you're going to win if you have 27 first downs. So they'll give our defense every challenge we could possibly want. Over on their defensive side, they were very young when they began, now they're eight or nine games into it and they're no longer -- you no longer talk when you talk about a team of so and so had this many starters returning because that's irrelevant now because they're going into this point in the season.

And they seem to have dialed up a little bit more of their pressure package in this last game or so than they did earlier in the year. They did a similar amount against us a year ago, so it's not like we haven't seen it. It's not like it's anything brand new, but they are bringing good pressure. I think they're playing a little bit loose and getting just excited to go out and hit somebody and see if they can create turnovers and so forth, so it will be a great challenge for us.

Special teams, we always say, is the key when we go on the road and I think if anyone has an interest in Big Ten football and doesn't think that the special teams had maybe the biggest impact on last weekend, Wisconsin's fake punt was probably the turning point in that game. Michigan State's fake punt was probably the turning point in that game. I think Iowa missed a field goal, which was big, and an extra point, perhaps. The Cleveland Browns, I didn't see it, but the little reverse pass or whatever they did was huge in their game, and on and on and on. Missouri, I think, didn't they bring the opening kickoff back?

So special teams is something that we'll never stop talking about and you'll never be able to convince me of its relative impact on the emotion of the game, and football is an emotional game. And so we've got to make sure that despite the fact that we've had to go with a lot of different lineups due to injuries in the linebacker and DB areas, we've got to get better at special teams, especially on the road. It's a huge impact. Purdue found that. Go full circle, Purdue found that out, coming over here, you can't make two big special teams mistakes and think you're going to win in someone else's stadium.

So we're looking forward to preparing. I don't know today if we'll be inside or out. It looks a little nasty. I worry about our cameramen, their well-being up there 50 feet in the air. So we'll see how that goes, but we're looking forward to it.

Health-wise, Christian Bryant is still in the hospital. His foot's doing good. The effects of all the medications and so forth, still haven't released him yet. We hope here today or tomorrow, last I heard. But his foot's doing fine. I'm sure it will be six weeks or better before he can play football.
Ross Homan, I think, will do a little land running today. He's been running in water a lot. I don't think there will be any way that he would be ready for this weekend. Who else am I missing? Corey Brown's going to be out for the year and the spring.

REPORTER: Dorian Bell?

COACH TRESSEL: Dorian probably won't make it for this week, but we'd like to think that he'll be back sooner than a week ago. He's not going to be -- it will be close probably for -- after the bye week, yeah.

REPORTER: Jim, I'm wondering, when you have a bye week, obviously you want the people to heal, get a little bit healthy, but when you're laying out your plans for practices, is there anything that you say, look, we'll address this when we have an opponent, but when we have an extra week, this is something we need to get into, but from a coaching standpoint, how do you use that extra week that you have when you've got a bye week?

COACH TRESSEL: We haven't had a bye week a whole bunch around here. In my nine years, we've probably had it half the time maybe, I'm guessing. Sometimes it's been early. Sometimes it's been late. I think, as you say, your health is first, catching up academically is second, just less time for them in football. And then what happens sometimes you say, you know what, we need to start doing this or that and now we can get some rehearsal on it, but that is way ahead of Minnesota. What you didn't want to do, you just did.

REPORTER: Purdue said that they basically went back to basics and started hitting a little bit more and they changed their entire plan during the week they had off.

COACH TRESSEL: I see.

REPORTER: I'm wondering as the week progresses, do you say this is something we don't have time now, but we'll address this later?

COACH TRESSEL: I think an early-in-the-year bye week is different than a late-in-the-year bye week, and I remember, Jim, were you still -- no, you weren't still on the team when they played Alabama and then they had two weeks off?

JIM LACHEY: '86, I think.

COACH TRESSEL: That was '86, but they went back and kind of had another training camp because it was so early. We kind of did that in '02 when we played Texas Tech and then Kent and then a bye and then I think Washington State, but we kind of went back to the basics, but I don't think you do that in late October, early November, and I don't think you make the plans for it until you know what your scenario is, the health and all those things. As you said eloquently, Minnesota is what it's all about.

REPORTER: J.B. Shugarts, it seems like he's trying to cut things out as much as he can with his foot. Is this a game where he may not play a full game? Last year you rested Boren in one of the games, is this a potential? Would that help him to have two weeks of rest leading into your final? And the other part of this is what is the push/pull for this, he gets beat in a sack in the game on Saturday, is that potentially because he's not a hundred percent?

COACH TRESSEL: You asked a few questions there.

REPORTER: I've got a lot of them in here.

COACH TRESSEL: The one time that 94 ran around him, he just had a poor kick slot, just poor technique, got off the ball a little bit late. If you get off late on 94, I don't care if your feet feel good or don't feel good, you're not going to get him. As far as feet, I've said to you before, I don't know if he'll ever have good feet. We were hoping to get 25 plays before it got too inflamed and that kind of thing and we got 39, I think, before it was just -- all of a sudden he couldn't do the job. I thought he did the job pretty well. In fact, I think he graded a winning performance in the ball game.

So, no, we wouldn't go into this game saying we're going to rest anybody. This game obviously has conference implications and everything else. And I think the game Justin might have sat out was New Mexico State, and probably if it was a conference game, you would have wound it up and so forth. But he's hurting. And like you say, he's just trying to fight through it.

REPORTER: Has Andrew Norwell been a pleasant surprise especially coming off such a serious injury? Obviously you like him, you recruited him.

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know about a surprise, because you think you've got a good one, how's he going to adjust, how's he going to be away from home, how much is he going to know about pass protection. High school guys usually are pretty good run blocking because the guys against them aren't quite as big and all that, but he's got very quick feet. He's very instinctive. Got a long way to go, but the experiences he's getting now, we're lucky he's as good as he is, and the experiences he's getting are tremendous, but he's still a freshman playing a very difficult position, but we're happy he's a Buckeye for sure.

REPORTER: Terrelle said something after the game about how the starters haven't really gotten to play the whole game very much this year, and I know after Wisconsin, he thought that was one advantage they had on you guys, their guys had gone a full game and you guys hadn't. Is that something that concerns you going forward that you've had a lot of games wrapped up early and haven't gone the distance?

COACH TRESSEL: Our first conference game was Illinois. I'd say we went all the way there. Miami wasn't a short one. We have had a couple, there's no question. I guess you could look at it one of two ways. It could end up being a detriment to you. It could end up if you go a bunch of long games and a bunch of guys get hurt, and, oh, my gosh, it might have been nicer if we didn't have so many plays. Again, you know, who cares? We're playing Minnesota, here's the guys that -- here's what we've done before and here's what the schedule is, here's what the open date is, here's what time they're telling us to play. Now, what you do in that game is going to determine whether or not you're successful.

REPORTER: Jim, you talked about going on the road and stuff. Are you disappointed with the way your team's responded to the first few trips on the road? Did you think a senior-laden group like this would be --

COACH TRESSEL: We've played two pretty good teams on the road, so I don't know if I'd use disappointed. Do we need to play better? Yes, absolutely. We've especially got to make sure we understand we've got to do even better in the special teams on the road, but, no, I haven't looked at our two trips and said, oh, gee, I don't think they were focused or I don't think they understood or they let the crowd get to them or nothing like that, but do we need to execute better? You know, for sure. And we've had the good fortune, and maybe it's a negative that we had all the home games, I doubt it, but do we need to play better on the road? Absolutely. It's hard to win on the road. And do we thoroughly understand that? You'd think we would at this point, but we'll find out when we take the road again.

REPORTER: Is there a real apprehension because you're going to a new venue simply because, I don't know, a different dressing room, maybe how you get to the field, all that? It might be minor, but nobody's had any experience with it.

COACH TRESSEL: Interestingly enough, in between away games, you've probably got a 60 percent turnover in your team. That's just the way it is. About 37 new guys this year that had never been to training camp, let alone been to Illinois or -- so you're probably a third of your guys have been somewhere before. So, no, we'll go over there Saturday morning and we'll get a good walk-through and all those kind of things. We can't let that be something. We've got to -- when the whistle blows and the ball's inside those stripes we've got to do those things and try to have everything else shut out, and I hope a bunch of red shows up in that stadium. I like those. Mr. Hall?

REPORTER: Have you gotten wind of these proposals by the NFL, the NFLPA and I guess Jim Delaney was involved in some discussion that they're moving forward and they would penalize players in their first -- in their rookie season in the NFL so there would be a little more liability?

COACH TRESSEL: Are you talking about the agent things?

REPORTER: And they're supposed to meet, I think.

COACH TRESSEL: There's been a couple meetings in regard to the agents illegally meeting with college players and inducements and fringe benefits and all that. We had two or three conference calls in July and August. There was a meeting, I think, in Indianapolis, September 14th. I think there's been a follow-up meeting. There's been a lot of discussions. The point you bring out about potential penalties later on is one that we as college coaches really promoted because it's difficult if there are no consequences for poor behavior. And will that occur? You know, we'll find out. I haven't been in the two meetings. I was on the conference calls. I've been briefed as to what went on in the meeting, but the neat things is, is that all the parties are in the room. We've got the NFLPA, the NFL, there's a group of agents, there's the NCAA, the AFCA, everyone in the room is trying to figure out what's best for the kids.

REPORTER: The thing that floated out there was there was a six to eight-month suspension.

COACH TRESSEL: I have never heard any length or whether it would be monetary or games or -- now, again, I wasn't in the meetings, but I didn't hear any of that from the summary of the meetings either. That's someone probably prognosticating, I'll bet you it's this. I have not heard that.

REPORTER: But that's progress for your side?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, it's progress -- well, our side is the kids. So it's progress for helping kids have the right kind of behavior.

REPORTER: Jim, do you see anything on film -- is Minnesota any different at all since the coaching change or are they doing the same thing?

COACH TRESSEL: As I mentioned, I thought they brought a little more pressure on defense than they had earlier in the season, but no more than they brought against us last year. So we look at those things: A, how did they play us in the past; and, B, how have they been playing lately? So we're expecting a very aggressive, hey, let's go after it mentality. And offensively, I think you've seen an evolution, they've had -- I don't know how long Tim was there, four years? Five? Four? I think they've had four different offensive coordinators. So there's an evolution in every offensive coordinator and if you have them late in the year, you can really kind of read it. If you have them early in the year like we had Illinois, they've only played a couple games and they weren't sure exactly where they were heading. But you can see the evolution that Minnesota's doing a good job of using the personnel that they have. Those two receivers, you know, they've really -- you can see they've really gone to featuring them. They've got the two good backs. They know they've got a veteran quarterback. So I think you're seeing a natural progression. I don't think we'll see a drastically different defense than what we've seen. We'll see one that comes after you.

REPORTER: Jim, with all the injuries at defensive back, you have three senior starters on the field and also just mentoring and helping the other guys coming in.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, those three veteran guys have really been -- have been special because not only have they been good mentors and not only have they had to worry about they themselves playing their position well, but they've had to take an inordinate number of practice snaps and that's what I get a little bit nervous about. Same thing with special teams. It's like, okay, we're going to have a group, we'll be all right. All of a sudden you get worn out a little bit because you're practicing so much. So we as coaches, we've got to get a look at this and we've got to get a look at that. We've got to be smart about taking care of their bodies, so those guys have carried a lot of the weight of the group.

REPORTER: It sounds like Jermale, a lot of guys coming in talk about Rolle helping them, has he stepped up in a way?

COACH TRESSEL: Jermale is the kind of guy that whether you want his help or not, he's giving it, you know what I mean? Because he wants a good team and he wants -- he doesn't care how young you are, he expects you to be in the right place. Jermale's a good football player. Jermale's a good leader, there's no question.

REPORTER: Did you have a sense that Philly Brown could be this kind of player? What was your sense of him when you signed him on tape, I'm not saying he fell through the cracks shall but he didn't get that big belly who like some of the guys did, but what did you see about him that told you --

COACH TRESSEL: Well, often early commits don't get big Bailey who
because everyone knows where they're going and you guys all want something that's new, that's why they call it the news. He was special. When we got a commitment from him, it was like, woe, this guy's special. Now, how is a guy going to adjust -- when you need a guy to run the ball, when you need a guy to kick it to, he caught it, how is a guy going to adjust to -- we've got to figure out where does he fit best, where can he compete. When he first got here, I always take a little bit of direction from the older guys when they have their little seven on sevens and stuff and I like hearing them talk about who's pretty good. I remember Terrelle telling me one day, he said, hey, that Philly Brown is the truth, you know. Now, he didn't have to know any coverages and he didn't have to know any plays. He was just out there. His ability was the truth. Well, how fast can you learn things? He really learns football. He has a good sense of it. We have felt that he was going to progress and he has.

REPORTER: Do you see him more and more on the field as the season goes on now?

COACH TRESSEL: I think he had about 30 snaps and Taurian had about 21 and prior to that, it was probably the other way as he was learning and so forth. But you never know. We need them all, because you never know who turns an ankle and you never know who does what, but I hope he's healthy and in the game because Philly's going to be a good player.

REPORTER: You talked about Minnesota evolving offensively. From your standpoint, it seemed like Saturday you were under center a little bit more than in the past. Is that something was Purdue specific or do you feel like there's something there that you've got?

COACH TRESSEL: I think a little bit of all those things. One, based on what they did, we thought that that was a good way to deploy, based on the way the game unfolded, that was good then for us to do. Like anything else, there's a little trial and error in everything. You think this might be fine and then when it isn't, all of a sudden, it's like, whoa, see you later with that. But if it is fine, let's build on it, but it's always -- the I-formation to the field is Jim Bollman's base formation, everyone knows that. It's so easy to read what's coming blitz-wise and coverage-wise, he's always had that philosophy, and I'm sure we'll continue to do it.

REPORTER: You guys do different things on offense, but at this point in Terrelle's career, what is it that you think he likes best or does best or have you had a day where you said, Terrelle Pryor, you're calling all the plays today, what do you think he would lean toward?

COACH TRESSEL: He's starting to call a few more of them now. He came to us at one point in him game and said, here's the way they're playing this, we've got to throw this and all of a sudden he hits a 19-yard dig route, he had it cold. And all of a sudden he came back and called the next play and I've got, man, we've got all you other guys up there, what do I need you for? But understanding is greater. Are we to point yet where we say, hey, we're just going to give him a formation and you're going to take over? Probably not there yet. Will we ever get there? We'll see. We study things in the pass game by protection because that's what it's all about and which things do you do best in protection and in fact we're right now in the midst of a pretty intense study of ourselves by protection, by quarterback in this case, although we were teasing Terrelle that if you take Big Ten stats original, Terrelle's fourth in the league in passing efficiency and Bauserman's first. So we've had fun with that all week, believe me. Right now, as we look at our various protections, which ones are we executing better, numbers sometimes lie, so the first thing you do is you get the numbers, and then you go back and look at the film and say, did we execute this because of protection, because of the actual design or in spite of the fact, you know, he dodged three people and jumped up in the air and threw a pass and that type of thing, but you know right now, I think the fact that he's been under center a little bit more and done a little more throwing from under center than he did early in his career, I think he's becoming more comfortable in that and that's something we want him to. I think he's comfortable with the five-man protections where he's got to do more Q throws and all that and I think he's also comfortable with the seven-man protections where he knows if they green dog someone, he's going to be protected or if someone has poor technique and they beat us around the corner. So I think comfort level is coming along in all those things. And I think I said on the Big Ten call, someone asked me about Terrelle and where you really have an appreciation of his growth is when you're getting ready for a team, we're getting ready for Minnesota, so you watch him last year against Minnesota and you've been watching him every day now, he's like a different guy. Now, that slant throw that he misfired and was picked, he couldn't sleep for two days, but he knew exactly what he did. Two years ago, you might have that same issue, and you don't even -- you had no idea why because we were just trying to get the ball out of our hand, that type of thing. But we'll just keep grinding away at that. And I don't even remember the question.

REPORTER: What does he do best?

COACH TRESSEL: Okay. How about that the Ken?

REPORTER: That's pretty good. We liked it.

COACH TRESSEL: All right. We've got -- I'm sorry.

REPORTER: He also looks comfortable out on the edge a couple times Saturday.

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, yeah.

REPORTER: Do you see him as an ultimate threat when he gets out there.

COACH TRESSEL: That's one more threat. There's no question. To me, wherever he is, he's a threat. For instance if you watch the Northwestern, Minnesota game, the key to that game is when they decided they really had to play man under, so forth, that quarterback went running like crazy because there was no one assigned to him. Terrelle can do that when he's in the pocket, he can step you and go to really be a threat. But when he's out on the edge, now you're a zone defender and you've got to decide, do I have to stay back here under this receiver or who's going to tackle him. We have to pressure from a lot of different places. The thing I never want to get caught in is, we only launch from one point because if you only launch from one point, you know, that -- what did Macarthur say, he said if they know where we are, they'll blow us up and the same thing true for quarterback.

REPORTER: You were talking about the protection -- the five-man protection versus seven-man, as your tackles have gained experience just like everybody, are you able to do a little bit more without keeping as many guys in because Mike is older, Mike is more experienced?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, I think our tackles have come along. I think we pass protected Wisconsin pretty well and Illinois and Purdue. Now, were we perfect? No. And in those kind of games, it might be one play that tip the scale and we've faced some good ones. Watt and Kerrigan, there are some good ones in this league. No, I think we're getting better and of course that helps. I could stand back there and complete some balls if there's no one in my face. It's all about protection. Ashley, we're putting you in the group here.

REPORTER: Thank you.

COACH TRESSEL: Dionne is kind of under the weather a little bit.

REPORTER: My question was that Ohio State is first in the Big Ten for turnover margin and they're obviously first in the NCAA for points in the game and sixth in the NCAA, how do you keep them focused and not overlooking an opponent like Minnesota who's 0-4 in the Big Ten?

COACH TRESSEL: If you look a little deeper into the statistics, we're not first in the Big Ten games in turnover margin. We all if you take all however many games we've played, but if you just take the four, three -- four Big Ten games we've played, we're, like, fourth in turnover margin, maybe second in scoring and so we keep the realities in front of our guys. I do want them to know how we match up nationally and how we match up with all the games we've played because those games count too and wasn't easy getting first downs against Miami or whatever. But I also want the reality of, okay, right now we're in the midst of the Big Ten season, here's who we're competing against, here's the guys you're lining up against, here's where they're ranked and I want reality and awareness, so I think our guys do a pretty good job, not perfect, but a pretty good job of honest reflection of where we are and where we aren't and, now, maybe not all the guys, but in general, I think pretty good. All right, Natalie, go ahead.

REPORTER: One of my favorite things you said post game, said Boom was electric, he came on the field and just lights it up, I'm curious, we always talk to Dan and he is very soft spoken and don't get to see that side of him. Is he electric more because of his performance on the field or is he electric stepping up kind of as a leader on this team?

COACH TRESSEL: We always talk about an impact player being someone that can just do their job, but they can raise everyone else up. And we don't even know for what reason. He just has a presence. We always talk about good leaders have what we call a sense of impending greatness. If you stick with me, something great's going to happen. Boom has that. Boom has that presence. And I think in part because he practices that way every day and he's in class every day early and he does everything you're supposed to do and he's full speed ahead and he loves contact, and this is a contact sport. So he just has that ability to lift up everyone. Now, you can't do that if you're not doing your job well though, and he happens to be doing his job. You can be an electric guy and really someone that people want to follow, but they'll stop following you if you don't produce, and Boom Herron produces. All right, Lori.

REPORTER: Two things that we saw against Purdue that I'm wondering if we'll see them long-term. One, you going into a game expecting only limited number of reps from J.B. Shugarts, is that something you see playing out, and, two, the pooch kick on a kickoff, is that a solution long-term, or is that just something you did to try to contain the Boilermakers.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, let me take the last one first. We mishit that kickoff. We were trying to kick it deep. That was not a pooch kick. I apologize. It was disguised as a pooch. So long-term, is pooch kicking the answer? It can't be. You cannot give people good field position all the time. Can you do it occasionally? If there's a wind situation, in Minnesota which I'm told the west end of the stadium is the open end and if there's a wind, it's very real one way or the other, it can be something that is somewhat of a solution, but consistency is the solution to everything and Drew Basil can kick the ball. He can kick the ball as well as anyone can. Now he's got to do it every kick, but I haven't met a freshman who could. And I've had some great freshman kickers, Nugent, Jeff Wilkins, guys that -- but I've never met a freshman that -- you talk about is it different in a different stadium, well every new experience is new. That first time in the 'Shoe. That first conference game in the 'Shoe, that first big-stage game in the 'Shoe, that first away game at this place, that first away game that has wind, you know, all that, so a freshman kicker has got to learn just like everyone else, but he's going to be fine and we're not going to solve it with pooches. J.B. Shugarts, we're going to get as many plays from him as we can without hurting. The thing we don't want to do is further injure a guy. Now, right now, I don't sense from our trainers that it's an issue of hey, it's getting worse and worse every day. He's just got soar feet. And they're not going to get unsore until he rests. Well, we're not going to be resting for a while. So he had bad feet last year and, you know, spring practice we pulled back a little. Winter training, we took a lot of load, he didn't do a lot of things, put him in the water a lot. We're doing everything we can. But he's just got now -- the one different thing right now is he's into a different type of orthotic which we're hoping can be a long-term thing so we won't have this overuse scenario that keeps him from being able to execute. All right. Thank you.

 

[BB73]

Official.site

COACH TRESSEL: As you know, we had the open week. We had two real good practices on Wednesday and Thursday. Our Friday was a little bit different. We broke it up into film work and lifting and short practice run-through-type things, but I thought we used our time wisely. Hopefully we'll be back on the field with a lot of enthusiasm and pep in our step.
We did work out Sunday afternoon for about an hour and the guys seemed to be refreshed, so if we can have a good one this afternoon and another good one tomorrow and a good rehearsal on Thursday and be ready to go with a lot of energy and a lot of emotion, I think if there's anything that you can accomplish during an open week, it's perhaps to fill your emotional gas tank back up. Their bodies, to a certain extent, can get rested up, but that takes sometimes months. But your emotions, I think, sometimes you can get that put back together and hopefully our guys will have had that opportunity to do that because we're going to need every ounce of emotion we can get as Penn State comes in.

Everyone knows the consistency of the Penn State program and they do things the way they do things and we could probably not even study this year's film and still have a pretty good idea of what defense they're going to play, what offenses they're going to play, how they're going to do their special teams because they are who they are, they're good at what they do, and as their players gain more experiences, they get better and better and better.

And so it's game 10 now and some of their folks that maybe were newcomers 10 weeks ago are no longer newcomers. I think they too have gotten a little healthier. I think they were a little banged at the beginning of the year and gotten some of those folks back, and they've now played two quarterbacks and I would expect that we may perhaps see both of them. That's the way we would prepare. I don't think they're dramatically different.

I think Evan Royster is a guy that now has hit it into gear. I think at the beginning of the year he probably wasn't himself and as the year has gone on, just like most tough backs do, he got himself back to where he'd like to be, plus he's got some great sidekicks who, I'm sure, have competed with him to make him better, but also spell him to make him better. And the receiver corps has grown. Their offensive line has gained experience playing together. Defensively their D line, they're using a lot of different players, and so they come in with great energy and great freshness.
Their linebacker corps, they rotate a little bit. Their corners have been intact. They did lose one safety. I'm not sure if he's back. Again, it won't change their scheme. It won't change how they play the game. They're excellent open field tacklers. They're excellent special team players. They have a return guy, receiver Number 20, that they say is the fastest guy in college football and he can go. They love to get him in the return game. And so it will be a typical Penn State team coming into Ohio Stadium, which is obviously a great compliment, because over the last 45 to, I guess, even count Coach Engle's 15 years there, the last 16 years have been extraordinary teams at Penn State, and we know what's coming in and now we have to make sure that we meet the challenge.

REPORTER: I want to ask, did you watch the game that they played last week against Northwestern live or --

COACH TRESSEL: Live? No. We're not allowed to scout.

REPORTER: On television, I mean.

COACH TRESSEL: I watched about the first quarter and then I headed to a high school game, so I was listening to it on the radio.

REPORTER: So as you watched it unfold --

COACH TRESSEL: I've watched it since though.

REPORTER: You knew the result obviously, but they got off to a terrible start, 21-0, and came back and had an emotional win. In your experience as a coach, how do you feel a team will respond after going from night to day in a period of one game, it seemed?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, the thing that's made Penn State good over the years is they're so steady. They're never going to be too high and they're never going to be too low. When it's 21-0, they're not going to fold the tent. That's just not how they're made. When they end the game winning 35-21, they're not going to say, hey, we have arrived and we're now the new kings of college football. They're going to go to work and get ready for Ohio State, and within the course of our game, they'll never get too high or never get too low and it will be one of those, you're going to have to play 60 minutes to compete with them.

REPORTER: Everything you got to do from a self-evaluation during the bye week, is there anything about your offense today that you learned anything different or you discovered anything about yourself in that self-evaluation that maybe is different than how you looked at things before the bye week with your offense?

COACH TRESSEL: I think we affirmed some of the things we were thinking, that we were improving running the ball. The thing that we all know is that we throw the ball pretty well when we have good protection, that we're a good football team when we don't turn it over and when we can come up with takeaways, all of the things that you'd think.
There was nothing that really popped up and said, oh, my gosh, you know, I thought we'd be better than this at that or we've got to stop doing this, start doing more of that. We need to be balanced. In this day and age, balance is so critical and we've gotten to the point, I think, where we've got probably better balance right now than maybe since Troy was a senior. So now we've got some real challenges to find out how well we can do with that balance coming up, but nothing alarming.

REPORTER: You always talk about getting better as the year goes on, your November record is very good here. Why do you think that is? Why do you think you've had so much success in November?

COACH TRESSEL: I think our guys do believe that you have to get better as the year goes on and hopefully we don't get too high or too low. I think it's difficult sometimes as the expectations get heaped on young people, it's easy for a coach not to get too high or too low because we've been both ends and we know how fast it goes. But that's not so true for a 19- or 20-year-old. They can buy the thoughts either direction, that, hey, you're terrible, they might buy that, or, hey, you're wonderful, they might buy that because they haven't found out that neither is true. But I think they've done a pretty good job of believing you have to keep working to get better and if you keep working to get better, you probably will. Then it gives you a chance in November.

When I saw these schedules about four or five years ago when they said you're going to have Penn State to start your November for a few years, I thought, oh, that's -- not to mention you're going to have Iowa and Michigan right after them, that's going to put a challenge on any November record anyone would have, but I think our guys believe that this is a very important time.

REPORTER: When you look at your running game and you talk about it's kind of to the point where you'd like, but it's been improving, what changed over the course of that? Was it just putting more emphasis on it? Was it giving the ball to Boom Herron more? What changed in the last three games?

COACH TRESSEL: I think that we've grown up front with our communication together and we haven't had too many situations where we've had minus yard plays where someone might say, well, I thought you called this or that, so we've had a little bit less mistakes. I think Boom has raised us through his play. I think his play has been excellent and if he'll play like he did this past month and like he did last November, we have a chance this November, and because I think he's a difference-maker.

REPORTER: Your record's 2-4 after bye weeks. Is there any explanation for that or is it just another statistic that may not pertain to anything in the future?

COACH TRESSEL: It's probably irrelevant if we become 3-4. It becomes a big deal if we become 2-5 like most things. I guess part of it, we were talking earlier with a group, I forget who it was, that we said probably the most impactful thing about bye weeks is who you play after the bye. And I know we played Penn State after the bye in '05 and we were going to end up with a good team in '05, we felt, we weren't great yet, we felt, and that was a September bye, which is probably not a great time for a young team to have a bye. We came back and we didn't beat Penn State, so that's obviously one of those four, but I think every -- if there was a formula as to how to do your bye week, we'd all use it, but it's according to where you are health-wise, where you are development-wise, but it's probably most impacted by who are you playing after the bye and so we're playing a pretty good team after the bye.

REPORTER: Why would you say it's not as good to have an open week early for a young team?

COACH TRESSEL: You don't have enough data to really know who you are. We had it after three nonleague games, we hadn't even played a Big Ten game, so we had no measuring stick as to who we were and then all of a sudden we had a lot of 19- and 20-year-olds playing and they started reading and listening to all the expertise and they bought it and all of a sudden three weeks later they'd lost three games in a row. That's just not a healthy time. You have to know someone's limitations, and someone with very little experiences, that's probably not going to be something they can handle as well as maybe nine games into it, hey, you've got some reality, you might be 5-4, you might be 4-5, you might be whatever, but there's some reality to deal with as to what can I do to get better during this period of time.

REPORTER: Talking fundamentals, was it a good week for younger guys?
Did they get extra reps during practice?

COACH TRESSEL: Our guys get -- when we're in a fundamental practice, all of our guys get the same amount of reps. The times that our young guys don't get reps is when they're running the other team's plays, but then our guys aren't getting fundamental reps, per se, they're getting a lot of learning reps. They're getting a lot of reading-type reps. So our guys -- in our practice set-up, our young people get a lot of reps, especially in a week like this or in a spring practice or in a preseason, our young people get a ton of reps.

REPORTER: How has Ross Homan's foot progressed and what's your expectation for him this week and Saturday?

COACH TRESSEL: Good. I would expect Ross to be ready.

REPORTER: Limited in any way?

COACH TRESSEL: I hope not. He's been out there. We didn't go live or anything. He was out there, ran 7 on 7 Sunday. Just like the trainer said, the key will be how does he do, like, two days in a row to see if there's any issues, but based upon after Sunday, I would say no doubt. He and Dorian Bell we would have back for sure, unless something happens in those two days. And then the guys that were lost for the year, we're not going to have Christian or Corey or Tyler or C. J. I guess that's the group. We wouldn't have them back, of course.

REPORTER: Is it better to catch Penn State the week after they've won this landmark 400th win for Joe rather than if they were 399 coming in here?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you know, selfishly, that was kind of like the guy that let them beat Bear Bryant, if you remember. I'm not sure I would have wanted that double play to be -- but, no, I don't think it makes any difference. Someone mentioned that two old coaches with the most wins or something are squaring off in this game and I'm not sure how I took that.

REPORTER: How do you take it?

REPORTER: Are you surprised that Coach Paterno is still at it? Like you said, it was '01 when he hit that one milestone, would you have thought, well, yeah, 10 years later he'll still be going or nine years later?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, you never know what goes through people's thinking and that's been his home for so long and I don't know if he envisions there being anything different than that. He's been there 50 -- I don't know, 55 years or something. 60? Yeah, he's been there longer than I've been alive. So I don't know if he can envision doing anything else, and, so, no, that doesn't surprise me that he's -- I just saw in the little press release thing that they have like the sixth most wins in the last five years of any program. So he's doing fine.

REPORTER: Jim, but, you know, like you just pointed out though, when they marquee this game, it will be the two winningest coaches in college football. Is that a little bit of a bragging point for you? I know you're not big into the pride thing, but what does that mean to you?

COACH TRESSEL: It means there's a huge disparity between one and two. That's the biggest thing it means to me. Where did all those guys go in between us two or am I that close to there? I don't know.

REPORTER: Jim, you talked about balance, the importance of balance. The last couple late seasons, Novembers have gone very run heavy. How much of that has been just the circumstances of the team, Pryor last year with an injury, and how much of that is just what you do in November in the Big Ten or is there any of that?

COACH TRESSEL: There may be a little bit that if all of a sudden the wind is howling and you can't -- but in a perfect world, I think part of it last year, Terrelle was banged those last three games and so much of -- because he's so careful with the ball, he's not sure if he's taking it down running, well, that really wasn't part of the equation near the end there. So I'm sure that had some to do with it. I don't remember vividly what the weather was like last November, but I don't remember it being awful, but you do what the defense allows you to do and -- but we've never been bashful about saying, if you do do well with the run game, you've got a chance to win.

REPORTER: Penn State did well here in '08. Have you ever heard Terrelle bring that game up in any context since then? You guys all talk that losses are sometimes harder to shake than the wins.

COACH TRESSEL: Maybe when we're practicing quarterback sneaks sometimes he'll humbly, you know, bring up that, hey, this is an important practice rep. I know, you know, type thing. But we don't really harp on a loss. We might harp on things that occur within losses. Maybe poor punt protection, had a punt block that led to a loss or whatever, but we don't sit around talking about losses that much.

REPORTER: Was that play, though, an indicator to you that this guy was going to look for that play, look for the -- you know what I mean, as opposed to just do the average?

COACH TRESSEL: He is a guy that wants to make a difference for his team. I mean, if he could -- if he could do anything so that his team would succeed, he would do it. He's always looking for it, like you say. Heck, you could -- if that guy doesn't luck out and get his hand on it, he's still running around the corner and it might be one of those plays everyone remembers that wasn't that creative, but above all else, it was a great lesson learned, that, hey, we didn't need that at that moment, we just needed a yard, and he's the first to admit he understands that and we haven't had to harp on it.

REPORTER: He's one of your seven or eight guys from Pennsylvania. How do you explain the success you've had going into Pennsylvania and who are a couple of the assistants that really do a good job over there? You got Bell, the two Corey Browns, Sweat.

COACH TRESSEL: I think it all started with the fact that Joe Daniels in 2001 -- by the way Joe's in the hospital, nothing horrible, but keep your thoughts and prayers with Joe. Joe went there beginning in '01, and we probably went, I don't know, three or four years with maybe getting one guy, I think maybe Rory Nicol and Kyle Mitchum might have been the first two, and it took us some years, but you know Joe, he just kept plugging and plugging and plugging, and then when he became ill, Luke Fickel took over and followed up on all the groundwork that Joe had, and Joe was from Pittsburgh and Joe had a great relationship -- and we had a lot of kids at Youngstown from Pittsburgh, so we had a good relationship with the coaches from there, and I think the fact that it's so close. You know, you get on Route 70 and you're here as fast as you're some other places, and so it's just a natural proximity. But I have to say that it starts with Joe.

Now, Coach Bruce would tell you it starts with him. Where's Coach Bruce? Not here? He was here earlier. Coach Bruce was the Pennsylvania recruiter back with Basch Nagel and Jan White and Fred Pagac, so I guess I should make sure if you're writing a story he might read, put that it started with Earle and then Joe took over because I don't want to have to -- you guys
have been there.

REPORTER: Terrelle being a junior now, is this game, playing against his home state and a lot of guys he knows in and that coaching staff that he knows, has the novelty of that and being an exciting kind of game for him worn off or do you think it's still a game that --

COACH TRESSEL: Ohio State-Penn State period, and the fact that he happens to be from there, just like I'm sure the kids from Ohio that are there, there's been plenty of great ones over the years, that makes a special game even more special.

REPORTER: Jim, do you remember the first time you ever met Coach Paterno?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: And could you tell us what it was?

COACH TRESSEL: I was interviewing with him for a graduate assistantship in December of 1974 and they were getting ready for the Cotton Bowl and they played Baylor and it was a thrill.

REPORTER: Because you are his peer, I've heard him refer to you as Little Jimmy on more than one occasion. How do you take that?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I'm starting to like it more and more. When you're young you don't like it, when you're old you start liking it, someone thinks I'm Little Jimmy. It's been a special relationship with him in that I did have a chance to visit with him when I was aspiring to become a coach and I was one of those kind of guys, I didn't end up being with him, but I ended up staying in touch with him, and then all of a sudden when I became a head coach just three hours down the road from him, we had a chance to interact a little bit more and connect in different ways and so now coaching with him for 10 years, you know, in the same Big Ten meetings and so forth, it's really spanned quite a distance, but I'm sure he looks at me no different than -- there have been times he's called me Lee, so --

REPORTER: I was going to say, he's known you since you were -- he's referring to you when you were a child and he knew you through your father.

COACH TRESSEL: You know, he knew my father. I'm not sure that I had met him, maybe I did, but when you're that little, who cares who a college football coach is, but, you know, when I vividly remember meeting him was when I had a chance at -- during my senior year of college to interview with him.

REPORTER: Has he ever given you any feedback on why you didn't get the job?

COACH TRESSEL: Didn't get which job?

REPORTER: Did he ever give you any feedback on why he didn't hire you that day?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, I've told you guys this story before. I don't know that I didn't get the job, and I'm not saying here I was offered the job, but I knew riding home from Penn State I wasn't going there because my dad told me I was going to Akron. So, now, was I offered the job? Maybe my dad knew I wasn't, I don't know. But it was the right thing to do because I got more responsibility where I went. It was probably the more glamorous thing to do because I was all taken by the Penn State and all, but -- so I don't know why I didn't get the job. Do you know something? Did Joe tell you --

REPORTER: No.

COACH TRESSEL: -- that Little Jimmy wasn't going to get the job anyway? Natalie, last one here.

REPORTER: Okay. I'm glad I was able to give you the head's up and I'm going to talk about the award you were just given from our friends here.

COACH TRESSEL: Now all your male friends here are groaning.

REPORTER: I know, that's why I'm glad I was able to at least give you the head's up.

COACH TRESSEL: Lori will spark them back up.

REPORTER: Okay. I'm going this route for a little bit. Curious about your players' reaction, we have heard you say that you are very humbled to get this award, but when servicemen and women come into practice, what kind of impact do you think it has on the team?

COACH TRESSEL: I think their awareness level is heightened during this time while they're at Ohio State. May be the first time they meet a serviceperson then all of a sudden a serviceperson comes in, and we have a lot of them speak to us and all of a sudden you can see our guys are rivetted and the more and more they grow to appreciate -- and that's really our goal, is to get them to understand how blessed we are and that we didn't just wake up as this country and you wake up as this guy that can come play football at Ohio State, that there were a whole lot of people that paid a dear, dear price for any of this to ever occur. And how would you know unless you were presented with it. Most of us, in eighth grade history and ninth grade history, yeah, we got through it, but did we really know it? Did we understand it? When they meet these soldiers and they see these units come in and they talk to them a little bit about the fact they're leaving their jobs and families and so forth to go and serve us and here we are, our guys are belly aching about the training table food last night because the steaks weren't done well, so it really is very important to us and we're lucky to be where we are to have the folks willing to come in and help our people grow and really help all of us because I don't care how long you've been living, sometimes you forget how fortunate we are to live in this country. Lori?

REPORTER: Is a bye week the time you can install something new on offense or defense or experiment, say, in kick coverage or especially given that it's week 10 in the season, is a team that's going to come out of a bye week pretty much the same team that went in maybe just a little bit healthier?

COACH TRESSEL: We've got all kind of trick plays we've got ready and we've got this new defense we're going to try. But I think it does two things. One, you can go back and you can work on your fundamentals, talking two things specifically to football. And then two, you can study yourselves and others and say, you know what, we probably need to do a little bit more of this or, hey, this probably fits our personnel better and so forth, so those two things you do. I think as I've looked back at bye weeks that maybe haven't fared as well, I've gotten overzealous about studying my next opponent, and by the time I was to the real game week, we were so clouded with information about our next opponent that we knew too much and it really wasn't who they were.

So, yeah, we've got to work on ourselves and, yeah, we've got to come up with some things maybe that will enhance what we do, and then hopefully the right thing is have the studying of our opponent in the right doses.

Now, the reality is, what happens in the game I guess will determine whether that was the best approach, but we felt that for the moment we're in, those were the things that we needed to accomplish.

 

[BB73]

That JT, quite the jokester.

REPORTER: Is a bye week the time you can install something new on offense or defense or experiment, say, in kick coverage or especially given that it's week 10 in the season, is a team that's going to come out of a bye week pretty much the same team that went in maybe just a little bit healthier?

COACH TRESSEL: We've got all kind of trick plays we've got ready and we've got this new defense we're going to try.

 

[BB73]

Today's presser.

Official.site

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you were all at the game. We didn't exactly set the world on fire in the first half and we came out and played a good second half and when you get a couple key thing happen in a game like a stop at nearly the end of the second quarter and defensive scores, you're going to have a chance to win and win decisively, so we felt good about that, then we felt good we could go back and study what it was we did well and what it was we need to get a lot better at because as we head to Iowa City we're playing against an outstanding football team and they're a veteran bunch, they're a confident bunch, they play extremely well at home, it's a great atmosphere, those of you who have been there, it's nice and tight and there's a lot of communication going on from the stands down to the field, so it's kind of one of those neat places, those places that as a player you never forget that you've played.
So it is November, we've got to get better if we're going to have a successful November, but I think our kids have that in mind and they came back to work on Sunday afternoon, and we didn't see them yesterday, but they'll be back to work this afternoon. The veterans know what lies ahead because they've played against Iowa.

Now, I don't know if any of our guys that played at Iowa City, I don't know if any of those fifth-year seniors were playing as true freshmen that particular year, but they're in for a heck of an experience, a heck of a challenge, and we look forward to getting ready to get after it this afternoon. Questions?

REPORTER: Coach, knowing with Iowa's loss and playing in their stadium, how do you prepare your team to play beyond the competition?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you try to play every game focused on what you have to do. Now, that's hard because you've watched film all week or you've listened all week to the experts and you can get distracted, but the mark of someone that's doing it the best way you can is that you look in the mirror and you say I've got to do this better, I've got to do that better, plus I see the way plays his technique, I see how good he is and so forth and so on, so our guys that have played against them know, when you watch the film, you know, so if you're paying attention, I think we should be able to keep the attention where it ought to be.

REPORTER: Your players talked after the game about the, job if speech is the right word, but the talk you gave them before they went back out for the second half and just did you feel disappointed that you had to make that speech at that point or that you needed something like that and just what were your thoughts there during that? Did you think you were at kind of a junction of the season there a little bit?

COACH TRESSEL: I was disappointed that we weren't playing like we were capable of playing. We've all been in games where you've played as well as you could and you lost and that happens, or you played as well as you could but you made those two mistakes and, therefore, you lost. I didn't think we were playing anywhere near we were capable of playing and we were playing against a team that they knew was good. We play them every year, it's not like we hadn't played them in a while, and we were playing in our stadium and all the rest, and at this time of year when you're supposed to have been improved, so, yeah, I was disappointed in our -- and up until that stop, I wasn't disappointed in that, in fact, I was energized by that, but disappointed up to that point.

REPORTER: But then after that, were you, I don't know, surprised, amazed, what were you about the effort past that point?

COACH TRESSEL: It was what it ought to be and that should never surprise us. If that surprises us, then we're in trouble.

REPORTER: How often do you have to go to that big halftime speech to get your guys motivated?

COACH TRESSEL: You only do what's going on in the course of the moment, so you don't sit there saying, okay, it's game seven and I haven't played that card because you can't play a card. I mean, you have to react to what's going on and, you know, typically what's going on is that we're playing near to our ability and we're maybe not doing some little things, it's atypical that we just weren't ourselves.

REPORTER: I guess what I'm asking is you can't give the big rousing halftime speech every week or it doesn't work.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, if we're not ourselves every week then there will be half the number of people at the press conference or twice as many when they get rid of you, but, you know, if you don't play as good as you can play nearly all the time, you're not going to have good teams.

REPORTER: Kind of along the lines of what you're saying here, you've had some games this year where you guys really have taken care of business, maybe had some teams that you handled then you had games like Wisconsin, Penn State where the halves were so different, 10 games in, do you maybe have a little bit of a less of a handle sort of on this team than maybe you had in other seasons? It just seems that maybe this team's a little harder to figure out 10 games into this year.

COACH TRESSEL: We've probably lost less games 10 games into the
season other years I've been here.

REPORTER: Do you know what you're going to get at Iowa?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, no, you never know. I never know. I've never known what we were going to get anywhere and so often what happens early affects it. There's one school of thought that, you know what, we went down so easy that first drive but came up short that was there this feeling that, oh, you know, this is going to be like a number of the other games, because emotion, thought process can turn any minute. So I've never known. If I thought I ever knew, I could write the story early, but you never know what you're going to get. You never know what's going to change the emotion of the game, that's why we talk about special teams all the time. Nothing flips the emotion of the moment like a special teams play. Maybe only second is a turnover. And just turn on the Iowa Michigan State game, Michigan State's a good team, they've lost one game. But they have three picks, two of them go one to the house and one way down there, all of a sudden they turn around and it's 30-0 and they're a good team.

REPORTER: It seems like second half defense and your running game were just lights out, and Terrelle was saying after the game he didn't have a good game. Do you feel like you need him to get going for Iowa out there on the road?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, we're going to need everybody and for sure Terrelle, you know, I think as we've talked before Terrelle is such a perfectionist and the expectations that everyone has for him are perfection, that when he doesn't get close to that, he is tough on himself, but he made some plays in that game that were certainly very, very important and there were some plays that he didn't make, those are the ones that he's most down about and on the road against Iowa every play we can possibly make we've got to make, which means one of them might be throwing it into the stands when it's not open, but whatever it is we need done, east a big part of it.

REPORTER: Does Iowa's loss change anything about this? Does it heighten the emotion for them a little bit more because they're backed up against the wall perhaps a little bit more?

COACH TRESSEL: I'm not sure you could heighten this one any more or less. All summer long and all fall long people have circled this game. It's not like, oh, who do we have this week. Oh, yeah. It's -- I mean, they know what this game, we know what this game is all about, so I don't expect their loss or our win the past week to have much effect on that. I expect what goes on in the game will have the effect on the emotion of the game.

REPORTER: I think people have known about Adrian Clayborn and their defensive line all year, when you see them on film, what --

COACH TRESSEL: They're so strong and they're so technique sound. And their technique is a little different than some. They're a little bit thicker on you, a little bit stronger on you as opposed to playing an edge and so it's a little bit different technique that you're facing and they're not real tricky, although their front twists a lot and gives you a lot of problems, but they're not really tricky. They're just very, very powerful and very consistent. In games where you might have a seven-yard run, against them it's three. You know, that's just -- look at their numbers. They're very, very good.

REPORTER: When you've played higher ranked teams on the road with Terrelle at quarterback, he has the thrown for a lot of yards, is there a common denominator for that?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, usually higher ranked teams have better defenses, that's the common denominator.

REPORTER: Is it the case you're throwing less or what goes into that?

COACH TRESSEL: Higher ranked teams are usually very, very good up front and the key to the passing game is protection. Some higher ranked teams are high pressure teams, zone blitz teams, whatever and the circumstances -- you watch a heavyweight bout, you don't see a bunch of haymakers, you do a bunch of haymakers, you might get caught with one, so you put all those things together and you look at the Ravens against the Steelers, if it's 10-7, it's big, so that's just -- that's real.

REPORTER: You touched on this a little bit ago about how important the start of the game may be. You were outscored in the first quarter, I believe, against Wisconsin, Penn State, Miami, being through the toughest schemes you guys have played, as you touched on, they bounced back from the Wisconsin loss.

COACH TRESSEL: And maybe Illinois.

REPORTER: Well, it was 7-7, but they scored the first touchdown. How important is it to get off to a good start, as you said, against Michigan State, they came back from a loss and were lights out. You've got to figure --

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, they're going to be lights out. We can't throw an interception for a touchdown and we won't let a big pass go over our heads, so at the beginning of the game will be huge but the end of the game will be too, because if you remember a year ago we were up 24-10 with, what, 10 minutes to go in the game, so when you play a team like Iowa, you better understand it's going to be three and a half hours, it may
be more than 60 minutes, and it's all going to be physical.

REPORTER: Your offensive line, talking to some of the guys they said they felt like they've been doing a good job in pass protection, not necessarily in run blocking, it seems like that's changed a little bit, what have you
seen out of your offensive line at this point?

COACH TRESSEL: I think the fact that we're a little more balanced than maybe we were earlier, that helps both sides. That helps when the defense knows that you may run effectively, it's a little harder just to pin their ears back and chase your passer. And if it's a rundown situation, they know you might throw, they can't play too low and root hog you out of there and not worry about if you stand up and throw, so I think that balance has helped that. But I think the experience of those guys playing together, they've now played really virtually a whole season. Together we've been lucky. We haven't missed much practice time with those guys. Missed a little bit with J.B., but he seems to have come back a little bit and played the whole game without a problem on Saturday, so probably just the opposite of what we lived through last year wasn't till about game nine or 10 where we felt like we had any continuity in there and communication and so forth. So I think they're coming along.

REPORTER: Does the offensive line kind of walk with a different swagger when you are running the ball effectively? I mean, like Saturday you put 300 yards up rushing on Penn State. Does it change sort of their demeanor?

COACH TRESSEL: The two things that changed their demeanor, one is if you can rush the ball effectively and, two, if you end the day and there aren't sacks, that's a big deal. And to have both of those things come true on Saturday, will be a tremendous challenge because these folks get after the passer and they play the run -- I think their numbers are what, 80 some yards a game, so Wisconsin ran it for 130, so that will be a great challenge. But, yeah, that's what gives you satisfaction as a lineman, you can't score touchdowns yourself or whatever, but how many yards did we rush for and were there any sacks.

REPORTER: A lot of people thought Clayborn might be the best defensive end in the country, one of the best with Cameron, is he having that kind of a year from what you've seen of him on tape?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, whenever you turn on the tape, there's two people, there's one chipping him, there's another -- whoever the uncovered lineman is going and helping on him, whatever it is. And he's -- it's not like you make your game plan and you say, we're not worried about 94, I mean, so, he still is one of the best defensive linemen in the country, as Cam is and J. J. Watt and we've got some good ones in this league.

REPORTER: Ricky Stanzi obviously didn't get to play in the game last year against you guys, he's cut down in the picks, just when you see him in the crossover film, what do you see out of film?

COACH TRESSEL: He's experienced, he's a fifth-year guy, played a lot of games. He talks a lot about how he's changed the way that he studies and that he feels he's got a lot better handle on things rather than just sitting and watching film and not tying it all together, he feels like he's got a lot more, which, again, is experience. You do something for a while and you sit back and say, well, what did I get out of that, and you might memorize against this formation they do this, but you don't even know what was going on in the game. As you listen, he's really gained a command of what goes on in games and the flow and the anticipation. Anticipation is the key for the interception world and that's been a big change for him.

REPORTER: It was a big week for former Buckeyes in the NFL.

COACH TRESSEL: Huge.

REPORTER: I know you don't get a chance to sit around and watch a bunch of NFL games, but any reaction of Troy Smith or --

COACH TRESSEL: Well, Troy, I guess he had a heck of a game. I got a text from his quarterback coach saying, hey, he did a tremendous job and has done a great job leading. I was a little bit sad that Santonio -- but it was kind of bittersweet. But we had like four guys on the Jets, so I couldn't not be a little happy, but only a little. Someone said Kurt Coleman got a pick.

REPORTER: Interception last night, yeah. Brian Hartline big week.

COACH TRESSEL: Did he?

REPORTER: Jim, I wonder, as it comes down to the end of the year, kind of the BCS system is kind of a beauty pageant, Wisconsin scored 83 points Saturday, do style points matter at this point? Is it important enough for you guys to go to the Rose Bowl that anything would ever enter your head to do anything differently to try and --

COACH TRESSEL: If style points are important with what we have ahead, we're in trouble because not going to be much style going on in the ball game we're getting ready to play. So would that ever enter my thought? No. Well, I shouldn't say that, because ever is a long time, but I can't visualize it.

REPORTER: Do you talk about what needs to happen to go to the Rose Bowl or just --

COACH TRESSEL: I still don't know the tiebreaker, because it's irrelevant. We haven't earned the right to even have it -- its doesn't mean anything to us because we haven't tied for anything. So once the dust settles, we always say you get as your works deserve and whatever that is, we'll go get ready for that.

REPORTER: Do you think Troy, if he ever got to be a starter in the NFL, would play like this? What were your thoughts about him? Obviously you know the Baltimore thing, a little bit of bad luck there when it was his shot.

COACH TRESSEL: It's tough for me to project what they need at that level because I've never coached it, obviously never played it, so I really don't know much about that level of football. When Troy had spent two years there at Baltimore, I had a chance to spend some time with Ozzie Newsome and he said to me, he said without question Troy was the finest natural leader that maybe he'd ever seen and that there was no doubt in his mind he was going to be a starter in the NFL. Of course they had just come off Flacko's rookie year and they'd done okay, that type of thing, and he kind of inferred, but the problem is, it won't be with us, we're not going to be able to keep him.

So the fact that he got an opportunity at the right place, you've got to be lucky, and somebody gets hurt and you get a chance to show what you do, but you've got to show it next week we were sitting with our experts roundtable, this is kind of the big group, we had the experts together at lunch here and you've got to do it every week.

So, yeah, he's done it for two weeks. The way this world works, you know, two weeks is fine, but if you mess up the third, you might -- Alex Smith might be the quarterback. So I thought he had the arm. I knew he had the toughness. I knew he loved studying the game, he'd grown to enjoy that, and the rest is sometimes a little bit of luck here and there.

REPORTER: If you weren't happy obviously at halftime with the way guys had played in the first half, what can coaches, players, do this week to prevent that from happening in the first half at Iowa? Is there anything in the approach or --

COACH TRESSEL: It's all got to be done individually. I don't know if it's anything collectively you could do as a group. I've got to take the responsibility of having myself ready to do whatever it is that needs to be done as well as it needs to be done against some very, very good people and bring along with it the emotion that needs to be there, because if you don't have that, it's not going to happen. So I think you can encourage one another. I think you can make one another accountable and all those things, but ultimately I hope we have a group of individuals that collectively bring it, and that's why they T them up every week. What was it, the Cowboys got beat by whatever and then they come back and beat the Giants who are killing people, now how do you figure that one out, in fact it makes me nervous, they fire the head coaches and then the teams win.

REPORTER: Have you got Donnie Evege back in the line-up?

COACH TRESSEL: He's back practicing some, but not live.

REPORTER: What's the time period? Will he get back for Michigan maybe?

COACH TRESSEL: I doubt it. I doubt it.

REPORTER: Any other injury updates.

COACH TRESSEL: No, we're good. Clay?

REPORTER: Pink locker rooms are an old story there, do they still do that?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: Are you hanging wallpaper to take care of it?

COACH TRESSEL: I think they used to do that in the old days. Bosick was saying they used to hide the stuff to hang. They've renovated their stadium and the locker rooms are nice, but they are a different shade and that's one of the old tradition things that it was done so long ago that I'm not sure that the people that are there now had much to do with it nor are they going to change that tradition, but last time we were there, I didn't notice it as a problem. Now, maybe two times ago that was the problem, I don't know, but I'd like to think that won't be the problem. All right, Natalie, next to last.

REPORTER: Getting ready to hit the road, fourth time, kind of looking at so far when this team what traveled, you've talked about things that need to happen, is there anything you've been able to see so far that can't happen if you want to walk away from Iowa City with a win?

COACH TRESSEL: We always say when you go on the road that you better have superior special teams and if you think about our road situation, when we were at Illinois, there were really no special teams issues that caused us to not be successful. We didn't really spark ourselves with the special teams, but we were solid. Then you go to Wisconsin, we have a punt return that sets up the second touchdown after the kickoff return, missed the field goal and we could have brought it back and so forth, then you go to Minnesota, they start off by pooch kicking and our guys read it and adjusted their return, changed their return while the ball was in flight and we split it and we're out across the 50 and we go down and score, we block a punt for a touchdown, and it's not just us. Wisconsin fakes a punt against Iowa when they're the road team. That was the difference in the game. That was an even game with Iowa probably really outplaying them until that moment. Somebody else, who was it, Michigan State threw the ball up in the air, I don't know if that have home or away, but when you're on the road, you better play solid in your special teams to give yourselves a chance. Now, that doesn't guarantee anything, but you can almost guarantee that if you play poorly in the special teams that you're not going to be successful on the road. Lori?

REPORTER: You've played against some teams this year that either because of coaching changes or just because it's part of their philosophy or a little bit unpredictable and then Iowa's sort of the opposite of that, I think you've described them in the past as being a team that just lines up and plays.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: And I'm wondering which is the more difficult to prepare for, because should Iowa throw something at you that you don't expect it's really going to come, mixing metaphors, but out of left field.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, how is that mixing metaphors, two different sports?

REPORTER: Two different sports.

COACH TRESSEL: I got you. Good. I learned something. This late in the year, if they came with something new, it would probably be something we've experienced. If you were opening with them and you spent the whole spring and the whole preseason playing against what they do and they came out totally different, it might shock you. They won't. They do what they do and they do it so well. They believe in it. Their players believe in it. They're very, very physical at what they do and the schemes back that. They want to be a balanced offense and they've probably, over the past couple years, gotten more balanced, and so they're not going to change. Now, they may change a little play they run because of what people are doing against them or they -- in '06 they blitzed us a lot more than they ever did. They came after us pretty good, but it was within their system. It wasn't as if they'd never run those blitzes, they just did their blitzes rather than eight percent of the time they did it 15 percent of the time and it felt like they were blitzing every down, that's what you admire about them, that's what you admire about Penn State, that's why you come out, we got behind Penn State and that wasn't a shock to me that we were behind Penn State, Penn State plays their defense, they play their offense, they do what they do, they're very capable as anyone else is, they have good athletes. How we were behind was a little bothersome, but scheme-wise, the good teams, they're going to do what they do, and Iowa will do that. (Players)


REPORTER: How often do you think about the kick last year?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Well, it was definitely a surreal moment for me, I'll always remember it. It was a year ago, the stakes of the game were pretty high. Its wasn't just to win the game, it was for the Big Ten Championship and go to the Rose Bowl, so, yeah, absolutely for me it was a great moment and I'll always remember it.

REPORTER: How do you do you feel you're performing this year? I know you'd like to have every kick, but it seems like you're having a pretty solid year?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Like you said, I'd like to make every kick, so with that being said, I'd say I'm relatively pleased with the way the way things are going, but like you said I'd like it to be perfect if at all possible.

REPORTER: What have you heard about Iowa's atmosphere for conditions?

DEVIN BARCLAY: I honestly don't know anything about Iowa, the state or just anything to be honest. I know that they have a pink locker room, that's about it. It's going to be probably hostile, so -- but that's the road games in the Big Ten.

REPORTER: What's your reaction to the pink?

DEVIN BARCLAY: I have a pink shirt.

REPORTER: This team's had a couple slow starts this year at Wisconsin or the game last week, does that -- should that concern anybody, going to a big game like this or is it just something that happen at times or what should people think of that?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Well, it is November for us, so it's obviously coming down to the most important games of the season for us, you know, anytime you go on the road in the Big Ten it's going to be a challenge and then with Iowa, it's going to be no different, it's going to be similar to Wisconsin, similar to Penn State, we've just got to come out and play our game and I think the rest will take care of itself.

REPORTER: You talked about last year you clearly knew what was on the line for the Iowa game, this time of year a year later, it's really unknown, what's your outlook in terms of what's at stake? What's your mindset the last for the last two games?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Well, I just think for us it's just important that we come out ready to go and not flat, not like Wisconsin or this last weekend, I think we do our best and we come out ready to play and we set the tone right away, that makes a big difference with us in terms of the way we play the game. So I think that's the most important thing and then obviously just executing throughout the whole game, taking care of our job individually and as a team, I think we'll be fine.

REPORTER: Where would you guys like to go bowl-wise, do you have any preferences or ideas? You know what I mean?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Yeah. I don't know, obviously every team wants to go to the National Championship, so to say that that's not still in the back of everybody's minds, that's not true. I think everybody wants that at the end of the day, but who's to say what results are going to take care of themselves and I think the most important thing for us is just winning these last two games.

REPORTER: Is it safe to say that even as you were playing a game at a time that this was always kind of on the radar, you knew this was kind of waiting out there?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Yeah, definitely a game we were always aware of, we had a period in camp where we were preparing for each one of these games, studying them, anytime you have to go on the road and play these tough teams, you really need to be, I think, even more focused than when you're at home. So for us it's just really important to know what the stakes are and do our part, come out ready to play and I think we'll be fine.

REPORTER: Which games were they? Every day you do a game?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Yeah, every day we would focus on a team, that was over spring ball and then in camp as well, and then we went down to Xenia to prepare for those road games, which really, it was tough conditions down there, but nowhere near what you'll really face on the road, so I think just being aware of that makes you get focused in on what you've got to do.

REPORTER: Did you ever find out who got your name?

DEVIN BARCLAY: I have no idea. Yeah, I have no idea, it was one of those last-minute jersey changes because Dane wears 12 and I had to switch to 23. You guys have got to talk to Lou about that one.

REPORTER: What do you think the people in Iowa think when they hear the name Devin Barclay these days given what happened last year?

DEVIN BARCLAY: I don't know.

REPORTER: Do you think they know? They remember you?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Yeah, I don't know what it's going to be like. I mean, as far as I know, I might be one of the most hated people there, and that's fine with me. It's Iowa, so, you know, I don't really know what to expect at all.

REPORTER: As an athlete, for a team like Iowa to have had such a tough loss in overtime here last year, what do you think their players are feeling entering this game, do you think that's a big motivator this week?

DEVIN BARCLAY: I'm sure. I'm sure they don't forget that kind of stuff. I don't know if it's going to be taken out on me in particular. Maybe. I don't know. But I think they absolutely remember last year and that's definitely going to be something that motivates them to play even harder than maybe normal.

REPORTER: Devin, a lot of athletes face a moment of truth, was that a moment of truth for you, that field goal so much on the line and what did you get out of just that experience of knowing you made it, confidence-wise, et cetera, what did that do for you?

DEVIN BARCLAY: For me personally, it was definitely an experience that helped me grow and have a lot of confidence in my football ability, because really that was my second football game ever, so I really learned a lot about what I was capable of doing and obviously being put under those -- with the game on the line, I guess as a kicker, you've got to be ready for those pressure situations, like, I can honestly say, you know, it doesn't get much more pressure-filled than that, but it could this weekend. You know, it could any other game. So with having dealt with a situation like that, I feel more confident knowing that that might come down to it.

REPORTER: How many times have you seen the clip?

DEVIN BARCLAY: I think my mom probably watches it every day, but I've watched it maybe a few times. I don't know, it was last year, you know. When you look back on it, like a couple times after the season, it was cool to relive, but it doesn't really do anything for me now.

REPORTER: Devin, as someone clearly understands what needs to happen on kickoffs, what did Drew and the rest of the kickoff coverage do better last week that they seemed to take such a big step forward?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Well, obviously it starts with the kick. The kicks were deeper, higher, better. Our get-offs were good. I think that the guys were flying down, everybody wanted to make a tackle as opposed to -- because if one guy takes a break, you know, you usually get exposed, especially on the kickoff, so I think we had hungry guys in there that wanted to prove that they could do that and that's not a weak point for us.

REPORTER: Did you see something in Dorian Bell especially being able to get back out there, he seemed to be leading charge like he hadn't been doing before?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Dorian was fantastic making tackles, I think they double teamed him as a couple points but it helps to have somebody like him back, absolutely, very aggressive and that's what you need on those.

REPORTER: Devin, up in Block O, every time you go to kick a field goal or an extra point, they do that ole', ole', ole', do you hear that?

DEVIN BARCLAY: Yeah, that's pretty cool. The first time they did it, Joe Bauserman, my holder, was grinning at me right before I'm about to kick and I'm thinking, stop, you're going to make me laugh, I've got to make this kick. So that's really cool. I love that. That's fantastic.

REPORTER: Does it bring you back to being in soccer, all those kids up there, the students recognize where you've been and what you've done?

DEVIN BARCLAY: It's touching. It's cool that they realize that and appreciate that and it means a lot to me. I think that's fantastic to combine the two sports a little bit, bring soccer into football at the 'Shoe is kind of cool.


REPORTER: DeVier, there was a lot of talk with Coach Tressel earlier about you guys at times getting off to a slow start, I don't know what you can do to prevent it, but do you guys recognize that? Do you talk about that, about how to avoid that?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know how you avoid it. I mean, I know before the game, guys seemed like they were fired up, ready to go. I don't know if it's a play that does that to you or I don't really know how to avoid it, I don't have a formula for it.

REPORTER: On the flip side, you guys always counter punch, it seems, is that part of your personality on this team?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know, maybe we play better fighting uphill, I don't know. I really don't have an answer, and I'm kind of stumped on that question.

REPORTER: Is it easier than not to think about what's at stake here or since you're a football team and you're well aware of this stuff, what all is out there?

DEVIER POSEY: Yeah, I think it's really easy to forget about all that, just being at Ohio State, you have such high expectations and I don't know if you guys heard the boos at halftime, I don't know, I mean, it's just how Ohio State fans are. It's just how college football is. You have high expectations, especially putting on a Scarlet and Gray jersey and it's kind of hard to -- I mean, it's kind of easy to forget about all that stuff because for me and for us, it's just a game that we play, football is a game that we love and I've been playing it since kindergarten every fall, so I don't know, it's just a game.

REPORTER: It's kind of like, if you win, you're still in the hunt for BCS, you're still in the hunt for Big Ten title, but if you lose, you could drop almost to the middle or the back in the Big Ten or at least third or fourth anyway. Have you thought very much about this, just what's riding on the game?

DEVIER POSEY: No, I really don't. We have a lot riding on it each week. You could ask me the same question last week. I don't know, I mean, we just really want to come out and just play and losing is really not in our mind. We focus on each play and we just want to win each play one at a time.

REPORTER: You guys talk a lot about running the ball in November, we saw a lot of that last year. How confident do you feel, if you have to go into this game this weekend and throw the ball a lot, how do you think that would go?

DEVIER POSEY: I think it would go well. Iowa's game plan is going to be to stop Boom and stop our running game so we better make sure we have both prepared. To me it really doesn't matter, whichever one works. I don't mean blocking in football, if a kid runs his butt off, Terrelle runs his butt off, guys line Zach Boren, if they get the opportunity, they'll do the same thing, but whichever formula is working, whichever gets us a W at the end.

REPORTER: When you think of what Terrelle's been able to do, is there a game that sticks out in your mind?

DEVIER POSEY: This season?

REPORTER: Just in his career.

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know. I mean, I'm trying to think back. I really can't recall a game where we had a perfect performance to Coach Tressel's standards or Coach Siciliano's standards. I really think that he played well --

REPORTER: How about the Rose Bowl?

DEVIER POSEY: Yeah, the Rose Bowl was a good game, but I'm trying to think more this season. I don't know, I mean, I really feel like he hasn't played up to his potential or his ability. I don't mean that in a bad way. I mean that in a way, that kid has so much ability in his body that you guys don't even realize. He runs a four-three. He's six-six. He can throw the ball, and, I don't know, I mean, I really don't know what a perfect game for a guy like that is. I guess he'd have to rush for, you know, 15 yards every play, complete every single pass, score every drive for you guys to say he had a perfect game. But I mean, he's a kid, he's not going to play perfect and we understand that, and that's just football, that's the game. Tom Brady throws interceptions too and, I don't know, but I feel like he holds himself to higher standards like that and he wants to have perfect games and he wants to throw every ball perfectly and, I don't know, I mean, just like me, I want to catch every pass, but that's just not football, it's not a perfect game.

REPORTER: How do you feel like you're playing, DeVier? Just kind of rate your performance.

DEVIER POSEY: I think I'm playing within our scheme. Ohio State -- I'm at Ohio State. It's just how things go here. I know in November we're first team and I'm fine with that, and I don't mind blocking, I don't mind getting out there and getting my hands dirty and I feel like I've been playing
pretty good.

REPORTER: You mentioned the boos, what was your reaction to that?

DEVIER POSEY: I didn't actually know until you guys told me after the game. My reaction after the game was, well, I really wasn't surprised, that's Ohio State it's just our fans, they're pretty spoiled, and we've got guys like Woody Hayes and Earle Bruce and Coach Tressel, those guys get a chance to spoil you.

REPORTER: Can you walk us through what happened at halftime, what Coach Tressel said?

DEVIER POSEY: I really can't repeat that. He got pretty animated. He definitely, you know, spilled his heart out to us and he challenged us, he challenged us to go out there the first play, you know, the kickoff team to make an impression and defense to get a stop and once we got the ball back in the huddle, he was like, you know, we had those -- we had that penalty and then we had another penalty, but his attitude didn't change. His eyebrows didn't go up. They were still down. And he was like, well, let's just make the drive a little bit longer. And as offense, we didn't really get discouraged by the penalty. I think B jumped offsides. I knew we had to go a couple more yards to get a score.

REPORTER: Were you surprised or shocked by the way he acted?

DEVIER POSEY: No, it was no surprise. Most of the time he comes in the locker room, but he was just -- his heel didn't stop moving and he was shaking his leg. I knew he had something to say. I just didn't know what it was going to be. He definitely got our team fired up and I think we needed that.

REPORTER: You said you needed that, is there any part of you that's disappointed that this team, this late in the year, would have needed that in a big game like that, or does that just happen sometimes and maybe you come out, you don't play a good half and you need a push or should this team be past that point where you need coach to get on you a little bit?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't really think that's the point. I don't really think that's the case. I'm pretty sure if Chip Kelly probably were in the locker room at that point, he'd probably do the same thing. I just think that's football, you know. Halftime speech is a part of the game and we needed a really motivational one at that point. But at that time in the game, nobody on our team felt like it was out of reach that bad.

I felt like we were there before this season. Wisconsin, I think it was 21-3 at half, and we came back out and made a surge back towards them and I felt like, everyone in the locker room knew that we could do that again, but I guess Wisconsin going out and trying to do that in the second half and us failing allowed us to succeed this time.

REPORTER: Just to be clear, DeVier, are you not repeating the halftime speech because you're trying to keep it private or are you implying the language was a little bit salty?

DEVIER POSEY: You can make a guess on that yourself.

REPORTER: You were talking about Terrelle earlier, talking about what standards he holds himself to, do you feel like that holds him back at all because he cares so much and tries too hard at times? Do you ever feel like that's sometimes a problem or not a good thing?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know. I really don't know. Anytime we've got a guy like that, I mean, even me, myself, I mean, we want to be perfect. We have standards here we want to live up to, you know, what people say, and do what yourself is able to do. I don't know if it holds you back, but I feel like more than anything it keeps you motivated.

REPORTER: Terrelle coming back his senior season, what's your reaction to that and are you coming back?

DEVIER POSEY: No, I'm not surprised. I really would love for him to come back. That's definitely one of my goals and definitely on my agenda to come back. Me and him always sit down and talk about creating a legacy here, being able to, I say, live in Columbus forever, not physically, but be able to, when people see 2 jersey, they think about Terrelle, Number 8 jersey, they think about me. I don't know how to create that, but we probably need a senior season just to catch that off and I think coming in as a freshman, me being able to see guys like Laurinaitis and Robiskie, Hartline being a fifth-year guy, seeing the maturity, seeing how they handled football, they come into the Woody with a business-like attitude and I'm not sure that we have that, per se, now, but I mean, I don't know what happens between your junior year and senior year, but those guys had it and they got it, and being able to see that and witness that, and see guys like Malcolm Jenkins on his four-year plan, I don't know, you kind of want to be a part of that. You get to see the things that our seniors get to do. To be a captain around here is pretty amazing. I don't know, going into the NFL, you'd have to give all that stuff up. It's a decision that he's made and it's a decision that I'll have to make in a couple weeks and I don't know, I'll just think my way into it.

REPORTER: Will you test the waters, at least put your papers in with the draft committee to see where your stock is at?

DEVIER POSEY: Definitely that's on my agenda I'm sure all the guys like Brewster, Mike Adams, and Boom, I'm definitely put my papers in too just to see what's going on, but, like I was telling Dom before, you know, when you get to the NFL, it's the pinnacle, that's the last level of football. I don't know how much of a rush I am to get into that, to be almost done with the game, any injury, if anything happens, be able to leave all this comradery I have, all my best friends, guys that I've been through so much with, that's kind of hard to give up.

REPORTER: After you and Terrelle hooked up on that deep ball in that series, did you maybe think this is going to get the passing game going, we're really going to be able to throw the ball today? Did you feel like this might be a big throwing game for us after you guys did that off the bat?

DEVIER POSEY: Definitely. I hope for a big throwing day every Saturday. That's just my position. I don't know, I definitely thought like that play would be one that would help the game and maybe another big play, a big passing play would help the game like last year and we had one in the fourth quarter, the one I tipped to Dane, anytime you feel like a running game, Penn State, or the ball is going to be ran, that's just the game, between the two schools, but anytime you can get a momentum changing pass, that helps out a lot.

REPORTER: What did you think about the tipped play to Dane when you watched it on film?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know, I really couldn't see. I remember like, in my mind, I felt a guy on my back and I saw somebody closing in on me so I thought, well, I'll just jump and try to catch it. And I jumped and had my hand on it and the guy smacked it out and I fell, and as soon as I hit the ground, I just heard a roar, and I was just like, I know I'm not at Penn State right now. So I got up and I saw Dane in the end zone with the ball, I didn't know what happened. While we were celebrating in the end zone, I was looking up at the screen to catch the replay.

REPORTER: Has Terrelle talked at all, have you all given him any grief about, you need to match Cam Newton, everybody is talking about you and Cam Newton, you look alike, do you bring that up at all? Is he aware of everyone making that comparison?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know, we joked about a guy that looks exactly like Terrelle, they wear the same wristbands in the same place, the same shirts under their jersey, that's about as far as it goes.

REPORTER: Do you think he could be that kind of player? Could Terrelle play like Cam Newton?

DEVIER POSEY: I really don't know. They're two different players and I really just see the good stuff that Cam Newton does, I just see the ESPN highlights and I bet there are some guys that just see the good stuff Terrelle does, they just see the highlights. I really don't know what he does good and what he does bad and it's really hard for me to compare the two, I don't really get to study other than in our film room.

REPORTER: What do you know about Iowa?

DEVIER POSEY: They're a good team. They're a senior-led group. I know those guys don't have amnesia, they remember the last time we went against them. They remember the Barclay kick and just stepping in their shoes a little bit they probably felt like we slipped away with an easy one, slipped away with a win because Ricky Stanzi got hurt the week before we played them and the running back got hurt as well, so they probably feel like they're at full power now and just stepping in their shoes, they probably feel like they can beat us, on their home turf and it's going to be a good game. They're not going to let us just come in there and roll over them so we know we're going up there for a battle.

REPORTER: Can you talk about the exhilaration of Barclay's kick last year?

DEVIER POSEY: I don't know, I just thought my prayers were answered that night right before that kick. I just remember being on one knee right after that. After our defense got a stop, I kind of expected that Coach Bollman went would just run the ball, take it down and make sure the ball was in the middle of the field. Barclay, that kick is like a lay-up for him, he's made it a hundred times during camp and I just remember storming the field and having a lot of emotions going through my body that night, it was a great feeling.

 

[BB73]

The presser was moved up a day due to Thaanksgiving week.

Official.site

COACH TRESSEL: Okay, Lori, last question. Where's Lori? Oh, okay, last question. She's stalling. Well, don't have to tell you what week this is. It's exciting and there's nothing like it. You can feel the energy in our building and amongst our kids and coaches and fans and all the rest and on the campus, and we're looking forward to it.

Seems like Iowa was a long time ago. We knew it would be a battle. It was. Kids kept playing and so did theirs and it was a heck of a Big Ten football game. It wasn't 30 seconds over that our thoughts began to rumble about this one, and we're anxious.

Michigan, I think, has done a heck of a job this year and the thing I've loved about them as I've watched them over the last few years is just the way they just keep playing and they get after it and they never stop, and that's why they're a good football team that is going to be a great part of the greatest game that there is, which is the Ohio State /Michigan game. And we're looking forward to 24 seniors, the last time they go out there, and that's a big deal to us, but it's a bigger deal to them.

We're looking forward to the fact that we're honoring that 1942 team, which one could argue that that's when a great part of our tradition began in Ohio State football, and not to mention the fact that what those men did once the season was over, they went and served in the ultimate way, and we even lost a couple members of that team in the war, so you put all those things together, I don't know if you could make the Ohio State/Michigan game any more special, but I think when you mention that football team and what they mean to our program and what they meant to our country, it just adds a little bit more.

These 24 seniors are great kids. They've done everything we've asked. They've been a part of some good football teams and they're trying to lead this team into being a good football team and they know they only have one more chance back in Ohio Stadium. And I know they're anxious and nervous and have a lot of emotions going through them right now. It goes fast and there's about half of them that have been here five years and the other half four, and they'll all tell you, I'm sure, that it's been a blur and it's been wonderful, and they're going to savor every moment of this week. With that, Lori?

REPORTER: Is there a common denominator in these games that you have as a rule in games against Michigan?

COACH TRESSEL: Every team is unique. Every game is so unique. That's
what you love about coaching football is that you've never had two teams that are the same. The struggles are different. Never had a team without struggles. And every team is so different and every Ohio State /Michigan game is so different, and so, no, I don't think there is a common denominator when it comes to this sport.

REPORTER: How do you go about preparing for and simulating Denard Robinson in practice this week? Will you use a running back at all back there with him or do you just put one of your quarterbacks back there?

COACH TRESSEL: It's impossible to simulate him because there's no one like him, so I'm sure we'll do a variety of things. I'm sure Kenny Guiton will be part of it. We'll have Joe Bauserman in there doing part of it. I'm sure we'll get some of the wideouts in there doing part of it, the running backs. It's a tremendous challenge because it's -- it gives you all of the problems that a wildcat offense gives you with a great running back back there, but along with it, it has all of the passing problems. So I think you've got to work on them maybe independent of one another, but knowing on Saturday they won't be independent and it will be a great challenge.

REPORTER: What sets him apart? Is it all of that plus his speed? What sets him apart in your opinion?

COACH TRESSEL: He's got great quickness. He's tough. He's got a grasp of what they're doing. You can tell he studies everything really well. That's what has won him the job over the course of time is the fact that he dove in and competed and thoroughly gained a command of what they want to do, and he does it with great ability, and he's got a live arm. He's hard to get on the ground. He's just a great player. Great, great player.

REPORTER: Was he on your radar at all out of high school? Did you have any interest in him?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, I don't know that we didn't have any interest in him. He wasn't a guy that we were involved in recruiting.

REPORTER: Is there a point at all this week where you need to enumerate -- these kids are all aware of what's going on, but Michigan/Ohio State, you can get caught up in the game itself, and there are so many other things going on, including you want a Big Ten title, BCS, all that other stuff, do you have to at least mention that at all?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I think all of the things that are real, are real, but the things that are most important is what you have to focus on and the execution in a game that you're so excited about is the focus. The Ohio State /Michigan game is the focus, and then there are tons of by-products for everybody, but the single most one everyone knows that's ever coached or played at Ohio State is that you're defined by your Ohio State /Michigan games. Certainly they're on their way to winning championships or not winning championships or going to BCS bowl games or not going to BCS bowl games, but they have a -- the Ohio State /Michigan game has a compartment of its own that is what you need to be most aware of, in my opinion.

REPORTER: It seems like you came in with that compartment and emphasis on the game, could you ever have envisioned a chance to go nine out of 10 against them?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, if you've grown up around Ohio or Michigan or even in the Big Ten and paid attention to football at all, you could not have an understanding and you also know that any of the games you won or lost before have nothing to do with the game you're ready to play, so, no, I don't -- I mean, you already had the answer to the question on an old tape probably. What's important is this game. You know, that's true. It's real.

REPORTER: The fact this is an end of an era to some extent, the Michigan game will always be Ohio State's biggest game, this is the last year you possibly won't have a chance to have a rematch in the championship, this is the last year of the old Big Ten.

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know, you play it like it's the last game in the world, so I don't know about an era, but I'm not sure that when we line up next year for the Ohio State /Michigan game there will be any less excitement or anything will be taken away from it. Maybe some of those by-products will be added, but I don't know how you could lose anything from this game. I don't -- I just can't conceive of that.

REPORTER: What does it add to the game though, Jim, that it is at the end of the regular season and that maybe in the past you knew, hey, we get a month and a half off before we have to do this again, you can really leave it all on the field, does that allow you to do anything differently going into the game? And again, if that's not the case in few years, maybe you'll have to play.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, I guess it's all from your perspective. Your perspective is you get a month and a half off until you have to do it again. When you play and coach, if you get to play the next week, it's, hey, it's only a week until we get to play again. So, have to, get to, we look at it as get to, but again, that's a perspective that you deal with if and when that arrives, but November 27th, 2010, that's irrelevant.

REPORTER: Statistically it's the worst defense Michigan has ever put on
the field. As you watch them, I know you talk about throwing statistics out, but what have you seen? Why do you -- what do you think their defense might be able to do?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, as you say, whether their defense was the top-ranked or our offense was the worst ranked or whatever, you're not going to face the team that you're watching on film. That's just the way this game is. Go back in the history books. Every play will hinge on what will end up being the final outcome and why statistically haven't they been as good? They've given up too many big plays, but the thing I love about them is I see them flying around and I see a lot of young guys who aren't young anymore. I look at our young guys, when they play young, they error some, they miss some, they coverage blow or whatever, but the older they get, all of a sudden you're looking at them as a veteran, so I can promise you this, they are going to play the best they can possibly play and then some. They're going to play better than they are. We need to play better than we are, and that's, to me, the fun of this game.

REPORTER: You talk about guys being defined by this game. At the beginning of the year when we were asking guys about the Big Ten title streak, they said we don't want to be the team that ends that streak and that same sort of streak now of beating Michigan. Could there potentially be pressure because of that, six in a row, you don't want to be the team that ends that? Is that a motivating factor?

COACH TRESSEL: I suppose if you were making lists of things that make a particular event important, that would make the list. Just like you want to be the team that if you lost a couple in a row was the team that flopped it the other way. But again, it will come down to execution and your question, I guess, is will that put pressure on you and make you tight and not execute, I hope not. I think once you get splattered a couple of times, all of those -- all the rhetoric ends and the football begins.

REPORTER: When you played Oregon, people looked at their offense and you guys kept the ball for 43 minutes in that game. I think a lot of people look at this game in a similar light. They're obviously explosive, but do you look at it too that keeping the ball is as important as anything else on Saturday?

COACH TRESSEL: The interesting thing about Michigan or Oregon is the least of what they worry about is time of possession because they score so fast. So I don't know that the time of possession thing is that critical. Now, would I like to keep the ball 43 minutes? I'll take that in a heartbeat, but we've got to win each play. We've got to win each series. We've got to do whatever we need to do offensively and defensively and special teams and there will be a lot of highs and lows in the game. There will be a lot of adversities. There will be some moments where you think it's going okay, but you better play the next play and that's what's neat about this game.

REPORTER: Are you expecting (Inaudible) in action this Saturday?

COACH TRESSEL: I don't check the Twitters too close since I don't have one. What is it? Do I have a Twitter? Where do you get a Twitter? Twitter.com, okay. How much is it? Free? Oh. No, I wouldn't expect that. He'll be back maybe after he goes home for Thanksgiving for the game, but he's not going to be playing in the game, unless there's something I don't know. I didn't see that on the medical report that -- although Doug Calland did say that this is the easiest week of the year in the training room, all of a sudden everybody's ready, so maybe he is ready. He's going to have to hurry to beat some of those other guys out though.

REPORTER: Is there anybody that has anything lingering? I know Philly came back in.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, I think he just got poked in the eye or something. No, I don't think anyone --

REPORTER: Terrelle's shoulder got popped pretty good, maybe that was nothing big.

COACH TRESSEL: It was a good pop. It was a physical game. He carried it, I don't know, 15 times maybe, so it was a physical thing, but he was bruised up, but again, that blood will get flowing on Saturday and he might get bruised during the game and have to go like this again, but guys will keep going.

REPORTER: Do you think that affected him in the game as you watched tape?

COACH TRESSEL: Not really, no.

REPORTER: How would you assess the way he came through that game,
just his play?

COACH TRESSEL: I thought he played pretty well. There were a couple times where from the sideline I thought he should have stood in and waited for something to develop, and then when you watched it on film, I could see why he moved around a little. I thought really he probably had -- I don't have it in front of me, because we didn't grade this film exactly like we grade the past ones, but I would say his grade was as good or better than any he's had. He really had a grasp on what we were trying to do. Iowa isn't going to change a whole bunch of what they do. They did play a little bit more man free than what they usually do. They got us one time and we had to throw it away with a poor design on what we called, but really he had a good grasp on it and I thought for the most part he did some good things. He had a couple big throws that could have been homeruns and we didn't come up with them and he had that one deep throw that he was moving to left and I think the receiver wanted to move with him rather than stay where they were, so that turned into a pick. Maybe could have stepped up and run the other pick that he tried to force into Dane there, but there was a little window there and I see why he threw it, but he was six inches off the window. But really, he ran the ball well, he got us in and out of plays we needed to be and obviously, you know, you're evaluated by how you do when the chips are down, and I thought he did a nice job in that last six minutes.

REPORTER: Do you have to spend any time this week with DeVier? He was talking about after the game how his mind was going a thousand places after that drop or miss.

COACH TRESSEL: He was probably happy after Dane caught that ball but, you know, we've all been there and, again, once he gets hit Saturday, even if he's thinking about it all week, which competitors do that, they want a chance to do something so they can put it behind them and he'll have his chances and he'll be fine.

REPORTER: How big a game do you think this will be for Dane being a senior, his last game here?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, Dane is a deep guy and he's a very aware guy and you could see -- I remember him sitting down in my office in March just shaking his head that there's no way he's a senior and he wants to absorb every second he can out of something, whether he's sitting in a class or sitting in a minute or he's in the weight room or the practice field, he is a motivated guy that he wants to get everything out of that body of his, that game of his, that experience of his, his academic experience, he's just -- so it will be a big deal to him. I mean, those guys that didn't redshirt, it really went fast because, you know, most of them didn't play tons. They might have played part of the time, and then all of a sudden they found themselves as the returning guy. I'm sure it will be an emotional time for him and he'll need to go out and get whacked a couple times, but he'll be immersed in the moment, but he'll want that clock to never end. That's just the way he is.

REPORTER: Another Boom question. I've done my homework this time.

COACH TRESSEL: Another Boom Herron question, we haven't had a Boom Herron question.

REPORTER: I asked one Saturday, about --

COACH TRESSEL: 20. I did my homework.

REPORTER: He had the five catches. He seems to have improved a lot as a receiver and I just want to ask if his game has become more well rounded this year and how important that is to you guys because you haven't really had a third wide receiver.

COACH TRESSEL: We felt that throwing to the running backs was going to be important and that Saine was extraordinary. Boom and Jordan are just fine, there's nothing wrong with them as receivers. Zach is a very good receiver. So that is a big part of what we do, and to be efficient throwing the ball, your quarterbacks have to really have good feeling that the checkdowns are going to be where they should be, they're going to make the play, they're going to do something with the ball after. I still think the biggest play in the Penn State game was the little five-yard checkdown to Boom where we were back on our own goal line down 14-3 and he made someone miss, third and six, and made eight, but Boom has always been a good receiver. I think if you had one play left and you wanted a receiver at tailback, you'd probably put Brandon in because he's exceptional, but Boom is -- Boom is good at it and it just so happened that he was in when we had some checkdowns or some swings or some control routes open. And, you know, Iowa's going to make you -- they're going to keep the ball in front of them. Very seldom are you going to get by them. That's why we had a couple times where we were by them, but they're going to make you catch it and they're going to tackle well in the open field and Boom does a good job of that.

REPORTER: Saturday, coaches sitting on the sidelines.

COACH TRESSEL: If we had cameras in the media rooms, it would be a reality show. I told half those guys I spent half my energy calming those two down, it's that competitive quarterback and that quarterback coach.

REPORTER: What I'm asking, did it cross a point where it was excessive in any way?

COACH TRESSEL: No. No.

REPORTER: What was he upset about?

COACH TRESSEL: A lot of times when those two are yelling at each other, I'm not sure, but that's the love/hate. There's got to be a good guy and a bad guy. I'm usually the good guy and Sic is the bad guy, that's the way I designed it. He knew that when I hired him. And I told that to Terrelle when I hired Sic. I said, hey, this guy is going to be on your fanny constantly. If you have six inches wrong on a step, if your hip's not just right, he is going to be all over you. So get ready for it. So it's fine for three days and then they have a little tussle and then they're fine in 15 minutes.

REPORTER: Cam Heyward obviously could have left last year, he came back. What do you think he's gotten out of this year from your standpoint. What is the message he sends?

COACH TRESSEL: A wonderful experience of being a senior in college and being a leader and being part of the collegiate environment and moving toward his degree, which was huge, probably huge to him but huger, if that's a word, to his mother. And, you know, just enjoying every day. He was just a fourth-year guy. The guys that leave, that redshirted and then leave after four, like Santonio or Gonzo or whoever all did that, I don't know if they missed as much as that guy that leaves after three because you barely know what you're experiencing after three years. That fourth year is something special and it will be memories that he'll think back to, he'll be sitting in some NFL locker room saying, man this is a long season, man, this isn't as much fun as college, just like they all do. So it will be memories he'll cherish forever.

REPORTER: Terrelle on that last drive, that swing pass to Boom was like right on his fingertips, almost every pass he threw were in that regard.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: What does that tell you about a quarterback when maybe he hadn't had a great day all around, but can summon it in that situation?

COACH TRESSEL: He was locked in, and I thought from the beginning of the game he was locked in then we had a couple that didn't go our way, and it just told me that he put a couple interceptions behind him, he put behind him that we were behind, and he was really zoned in on making his reads and putting it to the guy that needed it. He's had a couple good drives since he's been here. You think back to, all the way to freshman year, when the game's on the line, when it's fourth and 10, there was no hesitation that we were going to go for it because he's going to try to find a way. Now, might not always, we haven't always found a way, but if there's a way, he'll find it.

REPORTER: What are your earliest recollections of this game? I know your dad as a coach --

COACH TRESSEL: Never was at an Ohio State /Michigan game until I coached here. Tickets are hard. And they didn't have ebay back then, I don't think, but we always watched it. I mean, it was "The Game." You felt like you were part of it, just like everyone does now. I don't know at what age I first remember that, but I guess the era that I remember the most is the Rex Kern era and then beyond. Just one of those special weekends as I've mentioned many times, my dad was pretty busy. We didn't see him much from August until the Ohio State /Michigan game and we got to sit and have a couple hours with him, which is when you don't get much and you get a little bit, it's special.

REPORTER: With the way the game has evolved in recent years, do you think teams can succeed these days with a great offense if their defense is maybe just okay? Do you think that --

COACH TRESSEL: Well, if they outscore their opponents. You're seeing some -- you look at Auburn and they're scoring a bunch of points and their defensive numbers aren't as good as some. Oregon is scoring, although we haven't faced Auburn and I'm sure their defense is good, but Oregon's defense is good and they showed that when their defense had to pull out that game a couple weeks ago. But there's not a coach in America that doesn't want to have the best offense that it can have, if that means scoring 50 points a game, let's go, but every coach in America wants to have the best defense they can in special teams. I don't think anyone is philosophically saying, I'm not concerned about one side or the other, just like no one is going to ever say, hey, look, I'm just going to have a good defense and punt on third down. You try to get good at everything.

REPORTER: Jim, you've got one senior, you were talking about the guys that are fourth and fifth year, you've got one guy at three, Justin Boren. What have you seen in the transformation of him, a guy that came from the north, as a Buckeye?

COACH TRESSEL: He loves football. He's got an affinity for Ohio State and Michigan. No question, mom and dad both graduated from there. He has a great respect for both places and I know deep down inside, he feels really special that he's been at both those great places. What I've seen him do is grow into what I thought was a very good player and continue and get a little bit better and a little bit better and a little bit better and I think he's a darn good player. I think he's had a good year. He has fun. He loves being around the guys. You always see him sitting in the locker room, could be with anybody, could be with some other starting offensive lineman, could be with some defensive guys, could be with some walk-ons, it could be with anybody, you know, just having fun. He may not admit it, but he's going to miss playing college football and we always tease him that he likes plowing snow more than he does football, but I think he's had a great experience and he'll, for the rest of his life, have something that I don't know if anyone else -- there might be one or two, was it one of the Hustons one time? Did one of the Hustons go to Michigan first? I don't know. But anyway, there are very few people that have experienced what he has and I think he's enjoyed it and I think he appreciates it. And it's a difficult week for him because everyone wants to talk about, you know, changing schools and all that business, but he's very appreciative of his opportunities.

REPORTER: How did Mike Adams do in his battle with Clayborn?

COACH TRESSEL: Mike did a great job. Mike graded a winning performance. There were one or two times that Clayborn flushed us, but, no, Mike Adams played a good football game. Jim Bollman thinks he may have done as good or better a job than anyone did against Clayborn. And Mike has gotten better as time has gone on. He's a good football player and I think Justin's been good for him, with a veteran right next to him, but I thought he did a good job against Clayborn.

REPORTER: In his third year, Coach Rodriguez does have them at seven wins this year, but there's still a lot of unrest with fans and alumni at Michigan. I'm wondering from your perspective watching them, what kind of progress do you see in their program? Do you see it coming together for him as you get ready to play?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, first of all, I think just from a universal standpoint, there's always unrest if you don't win every game at this level. Secondly, the thing that is impressive to me is that I've watched them for three years and I haven't seen them blink. I mean, they have gone out and they've played every game to the end, and that means something good is going on.

Someone made that statement about Purdue a week or so ago, that, gosh, they lose their three quarterbacks and their best receiver and two running backs, they go out there and I don't care who they're playing, they're going toe to toe. There must be something good going on there. And I feel the same way about it with Rich and his program and he hasn't -- he hasn't batted an eye, and that kind of resolve and that kind of belief, in my experience, reaps results.

REPORTER: We know how coaches are defined by this game.

COACH TRESSEL: I thought that was Siciliano for a second, coming down to ask a question. I thought, Sic, what are you doing down here?

REPORTER: I'm going to ask you about Terrelle. Coaches are defined by their quarterbacks. He's very visible in this game. What do you think is going through his head leading up to this game?

COACH TRESSEL: Terrelle's a nervous nelly because he wants to compete and he wants to do well and be perfect and all those things, so I'm sure his mind is racing. Not unlike my mind or anyone on our staff or anyone on our team. Really it won't stop racing until you get out there. That's just the way it is. You can't stop thinking about it. You can't stop worrying about it. You can't stop thinking about what else you need to do. And he'll be the same way and so will the competitors on their side and then you'll get together and, bang, then we'll have a football game.

REPORTER: You coached Jamar Martin here, is Zach Boren perhaps the best fullback you've ever coached?

COACH TRESSEL: Zach's really good. Jamar Martin was really good. I don't get into the bests all the time, or maybe ever, but I'm awfully happy that he's our fullback and I think the thing that you see from our tailbacks is how much appreciation they have for him, because they consider him one of the linemen. I mean, that's just the way they feel about him. They do not look at him any differently than they do their linemen in the relative importance of their linemen. Ashley, you're batting third from last.

REPORTER: Your defense did a great job holding Iowa to only 81 rushing yards. What, if anything, do you build upon as you prepare for Michigan?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, conceptually they're very different. They're both zone-read teams as opposed to blocking down and pulling and so forth, but they do enough misdirection, both of them, that you have to be ready for it, I think, making sure that you play your gaps like you have to do against Iowa because they're so good at cutback. Well, Michigan, you better play your gaps, but now you've got the problem of the quarterback. And so not only do you have to play your run gaps against their own schemes, but you have to play the quarterback coming off the fake of the scheme, so it's a great challenge.

I think anytime you add the quarterback, you know I believe that, anytime you add the quarterback to the arsenal, you have applied pressure to a defense, but the experience against Iowa was a good one, because they are great technicians with their blocking and they're going to get people up onto the right people as Michigan does, and so having that great discipline, having that experience against Iowa filling your gaps and canceling gaps and staying on your feet and all those things will help us, but it's a whole new world when you add the quarterback to it and really it's a speed attack and Iowa might have been a little bit more of a power attack.

Although I know when Michigan started the game against Iowa a month or so ago, they lined up in the I and bounded it down the field in the I formation, so it's not like Michigan can't do that. So they'll sprinkle it in, but it was a good experience for us to have to handle Iowa's running game. All right, Natalie.

REPORTER: Midway through the season I'd asked you about the identity of this year's team. Now getting ready to play Michigan, what has surprised you the most about this year's squad?

COACH TRESSEL: What has surprised me most about this year's squad? You're in such the middle of the journey that I don't know if you stop and reflect about things like that. I'm not surprised that they've been methodical. I'm not surprised that they've been a good solid team. You never know what kind of emotional team you're going to have and this team probably isn't as high emotionally or low emotionally maybe as some teams we've had. I don't ever see them really hanging their heads, nor do I see them bouncing off the walls, which is a good thing because you want to control either and you want to keep them on the task at hand. I don't know if that surprises me because -- or I don't know if it should surprise me because just look at the make-up of the kids. They're solid, stay the course, do what I'm told, ask questions when I'm not sure, want to know -- they want to know why we're doing what we're doing.
So I guess it shouldn't surprise me that they're not like that, but, you know, football teams, in the course of a long season, you know, I thought we came out against teams earlier in the year that we were favored over and that type of thing with a little bit more pizazz maybe than some years and didn't feel as if we were pulling teeth, but it will be interesting to see their emotions this particular week because this is a whole different season. This is a whole different world. So I know I didn't answer your question, but --

REPORTER: That's okay. You gave us good stuff.

COACH TRESSEL: Where's Lori? There she is.

REPORTER: Coach Rodriguez has often said that he's in a unique position and that he has to get his team up for three different rivals, Michigan State and Notre Dame and you guys, and I wonder if that isn't an inherent advantage for you guys in that there is no doubt who your rival is.

COACH TRESSEL: No, we don't question at all who our rival is. Ohio State /Michigan is no doubt our rival. I don't know if I look at that as an advantage for us because every team in the Big Ten and every team that we get on their schedule, that game is circled in bright red, so we certainly have people play against us like we're their rival, but I don't know, I guess I've not been in a situation necessarily that I could relate to that, but there's no doubt about it that in our world, Ohio State /Michigan is the rivalry.

REPORTER: Can I just ask one real quick? Give me your best 20 seconds. Maria Durant will kill me if I don't get this response.

COACH TRESSEL: She's out of control.

REPORTER: Just the rituals of game day, what do you like, the Skull Session? The walk over? Do you have traditions and things that you like on that pregame experience?

COACH TRESSEL: When there's about an hour or two before the game, there's not really that much I like, simply because I want to get to the game. That's the hardest two hours for me. Now, I suppose if I look back and say, you know, that Skull Session is extraordinary, but honestly, I want to go play the game. You know, the walk to the stadium is -- it brings you into focus on, it's time to go play a football game, but that's not the most comfortable two hours of my day. I'm more comfortable once the game starts. And that wasn't 20 seconds of my best, but, oh, well. I haven't had too many of those.

REPORTER: Can you add one sentence on the plans for Thanksgiving?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, we're going to practice in the morning and I don't know if that makes it special, and we're going to have some turkey for them before they leave, but we'll have them out of here shortly after noon, and the ones that are within an hour or two of here may have a chance to get home, take some of the guys with them, that type of thing, but it's hard to make a practice day special, but we'll do the best we can. It will be good turkey. Thank you.

 

[BigJim]

ol' Tressel...

REPORTER: Are you expecting (Inaudible) in action this Saturday?

COACH TRESSEL: I don't check the Twitters too close since I don't have one. What is it? Do I have a Twitter? Where do you get a Twitter? Twitter.com, okay. How much is it? Free? Oh. No, I wouldn't expect that...

 

[BB73]

Post-game presser after TSUN.

Official.site

COACH TRESSEL: You're interrupting Earle? Don't do that. I made that mistake as a young coach once. This was an important day for us. Representing the 1942 team, that was a lot of responsibility because not only were they champions, but they were heroes. We're all getting to do what we do right now because of them. And then to represent our seniors who -- they're just first-class. They do things the way you're supposed to do them. They're unselfish. They don't care if they have the spotlight and all they want to do is help Ohio State. And so this was an important football game and I'm so proud of these guys.

We can talk about key plays or whatever, but our guys fought all day long and I thought that kickoff return after they had scored and, boom, all of a sudden it's back to 10 points was a key factor, but our kids prepared very hard and played hard and they deserve everything they have coming to them.

REPORTER: You avoided the question early in the week, going nine out of 10 against Michigan. The kick return was big with Jordan answering their touchdown. I don't know if there was a turning point, but nine out of 10 against Michigan while you've been here.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, if we were sitting here eight out of 10, we would have been unhappy, I promise you that. Yeah, it's huge. This is the 2010 team. That's what we talk about all the time in coaching is that every team is its own team, has its own signature and its own challenges and adversities and high points, and these kids were five or six and 0, and we dropped one and they came storming back, and we played hard in November, which if you play hard in November, usually good things will happen, and Mr. Smith assured me that some good things will happen. So right now our guys have got to finish up the academic quarter and do a great job on final exams and see what lies ahead.

REPORTER: Coach, did the officiating crew give you a more detailed reason why the penalties were called after the touchdowns? I know you probably can't answer that question, but did you get an explanation why?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you know, excessive celebration. No, it was not the dive. I can't answer that.

REPORTER: (Inaudible)

COACH TRESSEL: That's what they inferred.

REPORTER: (Inaudible)

COACH TRESSEL: What are you going to do?

REPORTER: Would you reflect on six consecutive Big Ten Championships for your staff and your kids? This senior class has four Big Ten Championships, but you as a staff have won six consecutive Big Ten Championships. Would you talk a little bit about what it means to you to have this group around you, what it means to Ohio State?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, we've got probably half the senior class that has five -- will have five Big Ten rings and five pairs of gold pants, which that's a big deal. It won't do anything for us in a bowl game. It will do something for us in our dresser drawer or wherever you keep your stuff, but it's just a feeling of accomplishment. What our guys enjoy and what our staff enjoys, and most of our staff's been here for all of those, which the continuity has been very important, we enjoy the journey. It's the thrill of the challenge. It's hard to do.

And our guys work, now. Our players and coaches, they work. And they enjoy it and our guys will be back recruiting at -- we have a 10:30 a.m. recruiting meeting tomorrow. That's the way life is. And they'll hit the road tomorrow night and be at it. But the process of chasing the championship, to me, is the fun.

REPORTER: Coach, let's talk about the job of your defense. You held Michigan to, I believe, 30 points below their season average and about 150 yards below what they've done to everybody else in the league this year. Let's talk about the job your defense did, and some of the adjustments after the first two possessions.

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you know, I don't know anything about the adjustments, so we'll get to that right off the bat. But our kids get a feel for things and they learn on the job very well and they can run and they hold a lot of people under their average when they're playing. I thought our special teams contributed. That last punt by Ben Buchanan, I thought, was kind of just an exclamation point that, hey, you're not going to get beyond our goal line anymore. Obviously the kickoff return. And offensively we didn't have many turnovers. We had the one at the end of the half, which was irrelevant to the defense, but I don't think -- did we have any others? I can't remember.

So I think the combination of those defensive guys learning and adapting and getting a feel and mounting pressure on both quarterbacks. You know, Forcier played -- Denard threw it 18 times and Forcier 15, so they played almost equal, and our guys just keep coming and that's why they're a good defense.

REPORTER: Talk about nine out of 10, seven in a row, and six Big Ten titles. Does Ohio State and the Big Ten need for Michigan to return to being among the elite programs in the country again?

COACH TRESSEL: Michigan is among the elite programs and will be and their record will reflect that in the course of time but, you know, we all have our ups and downs in a period and so forth and it's highly competitive. It's going to become more competitive because we're adding Nebraska. The world changed when we added Penn State. The world changes even more when we add Nebraska. The world changed when Dano (Dantonio) went over to Michigan State. There's constantly changes, but Michigan will be back, we don't have to worry about that.

REPORTER: Jim, obviously you talk all the time about you want to get better over the course of a year. To be 11-1, where do you feel like this team is in achieving this goal and just how good of a team do you think you are at 11-1 at the end of the season?

COACH TRESSEL: Not good enough to be the outright Big Ten champions and automatic bid to the Rose Bowl and all those things that you shoot for, but we're pretty fair, and I believe we're a top ten football team and probably going to get to play a top ten football team and see if we're allowed to stay in the top ten is what I would guess, but I think it goes beyond that.

Sometimes the ball bounces funny and you end up undefeated or you end up losing however many, and our guys just kept working and whatever came their way, they handled it and pressed on and handled adversity and handled success as it came. They need a little break and they need to take a deep breath and then they need to think about playing against one of the top teams in the nation wherever we play, whoever it is. We've had -- really we've had 13 games in 2010. We played a pretty good Oregon team on the first day of the year, so it's been a lot of fun.

REPORTER: The big one called back for over 98 yards, that ties the longest run, can you talk about what it was for him and maybe the team in general, not just the celebration penalties, but personal penalties, it seemed like an odd game it seemed like.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, I suppose. It was an emotional game for everyone. It was a strange game offensively where we kind of led with the pass in the first half and all of a sudden we got a couple turnovers and we are looking more at leading with the run the second half, and I don't even know if we threw the ball the second half. It wasn't like all of a sudden a snowstorm came in or something. It was just that's not what we needed to do and we always talk about we do what the team needs, and first half we needed to throw it. They were jamming the box full of people and we felt like we could throw the ball. And our guys were protecting well. And TP was stepping up running and making good decisions and he probably threw a couple touchdowns today, I imagine, two, and put him tied with Troy? No, career. Check that.

REPORTER: (Inaudible)

COACH TRESSEL: He is? Go to the old veteran. Old stand by. All right,
Clay, last one. You're the best dressed, that's why I'm going that route.

REPORTER: (Inaudible).

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I don't know about turning point, but that was a critical point, because they worked very hard to go down and get their touchdown, and all of a sudden it took us 20 seconds to answer, and Jordan Hall is a great football player. I wish there were more opportunities for him to have the ball in his hands because, man, he can play, and we love him as a punt returner. And they tried to pooch that kickoff. I didn't see their starting kickoff guy there because he's their punter too, and so they obviously had to come up with a different plan.

Our guys couldn't tell by the kicker's approach where he was going with the ball and our front-line people did a wonderful job of adjusting, and Jordan, you know, took it to the house and that was critical. But Jordan Hall is a fantastic football player and I'm glad he's a Buckeye.

REPORTER: (Inaudible)

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I never feel slighted. I intimated someplace nice? Every bowl I've been to has been nice. We always say you get as your works deserve, wherever you deserve to be will be, and we will be happy and we'll have a tough opponent, so --

REPORTER: (Inaudible)

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, I think we're a top ten team. You know what, I don't even pay attention to all the different things and that stuff, but, yeah, I think -- there's 10 BCS teams, right? But who cares what I think. See ya.

REPORTER: Ross, could you and Brian talk about, you have five Big Ten rings and five pairs of gold pants. The other guys have four, you guys have five. Ross, could you start and, Brian, you talk about what that means to you to beat Michigan five times and win five Big Ten championships.

ROSS HOMAN: I think first and foremost, it's important to never lose to Michigan as a Buckeye, which is unusual, and to end up with five rings from championships is another accolade. I'm so blessed with these guys, these seniors, these coaches, this whole team. It's a dream come true.

BRYANT BROWNING: It's definitely a blessing, we're here, the coaches made it a goal for the team this year, this season, and coaching five great teams and having these goals to go out and try to coach every game and these seniors have been working all year fortunately for us.

REPORTER: For the defensive guys, Michigan had the ball most of the first quarter, I think 12 plays, 10 plays, the first two possessions. What did you guys change, do, anything that really kind of shut them down? You
were 30 points over their average today.

BRIAN ROLLE: We didn't really do anything, we didn't do any hurry-up type stuff, we just went after them, they got tangled up in the ball a little bit.

ROSS HOMAN: Out there it's kind of -- it's always -- we just kept attacking, our D line.

CAMERON HEYWARD: Just to piggyback on that, we did a great job just handling adversity. There was a couple situations where they got some big yards and I think each time they did that, another guy just stepped up, we got the turnover, we got four and out a couple times, and it just says a lot about this defense.

REPORTER: Dane, was it explained to you guys what the penalty was they were calling? Was it about your glove, when you were making the sign to the crowd? What did the coaches tell you about what was going on there?

DANE SANZENBACHER: I think they said that was what it was. They didn't want any hand gestures or anything like that and just celebrate with your teammates. So I think it's safe to say we will never wear gloves with anything on them again.

REPORTER: Dane, do you blame Nike for this?

DANE SANZENBACHER: I do. You're going to get us fired.

REPORTER: You guys started with two three and outs, what did you find there? You had that big catch early, what did you find offensively?

DANE SANZENBACHER: We weren't really surprised by anything. It was just lack of execution. I mean, the plays were there. It was just one thing here or there that wasn't opening up, but it was just one of those things where you've kind of got to get a feel for the game, how things were going, and the defense consistently did their job and made it easy on us.

REPORTER: Dane, being from Toledo, can you talk about what it's like finishing as a senior with a perfect record against this team?

DANE SANZENBACHER: It's incredible. It's obviously a goal you have coming in and you never want to be on the other side or the losing side of this rivalry. Especially from Toledo, since we're a town with a large amount of Ohio State and Michigan fans, it's always been a huge game for me and I'm proud to say I'm leaving here never losing to them.

 

[scarletngray]

"Mr. Smith assured me that good things were going to happen"...

Me likey...

:osu:

 

[BuckeyeNation27]

REPORTER: Dane, do you blame Nike for this?

DANE SANZENBACHER: I do. You're going to get us fired.

I love that kid

 

[BB73]

Sugar Bowl presser.

Official.site

COACH TRESSEL: Hello. Am I supposed to have an opening statement?

REPORTER: How about Legends and Leaders? Your take.

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I just heard about that last night. I'm not sure which one we are. We're leaders?

REPORTER: Jesse Owens wasn't a legend apparently.

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know. I mean, it's great. I don't think we could do it geographically because it's not a geographic division, so I honestly hadn't given it much
thought. Like we always say, tell us what time we're playing and who we're playing and we'll be ready to go.

REPORTER: Anything about Arkansas?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, the thing I've been impressed with, and I haven't watched as much film as the staff has, we've been in and out of the office recruiting, which really starting today we'll be back in the office primarily, but excellent quickness. There are teams with great speed and there are teams that have the quickness that goes along with it. They just look to me to be exceptionally quick.

Obviously on the offensive side, that quarterback, Ryan, has got -- he's got a lightning-quick release, spins the ball as well as anyone we've seen. He's got great weapons to go with him. I just think the quickness of their football team. They are a quick, tough, football team and they're battle tested. Look at the people they've played and gone toe-to-toe with, everyone on their schedule, and it will be a great challenge, of course.

REPORTER: Are there any similarities between what they do and anyone you've faced this year?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, you know, in this day and age, everyone does so many of the same concepts. Defensively they're going to play base defense and play zone, but they're also going to zone blitz you. They're going to come after you and play some man, not unlike most everyone. Offensively, they probably -- we haven't faced anyone that's thrown for however many yards that is per game, 300 plus yards per game, so they may throw it a little bit more, but they've still got a 1000-yard back and you better not just go double team every receiver or they'll be scorching you down the field in the run.

They don't run a bunch of options, which some teams we've faced were option teams. But when you have a four-week time period you better expect some unexpected. Primarily we will face what they do well, but we'll get some unexpected, so it's a good opportunity for us to go back to the fundamentals and work on ourselves, get some young people some work, develop our own plans based upon what we think has been a part of our evolution on both sides of the ball and special teams and then get some wrinkles ready to see if we can apply a little bit more pressure in each area, but I don't think they're exactly like anyone we've played, no.

REPORTER: Interesting difference in getting bowl preparation, it's a team that kind of has a blank slate obviously, even with Texas you had played them kind of recently a little bit and, you know, conference teams, they may be a little different year to year, but what's the difference in terms of both your preparation and the kids too, if you can kind of comment on ground zero.

COACH TRESSEL: I think there's some novelty and excitement just like there was a year ago playing Oregon. We hadn't played Oregon and we hadn't been to the Rose Bowl for a long time. We haven't been to the Sugar Bowl. We've been to New Orleans a few years ago, but we haven't been to the Sugar Bowl, per se, in a long time, so there's some exciting novelty to that. Of course you're not going back and saying, well, the last time we played them, let's go study that. So I'm sure we don't have a feel and that's why the thing that jumps out to me is we better be ready for their quickness because they look to me like they're exceptional in that area and we better be preparing ourselves for that.

REPORTER: Jim, you've faced some pretty interesting offenses in bowls the past couple years, what Texas did, what Oregon did, what's your defensive staff like, what are Jim and Luke and those guys like when they're planning for some of these great offenses you've faced? What do you see from them in bowl prep?

COACH TRESSEL: I think the thing that every time we get ready for a game is the first thing they do is say, okay, what do they do best? What does it look like they hang their hat on in those key moments, those key down and distance situations, when they're up against it a little bit? What is it that they really always go back to as a base, just like I'm sure defenses do that with us. So, you know, in this day and age of computers and video breakdowns and so forth, you have a pretty good handle on what they like to do against what.

Now, typically you comb through all the films and say, okay, which team are they attacking who deploys similar to the way we do, what's their conceptual thinking against our style of defense or our style of offense, so you have a little bit of time to do that. It's been a little fragmented because our guys have been off the road and really the offensive staff will really be the first time they're all in here together. Defensively, from Wednesday on, they'll all be in here together and they've watched film independently and each individual position coach has got some thoughts. Now, you can bang them off each other and talk about why you think this and why we should maybe consider that, but first and foremost, I think you have to try to get a feel for them.

REPORTER: Anything you've done defensively against Texas, Oregon, the past couple bowl games you've been pretty happy with?

COACH TRESSEL: I'd say we've done pretty well. I can't think of too many times over the course of the years I've been disappointed how we've done defensively period. I thought we had a good plan for Oregon. I thought we had a good plan for Texas. I thought we had a good plan for LSU. I'm just trying to backtrack through the games. I haven't been disappointed in any way. I think anytime we've had points scored against us, there's been a contribution that wasn't solely defensive.

REPORTER: Last year, Terrelle got much healthier between the end of the season and the Rose Bowl, had a big game. This year, do you think he has a chip on his shoulder from kind of being overlooked or dissed or whatever you want to say on the All Big Ten awards?

COACH TRESSEL: You know, I haven't checked his Twitter because I don't know how. I don't know. He's a competitive guy. So when you have a month or so to think about, okay, what is it I've got to do better and what is it that I'd like to establish in my play, in my game. If you'll look at it the right way and outline the time, which historically he's always done that, if you look at from an off season to the next spring and then spring to the next fall, most recently from the end of last season to the Rose Bowl, and then the Rose Bowl to the start of the season, so I'm sure he'll use this time well and he'll have that competitiveness to it. I don't know if I'd call it a chip on his shoulder, but he would like to be very good.

REPORTER: Robinson was 7-5, Persa, that was a seventh-place team, Tolzien, they were very good, but they were basically a running team too.

COACH TRESSEL: Do I think? Yeah. The two guys I thought that deserved recognition in Big Ten at quarterback were Tolzien and Pryor. You can't leave Cousins too far behind. We didn't play him, so he's not as near in my thinking, but because of what we believe, the quarterback is evaluated by how a team fares one loss-wise. And I think TP knows that and feels that, feels comfortable with that.

REPORTER: You're aware of the comments he made in the Chicago Tribune last week where if he was running this offense or this offense he'd be -- did you take umbrage with that or have you talked with him about it or do you understand what he meant?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, usually when you look at comments extracted out in the midst of a long discussion, if you take umbrage to one, you've probably not felt the whole context. Probably my discussion, if I were in those shoes would have been the discussion which was part of it which, hey, I'm happy with titles, I wouldn't trade my championships for any honors or statistics or whatever and left it there. But, you know, I'm more experienced.

REPORTER: Jim, can you use Ohio State's record against the SEC in bowls as motivation just that this team could end that drought?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, I think you have to be a little bit careful of what you major in because the thing we've got to do, really focus in on, is what it's going to take to play Arkansas who we didn't play in any bowl games in our history and not get too caught up in irrelevant things. But on the other hand, you do like to accomplish things and a great performance in a bowl game the magnitude of this against a team who's very, very good and happens to be in a very, very good conference, of course you use that as a tremendous goal.

REPORTER: I think a lot of you came out against Oregon last year and tried to pummel them because they looked small.

COACH TRESSEL: They didn't look small to me.

REPORTER: I'm just saying, Glen Mason -- this isn't here or there. But as you go into a bowl game, are you compelled to change things because you know they've got a month to get ready for you, from an offensive standpoint, are you --

COACH TRESSEL: Not really. We've always believed that we've got to figure out what it is we do best. We've had a whole season to evolve. And then of course you've got to see what health you're in because many times you can look back at what you've done well and all of a sudden two or three of the guys that have been doing it are banged up or whatever. But, no, we won't change dramatically, we want to run it. I thought we got better this year, the better job we did running it, but we also want to apply pressure with the pass.

If we can be balanced and do a good job of possessing the ball like we have done, which I think has helped our defense and do a good job taking care of the ball, which we've done a pretty fair job of and it's helped our defense, and do a good job with our special teams and all the rest, we won't change dramatically.

REPORTER: Do you all look a lot at Auburn? You've got a quarterback that looks a lot like him and they scored 65 on these guys. Do you look a lot at that game and how Arkansas had tremendous problems?

COACH TRESSEL: We'll study that one for sure because we always love to steal ideas from anybody and most especially when you think you have similar capabilities and so forth, but we're not going to go and get a highlight film of things that have worked for other teams against them and put all those in because the reason they worked is because Auburn is good at them and we've got to decide what we're good at.

REPORTER: On the flip side of Ryan being a less than mobile quarterback, there's five Razorbacks with 500 yards, six that have scored four touchdowns this season, how are you inclined to approach this team defensively?

COACH TRESSEL: They do a good job of getting a feel of how you are going after them defensively and then because of their versatility, they can say, okay, they're trying to stop this and we'll go to that. And they do spread the ball around. Ryan is a veteran guy.

I think just systematically, and I've watched probably more of their offense so far in this early time than I have of their defense, systematically, I think they do a great job of knowing what you're trying to do and attacking you with the thing they know hurts those coverages or those deployments or so on and so forth. You better not go in there with just one thought because they'll figure it out and they'll adjust and they'll stall you pretty good. So you better, in my mind, have a lot of different things ready to go and then get in the midst of that chess match. And what's fun about games is some games you're out there and you're always a step ahead of them and then there's other games that, man, it seems like they're always a step ahead of us, and that's football. You want to be the one applying the pressure and the indecision and those kinds of things. And our defense does a wonderful job of that, so I would expect them to have that ready to go.

REPORTER: You talk about taking care of the ball, you're going to knock on wood here, but you have only lost two fumbles this year.

COACH TRESSEL: We lost one this morning and one on whatever the last day we practiced, Saturday morning.

REPORTER: You're getting them all out in practice then. Is there a common denominator for that?

COACH TRESSEL: I'd like to think it starts with our guys' belief factor, how important that is to the team, is that if we don't turn it over, if we take care of the football, we don't throw interceptions, and we put our defense in good field position, our defense will do a good job. If we leave our defense in poor field position, then the emotional flow of the game goes against them, it's harder to play good defense, and that's why we've never really gotten too into the discussions about what are our defensive numbers and what are our offensive numbers, because they're so interconnected with one another's part of the deal that we've had great defenses, but they've been helped tremendously by good turnover margins and good special teams and all the rest.

So why has it been that good? I don't know. I'm happy. But it better stay that way if we want to have a chance to compete in a game like this.

REPORTER: Have you ever seen personally any of those pig snout hats the fans wear or ever heard thousands of people yelling --

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, the hats? I mentioned that to the group. We went and visited when Coach Holtz was there and Coach Pagac, Sr., bought one and the whole way home on the bus he was wearing one and we were passing people by and he'd be standing in his window with his hat on and people almost getting into wrecks and that's the only time I've seen it. But one thing, the little bit I was there for two or three days, they love their football and they love having fun.

REPORTER: It's quite a thing when thousands of people are making that chant.

COACH TRESSEL: It's awesome.

REPORTER: Do you have any juniors filling out paperwork?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah.

REPORTER: Could you tell us who they are or how many?

COACH TRESSEL: I could, but I can't remember for sure. I don't want to leave -- I think I've sent four and I've got one I'm just waiting for the transcript because we requested by the NFL to send the academic transcript along with it as well, so I've sent -- I've sent one time three, and the next time I've sent a single one, and I've still got a form filled out on my desk.

REPORTER: So a possible five?

COACH TRESSEL: Possible five.

REPORTER: When you look back on this time last year, compared to the Rose Bowl and obviously the outcome there, is there anything that you draw from your preparations or even within that game that you use this year that you feel like could be an advantage?

COACH TRESSEL: I think we think back to every bowl game we've been to and we think back to why we've evolved to deciding how we're going to prepare, but it still goes back to, we want to have the right blend of time off, fundamental time, young kids getting time, film study time, adding a little bit of time, but really honing the things we do well, and in this period we're not in school, so we like to add some things to it with our kids going out to hospitals and the food bank we're going to tomorrow and doing some different things. We've had the military in every day, various military folks. And today, this morning before practice, we did shout-outs to send overseas for the holidays.

So you just try to fix everything in there, but we don't really go back to our notebooks from last bowl games and look at what we did because we're a different team than we were a year ago and it's a different calendar, we're playing the 4th, not the 1st. Hopefully we've learned every time we've gone to a bowl.

REPORTER: What do you think went right last year as you built to the Oregon game, as you look back on that?

COACH TRESSEL: We knew it was going to be a whale of a game and we knew we needed to do a good job offensively, so as not to put too much pressure on our defense because we knew how great their offense was. I think the fumble they had going inside the 20 was a good thing, impactful, probably as impactful as think calendar decisions we made leading up to the bowl, those types of things, guys making plays, Jake Ballard jumping up in the air and catching a ball that was out there, but our guys were focused on trying to be the best we could be, which, again, I have not been disappointed from that standpoint in our guys' bowl preparation over the years, they've worked hard to see if we can match up.

REPORTER: Is there such a thing as when you turn on a tape you see a team and you know they're from the Southeastern Conference the way they play and does Arkansas kind of fit that bill?

COACH TRESSEL: Most of the films we've turned on with Arkansas, they're playing each other, and there's two teams whacking each other, running fast, and great football, and I think everyone in America knows that's a great brand of football, but you turn on a great Big Ten game and they're whacking each other. So I haven't watched too many game copies yet, I've just looked at some cut-ups so far, and what I like to do once I get off the road and start watching is I like to watch the continuous game and get a flavor, a flow, for what's this team about. So I could probably answer that better after I have a better handle it on, but there's no doubt, the SEC teams we've played against, I don't remember South Carolina that well because that was 100 years ago, but the Florida team we played was great athletes, a lot of them still playing, and the LSU team we played, I mean, I loved their make-up, they had all those fifth-year seniors and fought the fight, lost a couple games and still were there hanging at the end, never going to put their guard down. Thus far what I see about Arkansas is that they've been that kind of team that's just been a battler and you can't end up 10-2 in that league without being battlers.

REPORTER: Is Terrelle one of the five who sent in the paperwork?

COACH TRESSEL: I can't answer that.

REPORTER: You really can't?

COACH TRESSEL: I can't.

REPORTER: Why not?

COACH TRESSEL: I just don't feel like it. I don't know. I can't bring myself to, how's that?

REPORTER: You look at some of the players and it's hard to believe that Darren McFadden and Felix Jones were all in the same --

COACH TRESSEL: Glad they're not now, although nice, and all those guys are pretty good. Arkansas historically, you go back to Frank Broyles, they've had great teams. They always will. They have a proud tradition for the state of Arkansas, just as proud as we do for the state of Ohio. And as someone asked earlier, is it unusual that we've never played them in all these hundred years of football, and it really is, because we've been to a lot of bowl games, more so from the '70s on because of the rule change, but I think it will be an exciting thing. I think that's why there's a lot of interest in the game from our fans and their fans. I think that's why New Orleans was interested in having those two teams in there, because there's a heck of a lot of tradition when you look at those two teams.

REPORTER: Brewster was named All American Football Writers --

COACH TRESSEL: So was Chim, I think.

REPORTER: Talk about both those guys. What did they get done this year that they got that recognition from your vantage point?

COACH TRESSEL: You know what, those two guys are good players. I don't know how all the different All American teams -- I know how the Coaches All American Team is done, we have a committee and we put in players and other teams put in players that aren't on your team and there's a system, and I don't know exactly how the Football Writers do it, but I'm impressed with the fact that those are two guys who really didn't get that much hype, but really were very good players this year, and those writers must have been doing their research because those are two good players and if you match them up on film, they match up favorably against anyone.

REPORTER: Finals were last week and how are you looking academically, and will you give us an injury update?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, finals-wise, I don't know. Usually the grades come out Tuesday or Wednesday. Let's see, finals ended Friday, so we should have them here. I just got back about 12:30 last night, so I haven't had too much interaction with anyone. We should get our grades here in the next day. I haven't heard any crises, which is usually a good thing. Injury-wise, I'm trying to think about who is --

REPORTER: What about Christian Bryant?

COACH TRESSEL: He was back there practicing a hundred percent. He was scrimmaging. He's back. Back a little quicker than I thought he might have been. So his Twitter might have been right that I missed.

REPORTER: All kinds of changes, we talked about the new division, did you see the new logo? What do you think of that? And 18 new trophies you guys will be playing for.

COACH TRESSEL: I haven't seen any of those. I've heard of the Leaders and the Legends, I haven't seen the rest. Trophies for what?

REPORTER: Like MVP of the game.

REPORTER: End of the season punter, receiver.

COACH TRESSEL: I didn't have a vote and I haven't gotten to my email. I'm sure we've been communicated with, but we've been scrambling. There's certain times when we're allowed to do certain things and the last few days, we had 19 recruits or 18 recruits in with their families all weekend, they left here 3:00 in the snow on Sunday and I left at 3:15. So I really haven't seen any of that yet.

REPORTER: With Pryor there seemed to be some doubt before the Michigan game with his shoulder. Where is he at right now? Is he a hundred percent? Is he going through everything right now?

COACH TRESSEL: I asked him last night when I was driving to the airport how the guys' workout was yesterday and he thought it was good, and I said, how was your workout, and he said, I did all the upper body lifts for the first time since early November, and he said he feels good, so he hasn't shown any hint of not doing anything in practice, so --

REPORTER: What about the guys who didn't get much hype, Brewster, what is it about Chimdi that he hasn't gotten that?

COACH TRESSEL: He's a workmanlike guy, just a quiet guy that is always where he's supposed to be and doing what he's supposed to do and studying like crazy because he's an outstanding student, but he's just a focused guy. And exactly why he hasn't, I don't know, but I think he's deserving of the recognition that the writers saw in him.

REPORTER: With Brewster, did you get the pay-off of him being a third-year starter this year?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, gosh, yes, from a knowledge standpoint, huge. And the two things for Michael that were huge were he was healthy all year, which most of last year he wasn't, so he was out there trying to do all the mental stuff along with being physically handicapped in a way, so he had all that knowledge and he had good health and he had the same guys next to him since spring ball, so there wasn't any new learning curve or telling the other guy, the new guy next to him what to do and all that stuff. But experience, how many times have we said it, you can't buy it and when you don't have it, you're nervous.

REPORTER: What do you want to get done before these guys go home next week? Where do you hope you leave these guys in the next week of practice?

COACH TRESSEL: We've got -- our defensive guys are going to spend the afternoon recruiting today, and starting tomorrow, we're going to write the schedules, the practice schedules, for the time through the 21st. I'm guessing we'll move a little bit more into the game-planning mode than we have been in these first four I guess we've had. These have really been fundamental practices and we've maybe spent 10 minutes each day in any type of game-play mode. We'll probably move into that maybe as early as Thursday, maybe Friday at the latest. And then when we get done the 21st, we'll want to have a good bit of our thinking or game planning done, and then when we come back after Christmas and spend two practices here, we'll want those really to be rehearsal, game-plan, get-the-holidays-out-of-us-type practices, so when we hit the bowl site, we can just really just try to fine tune.

REPORTER: What's your message to them when they go home? Do you want them to forget about football? Do you tell them to -- they so rarely get to go home.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, their message is, if you're fortunate enough to have time to spend with family, soak it in. Enjoy it. Our guys are gone all summer. They don't get to go home for Thanksgiving. They haven't had much time, so we want them to go and just enjoy the heck out of it. And we hope they don't overindulge, come back 10 pounds heavier or whatever, but we're not going to send them home with four days worth of workouts or something like that. We just want them to go and enjoy and fill those emotional gas tanks and know that when we get back we've got a hefty challenge.

REPORTER: You have so many veterans on this team and this practice time, have you gotten to look at some of the younger guys, anybody that's sticking out to you?

COACH TRESSEL: Today, the guy that had a couple good runs was Rod Smith. He went and took his team down and scored a touchdown and did a good job. He's the first guy I can think of. That's what will be fun is to go and watch film of these young guys, we've been holding cards and they've been running other people's plays and you don't get much better doing that. I saw TY Williams go up and make a really good catch the other day in the scrimmage, but it's fun for them, running our defenses and our plays, rather than everyone else's, because when we start moving into that game plan mode, now they're going to be back a little bit more to that which isn't as much fun, so we want them to be able to bang into each other.

REPORTER: Who are you going to use to simulate Mallett? Taylor Graham seems to come to mind.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, Taylor and Kenny, they're both wearing his number and so forth. I was just watching a little bit of that Auburn game and some cut-ups and I saw No. 8 played a lot and looked good, too.

REPORTER: Yeah, Mallett got hurt.

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah, he threw it like 32 times and looked pretty good too. We'll use both those guys.

REPORTER: With Petrino, coaches after a while develop a reputation, you know he's going to come out probably winging it.

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, sure.

REPORTER: What sets him apart as you think about Bobby Petrino offensively?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, as I think back to his good teams at Louisville, which we saw a little bit more, is that, yeah, he was going to throw it and conceptually you could see they were very well schooled, he was going to run it, had that big old No. 10 Bush or whatever his number was, they had some guys that could run it. So he's going to do what the defense dictates, and he's going to do what he can to put pressure on your defense and they've got the comprehensive package. So they're good at it, they're very well schooled and I haven't watched them that much to be able to say, here's what they do against this or that, but they've got answers.

You always talk about good offensive coaches. I think good offensive coaches are ones that have answers and good defenses are ones that make the offenses guess when to use those answers and that's the fun of the chess match.

REPORTER: Do you know him at all?

COACH TRESSEL: I really don't. No, I really don't. I think we've got all of our seniors stopping in today and then we've got all kinds of -- I just had to turn in all kinds of -- there's a lot of availability once we get into the bowl thing, like six guys this day, that day. You're going to end up interviewing our water guys by the end of the week. So we'll have all the seniors. Make sure you guys get plenty of rest and have good holidays and can't wait to get to New Orleans.

 

[FCollinsBuckeye]

REPORTER: Is Terrelle one of the five who sent in the paperwork?
COACH TRESSEL: I can't answer that.
REPORTER: You really can't?
COACH TRESSEL: I can't.
REPORTER: Why not?
COACH TRESSEL: I just don't feel like it. I don't know. I can't bring myself to, how's that?

 

[BB73]

Today's presser from The Big Easy.

Any comments about player suspensions belong in the '5 players ...' thread, not here.

Official.site

2011 ALLSTATE SUGAR BOWL QUOTES
OHIO STATE HEAD COACH JIM TRESSEL

Opening Statement: "Thanks so much. We (Ohio State) are excited to be here in New Orleans, as all of you are to get the opportunity to cover it. You talk about goals and so forth as you go into a season and to end at the Allstate Sugar Bowl is a pretty special thing and on behalf of all of us we'd like to thank the Sugar Bowl Committee. We are excited to compete against a great Arkansas team. I had a chance to talk to Bobby (Petrino) the other day and I know they are excited as well. Our kids are looking forward to a lot of fun and a great experience and they've already gotten a chance to taste New Orleans a bit, I hope we don't eat too much but this food is awfully good and I know you folks will experience the same."

On if all five players involved in NCAA decision pledged to come back for next season...

"They would not be here if that weren't the case."

On if all five players involved in NCAA decision will play in the game on Tuesday...

"The guys will play as to what they deserve to play from a football standpoint. We will be evaluated as it relates to football."

On how big of a distraction this has been for the Ohio State team and for himself as well...

"Anytime you spend time on anything that's a little bit of a distraction, but we are fortunate in this particular case playing in the Sugar Bowl against a well-coached team like Arkansas. All you have to do is turn that film on and think about your good fortune to be in a BCS game and so forth. You can try to make up that time, but you know just like anything else you invest your time in certain things and wish you had more time for others. But with a little bit later game being January 4th it has given us an opportunity to take care of what we need to and when things come up you take care of them. When game time hits on January 4th we will be ready."

On Coach Tressel's history with Coach Bobby Petrino and the Southeastern Conference...

"I know personally I have lost three in-a-row against the SEC. I'm not tired of hearing about it, it's a reminder to me of just how good the SEC is in football. We are playing another great one in Arkansas. As far as Petrino, he was at Louisville when I was at Ohio. I don't think we've ever played against each other unless we were assistants somewhere. Now with John L. (Smith), we know him well. We've coached against him when he was at Idaho and Michigan State and so forth. But I've always been impressed with Coach Petrino. We used to send assistants down there at Louisville because it was close and they did a lot of great things. He's doing a great job at Arkansas."

On who was involved in crafting the final decision (allowing players to play) on the five players involved in NCAA decision and the difficulty of dealing with the situation...

"I think every decision we make is by committee, whether it be the people above you or next to you or the people you serve. You don't wake up one morning and say this is what we are going to do, that's not how football coach's work. You get in meeting rooms and you argue and decide you're going to do this on third down. Every situation that doesn't go the way you'd like it is disappointing as a coach. That's just the way it is. Whether they (distractions) are the ones on the field, or off the field. That's why you are there. You are there to serve and handle the good times and the bad times."

On rumors of Tressel retiring from Ohio State...

"Apparently it was somebody on a website using their freedom of speech. It's not true at all but that too is kind of a waste of time. Recruits are calling asking if it's true or not. Other coaches (from other schools) keep calling saying this is true to our recruits. The rumor is a waste of time but this world is an ever-evolving waste of time. I don't know when people have time to spend so much time reading all this stuff. It's amazing how much stuff is out there. The rumor is not true but its part of the deal. It's better than the alternative, the day they fire you."

On not winning Big Ten Coach of the Year award and the history of both he and Petrino's fathers having coached football...

"That's the blessing that both Bobby and I have had. When you get a chance to grow up around coaching and see the impact your father had, it becomes a blessing for you. It gets in your blood. I think it also gets in your confidence that it becomes something you think you can do because you've seen it being done before. I am sure I got my first opportunity in coaching as a graduate assistant not solely on my coaching merits. We (Petrino and Tressel) were fortunate to have dads as coaches. As far as the coach of the year award, I've got many of plaques and trophies in my office so that doesn't blow my mind."

On his reaction to the type of memorabilia the players sold...

"It's disappointing. A number of people reached out as we've been dealing with this thing maybe to calm my thinking or whatever and one the thing said was, 'Keep in mind coach you're dealing with a different generation. Back when you were growing up one guy got a trophy, maybe, and now you're dealing with a generation that if you were on the team and you were seven years old everyone got a trophy. Maybe this generation doesn't understand the value of awards like we did.' I understand the argument. Not sure I justify the deal, but it does make it disappointing."

"Our kids all went out and visited Archie Griffin, because they said, 'Coach, how can we let the former players know that we feel terrible about what we did?' and I said, 'Gosh, I don't know. Archie Griffin is the head of our alumni association, the CEO, and his office is across the street. Go see if he'll take a visit.' He wasn't in the office that day, but he said, 'You know what, come out to my house.' He said the kids might get a different perspective when they look at my basement and see how important some of those things are to me. Like most things, a valuable lesson. I've said many times in adversity, lives are changed. It really dawned on me this morning with our players as some of them conceivably couldn't have been here if we made that decision."

On any injuries...

"Chad Hagan, you haven't seen him all season at all. He's been medically out, but he's been here. He's been in the yellow jersey at practice. He's got a situation where he's had to have some surgery, but he's here in New Orleans. Knock on wood; we didn't have anybody we lost [due to injury]."

On if he's ever considered being an NFL coach...

"No, I really haven't. It kind of goes back to the question about Bobby
[Petrino]; we both had a college football coach dad. It kind of gives you an opportunity to learn some things, and maybe some confidence that you can do that. I've never even been measured by the pros. I don't know that I have the confidence that I could go and pretend that I know exactly what they should do. I don't know that I would be the right person for that. Does that mean that everyone who's a pro coach has got to have been a former NFL player or anything like that? No, but I don't think I have the right training, background for that. I'm not sure that I would do a very good job."

On whether the quarterback race will heat up with Terrelle Pryor out for five games next season...

"Not leading up to this bowl. I'm sure in the spring and so forth. Again, one of the things we've asked everyone involved to do is because of the decisions everyone has made, what we all know about - there are 24 guys who aren't going to be here anymore - let's make sure we commit ourselves to Ohio State versus Arkansas through January 4, and I'm sure the answer to your question is that of course, in the spring that would heat it up."

On what effect the suspensions will have on the team's play in the Sugar Bowl...

"Gosh, I hope none. I think the thing that will have an impact on how we play in the Sugar Bowl will be how we play. Will we take care of the ball? Will we knock it loose? Will we cover our lanes on the kickoff coverage? So, will those things have an effect? I would sure like to think they wouldn't."

On doing anything different to prepare for Arkansas...

"You do have a little bit more time. I think you have to be a little bit more careful, because so do they. So, if all of a sudden you get too glued into, 'Hey, I know they're going to do this when they line up this way,' they've had a chance to change some things. I think you have to work on your fundamentals first, figure out what you need to do better, figure out what you do best, and then just prepare like crazy. In my mind it won't be the Xs and Os. It'll be the execution. It'll be the how long and how hard and who will go the longest, because they're a good football team. I said to the guys as we were getting ready once we knew we were playing them that this is the quickest team I've seen us play since Oregon. These guys are quick. They're not X and O-wise similar at all, but quickness, which is the key to this game, they're quick."