Gene Chizik arrived (late) and spoke for close to 30 minutes. Here's what he said:- "Nice to be able to come back from a tough start Saturday night. Obviously we don't like start in that position, but I think our team responded about as well as we could have responded."
- "It was great that we won, but we have a lot of work to do this week."
- Already get to a Marcus Lattimore/Mike Dyer question. "Obviously they're both very good backs and I'm sure they'll both have great college careers. ... Two great kids and two great players." That wasn't much of an answer.
- On entering conference play: "We're going to have to up our level. We're starting too slow and in this league it's going to be hard to come back from those kind of deficits and win."
- On concern about ball getting spread around: "I don't want to use concern. We'd like to have more of that. There's no question about it." Said guys (aka Darvin Adams) are starting to get double-teamed.
- More Lattimore/Dyer talk: "There are so many different elements in recruiting a guy and having him have an interest in your school."
- Auburn hasn't played South Carolina in a minute: "There's a heightened awareness of what's at stake when you play conference games. A lot of these guys playing a team for the first time, but it's conference play, so they should be ready to play."
- Thought RT John Sullen played well in place of an injured A.J. Greene.
- Concern on short yardage: "We've been very sporadic on those. That's not where we want to be. We've got to find a way to convert on those downs when the game is on the line."
- He does not think Greene will return this year. Did not give more specifics.
- Said Onterio McCalebb is OK after getting knocked dizzy late in the game. Mario Fannin (shoulder) is -- all together now -- "day-by-day."
- On South Carolina: "Very, very good football team on both sides of the ball. Very physical. Really getting their running game going. Defensively, very aggressive. Lots of speed."
- Said cornerbacks need to play the ball better. Disappointed by not having any interceptions this year. "We've got to create some turnovers on defense. We're not doing that much."
- "We've had a chance to get some picks but we've dropped them." Chizik's concerned with South Carolina's big receivers. "There's no question in our secondary that we'll have to play our best game to this point."
- On the "God thing" statement: "Don't read too far into it. It's real simple. We've talked about those guys having faith, no matter what the circumstances are. And our faith got tested last night."
- Still think tailback running game is lacking. Thought Mike Dyer hit some creases quick. Wants to establish that part of the offense. "We have to do that."
- Would like to be 50-50 with pass/run. "As games unfold, we've got to do what we feel we need to do to win."
- In the wake of the Michigan State coach news, a health-related question. Gene tries to exercise when he can. "That's something I feel like I have to do is get away from work for a little while and get some exercise in there."
- On penalties: "We've got to be more focused."
- More on the Clemson game: "The win was not pretty, but that was a very good football team." Said Zac Etheridge made a huge tackle in the overtime that probably would have resulted in a touchdown.
- Got Josh Bynes some breaks this week on the dime. "Very valuable to what we do. Has a great field presence of what we do. In that regard, he's invaluable to us right now." Still thinks he's playing too many snaps.
- Expects Trovon Reed's role to expand. Wants him to play wideout, expand role. 'He's just got to stay healthy."
- Thinks there are a lot of good QBs in the SEC right now. Compared it to his time in the Big 12.
- Said he has a little bit of a background with Steve Spurrier. Added nothing further. Strange answer.
- Auburn attacked the perimeter with its passing plays a bunch last night. Said that's what Clemson was giving the Tigers.
- Singled out Darvin for having a huge game. "Catching the football-wise, he had a great night."
- On Darvin being the best at getting the ball to the officials quicker than anyone else. "He catches a lot of ball."
- Newton was under center more last night. More in the future. "Could quite possibly be." Ooh, super secret.
- Wouldn't bit on Fannin changing positions. "He can do it all."
10 comments:
credibility: I am an older walk on with a PhD and a student of the game. Why has Malzahn thrown out his playbook? We all thought (85k fans) it looked like sand lot football with no designed plays... Also, when giving a ball to speedsters, the line just watches instead of serious blocking. I was honestly embarrassed at the game. Embarrassed !! No game plan or structure..!
Auburn's offensive line does not push anybody off the ball. what is that? They are suppose to be good. Our defense gets gouged constantly for big yards. Both sides of the ball they totally look different than bama. What is wrong with the offensive line and defensive line coaches...and don't get me started on our defensive backs. They do not stay tight with the receiver when playing man, and therefore, maybe we need to play mostly zone. I would think Ziemba could knock a whole in the defensive line and dyer fun behind him. Our QB needs to get some 4-7 yd pass plays. throw over or in front of the linebackers. We just need an overall balance improvement in every area of our team. I would like to see Auburn get a defense again. We do not shut anyone down.
Did any of you anons watch the game? Clemson had some athletes on both lines. Those guys were huge! Dequan Bowers will be a top pick. They were bigger than our guys on both sides and we still licked them enough for the win. Don't blame it on the players fully either because Dabo and his staff coached a helluva game. Great comeback win.
Hey Andy! Why do you think Chizik doesnt throw out any decent interview answers? Could it be that he knows the media is just waiting to pounce on any little detail he gives out to blow it out of purportion? I mean look how all you guys reacted to the God thing last night. Maybe you should drop the attitude and look in the mirror.
I will agree with anon on one thing that continues to concern me, which is why don't we run many passing plays that are 5-10 yds downfield. i know we hit for some big plays last night but it looks like Cam falls in love with the long ball when there are(or should be) options 5-15 yds downfield. i don't know if it's not a big part of his skill set but he looks for darvin way too much when there were a few guys that were open for moderate gains that could sustain drives...just my opinion, though.
thanks for the great coverage, AB.
I think the OL is still suffering from the sissification introduced by Franklin. But seriously, we have a bunch of SRs on the OL and they can't open up some holes?!
Golly guys; WE WON! Clemson was a tough opponent and will probably win the ACC title.
Lets celebrate a huge win and hope our coaches straighten out the details.
We don't throw many short passes because Cam isn't very good in that part of the game, though he seems to be improving and hopefully that will get better as the season goes along.
I paid $125 for a seat in the Clemson section, and I'll say it was worth every penny.
I was not impressed with the O in the first half--just as I predicted before the season, defense is the strength of this team. The good news is Malzahn doesn't just keep doing the same thing over and over and he eventually found some things that worked. If we could just execute the simple things, hitches, outs, posts, zone-runs, etc... we'd be pretty good on O. Newton's runs should enhance our O, not define it...
Also Andy, you're a great reporter, but you guys need to realize that it's not Chizik's job to get you a good story. I know it sounds kinda Steve Jobs like ("Our goals do not include helping you get a good grade."), but it's true.
As a fan, I used to hate it when TB would basically announce the game plan to the media each week. And from what I see, Chizik's MO is pretty much par this days.
ACTVX, I totally agree...I noticed this is the Miss State game. Defenses (Ark did it last year) just stack the box and keep their 2ndary deep. The middle of the field is begging to be exploited.
If we hit some intermediate passes, it would be too much for defenses to handle.
That's exactly what we did against Bama in 2004. They were playing that aggressive front look and we just started hitting those middle routes and then pulled away from them a little bit...hopefully we'll see some of that against USC. I can't imagine that Malzahn doesn't see it on film...
But unfortunately that's one problem with gurus, they have a set way of doing things and so they miss the obvious when it's outside their personal ideology. Hopefully that's not the case here...
Never said it was Chizik's job to give us a good story. Just waiting to see this electric personality that all the players and recruits talk about. He mails it in with the media.
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