Post-Game Press Conference: Football vs Tennessee Tech

touchdown Ryan to to win the game for the team uh walk us through that whole play from from getting the play call in the Huddle to you know what happened you know once the ball sna well once I heard the play call I realized like the past few plays they wasn't even covering me for one and then for two they was sling outside so once I got the car I was like oh yeah I already knew what I was going to do and once the hole opened up I just hit it you know what I'm saying and did what I did what was the moment like after you know you're in the end zone the you know the the you know steam goes off and you know you got 6 seconds on the clock and you know team's in a pretty good spot at that point that's actually something I've been wanting to do since I've been here you know what I'm saying walk off touchdown run it was very exciting for my teammates um they were exciting for me U it was a great feeling what was the message before yall went on the field for that drive or you had so much to go to get to where yall needed to be to have a chance to win the game oh the message was just keep you composed that's it stay calm that's all Frank uh you scored on the first three drives touchdowns and after that what was tenness te doing better or well on defense or what were yall struggling they made adjustments they made adjustments to our Run game uh and then the pass rush the pass rush got a lot better towards the end of the game too yes Sir John you set the tone early with with the interception on sincey Tech's first drive walk us through that play what read you make to make that play in that spot yeah we were just in cover three we been practicing it all week so I just I saw it and the first time I messed it up and the same time I saw it again I just just made a play great defensive play how big was that early for yall on the defense to sort of set that tone at the start of the season and get off to that good a start on your first drive as a group that was huge I mean defense came out with the energy we brought everything we were prepared we were ready so just coming out first game just doing that like that was that was huge for us when teny Tech had to go to their second quarterback and you know he had a little bit of different skill set than the first guy how did you know they take advantage of that you know particularly in the second half um sorry can you repeat that yeah their second quarterback was a little bit more mobile was able to get out of the pocket seemed to open up some options for tennessy Tech against y'all what was hard about guarding him in those moments uh I want to say anything was hard about it we just had to make some sideline adjustments just just figure out what we can do to stop it and it wasn't too difficult I mean I feel like we we uh we we prepared well for that so yeah thanks SE thank you like mil next up miles Butler good afternoon well morning I should say miles you had a lot of success on your first drive seemed like the script for that worked really well what opened up in the passing game on that opening drive for you guys um just calling doing what coach call just doing doing the thing I have to do the right thing and being in the right spot knowing Nick we going to give me the ball being in the right spot so just trusting the offense how's your connection with Nick grown you know through the month of August now that you know we're in September now September it's grown a lot man Nick Nick opened me with open arms soon as I came in cool guy great guy very down to earth guy so that connection just kept growing as the days as the days kept going I appreciate Nick for sure how did Tennessee Tech adjust sort of in the second half or maybe the passing game wasn't as successful as it was in the first half um they just knew they they kind of was sitting on a lot of our routes you know just you know making adjustment as as just how football go you go in the halftime you going to make adjustment you ain't going to keep getting beat so they played football they did the right thing you know they made adjustments start sitting on some of our routes and we had to find another way to execute and that's what we did in the fourth quarter fourth and five Amari C gets open in the Middle Field you know walk us through what you were seeing on that play and sort of your reaction afterwards I was saying Amari go be Amari that's who Amari is like when he get his chance he going to pop it he was being Amari in that fourth to five that y'all just not seeing Mar we've been seeing Mari the whole time but that's one that's one when he get his chance you had to play there to the very end how crucial is it to play to the very end especially on night like tonight play all the way up the morning you know it's you have to stay locked in you have to play play all four quarters you know that's why it's four quarters not three quarters the fourth quarter game so you have to stay locked in can't lose lose focus can't lose your compos got to stay here and that's what we did in the four I'm proud of my team all of them defense offense special teams I'm proud of how we came together and we finish the game the Right Way Miles thank you miles thank you yall have a great night app he get paid yeah I got notifications I get notifications it's a team effort we usually have somebody doing Graphics got somebody editing photos somebody taking clips from video people down there people that Social account but jce is the one hitting s on everything for sure so remember my last they didn't go over the top couldn't block to go over the top hey fellas um tell you what tonight was uh an interesting night to really say the least right um and I want to say hats off to Tennessee Tech coach Wilder and that crew um they came in here and they played one heck of a ball game you know first games are what first games are right um you know you you you look early and you think that you're going to have an opportunity to go boat race somebody a little bit and and just keep going and then all of a sudden then you sput her out and um momentum football's a game of momentum and I thought you know we had it early Tennessee Tech uh you know March back they took it and that was okay um I don't think this group pan uh we wanted to play better um and what you saw from this team was um growth right a lot of new faces um some adversity uh and you have to learn how to win in a lot of different ways in college football you got to learn sometimes how to play from ahead you got to learn how to play from behind um and I I think we got it all in one you know rain delay playing from ahead coming from behind look I didn't want to brought up that way but what I felt was this football team learned a lot about itself his character you know um and winning does take what winning takes right it takes it takes commitment uh for four quarters 60 Minutes every play and we needed every bit of four quarter 60 Minutes um and to get the victory so you know there's a lot to learn be learned from game one uh to game two at the end of the year nobody's going to look back and remember what the score was what people were going to remember that it was a victory and so I'm going to celebrate it that way right uh I got a lot of confidence in this team I think we can get better uh we we we had some a couple of losses uh uh injury-wise in this ball game so I hope we can get some of these guys back uh as we get ready to turn the corner um and the play Old Miss but hats off again to Tennessee Tech coach can you speak on getting that first win here under your belt and number two you mentioned boat RAC would it been more memorable had you boat raced them or was a thrilling win like this make this first win more memorable to be honest um C so I I I look at where we are um and this is special because it was almost it was almost 10 years to the day man when I had to sit um and and play a game at 11:30 at night and it's almost like okay hey man are are the dark clouds coming back right you know you you have to sit there and ask yourself that I mean anybody who's a realist sits there and ask okay hey you know like what type of thing is this going to be and I'm human you know I'm just a regular guy right so you know you you thought about but then my wife sent me a text as I'm sitting in the locker room my wife sent me a text and she said listen this ain't that she goes hey be confident uh this ain't that uh you got a new team a new new opportunity this isn't 2014 this is 2024 and you know what just like that man I sort of snapped you like out of it right and what I saw from this football team tonight man was really incredible it it it was um first first Victory we'll we'll all remember it that's for dang sure we all we all gonna remember it but just just how resilient the kids were you know what because when you have a new group like this and uh you can have one of the best quarterbacks in the world but at the end of the day man somebody's got to make some plays and that's what happened guys made some plays you know the in one minute we probably had more plays made in one minute in that ball game than we made the whole the whole second half so again um be confident don't don't discount uh what opportunity brings you co you mentioned it's a game of momentum it seemed like safety in the second quarter really shifted momentum for the rest of the game you know what changed after sort of that moment for you guys on both sides of the ball you know I to be honest I just thought it was a safety right I I didn't I I didn't think of it as anything other than two points what I was thinking about was we needed to make sure that we got a a defensive stop and you know we wind up holding those guys to a field goal right so like to to me maybe that was a momentum changer for us I mean like for them but for us you know we we we just have to learn you know how to how to how to roll roll this thing over and make sure that we can flip the momentum but we didn't right it just seemed like we stalled and we became stagnant and they loaded the box and we missed some opportunities got lucky with a couple of calls uh that sort of extended drives right like to me that wasn't how we wanted to play football but here's what I'll I'll say I think this much sometimes man you don't you don't necessarily get uh the win that you want you get the win that you need and that was the win that we needed like in my opinion we needed to learn how to win tough and man that was a tough way to win one for sure we went the hard way you started off H you said with a boat race um comment but things went stagnant as you mentioned what what adjustments was Tech making and what where were you struggling to move the offense from there I think like for us when when we go back and look at it and we made we made some like adjustments right I thought they were loading the box and I thought we were able to I I talked to you know coach reader and they made some adjustments whenever you're getting attacked on live scrimmage like that get the ball on the perimeter I think every time we threw a running back perimeter screen it went for like 10 yards so man you could have probably you know mean spit it out there all day on the perimeter with re receiver screens and running back screens because if they want to load the box like that there's just not enough guys out there to bring it down and so like we saw that like happened a couple times I thought we we we missed some easy like pitch and catches right I I mean easy outs easy hitches I mean those haven't been characteristic and so um I just look at it and just say hey look we got to be better so there's a lot to go back to the the the table with this week uh we've got good enough players I I'm I believe that they're going to be excited about executing but the reality of it is uh we played we played just good enough okay to to um to almost put ourselves in position to get beat okay and that's not what you want what you want to be able to do is be methodical be mechanical take your shots you know um I just didn't see us push it down the field like we wanted to tonight and I thought there were some some opportunity but you got to keep your quarterback upright all right so um as we look at it there's just a lot there so we'll unpack it uh tomorrow we'll fix it and let's move forward tell me about that last drive there and and kind of the the special character that is Nick keep team poys on a fourth and five there look um it's crazy because Nick was poised on Fourth and five on on Third and five he sort of he s of panic a little bit you know I mean so like again it just shows um you know trust process you know if you ask him he probably he he probably would have wanted that third down back he didn't get it he got fourth down and and and made it work um I just think this kid's a special talent right we do have to keep him uppr right but I think there's other things that we can do to make sure uh that we spread it around that we get the ball in our Playmakers hands because we got way too many Playmakers not to make sure we spread the love coach you talked about how you know tonight being a close win you think that team can almost learn more from this being close battle Tech had it Blow I didn't expect the blowout what I expected was you know us to come out and play better right or or play well and I thought we went out and played well initially and then uh you know became stagnant that's not what we want so you know we'll address that um and we'll work to fix that all I can say is this right learning you with with 59 to 60 new players there's a lot of learning going on you know so I I'm G to I'm going to talk about the lessons that we can take from this ball game and then move forward because like when you got a bunch of of of guys just working the jail together whether it's the offensive line whether it's our quarterback with our receivers man our Run game whether it's defensively look uh if you dwell too much on the negative okay man you you you can find yourself stunning their growth I I'm I'm not going to dwell on the negative I'm going to focus on what needs to be fixed okay then I'm going to accentuate the positives and what we're going to do is get ready to go play Old miss you guys r a lot of guys different positions tonight yeah we did running were there any that stood out to you tonight maybe Above the Rest or was it just kind of a room that functioned best as a as a whole tonight yeah you know I look at the running back room and I say to myself um it's it's one of the deepest that I've been around and I've been around some pretty good running back rooms it's just deep you know I mean I don't care who you hand it to I think they're all capable of doing something special with it and I think they've all gotten better because they've learned how to catch the ball out the back field they've learned how to protect I mean they've got to be three-dimensional in this offense you know for what we need to do so um I I just think they've gotten better uh previously you we talked about the the last drive and how he converted on p b really y all had success all night on fourth down from distances what made fourth down so successful for well the analytics on it help right I I think that's part of what you do when you look at some of the analytics and you ask yourself hey I mean like does it make sense you know we we found ourselves in some precarious field position at times right it was like the 40 the 37 the 30 so you know like those uh like for us didn't want to didn't didn't want to give them field position uh you know with a long field goal uh to to me that really didn't make sense right um so I think we stood with the analytics I had enough confidence in the things that that that I had seen in practice and I thought uh you know M coach reder had some some some strong play calling uh early in this deal especially on fourth down so um I'm I'm going to trust him I'm going to trust our process of how we prepare um but the analytics I think help a lot nowadays you know like with where you sit where you're at and doesn't make sense to to to go for it on fourth down and continuing with that last Drive do you think that gives you a little bit of momentum going into this week preparing fors and do you know of anything that 100% has to change to win next week everything has to change you know I I don't I don't I don't think you leave uh you know any any stone unturned right I think think man we have to be better with penalties I think we got to be better on third Downs okay both offense and defense I mean you can run down the Gambit I think there's just a lot of room for improvement so with that being said right um you're gonna you're going to go into a hostile environment and those games are fun to play okay but here's the thing about like fun games and hostile environments you can't lose your composure you have to function at a high level and really what it comes down to is not making a ton of mistakes and tonight we made way too many but that's it's okay like I said we'll turn it around we'll look at it and uh this gives us a lot of a lot of confidence I think I this game itself regardless of what other people say I know what it looked like down there on the sideline I know what happened when Amari caught the ball I know what happened when Frank put it in the end zone I saw I saw the the the look in these guys eyes that's confidence right and that a lot of people can't measure it but I can coach you had your first win at Middle Tennessee today this is also the 300th win in FL Stadium wow it feel to have both of those in your first game you know what I mean like that's that that's a I'm stunned by that you know to be honest I I didn't I didn't know um the 300 um in program history Floyd Stadium uh that's incredible that speaks a lot to the people who who came before us cuz they put it at 299 right and uh I'm just lucky enough to get 300 um it's just I don't know I I I I really don't think about it I'm just glad that we got the win so I'm thankful but thank you for bringing that up man that's just one of these bones man I I I have to pick with Mr Owens over there man he could he could have he could have gave me a little more energy going into the night coach you have Amari Kelly on that fourth and five play yeah what is it like to have a Dependable wide receiver like him you know we have so many Dependable wide receivers I look up right uh I mean I don't think we found holding enough tonight and I think that's a matchup man that we have to you know find right I I I I feel good about all our receivers I just think you know like tonight was just one of those nights you know like for us where um you know we we we didn't have the Mojo especially the second half we just didn't have the Mojo right and so we have to work a little harder we all receivers dline tight ends we all just got to work a little harder man because it's it's there it's there to be had right and I think we left a lot of production out there on the field tonight but that's okay there's always tomorrow with the delay with the lightning tonight players might be thinking we not going to play tonight how do you keep them in that game mindset I I didn't have to worry about that those guys were pretty fired up they they were they were a pretty Rowdy group uh just standing around like every every 10 minutes man they seem like little kids in the backseat are we there yet are we there yet are we there no okay just relax so we had to have them you know take their pads and off a little bit and stretch out a little bit but they they handled it the right way they really did all right guys thank you thanks coach I appreciate y'all