2020 UTSA Football
Media Roundtable
Nov. 2, 2020
Head Coach Jeff Traylor
On what he noticed while watching film from the FAU game …
"I was really disappointed. We kicked the ball out of bounds to start the game off, which is a gut punch from one of your very best players. Hunter is a great player. Defensively, we didn't play very well in the first half. We gave up 240 yards and 17 points. That is very unlike us. We just didn't play good team football. It starts with a kick. We didn't play good team football. Only 10 snaps in the first quarter. That was what was disappointing the most to me. We just didn't play good team football. We complemented one other for almost 28 quarters, but we did not complement each other very well. We punted the ball down to the one-yard line and gave up a big drive again. Offensively, they did a great job against us. They put nine in the box and dared us to throw the ball down the field. We missed two of those throws, but the other six were 50/50 balls. The only 50/50 ball we won, they ruled we were out of bounds when we caught it, so we did not win a 50/50 ball. All of that, and I did not do a good enough job obviously. It is my responsibility. I never want it to ever sound like it is my kids. Obviously, our kids are always what makes the game, but it is on me to have them ready."
On what qualified throws to be 50/50 …
"The way they are playing defense, they are just giving you one-on-one. You are not going to get a better play call than one-on-one, very rarely in college football or pro football, or high school football for that matter, because they just turn you totally loose. There is nobody there. Occasionally there is a bust, but most of the time they are going to be pretty assignment sound. We had six chances. We didn't win any of those. We need to win some of those."
On Frank Harris' performance with the offense …
"Frank played well enough for us to win. Obviously, whenever the offense does not play well Coach (Barry) Lunney and Frank and I are going to take the most abuse, and that's always fair. All three of us get way too much credit when we do well. We all get way too much blame when we don't do well. It's just the nature of the business. If you go back and watch the game, are there a couple of throws Frank wishes he had back? Sure. He played really hard and competed the entire game. We didn't do enough to help him in the outside lanes, we didn't protect him very well, and some of that's on coaching. FAU did a really good job on some schemes on their blitzes. We have our seventh offensive line change up, there's just a couple communication errors that they just hit us in the exact right spot. That's always the head coach, so there's a little bit of that. A little bit of us not winning in the outside lanes. A little bit of us just not winning up front. It's never as bad as you think, and it's never as good. I left the field feeling really bad about the way we played. I still don't feel good about it, but we're literally four or five plays away. The penalty on the touchdown was an absolute killer. The penalty on the late hit on our sideline, those are two penalties worth 14 points. Us not getting a field goal right before halftime, and I had to use my timeouts to try to lengthen the game, so I didn't have any timeouts in my pocket. You just can't take a sack in that situation. Frank knows that, and it just happened. All those plays are on me though. We have got to get better. Let's don't forget, FAU was really good. I was really hoping we were about to take the next step and get in that elite club. We're not far away but we're not there yet."
On Jordan Weeks' performance and if Frank Harris will start against Rice …
"Frank is going to be the starter. Frank played well. That was not any indication of Frank Harris by me doing that. We need to see Jojo (Jordan Weeks) play. He got thrown in the UAB game. That wasn't very fair. He didn't get to practice much this week, so it really wasn't fair again. The kid just needs to play. I think it is important for the development of him and for me as the head coach here to watch all of our guys play with live bullets going around them. There are three positions in which I wish I never had to change. The offensive line, you don't want to change those guys, and all we have done is change them. It is never our choice. It has always been COVID or injury. The quarterback, we have had to change all of them. It has not been our choice. It has always been either COVID or injury. I don't like to have to change our cornerbacks. I like when our two corners get going. That is a dicey position out there. Those three positions I don't like to change. If you watch the rest of my entire team, I like to substitute a lot. I like for a lot of kids to play. I think it is good for morale. I think it is good for the team and development. There are a lot of reasons that I believe in playing fresh players, but those are three positions that I would rather not make changes. When I do it is a really big deal for me to make those moves personally."
On running the ball and protecting the quarterback against FAU …
"On the running, they just really committed nine to the box. We lost a few one-on-one matchups up front, but our offensive line played better than you would think by the way we ran the ball. There was an extra hitter in there. On the pass protection, some of it was scheme driven. FAU did a really good job of showing us some pressures. We might not have gotten as many repetitions as we should have during the week. A couple of them were miscommunications on lineup changes where those kids playing the other spots would have been used to communicating that off that just weren't communicated very well. That being what it was, lack of preparation by me as the head coach. That defensive coordinator has been a really good coordinator for a long time, and he got us a few times. There are 80 snaps in the game. If you go study it, there are about 10 snaps in every game that the coordinator goes, 'I botched that one. It was not good.' There are 10 of them where you go, 'This should score.' The other 60, it is pretty much a stalemate. It is culture. It is a battle. It's winning your one-on-one matchup. It's making somebody miss. It is culture, win the day and the Triangle of Toughness. That is what that game was. They got us some, and we got them some. On the plays that he dialed us up, they got home. The plays that we made our calls, we didn't get home, and that is on me as a head coach to get our players more prepared."
On the offensive line and Ahofitu Maka and Kevin Davis switching positions …
"It was just what we had to do. As a young man to go back in there and do something he hadn't since his freshman year, that was pretty special. What hadn't been talked about very much was the humidity, the rain, the grass field and how wet it was. I think Kevin did a really good job. We had one bad snap the whole game, and Frank (Harris) still caught it. Much credit to Kevin and Maka for being put in a really tough situation. They played well enough for us to win."
On if he plans to keep Maka and Davis switched …
"It depends on how well and fast he heals, but Kevin (Davis) did well enough for us to be okay there. We are getting closer to getting this thing figured out up front. We are looking forward to having Brandon Rolfe back. He was playing really well before he left, and we are hoping to get Brenden Brady back. Those first four games were like me learning my team. These last four, I have learned a whole lot more about our team. We are all kind of figuring it out. These last four games, I really challenged our players that this needs to be the November to remember. We have a real chance to make a statement these last four games. They are four good teams. Rice is way better than they have been. They are a veteran group with a lot of players returning. You can tell they are big, strong, physical kids."
On the cause of the team's lack of preparation against FAU…
"My kids have seen it in practice, and we have repetition on repetition. I just feel like I have given them what they need to be successful. Whenever they see something that I did not give them, I always feel personally responsible for that. I thought that FAU did a great job on their pressure and giving us a couple of looks that I did not get our kids ready for. It was a veteran defensive coordinator that pulled a couple tricks out of his pocket that I had not shown our players. Where it hurts, when you are changing our offensive line around all the time, somewhere along the way, that is why veteran teams and players play so well. If that lineup had been the same all year, we have seen those looks somewhere at some point during the season, but there is not carry over because it changed again. When you change it up so much and you are new, you can't afford anything to not go exactly right. If they do anything different that we haven't worked on. I will always own that. There were a couple looks that I just didn't give our kids, so we didn't get that communicated very well."
On if the change in lineup is equivalent to starting over each time …
"I think you can tell where my heart is. My heart is always with my guys and my players. The reason we have been successful in my career is because my players have always believed in me because I try my best to give them the best opportunity to always win. When we say win the day, we literally try to win the day. We go out there and we are working our tails off to make sure that our kids get every single look Rice is going to give us. This is a very veteran group, and they do a ton of stuff. They do it all, and that is going to be a really tedious test for Coach (Matt) Mattox to get the offensive line prepared for all of the looks they are going to see this week."
On moving forward with consistency on the offensive line …
"There are only so many ways you can do it. You are going to run some inside zone, outside zone, counter, some option game. Ball is ball. When you are ahead of the chains and it is third and two or third and four, that is when you just see more defense. When you get to third and six or third and seven, that is when all of the exotic blitzes come. We have to see. We have to do a better job on third and second down to stay out of those third plus. That is where we have been very successful this year. Teams are studying us. They have eight games on us now. They know we have got to make them throw the football down the field and see what happens. We will have to make them pay when they do that. If you hit it, you score, and if you don't, it's second and 10. Now there is nine in the box and you hand it off, now its third and eight. Guess what? You are getting the best blitz they had all week. They worked it and they had it in their back pockets. Coach (Tyrone) Nix is doing that same thing on the other side of the ball. That is just the game. We hope we do have the same five we had out there last week. We just tested for COVID this morning, and we will be tested against Thursday and Friday and see what lineup we roll out there with this Saturday. If you watch, everybody is dealing with the same stuff. FAU had all of their players back, and that hurt us. They just got their kids back, so we didn't get to play the same team the week before them played."
On what more the team can do to push in the last four games of the season …
"We didn't tackle very well. We had 28 missed tackles. We didn't protect very well, so I have made the decision that we are going to pad back up and go harder. I know that is probably risky, but I really challenged our guys last night. If we really want this to be a November to remember, we just have got to suck it up for four more weeks. I am very proud of our players. What they have done is unbelievable. I think there are two teams in the entire country that have played eight straight games. I know there are two that have played eight. There are two of us. That is a remarkable deal. For a first-year coach and a new program, we needed that so bad. Obviously, I want to get these kids as far as I can get them. If you had told me this summer that we were going to play eight straight games and be sitting here 4-4 going into November, I think everybody on this screen would have said, 'I'll take that. Let's see what we can do.' That is how we are looking at it. We are in position to make this a November to remember because of what we have done in June, July, August, September and October."
On seeing a difference in Frank Harris' harder practices …
"He is in the moment. When he got injured again and had to miss that time, it just reminded him again how valuable it is to play. He didn't like being pulled for Jojo (Jordan Weeks), but he understood what we were doing this time. We have grown there. Our team, we handled this loss better than we did at UAB. We are maturing. We are getting better. I know it didn't look that way because of the score but a lot of that is because of him, his maturity, and how hard he competed. His teammates saw how hard he competed. I was proud of him during the game, but when I watched the film, I was more proud of him. Are there some plays I am sure he wishes he had back? Yes. He will be first one to tell you that, but he played and competed very hard. If we all played that hard, the outcome would probably have been different."
On Josh Adkins' recovery process …
"He is getting better. He has not been cleared yet, but he is getting better."
On how Election Day is impacting this week's practices and the team's preparation …
"We finally have a routine, and now we are out of it again. 2020 has been a year to remember for sure. It might be a year to forget. We just decided to go in the evening when the kids are done with tutorials and classes. We pushed it to tonight so we can all go vote tomorrow. That is an NCAA deal. Tomorrow is our day off, and we just had to adjust. The biggest deal is that my coaches have to prep and get this ready for your base installs. Then we will have all day Tuesday to get ready for Wednesday practice."
On approaching voting with the players …
"We have already all voted. It is a nice tribute that everybody is off on Tuesday to go vote, I get it. Our kids have already all voted. I guess they are going to have their day off and study. They have all already registered and voted."
On how he has addressed voting with the team and the importance …
"I have a great leadership council that was elected by the team. My guys do so much to take care of our team. Every day we are getting more and more player led. I think this generation understands the power of the vote and how much power they have, more than maybe any generation. These kids didn't even have to play, and I think we have all forgotten that. They could have opted out. This year doesn't even count. They could do it again if they want to. I can't brag enough on them. With the election and what is going on in our country, they get COVID tested three times a week, and it is not fun. I literally just said that the good news is we don't make a bowl and I get this thing shoved up my nose eight more times. Hopefully we make a bowl game and I get it shoved up my nose 23 more times. These are young men, 18-22 years old. I am really proud of them. They just keep showing up. We don't like losing. We know we did not play well on Saturday, but our kids just keep showing up and doing the right thing."
On the reason behind Jamal Ligon not starting against FAU …
"It was just competition driven. Tyler (Mahnke) just had a better week in practice, so Tyler got rewarded. Jamal responded very well when he got in the game. He played very well. He is a very high-character kid. Him and Tyler both are. They are great competitors and just two guys competing for a job. Jamal did very well once he got in there."
On Brenden Brady's low usage …
"We just wanted to be smart on that field. It was wet, and the surface was not very good. We were not going to play Peter (Gray) that much because of an ankle injury. On the second play, he injured his ankle, and that kind of spooked me a little bit with Brenden. I just wanted to get him on a better surface before I let him play more."
On a carry split between Brenden Brady and Sincere McCormick …
"I hate to ever get too specific on that kind of stuff because it just pins you down. He is a really good back and he is going to play. What that looks like, we will just kind of see how that goes. There is no doubt it will make Sincere better and him better. I have used the analogy of boxers. There are only so many punches in those guys. A running back is the same way. Sincere will never say it but carrying the ball 37 times the week before took something from him Saturday. I don't care what he says, it just had to of had. We would like to spread some of that out."
