I never got a chance to post yesterday's quotes because I was doing yard work and other errands cleaning up from Ida. Here are today's, and I will try to get the best of yesterday's up at some point. Looks like I will head to Birmingham on Saturday morning, so I will be cutting it close and need no traffic snarls on the Interstate to get to my press box seat by noon.
FRITZ
"We had our second practice of the week. We didn't get a chance to go on Monday because of Labor Day. We had another good practice today. We're going to start cutting down on Thursday. We try to really get after it on Tuesday. Wednesday we back off a little bit and we back off quite a bit Thursday and we back off a whole bunch on Friday, which some schools do and some schools don't. They take Thursday off and kind of do a fast Friday. I've just haven'r ever really seen the benefit of that. We're on a good pace to play lights out on Saturday. It's going to be a noon kick, free admission to the game and no parking price as well. Hopefully we'll have a nice little crowd out here to be able to watch the Green Wave versus Morgan State."
On getting guys ready to play against Morgan State team that really struggled in opener:
"Well I just get after them every week the same way. As we always tell our guys, every game counts one. The Oklahoma game wouldn't have been two and every loss counts one. We talk all the time about in-season heroes and not putting your best effort forth in January, February, March, April, May, June and July but doing it during the season. This is a mental and physical grind, and some guys relish it and other guys succumb to the grind. I think our guys understand this is an important one. You want to play and improve every single week."
On Morgan State only getting seven first downs against Towson and selling to team that Bears can move the ball on them:
"Well, it was the first time they played in two years. The last time they played was 2019, so surely they are going to make a lot of improvement. We talked about how good teams make their biggest improvement between week 1 and week 2, and I'm sure that's what Morgan State is also telling their guys. We just want to improve and play better than what we played last week. That's in all three phases."
On what impresses him the most about Jadon Canady:
"He picks things up. He's a really smart player. Just this morning for example, I sit in the back of our meetings every day and take notes and try to help my coaches with teaching strategies, and he answered three or four questions this quick. He's really picked up what we're doing. This is not basic mathematics. This is advanced algebra. It's good, tough stuff with all the formations and sets and motions that people are playing. You've got the blitz package, the short-yardage package. We try to take a little bit of weight off of him by not playing him much in the kicking game, but he's smart and he's able to process things quickly and he pulls the trigger. You've got to go get it. Some guys know the difference between come here and sic 'em. He knows the difference. He goes and gets them. Other guys see it and hesitate a little bit. He can pull the trigger quickly. That doesn't take athletic ability. That takes understanding what's going on and boom, going in and getting after it. He did that about three times Saturday. One was that interception he had on the second play of the game. He also did it a couple of times on run plays. You talk about playing the ball over the block. Some guys are so concerned about the blocker that they don't understand that manageable distance between the ball and the blocker, but he can pull the trigger and go get it."
On it being unusual trait for true freshman who did not go through spring practice:
"Pretty unusual. It really is. Larry Brooks can pull the trigger. Macon Clark can pull the trigger. Rod Teamer can pull the trigger. That's why he's playing in the NFL. He's a very good athlete, but he understands the game and can pull the trigger. You can develop that ability, but it's not very often guys come in here and they have it. You don't practice and tackle all the time, so you don't get a chance to evaluate it as much in practice."
JADON CANADY
On not feeling nerves against Oklahoma:
"The nerves probably kicked in the first play, but after that I settled myself down. I was calm after that."
On interception:
"The whole week during film, that route I picked off, coach Hampton went over in a lot of detail. It was cover 3 and I saw the route from the film and I knew I could go get it and I picked the ball off. I was definitely excited. That boosted my confidence all the way up. I was a man of the world right there."
On brothers' athletic success preparing him for college:
"When I was 14, I went to all the colleges with my brothers, so I definitely knew what college was already about and I was familiar with the atmosphere. That was a huge help for me."
On toughest thing to learn:
"The playbook was definitely the biggest jump from high school to college, but after a month or so I had it down pat."
On grading himself against Oklahoma:
"I'd say I had a pick and I didn't let anyone get a catch on me and I had six tackles. I thought I did a pretty good job, As a defensive team we were good in the second half, but the first half was shaky. We definitely came through in the second half. I'm definitely excited to see where this defense can go. I feel like it's only up from here."
On if he were under-recruited:
"I'm grateful for any chances I had. I had a total of 13 offers. I want to prove to the big schools I can play there as well as I play here, but to me there's not difference."
On interception knack:
"Number one, you have to have ball skills. You have to a good eye for the ball and judgment."
On getting ready for Morgan State:
"We go through the film the same way, practice the same way, practice hard and keep the same intensity up there. We should be good to go."
DORIAN WILLIAMS
On Morgan State getting seven first downs and not taking them lightly:
"We like to treat every game as a championship game and we want to treat these guys the same way we treated Oklahoma and the same way we treat every game going forward."
On no shutouts since 1997:
"We would love to have a shutout every game if we could. It's something every defensive coordinator dreams of, so it would be nice to have during our season. I feel every week can be a shutout if we execute to our standard."
On rating defense's performance against Oklahoma:
"I think we did all right. We had a couple of miscues and missed some tackles. We could have played better than we played, but that's something we expect out of ourselves--not missing tackles and not having busts coverage wise."
On being praised for loss:
"Everybody here wanted to win that game. We took great pride in trying to win the game for back home. Yeah, that hurt a lot. All of the stuff in the media saying how we played hard was nice, but everybody wanted to win. Nothing beats winning."
On if more confidence now about season:
"First game is really when you see how your team is going to be, so I feel more confident going in knowing what we can do and what we can improve on."
JEFFERY JOHNSON
On grading defense performance against Oklahoma:
"Altogether I think we played pretty well. First game for everybody, and I know we just have to capitalize on the mistakes we make. There's always opportunities to get better, but we performed pretty well."
On weight loss:
"I would say I lost 50 to 55 pounds from last year. I was probably around 345 to 350. That was the most I got up to."
On feeling like different person:
"I do. I'm able to move around more, chase down more balls and make tackles on the back end, stuff like that."
On no shutouts since 1997:
"I mean, I would love a shutout. That's something we've been working towards. That's our goal, to have our defense get a shutout one game."
On having same intensity this game as last:
"That's just kind of our thing as a defense and as a team. We attack every game like it's the same and put in the same work and the same effort going into every week."
On Canady:
"He's just a go-getting hard working guy. He's been doing this since he got here. I expected nothing less."
FRITZ
"We had our second practice of the week. We didn't get a chance to go on Monday because of Labor Day. We had another good practice today. We're going to start cutting down on Thursday. We try to really get after it on Tuesday. Wednesday we back off a little bit and we back off quite a bit Thursday and we back off a whole bunch on Friday, which some schools do and some schools don't. They take Thursday off and kind of do a fast Friday. I've just haven'r ever really seen the benefit of that. We're on a good pace to play lights out on Saturday. It's going to be a noon kick, free admission to the game and no parking price as well. Hopefully we'll have a nice little crowd out here to be able to watch the Green Wave versus Morgan State."
On getting guys ready to play against Morgan State team that really struggled in opener:
"Well I just get after them every week the same way. As we always tell our guys, every game counts one. The Oklahoma game wouldn't have been two and every loss counts one. We talk all the time about in-season heroes and not putting your best effort forth in January, February, March, April, May, June and July but doing it during the season. This is a mental and physical grind, and some guys relish it and other guys succumb to the grind. I think our guys understand this is an important one. You want to play and improve every single week."
On Morgan State only getting seven first downs against Towson and selling to team that Bears can move the ball on them:
"Well, it was the first time they played in two years. The last time they played was 2019, so surely they are going to make a lot of improvement. We talked about how good teams make their biggest improvement between week 1 and week 2, and I'm sure that's what Morgan State is also telling their guys. We just want to improve and play better than what we played last week. That's in all three phases."
On what impresses him the most about Jadon Canady:
"He picks things up. He's a really smart player. Just this morning for example, I sit in the back of our meetings every day and take notes and try to help my coaches with teaching strategies, and he answered three or four questions this quick. He's really picked up what we're doing. This is not basic mathematics. This is advanced algebra. It's good, tough stuff with all the formations and sets and motions that people are playing. You've got the blitz package, the short-yardage package. We try to take a little bit of weight off of him by not playing him much in the kicking game, but he's smart and he's able to process things quickly and he pulls the trigger. You've got to go get it. Some guys know the difference between come here and sic 'em. He knows the difference. He goes and gets them. Other guys see it and hesitate a little bit. He can pull the trigger quickly. That doesn't take athletic ability. That takes understanding what's going on and boom, going in and getting after it. He did that about three times Saturday. One was that interception he had on the second play of the game. He also did it a couple of times on run plays. You talk about playing the ball over the block. Some guys are so concerned about the blocker that they don't understand that manageable distance between the ball and the blocker, but he can pull the trigger and go get it."
On it being unusual trait for true freshman who did not go through spring practice:
"Pretty unusual. It really is. Larry Brooks can pull the trigger. Macon Clark can pull the trigger. Rod Teamer can pull the trigger. That's why he's playing in the NFL. He's a very good athlete, but he understands the game and can pull the trigger. You can develop that ability, but it's not very often guys come in here and they have it. You don't practice and tackle all the time, so you don't get a chance to evaluate it as much in practice."
JADON CANADY
On not feeling nerves against Oklahoma:
"The nerves probably kicked in the first play, but after that I settled myself down. I was calm after that."
On interception:
"The whole week during film, that route I picked off, coach Hampton went over in a lot of detail. It was cover 3 and I saw the route from the film and I knew I could go get it and I picked the ball off. I was definitely excited. That boosted my confidence all the way up. I was a man of the world right there."
On brothers' athletic success preparing him for college:
"When I was 14, I went to all the colleges with my brothers, so I definitely knew what college was already about and I was familiar with the atmosphere. That was a huge help for me."
On toughest thing to learn:
"The playbook was definitely the biggest jump from high school to college, but after a month or so I had it down pat."
On grading himself against Oklahoma:
"I'd say I had a pick and I didn't let anyone get a catch on me and I had six tackles. I thought I did a pretty good job, As a defensive team we were good in the second half, but the first half was shaky. We definitely came through in the second half. I'm definitely excited to see where this defense can go. I feel like it's only up from here."
On if he were under-recruited:
"I'm grateful for any chances I had. I had a total of 13 offers. I want to prove to the big schools I can play there as well as I play here, but to me there's not difference."
On interception knack:
"Number one, you have to have ball skills. You have to a good eye for the ball and judgment."
On getting ready for Morgan State:
"We go through the film the same way, practice the same way, practice hard and keep the same intensity up there. We should be good to go."
DORIAN WILLIAMS
On Morgan State getting seven first downs and not taking them lightly:
"We like to treat every game as a championship game and we want to treat these guys the same way we treated Oklahoma and the same way we treat every game going forward."
On no shutouts since 1997:
"We would love to have a shutout every game if we could. It's something every defensive coordinator dreams of, so it would be nice to have during our season. I feel every week can be a shutout if we execute to our standard."
On rating defense's performance against Oklahoma:
"I think we did all right. We had a couple of miscues and missed some tackles. We could have played better than we played, but that's something we expect out of ourselves--not missing tackles and not having busts coverage wise."
On being praised for loss:
"Everybody here wanted to win that game. We took great pride in trying to win the game for back home. Yeah, that hurt a lot. All of the stuff in the media saying how we played hard was nice, but everybody wanted to win. Nothing beats winning."
On if more confidence now about season:
"First game is really when you see how your team is going to be, so I feel more confident going in knowing what we can do and what we can improve on."
JEFFERY JOHNSON
On grading defense performance against Oklahoma:
"Altogether I think we played pretty well. First game for everybody, and I know we just have to capitalize on the mistakes we make. There's always opportunities to get better, but we performed pretty well."
On weight loss:
"I would say I lost 50 to 55 pounds from last year. I was probably around 345 to 350. That was the most I got up to."
On feeling like different person:
"I do. I'm able to move around more, chase down more balls and make tackles on the back end, stuff like that."
On no shutouts since 1997:
"I mean, I would love a shutout. That's something we've been working towards. That's our goal, to have our defense get a shutout one game."
On having same intensity this game as last:
"That's just kind of our thing as a defense and as a team. We attack every game like it's the same and put in the same work and the same effort going into every week."
On Canady:
"He's just a go-getting hard working guy. He's been doing this since he got here. I expected nothing less."
