GAME NOTES
Buffalo Bulls Head Coach Jeff Quinn
Opening statement:
Obviously disappointed. Certainly not what we expected tonight when we started this football game and the preparation after Baylor. I knew we had a real solid week of work, our kids were excited about playing this game and they continued to show me they care. They gave great effort but we need to get better. That is not just on our players but on me and our coaching staff.
On where the most strides need to me made after three games:
Well I really felt offensively there were a couple key situations in the game that I look back at and right before the half we could have came away with three points potentially that we did not. That was something that happened immediately after the (Matt) Ostrowski injury and there was some time there we were discussing we told Jerry (Davis) look we are going to take one quick shot at it. We wanted a shot at the end zone if not throw it out of bounds. We knew the clock was going to start. Looking back at it I think we could have done something different looking at it from that standpoint. Outside of that we tried to play aggressive football. Our defense did a great job. They had a fifteen play job I believe to go up 17-10 I believe it was. Our kids played hard and they were physical. We had a couple key situations in special teams that did not help us either.
On the frustration of the 15 play drive after stopping UCF for three previous drives:
Well it is always disappointing to see your kids break down a little bit and keep that momentum on their sideline. They were giving us a lot of energy and we talked to our defensive kids all year long about how important it is to keep playing consistent, aggressive and relentless to the football type of defense. When you put a 15 play drive together it took a little bit out of them.
On the thought process of the 4th and 2 play:
They were crashing their ends off our read and we thought we could get the ball out flanked on them. He read it out exactly what you didn't want to see happen. He did a great job. I thought we could get it out on the perimeter quickly. We did it earlier in the game but this particular situation it was not effective. I wanted to go for it. We talked in the headsets there was an earlier situation where we talked about maybe going for it early in the first quarter, this is situation we knew we needed to try to create some momentum and obviously it back fired. I want to be aggressive in our calls and in all situations and not sit back. If it works you have a lot of momentum going and you know there is a potential of getting the game back in the balance but it didn't so it back fired.
On the struggling offense:
It never feels good. We work too dang hard to get this thing right. We are learning and we are going through the process. Yeah I am aggravated ,our kids are upset and our coaches are. You have a lot of things that you do offensively and that you know are good sound fundatmental systematic plays you know can be executed that are not at times. It certainly is disappointing. I believe our kids understand how important it is to show result and resiliency.
On Oliver running the 4th down play:
We have four running backs and three have been primarily in the game. I think (Jeffvon) Gill was either winded or hurt at that moment but Oliver was our next bull in and we expected him to make those plays. The one thing you have to understand is you have to keep going back to these guys to put them in those situations so they can show or demonstrate they can be successful. That is the key. It is hard when you lose. Certainly hindsight is 20/20 and we know those things. You start questioning things but at the same time I felt good going for it and I felt it was the right call. We discussed it with Greg Forest and myself and felt like it was going to give us what we wanted. We wanted to get the ball outside and I will certainly reevaluate that.
On the offensive line:
We are trying like heck to give those guys up front on the offensive line some assistance. At the same time they are going ot have to step up and be the kind of football players we can count on in those situations. We can't be helping them each time blocking their ends. When Ostrowski went down that was tough for us. They have Pat Wilson who is a red-shirt freshman and with Ostrowski going down we put Jordan back in. At the same time we have to be able to do a better job of blocking for Jerry and pick things up. We had a great pick up on the one if you saw it and we got a holding call on it. We had all the boides in the right place and bam they saw a holding in that situation and those are always thing that will kill your momentum.
On Ostrowski's condition:
I have not personally heard. I know Matt is going to be fighting with this rehabilitation of getting him back . I think it was a very serious injury that we saw on the field. We are just going to pray every moment that he is going to be alright.
On not capitalizing on the team's drives: It's very frustrating because obviously on offense you want to score a touchdown. As a unit we really we didn't execute enough and didn't make enough plays, but I thought we moved the ball up and down the field pretty well. They played great on defense but we all believe that if we execute on offense, no one is going to stop us. Playing the game of football, you know that adversity is going to strike in every single game. We just came up short and didn't make enough plays
On handling UCF's dual-threat quarterback: It was tough but it wasn't that tough. We have a quick, fast, aggressive and violent defense so we swarm to the ball. It was just adjusting to what he was doing, and knowing where he was going with the ball.
Marcus Rivers
On the team's mentality going into an upcoming road trip: Mentally I think we have it all I just think we have to let this game be our past. We need to move on and move forward, adjust and watch film and practice hard. I think we played we played well in this game, I'm not going to say UCF was the better team, but they just out-executed us.
On the team's recent offensive output and his confidence with the ball: Every time I touch the ball I'm trying to do all that I can do, but we need to click as a unit, with one heartbeat. I have a lot of confidence but it's up to the coaches to see whether or not I'll be able to start, but I'm ready to be the Next Bull In.