Head Coach Quotes
11/26/2011 12:00:00 AM | Football
Nov. 26, 2011
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Head Coach Jim Grobe
On the effort-level of his team this week...
I think we were on a high last week after beating Maryland and didn't feel like we practiced well this week. It's kind of a crazy week because a lot of the kids are going home for the holidays, so you've got to figure out how to do that and typically we've played pretty good after Thanksgiving - we've had some good efforts. But tonight we were a football team that didn't have a spark.
On the play of Vanderbilt...
I thought Vanderbilt played like they wanted to be in a bowl game. They played with some energy and played like they were on a mission. That was a hungry team we played tonight. To their credit, they out-played us. Their kids played really, really good. On early turnover and opportunities that got away...
We had opportunities to turn the ball over defensively early, which could have been huge, and we didn't do that. Certainly, starting the first series and fumbling the football was not good from a momentum standpoint. I thought our defense did a really good job making them kick a field goal. I really felt like when we went up 7-6, I thought, `here we go,' but we just never did.
On Wake Forest's offensive performance...
I thought, offensively, we had nothing all night. I kept thinking we still had a shot. Even midway through the third quarter, I thought we had the potential to hit a couple big balls and get right back in it. You live by the sword and die by the sword. When you're a throwing offense and you're not throwing-and-catching real well, it can make for a long evening.
Vanderbilt Head Coach James Franklin
On the gameplan against Wake Forest QB Tanner Price...
"We just run our defense, and we just focus on the things that we focus on. We knew that he was a good player. We knew that the two wideouts for them were good players. We needed to stop them and try to control them as much as we possibly could. Our plan is always the same. We try to make them one dimensional. We try to eliminate the running game and then try to pressure the quarterback. We didn't do that as consistently as I'd like to tonight, but we got there when we needed to."
On scoring early in the game...
"The thing that was big was special teams. We kicked some field goals, which I don't like to do - kick field goals on the road. You get beat a lot of times. You have got to punch it in when given those opportunities."
On playing in a bowl game...
"Wherever they tell us to go, we'll be really, really excited. We'll represent the city and the school the right way."
