On losing momentum after Ball State’s 72 yard touchdown play:
“Yeah, (it was) disappointing. It was an explosive play; it led to points. But if that does happen you have to turn around, you have to be resilient. You’ve got to bounce back from that and we didn’t do a very good job of bouncing back today. Even with the sudden changes trying to stop them, they ran their offense. Give all the credit to the quarterback. He runs their system in a very efficient manner, and they outplayed us in every aspect and they deserved to win.”
On the issue of penalties:
“A lack of poise. I can count probably three or four of them that extended the drive, third down penalties that extended the drive and that’s something that hurts you. I don’t know how many led to scores. I’ll look at that and we’ll critique that more, but you’ve got to have poise in those situations. We just didn’t play very smart today. We’ll look at who the offenders are, and obviously that matters. If you’re offsides it hurts the team. So, we’ll look at that and address those individuals, but we’ll address again how detrimental it is to any type of success you could have, particularly defensively when you extend those drives, or as you saw two penalties on touchdown plays. Those things are egregious and you can’t put up with that. We’ve got to go back and teach the aspects of ‘Listen, when this happens you put yourself, your teammates in bad situations.’ Obviously two of them cost us points for sure.”
On quarterback David Watford’s performance:
“Again, he has to be accountable, responsible for the throws that he makes. We’ve got to be accountable and responsible for the routes that we run. The whole passing game, guys have to be in tune with what’s going on. It looked like out there today that guys weren’t in tune as we need to be because of the turnovers and the missed opportunities to convert third downs and move the chains.”
On changes in the game with receivers:
“We’ll see. We’ll look at it and grade the film. There’s a lot of things you look at, not just the catches, but the alignments, blocking, all those things, that they are running the right routes. That evaluation will be made after the coaches have a chance to watch the tape. I know Keeon Johnson made a couple catches, some athletic catches, so there’s a bright spot there. Overall, we didn’t play well enough to win, to allow the team to have some success and we have to go back and make sure we are doing everything we can to help this team succeed.”
On Ian Frye and Alec Vozenilek:
“Ian obviously didn’t play this game because of the hip flexor that he sustained in our last game. So we’ll see what happens with him as the week goes on. I thought Alec did an excellent job today handling both duties, the field goals and punting. He will continue to keep doing that as long as he’s healthy and we’ll see where Ian is as the week progresses, but again I don’t look for him to be back anytime soon because when you have that type of injury when you’re a kicker it may take some time. Again, I said Alec did a great job today and scored some points for us, moved the field with his leg for his punting.”
On his coaching after two losses:
“My goal is to make sure that we do everything we need to do and that’s what I’m committed to doing. I go to work everyday with that mindset. The coaches we have here go in with that mindset. The players come to play. When they don’t play as well as we need to, this is the result of it. They’re not quitting in that locker room in there. They want to come back again tomorrow to get ready for seven games left in the season. So, we’re 2-3. That’s where we are right now with a chance to get better. That’s all my focus and goal is to do.”
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Chris Graham
