UVA football coach Bronco Mendenhall talks with reporters after the Cavs’ 34-14 loss to Miami on Saturday.
Opening statement: “First of all, congratulations to Mark Richt and his team. They have a talented football team – skilled and physical and pretty deep in terms of personnel, so I was impressed with the talent level, but we expected that going into the game. Similar to what we saw maybe from Louisville in terms of talent base. I was pleased with our team for the first half and the way they battled. Our miscues in the second half, we turned it over four times, and numerous penalties, and clearly I’m not getting through yet to our team in those closer moments where the game is kind of going back and forth. We held them to a field goal in the first one, so it’s 20-14. But again I have not yet and it’s a direct reflection of me, and the team plays as they are prepared and I haven’t yet been able to get through deep enough to have the play be clean enough and disciplined enough and execution sound enough and turnover free enough for us to have a chance to go all the way to the end, which I was anticipating and really hopeful this game would do. Nothing in the first half said anything different to me. I love feeling like we take a step forward, I love seeing areas of improvement, I love seeing the kids try hard and we didn’t play nearly cleanly enough nor mistake free enough nor just simple execution, so my task is to charge my coaches to get through deeper and more effectively with our team to give them their best chance to play good football all the way to the end of the game. I’m looking forward to that. I’m invigorated by that chance and really wish our seniors could have had a better experience in their last (home) game today. I’m very appreciative of the fans and the turnout today for a lot of the game. It was a really nice college atmosphere and I appreciate that and on behalf of our players, that’s special to see a bunch of people on the hill and a fan base that I think was really pulling for us today for a long time.”
On consistently struggling in the second half this year: “I’m looking hard for a thread and I’ll keep looking. I think it might not necessarily be first half and second half. I think it might just be volume of plays, being able to hold and our habits just aren’t holding long enough. They aren’t deep enough, and they aren’t thorough enough. So the more volume that’s asked and the more different situations they’re put in, they’re just not deep enough. I think we practice very hard and very effectively and I think we’re seeing signs of what we’re capable of against anyone we play, through parts of the game, usually the first half and somewhere through about three quarters, and then there’s some things that manifest that I would love to help this team move past to have consistent success. But again today was a clear representation that we’re not there yet, especially when you have some youthful players, you have to be even more of a masterful teacher and be really cognizant of where you put them, what positions you put them in, and how you use them. I’m responsible for all of that and I don’t take that lightly and I would love these kids to have success.”
On Miami scoring 10 points off of turnovers: “Miami was more physical than what I expected on both sides. Their fronts controlled the game, so they were able to get some pressure on our quarterback and it doesn’t necessarily need to be blitz, but they were able to run the ball with big sets. They had the fullback that’s 280 plus their big guys in there. Certainly you have to be aware of their receiving threats, and we saw two big plays in that regard so we could be fairly aggressive but it kind of turned into a guessing game and when I guessed right we could hold them for three yards a run and if we were playing coverage they were able to sustain drives on the ground and get about four or five yards per carry and sustain drives and control the game. I think we battled well, but we still have lots and lots and lots and lots of work to do in terms of defensive execution, run front dominance, tackling and then there were two big plays mixed in there too.”
On putting Matt Johns in at the end of the game: “It was my decision and at some point intuitively, okay that turnover, that’s enough. I didn’t feel like we were gaining momentum, it felt like we were losing momentum and I thought at that point having a change would give us a better chance to finish. It wasn’t necessarily Senior Day oriented. I love Matt and wanted to give him a chance and so I asked Coach Anae to put him in and I think he did well. He gave us a spark and put a few balls on the money and his teammates were cheering hard for him as were his coaches.”
On playing Georgia Tech next week and the option offense they run: “Our staff is very familiar. At BYU we played and beat Georgia Tech twice under the current coaching staff. It’s an amazingly fast and exciting week. I love playing option football, I love the challenges that it creates, and I love the all-encompassing nature of how difficult it is to get ready in that short of time. But our current team does not know anything about our scheme in playing Georgia Tech.”
Share
Contributors
