The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Colorado quotes
10.04.2008 | Football
Oct. 4, 2008
TEXAS COACH
Head coach Mack Brown
General statement: Fun game for us. I'm proud of the guys, proud of the coaches. This is a tough place to play. For a homecoming night game, Colorado would be fired up. I thought our guys played really really well. We're happy to be 5-0. Road wins are tough. The guys did a good job in El Paso, and a good job here tonight, and we're excited about Dallas next week.
Tonight is another example of this team doing what it's supposed to do. And that's come out here and be ready to play a good football team and domintate the game.
On play of defense: I'm proud of our defense, especially when they came out with two turnovers in the red zone. We forced them into three field goals which they missed. Our defense is playing so much better than in the first game against Florida Atlantic. We're much better up front, the secondary is growing up, and the guys have done a great job coaching them. I thought the guys rushed the ball so well. They didn't give Cody (Hawkins) much chance to throw the ball. A lot of tipped passes and that's because of pressure. The running game again was obsolete tonight. For two weeks in a row Arkansas and Colorado would line up and run the ball, and both of them did. And we've done a good job of stopping them.
On play of Colorado: Colorado changed up what they had been doing. They put a lot of guys on the line of scrimmage. Blitzed everytime again. But Colt (McCoy)'s so good and so accurate, that he just threw the ball down the field and helped us score 38 points.
On play of Chris Ogbonnaya: We'd known what Chris could do, and that's why we felt like we didn't need to look at him a lot in the non-conference schedule because we've seen him for four years. We know he's smart, he's got great hands in the passing game.
I thought he was the best back on the field tonight. We were planning on using Chris a lot tonight. When their offense scored their only touchdown against our one defense he made the great run to answer very quickly.
On answering any adversity: Both sides of the ball handled adversity very well. We needed some adversity. We had some at different times, and I thought the guys handled it really well. They never got shook, they stayed in the game and played hard for 60 minutes.
On play of offensive line: I thought they played really well because they picked up so much junk. It was just everywhere, and that's why we had a couple big screens, and we hit the counter-play twice with Chris (Ogbonnaya). You just have to be patient when someone's blitzing as much as they were.
On play of Colt McCoy: He's just playing so well. He's amazing because he's playing with so much confidence, and he knows where everybody is. Even on the plays he's not proud of, the long return for the interception is man coverage, and the guy makes a good break on it. Maybe he could have had it a little further out. But he had it to the right guy.
On playing Oklahoma next week: It's what these two teams should have mid-season. It's two top five football teams that are playing really well. We'll have everybody in America talking about the game next week, and that's what we all want. It's fun. It's what Texas and OU have wanted forever, and we have got it back. With 90,000 plus Gameday, plus everybody in America. They're very good. They're very deserving of number one, and I think we're a team that's getting better.
TEXAS PLAYERS
QB Colt McCoy
On the win: We came out strong and put up 14 quick points. I give a lot of credit to the defense. They played awesome. They gave us a lot of good field position.
On opening Big 12 play: It's the first game of the Big 12. That's all the motivation that we need. You can't over look Colorado. They're a great team. The defense played well. They did a lot of different things that we weren't ready for.
On the Red River Shootout: We are going to enjoy the win and get back to work tomorrow for OU. They're a good team and they deserve to be number one. We feel confident in our coaches and our team, but we have little things to correct.
On his fast start: I'm going into my third year. I should know the offense, and I should be playing well. I want to win. I think quarterbacks are defined by wins, and that's our goal as a team.
DT Roy Miller
General statement: I've got great teammates, and they help me out a lot.
On Colorado's running backs: They've got two great runningbacks-- Darrell Scott, and that number 43 (Rodney Stewart). They're fast, too.
DT Lamarr Houston
On the win: We have to look at the film. We could have won by 80, and we would still be looking for mistakes. If you mess up, you mess up. I'm glad we played the way we did tonight with everybody focused on next week. That's hard too. This is the first game on the road and the Big 12 opener. We knew we had to stay focused and play all four quarters.
On the Red River Shootout: We've got a good game coming up. It's the way we wanted it to be. The defense is starting to come together.
On being 5-0: It's early in the year. Records really don't matter.
On point differential: If we win by a lot, we win by a lot. If we get a shutout, we get a shutout. We're just playing football.
On playing in his home state: It felt good to play here. It's good to be back. My friends and coaches came out. Even though I didn't go here (Colorado), I know a lot of guys on the team.
WR Quan Cosby
On the win: It sets the atmosphere for a huge showdown. We got a huge win on the road against a very good team.
On looking ahead: We're going to get back to work. That's the way it has to be in the Big 12. We're excited about every win. It was a huge win for us. In the Big 12, there are a lot of good teams, so we have to come out and work hard every week.
On CU's mascot: Ralphie's a big buffalo. It's scary looking. It's great, and it just adds to the atmosphere. I didn't realize how close it got. We were like `Whoa!'
RB Chris Ogbonnaya
General statement: It felt good. It's always big for us to win on the road. Overall we did a great job.
On the running game: We're just doing our best to do what is asked of us. We take whatever is put in front of us and try to get the job done. We want to win football games. We just want to get our part done.
On his performance: I really don't care about numbers as long as we win. As a senior you don't have many wins left. We have a great offense and played a great game.
On next week's opponent, Oklahoma: We just need to take it one game at a time. Start strong and finish strong.
DE Brian Orakpo
General statement: We have a great bunch of guys. A lot of guys working hard and playing four quarters. Our defense had a great effort getting after the quarterback.
On next week's opponent, Oklahoma: We can really feed off this win. Watch film and fix our errors. Get ready for Oklahoma. It'll be a great test, they're the number one team in the country. It'll be two top five teams getting after it.
CB Ryan Palmer
On defensive performance: Everyone came in feeling confident with the defensive line we have. We know that with a four man rush we can get to the quarterback. They missed three field goals which helped us out, allowed us to keep rolling. We did a good job stopping the running game and making them one-dimensional. When you stop the run it makes things a lot easier and you force them to pass.
On not looking ahead: We're blue collar. We want to come into every game with intensity. We're Texas, we want to dominate every game.
LB Roddrick Muckelroy
On next week's opponent, Oklahoma: I don't really think about the past. We're gonna get ready and prepare this week, but what happened last year will be on our minds. It'll be fun.
On Defensive coordinator Will Muschamp: He came in with a new scheme and we all jumped on board. We can't lose focus with him; he doesn't let us. He's always riled up and it gets us riled up.
COLORADO COACHES AND PLAYERS
Head coach Dan Hawkins
On Texas being as good as their ranking: I said before that they're a good football team. They're very solid, Colt [McCoy] is playing great. A couple times I was asked no how we could exploit their weaknesses, and I'm going, `Not this team, they don't have that.' They are very solid.
On lack of producing points: We missed three kicks, so we've got to get that done; we could have gotten on the board earlier with that. We had a hard time running the football and a hard time getting any consistency with anything. Running the football, getting protection, they did a good job on defense. We just have to be able to take advantage of opportunities. If we can make some field goals, it's 14-9 and you got a little more momentum, your spirits are a little bit higher and you have a little bit better opportunity to do some stuff there. You've got that positive and negative thing going on, where when you don't make them then it becomes tough. Nothing against Aric [Goodman], I told him and said, `I love you and that's a part of the beauty of it. You've got to have the courage to jump in there and say, `Hey that's me and I'll be back.' But if we get a couple of those and then had the long interception and we couldn't really capitalize after that.
On coming in to the game as underdogs:
We knew they were very good and that we'd have to play very well to get some things goings. You don't ever come in with a negative attitude necessarily, but we knew they were good.
On watching tape on Texas before the game: We watched offensively, but we didn't watch their defense, mostly all of their stuff from last year.
On getting pressure on Texas QB Colt McCoy: We did ok. We kind of gave up that [big play] at an inopportune time. Colt made a great play on that first drive and flipped it out there. We're trying to come off and tackle the quarterback and he flicks it out there. They hade a couple of other long ones in there, so it was hard out. It is a game of emotion, and despite your greatest pleas or one-liners, you need to have a little credence, a little proof in there. By and large they did a pretty good job. We just have to tackle a little better I think and get some answers on special teams and offense.
On the play of Colorado QB Cody Hawkins: You look at stats and again, I don't know where he was, but I'm sure it wasn't great. But you have to get your running game going to compliment your play-action and then you have to be able to protect as well. He functionally didn't play great, but that's kind of residual of the circumstance too.
On the play of Colorado's backup QB Matt Ballenger: He did a nice job. He came in and threw a good ball to Patrick [Williams]. It's kind of like a team in general too, it's great to see him get some snaps and get some work done, and move the club a little bit.
On being surprised about running game: I don't know if `surprised' is the right word. We always feel like you have to be able to run the football a little bit to keep your offense going. When we didn't run it like we wanted to, then it became a big adjustment game.
On the game being a measuring point: Like I said, we're playing a tough stretch. I think we have a good pulse of where we're at and where we're going, and I like that. We have to continue to get some depth and experience, and continue to get quality recruits like we have. We'll get there. We have some weak players in certain areas and as we continue to establish depth and get experience in there, we're going to be okay. As you play these really good football teams, the margin for error is really, really slim; that's just the nature of it.
On the quality of Texas' athletes: They have a lot of good players. I think every one of them had some success, to some degree. A lot of that is a case of just having fresh bodies to run in there and being big, strong, fast, and physical.
CB Jalil Brown
General statement: It was a tough loss, we were giving it our all out there and tried our best, but unfortunately it didn't work out the way we planned for it to go.
On Texas offense: They were right there with teams like Florida State and West Virginia, but I feel like they were a little more gelled. Their offense worked a little better than the previous teams we've played.
On Colt McCoy: It's always tough preparing for a dual threat quarterback like that. He can scramble out of the pocket but also through the long ball. You have to be in a position for both and you can't be leaning one way or the other.
CB Cha'pelle Brown
On Texas: The quarterback [Colt McCoy] was pretty good. We have to go back to the drawing board and get back to work. We missed a lot of plays today.
WR Patrick Williams
On Texas defense: I tip my hat to them, they definitely flew around and made plays. They pressured our quarterback and when you get that kind of pressure on the quarterback, you're going to have a tough time out there. Our offensive linemen played well, but we didn't play well enough as a team to come out with a victory.
We knew what they were going to do on defense. They came out and played man and challenged us to run the ball and it didn't go how we wanted it to but that is a part of college football. You have to make plays and adjust with on the fly.
QB Cody Hawkins
On Texas: Texas is a great football team and they're going to play like it. We didn't play with the capability we can. We didn't make enough plays to win and could not get into a rhythm. Tonight we were just struggling to find ourselves, but we just have to keep coming out. We did a decent job staying positive and staying together. The bottom line is we have to come out and execute.
On offense: You have to score points, especially in the red-zone. The most important thing for our offense is to put it in the end zone. Regardless of if we got the field goals or not, we weren't playing our best and weren't getting the job done.
On Texas defense: They are a good defense, we could have done a lot of things better. They definitely did a good job and schemed stuff up. They did just enough things to make you change what you were doing. They were physical and fast and well schooled.
On running game: We got a lot of young guys, we're trying to plug some young guys in there and up front we're also very young. We've got three guys who had never started before and Nate Solder going through a position switch. We've just got to keep coming out and getting used to things. It was definitely a tough test. We just have to keep getting better, look at the film, and put it behind us tomorrow, we have a lot of potential but we have to put it together on a consistent basis.
LT Nate Solder
On offense: We did some things good and some things not as good as we should have done. We definitely could have played a lot better- we didn't play to our potential.
On Texas defense: They were pretty straight up, they did a little stunting here and there. They're not as fast as Florida State. I give them a lot of credit.
On Texas DE Brian Orakpo: He is a good player, I give him a lot of respect. He can move well, he uses a lot of different moves.
DT George Hypolite
On Texas' offensive line: They're very big and do a good job in their system of moving left to right. They gave Colt McCoy time to make plays. Their offense sets up for the kind of guys they have. They did a good job.
On Colt McCoy: We try to attack the same way, but you're still conscious of it. You want to make sure you keep him boxed in and keep him in the pocket because he showed tonight that he can do a lot of damage outside the pocket. You have to take your hat off to the Texas team, they made the plays when they needed to.