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Rutgers (7-2, 2-2 in Big East) visits Syracuse (3-7, 0-5) this Saturday for a Big East Conference game at 3:30 p.m. Here's Rutgers head coach Greg Schiano's state of Rutgers football:
Opening Statement:
"I appreciate you coming out. We have an opportunity this week to go up the dome and do everything in our power to play the best we can. As you know, having covered the team, it is not an easy place to go play with different conditions. We will prepare for that and go out and try and play our best.
On practicing in the bubble:
"We might. We talked about maybe Thursday we go in there. The thing is. We might do just to look up and get used to seeing the ball against the bubble-type seeing."
On Kordell Young's injury:
"Unfortunately, Kordell is going to have season-ending surgery which anybody who has been around him, you just hurt for the kid. I know I do and I know you do. I have every bit of belief that he will get surgery and he will get well, fight his way back and be a productive player here. That is the kind of young man that he is."
"I think one of the things that we talked about is that he is a guy like Zaire [Kitchen] that he can look to who has been down that path with multiple knee surgeries. It is the other knee. It is not the knee that he had repaired. Hopefully, once we get this one fixed, nothing else can go wrong."On Kordell's mind set:
"He has incredible faith. He is a strong kid. I think anybody would be shaken a little bit but he has a strong belief in god and believes that things happen for a reason and he is going to be back."
On the effects of the running back rotation:
"It definitely has an effect. He was the best without a doubt. It really affects us if you think about it, before he was able to go, Mason Robinson was doing it. So now we have lost not only the first third down back but the second third down back. We are going to have to mix and match. Joe [Martinek] can do it. Jourdan [Brooks] can do it. There is a few people who can do it. We just have to watch reps in first and second down as well."
On being ranked #25 in the Associated Press poll:
"It is nice but that is more for the fans and for the alums and that kind of thing. At the end of the season, that is when we look back, judge and evaluate those things. That is really the only time the rankings are truly significant because that is the end of the season. It is better than not being ranked and hopefully if we can keep playing the best that we are capable, hopefully we can climb in those polls. It could change this week. When you have more games to play, you got to go out and take care of business."
On concerns against Syracuse:
"I look at their defense and their rush defense is one of the best in the country. If you can't throw the ball effectively to loosen them up a little bit you are going to have a hard day running it. We need to be able to run it when we want to. No one has been able to do it. We have to really find ways schematically and then give our guys a chance. We have to be able to throw the ball effectively. When you look at their offense, No. 3 and No. 29 are two really good running backs and I emphasize really good. Delone Carter has had three games over 100 yards the last three games and you can see why. When you look at No. 29, he comes in during the wildcat package and he is really and all around good athlete. Not the biggest guy but man alive he is powerful and has great vision. That is where you start. They have had a few guys go down with injury and some guys that are unable to play now. We have to make sure that we contain them. You look at the two-headed monster they have going at quarterback right now. You can see [Greg] Paulus very comfortable in what he is doing. Having been away from the game as long as he was, he looks very very comfortable. No. 12 comes in and a big strong armed guy that can really chuck it. There is a lot of variables there that you have to be prepared for defensively and adjust on the fly. Hopefully we will be able to do that."
On Devin McCourty's play:
"Devin over the course of his career has been a tremendous playmaker. You go back to his freshman year against Illinois, he picks one off and scores with it and that is kind of been the way he has played since he has been here. I think he prepares incredible hard and I am talking one of the top five I have been around either college or pro. He works very hard at it and practices very hard. Every day he goes out there he is playing a football game in practice. So then it is no mystery that when he gets in the games he makes plays. When you have a guy that has the physical talent and skills that Devin does you are going to use him as a coach as many places as you can without wearing him out. Whether it is blocking punts, whether it is a flyer on the punt team, returning kickoffs or playing corner, he has really been a guy that we have matched up on best receivers and done things like that and he has come through every time. I don't know if there is a defense or special teams player playing better than him in the entire country."
On worrying about him playing too much:
"I do. I try to pull him aside and take him out. Do one rep that's it. Don't do five reps in drill work. I try to personally keep my eye on that because everybody else is running around coaching. I want to make sure that this last part of the season he is still feeling good."
On Syracuse losing Mike Williams:
"When you lose a receiver, I mean he jumps off the tape at you. We watch every game from the whole season. He is an incredible athlete. They have had guys step up. That is one of the beautiful things about football. There is always opportunities. One guy's misfortune is another guy's opportunity. You can notice. No. 1 is a tremendous player. Arthur Jones and Devin [McCourty] are probably playing the best football as any defensive players in the league. That is a huge loss. There weren't many people that blocked him efficiently and consistently during the year. Double teams didn't matter. He is a dominant player. I said it last year, I thought he would be a first-round pick if he came out last year. He is that good of a player."
On stopping USF's defensive line:
"I thought both our tackles play well. I think Anthony [Davis] again performed very well. Do we help a little bit when we know we have good ends, sure we do. We chip with the banks and do some things where we bring the protection. With South Florida, you had two very good ends so you can bring the protection one way but you can't bring it both ways."
On D.C. Jefferson:
"D.C. is coming along, he really is. He really is getting better every day. In the pass protection he really didn't play a big role because if he was in there he was getting out on route. In the run game, I thought he did a better job than he has done. We saw an improvement. We saw a step up in D.C. He is going to be, if he is willing to put the time into it and I know he is, he has that kind of attitude. That is what they look like now and that is what they are supposed to look like."
On possibly settling on Joe Martinek as the main back:
"Joe is playing well. I don't want to sit here and say that that is it. It just didn't feel right Thursday night but I think Jourdan is capable of going in and playing at a high level. I think De'Antwan [Williams] is as well. We are getting down in backs. The good thing is Tyrone Putman is a good football player. If it ever got to that, we are putting a good football player in the game. Remember at the beginning of the year we talked about these backs and we are a couple down already. You just hope that we can stay healthy with the guys that we have left."
CONTINUED
On how you are going to balance out the running back rotation:
"We have not gotten to that stage in the game plan yet. Right now, it has been first and second stuff. It is coming tonight. We will probably do it by committee. This guy can handle this and this guy can handle this. The great thing that Kordell [Young] could do is he really could understand protections and could scan, which is things that are done in the NFL that not a lot of college backs do very well. Kordell could do it and he helped us a great deal. We are going to really have to chop his job up a little bit and see if certain guys can do certain things."
On planning on a certain number of plays for Joe Martinek:
"Not really. I don't if there is a certain number. I think our coaches do a good job of keeping an eye on guys from a physical standpoint both from the booth and on the field and doing a good job of resting them when they get gassed."
On Anthony Davis:
"I think he is playing at a higher level each week. We need him to. He is one of our legitimate guys that has ability above most people he plays and we need him to play that way and he is doing that and it helps us a great deal."
On the offensive line:
"Both guys played and I don't think we are going to get away from that unless somebody really distinguishes themselves. It has kind of been feeling our way through it and we are still at that point. I think Howard [Barbieri] the more he plays the more comfortable he becomes. That is a good thing."
On possibly seeing Syracuse more on the recruiting trail:
"I don't know. They are working hard but so did the previous staff. Recruiting is the lifeline of your programs, everybody is going to work hard. Doug [Marrone] is a New York guy. I think he has more natural connections to the down state city area but everybody works hard in recruiting, it is so important. It is more assistant coaches than head coaches. I am only allowed to go once. It is my assistant coaches that run into their assistant coaches. When you are Syracuse, you are going to recruit New Jersey and New York no matter who the coach is there. I just think sometimes it is the relationships you may have had previous that you can call upon to open up pathways again."
On being confident heading into the Syracuse game:
"Every game, every year is different. We just need to make sure that we know what we are doing and that we are prepared. You win games Sunday through Friday and you go out and play them on Saturday. I think our preparation is going to be the key thing. How we prepare this week will determine how we play on Saturday. If we prepare well than we have to go out and do it on Saturday."
On your reaction to the television selection for Saturday's game:
"I don't get involved with it. I don't mean I don't get involved with it with the scheduling or how we do the games, I mean I don't think about it. That is not my issue. I try and get our team ready to play. I don't worry about TV or not TV. I know Syracuse will be there and I know we will be there god willing and that is really the big thing to me. I think they make the decisions before one of them was ranked. I am not making excuses for them that is not my gig but I know this. I don't care if we are on TV, we have to go up there and play the best football we can and that is all I am focused on."
On Steve Beauharnais' play against USF:
"He played very well. He played at a high speed and very physical. He is a promising young guy."
On a good record on the road:
"I think any time you do something and you have success and you do it well, I think it is natural that you have confidence that you can do it again. I think one of the things that our kids do a very good job is they are very business-like with these road trips. It is not silly willy time. We are going to get a job done. We enjoy each other's company. It is fun to just be 100 guys going of coaches and players and we are all together. We know what we are doing. We don't change a lot. We do most of our stuff here. We get up there and we eat, sleep and go play so it is not a ton of change whether we are home or away. I think that gives us consistency. It takes a more mature team to be able to play well on the road and when the crowd is against you and things aren't going your way you have to be able to stay in the moment and focus on the job at hand. So far we have been able to do that. The Dome is the Dome. It gets louder a lot quicker in there with an enclosed structure so we have be ready to handle the noise issues."
On your defensive identity:
"Our identity has kind of changes midway through our time here at Rutgers. We went in a little bit different direction. We still have a four down front, but 2005 we kind of went in another direction schematically. Bob Fraser and Ed Pinkham, even though they weren't here, had a big part in that. It is things they were very good at doing at Colgate and I was very close with them and we would talk football a lot. Eventually, they both end up on this staff and are tremendous defensive football coaches that have kind of gave us a road map of how we are going to play defense."
On attacking the quarterback:
"We attacked the quarterback before as well. I like this system we use. It gives us flexibility to adjust as the game goes on. Is it perfect, no, there is no perfect system but I really do like it obviously more than the one we were doing and the one that we did at Miami and that kind of stuff."
On possibly scouting Greg Paulus:
"We scouted him. He is a very good player. He was one of the top recruits in the country. He didn't have a great deal of interest in Rutgers. We scouted him and I believe we offered him a scholarship. I think everybody in the country probably did. He went to play basketball and then later on we recruited his little brother who went to North Carolina so we are familiar with the Paulus family."
On what your reaction was when he chose to go to Syracuse:
"I don't remember to tell you the truth. I think he looks very natural. He doesn't look at all like he is rusty. Now it is the later part of the year. I remember watching one of those games earlier in the year that came down to the wire and he was just playing really well. He is a good player. I wouldn't be surprised if he keeps playing this game."
Playing on the road with the Rutgers band there as well:
"We try to get them with us as much as we possibly can. I think it is good for our fans. If you look, we really have traveled very well. You look at Maryland and that was a whole strip of Scarlet there. I think it is great when the band is there and the fans enjoy it. Hopefully you win the game and you get to go down and be with everybody. That is college football to me. I think the band works incredibly hard. Tim Smith and his people, those kids do an incredible job and they are working their tails off. You don't get to see it but they are practicing. It is not easy and they are not treated like the players where they stay in this hotel. They get there and they go to work. I am grateful to them. You see our band keeps growing and growing and gets better and better. That is important to me because that is part of the whole day at a college football game."
On Tom Savage possibly having a new experience in the Dome:
"It is a little different. That is what I meant when I said it is a little different with the lighting and noise. I encourage him to get out. We don't go the stadium the day before a game, I just don't believe in it. But when we go to a stadium, I encourage the guys to get out and get a feel for the surroundings. We get there early enough so they can do that on game day. I am sure they will go out there and throw a little bit before we even go through warm-ups just to get used to looking up and seeing it. That may be why Thursday we go in the bubble."
SOURCE: RUTGER ATHLETIC COMMUNICATIONS
