The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Quotes: Tom Herman press conference
09.24.2018 | Football
Quotes from Tom Herman's press conference on Monday.
COACH HERMAN: Not much to say. Proud of our fans and our students especially. What a great atmosphere that was, especially kind of an odd kickoff time at 3:30. But I tell you what, if there's a better feeling in college football than walking over to a jam-packed student section at DKR that have stayed for the entire game and singing the Eyes of Texas after a victory, you'll have to show it to me.
Because that's pretty neat to see them stick around and just pack that student section and be loud and be impactful in the game. So thank them. Thank our fans for again another great atmosphere and we certainly felt and used the energy that they gave us.
We're moving on. I said on our teleconference or whatever that thing's called, that I told our team yesterday: They're not going to spot us seven points in Manhattan because we beat TCU. Can we take the lessons that we've learned, both from a football standpoint and a psychological standpoint from the last couple of weeks? Certainly.
But what happened against TCU, what happened against USC, for that matter what happened against Maryland, is inconsequential to how we play and how Kansas State plays against us in Manhattan.
So we enjoyed it Saturday evening. And we have moved on officially yesterday to trying to win a road game, which we haven't won, our program hasn't won in Manhattan Kansas since Caden Sterns was two years old. So that is no small feat, certainly. And we don't take that very lightly. And in our only road contest this year we obviously did not play very well. So we're preparing our tails off.
Injury update, Jarmarquis Durst is doubtful with a pretty severe shoulder strain. Montrell Estell is doubtful right now with a concussion. Patrick Hudson is doubtful. He goes to the doctor, I think I told you guys, on Thursday. Now he goes to the doctor today for a return-to-play protocol.
And then everyone else is pretty good. Calvin Anderson and Sam Cosmi did not practice yesterday, bumps and bruises, but they should be back ready to go. Brennan Eagles is going to go through practice Tuesday so we'll know a lot more after practice. Keaontay Ingram will practice on Tuesday. DeMarvion Overshown will practice on Tuesday and Zach Shackelford will practice on Tuesday.
Does that mean all those guys will make it to the game? I don't know. But we're healing a little bit here at some key spots.
Excited about this week's preparation and opportunity to go 1-0 again in the Big 12.
Q. This really hit me looking at the postgame videos the players tweeted out. Does it play to your advantage now that there's not a single player in that locker room, let's be honest, who has ever won big at this level. And this is all new to them and that -- it seems like you've flipped that now and can use that, right?
COACH HERMAN: I think so, yeah. I think winning is intoxicating. And it feels really, really good. But I think the key that I'm proud of this group of guys, this team, is they understand that you don't beat TCU on Saturday. You don't. The three and a half hours on Saturday is the reward for how hard you prepare and the sacrifices that you make.
And so I think when you do win -- because again when you don't win, most of the time the sacrifices that are made and the work that goes in is fairly similar. So when you don't get rewarded, that stings really bad when you work as hard as we work in preparation.
But these guys have -- and I hope I'm here for a long, long time, and we're going to celebrate wins like that for a long time around here when we do win, because of how hard we work throughout the week.
Q. Follow-up on Sam. I'm sure some quarterbacks hate that phrase "game manager." But here he's thrown for 200 yards in all 10 career starts. He's now 5-5 as a starter here. Yeah, he does manage the game but he gives you a little bit more in the running game. How do you feel like him now, he's progressing four games in?
COACH HERMAN: Well, progressing well. Certainly has a long way to go. We were very critical. He was of himself and we were as coaches of him when you watch film. It's a lot easier to be critical when you win. But there hasn't been a perfect game played yet. But I do think he's progressing.
I think the more he does progress, the more confident he is in himself and the people around him. And then it's kind of a flywheel effect or snowball, if you will, the more confidence he has, the better he plays; the better he plays, the more confidence he has and so on and so forth.
But he is progressing well. We've still got a long way to go.
Q. Follow-up. In seven wins that Sam has played, he's only thrown two interceptions. In five losses he's thrown seven. So talk about how his decision-making seems to be improving. I notice he hasn't thrown an interception, don't want to jinx you, hasn't thrown an interception over the last three games. Talk about the progression it seems like he's making. Seems like he takes a sack but it's because he's waiting for guys to open. Talk about him as a decision-maker.
COACH HERMAN: It's better, certainly. I think in this sport, you know, you want to -- everybody wants to blame things on certain people. The quarterback gets blamed for interceptions, granted. Because on the stat sheet it says three interceptions.
It doesn't say a tipped pass that got intercepted. It doesn't say a blitzer that hit his arm when he should have been protected interception. It just says interception.
So I think decision-making has improved. I think he's still got to trust his speed a little bit. When things break down, just run. Don't try to go back and forth and spin and cut back and all that stuff. Just go. Go forward when things break down. And he's learning that. But in the drop-back pass game his decision-making is certainly improving.
Q. What is it about playing in Manhattan? Texas has a miserable record there. Were you there when Ricky and Major were there and the Longhorns got beat badly --
COACH HERMAN: I was not. I was '99 and 2000.
Q. Have you ever experienced anything like that in your playing or coaching career, where some places were really difficult to win? And why so is Manhattan difficult to win?
COACH HERMAN: It's usually the places that have really good teams that are -- and really good coaches that are hard to win. So obviously Bill Snyder is a Hall of Famer. His name is on the dang stadium.
So he took over a program that was literally the worst in college football and turned it into a conference, national championship contender. He's got great new facilities. He's recruiting well.
So he's got good players, great coaches. He's got continuity. I think all of that, I think it's difficult to get there in terms of just location. I think sometimes that plays a factor in just your travel and the wear and tear on you from a travel aspect.
And the fans are great. It doesn't matter what their record is, they're going to show up and they're going to be loud and they're going to try to make an impact on the game much like our fans have the last two weeks. So you put all that together -- well-coached team that plays hard, that plays smart and they've got a raucous fan base that shows up regardless of weather, regardless of record, regardless of any of that -- and that makes for a difficult place to play.
Q. You want these players to embrace winning, obviously. So you're walking a fine line because you want them to keep the memory of TCU and USC, at the same time being hungry for what's coming up next.
COACH HERMAN: I think there's a fine line between -- I don't think the memory of TCU -- I think the memory of what it felt like to win, regardless of opponent, is certainly one that we want to keep engrained and we want to feel that again but we've also got to know that it doesn't just happen on Saturday, like I said.
You want that feeling again? Great. You're very capable of getting it. But you've got to go do the things you did Sunday through Friday, last week. In order to make that a reality on Saturday you've got to do the exact same thing, and maybe to even a higher degree because we're playing on the road.
So I think our guys get that. They understand that. Again, very long, hard conversation yesterday in our team meeting about whose opinions should matter. And quite frankly, when it comes to football, it's my teammates and my coaches. And that's it. That's it.
And right now my teammates and my coaches have confidence in me but they're also going to push me to train because they rely on me -- and I'm speaking as if I'm a player -- they rely on me to do my job so they can have that kind of success.
Q. Turnovers, I think you're on the plus side of turnover margin now. You guys don't have a turnover chain or any kind of prop. I know you have the belly rub. Chris Nelson --
COACH HERMAN: I don't know where that came from, but, yeah.
Q. No gadgets?
COACH HERMAN: No, one of our four items on our plan to win, two of them you could attribute to that. The very first one is play great defense, and the second one is win the turnover margin. I saw a stat in the two years that we've been here: Every time we've gotten a turnover it's basically averaged 4.1 points. And every time we've given the ball up we've given the other team 1.2 points or something like that.
So we certainly make our defense aware of how powerful getting the ball is. And basically if you're into averages, which can -- what's the saying, 82 percent of statistics are made up on the spot, right -- but if you go on average, your defense starts to take pride in the fact that, hey, we get the ball, that's four points.
And when you look at the final tally against TCU, we won the turnover battle, 4-0. That's what the margin of victory was. It was 15, not 16. So I mean there's a direct correlation there. And so I don't think you need that kind of stuff. Is it fun? Yeah, anytime you can have fun with your kids is great.
But I think our guys are fully aware and locked into how powerful taking the ball away on defense is and winning the turnover battle as a team is on winning the game.
Q. Offensive line play obviously has improved a lot over the last couple of weeks. Can you attribute Calvin Anderson, I know he came in and it took a while. But I mean his calming influence, being a senior, being a graduate player? And how is Zach coming back into that mix, I know it gives you good depth, but is that going to change the dynamics any about what's going on with that group?
COACH HERMAN: I don't think so. Zach, Elijah Rodriguez is a captain for good reason. Patrick Vahe's played a lot of football here. Calvin Anderson has played a lot of football, period.
But there's no doubt who the leader of that group is and it's Zach Shackelford. And so getting him back is always a good thing. But I do think to the first part of your question with Calvin Anderson, I do think especially with him and Patrick on the same side, man, that's a lot of football that's been played on that left side.
Now, we've got to play better. We've got to coach them better. I think those two guys, and they would tell you, did not have their best games. Played well enough to win, obviously.
But really good defense we were playing against, too. Really good defense. A defense that held I think Ohio State to whatever, 24 offensive points.
So we understand what they were playing against, too. But I do think Calvin has a bit of a calming presence on that unit, because there is so much experience there.
Q. I was wondering if you could give us your opinion on your running backs and how they're performing in the passing game. And are you guys getting enough production out of the running backs in the passing game?
COACH HERMAN: Yeah, I think when the game plan calls for it, certainly. I think there's no doubt that Tre and Keaontay are probably in another tier in terms of ability in that room to affect the passing game out in terms of running routes and ball skills and all of that. Yeah, we're where we need to be.
Q. You said beginning of last season that you guys wanted to win with great defense when you got here. Obviously with the progress they showed last year and the way they're playing now, how gratifying is it to see the way that unit is playing and helping y'all out?
COACH HERMAN: There's a lot of pride. And you guys probably get sick of me saying it. But since the inception of the BCS and now into the College Football Playoff, there's been one national champion that's finished with a total defense outside the Top 25 and that was Auburn. I think they finished 32nd that year. My math might be a little bit off. But they also had a quarterback named Cameron Newton that was a pretty good player.
We understand that to play at a championship level you're going to have to play great defense. And right now through the last three games, I think save for a couple of drives here and there, we've done a really good job certainly in the second half for the last two weeks. And it's something we take a lot of pride in.
Q. With Collin Johnson the way he's been playing and obviously the game on Saturday, do you think he's finally coming into form the player you think he can be?
COACH HERMAN: He's had a good couple of weeks, no doubt about that. But I think we all new -- again, the difficult thing with Collin is his skill set is. He's one of the best one-on-one, 50/50-ball guys I've ever been around, I would certainly imagine probably in the country right now.
But I don't get to call the defenses either. And so if they want to devote two people to covering him, then that makes getting the ball to him a little bit more difficult.
But quarterback has done a nice job of recognizing when we get one-on-one coverage and getting the ball to him. And he's done a nice job of making sure that when his number does get called he's making those plays.
Q. The leadership thing is sometimes, it's hard to quantify when you're on a roll like this, you're going on the road. Kids get coached up by the coaches, but also the importance of being coached up by the leaders and who are those guys that you as a staff rely on to maybe be that other voice?
COACH HERMAN: Oh, wow. I hope I don't forget anybody but I'm going to try to tell you the members of our leadership council. Right now it's Chris Nelson. Breckyn Hager, Charles Omenihu, Anthony Wheeler, Gary Johnson, Chris Boyd, P.J. Locke, Brandon Jones, Andrews Beck, Elijah Rodriguez, Zach Shackelford, Patrick Vahe, Shane Buechele and Sam Ehlinger, Collin Johnson and Jerrod Heard. I hope I didn't forget anybody.
But those are the guys that we're going to lean on because I meet with them on a regular basis and we talk about what's necessary. We talk about in our 20 years, my 20 years of coaching experience, the hundreds of years combined that we have as a staff, you know, what are the potential pitfalls, and -- as we approach this part of the season things of that nature.
So those are the guys we really lean on in terms of having a voice in the locker room and conveying our message, but also conveying any messages that the players, the players in the locker room know that they can go to them with anything and it will get back to us, too.
Q. I know these guys have had their struggles over the years. There's some prosperity now. How does that change? I know you can coach them harder when they're winning and how does that help move things along?
COACH HERMAN: We're talking three games.
Q. It's a lot for us. Three games.
COACH HERMAN: I know.
Q. We are talking three games. It's a big deal.
COACH HERMAN: We talk a lot about pats on the back in our program happen usually five times in your career, after the five bowl victories and when you walk across the stage and graduate.
Other than that, we're going to push you. And we're going to push you really hard. Win or lose. And do we know now that the formula works? Are we confident in the formula? Are we confident in the plan? Yeah.
And that's a really good thing, because I think there's some validity and some testimony now that the plan does not just get us close, right, but the plan can actually put us over the hump. And we're going to continue to coach them the way we have been.
Q. It's not easy to play safety in this league. Caden Sterns playing great, seems to always be around the ball. Have you ever been around a freshman that's had that kind of impact on the back end?
COACH HERMAN: Not that way. No way. And you could see in the spring, the minute we put pads on that this kid was always around the ball. And there's one thing to be around the ball. It's another thing to make plays on the ball and actually come away with it and PBUs and all that stuff.
So the great thing about him is he's always around the ball, run or pass. And he will come downhill in the run game and he will hit you. And I'm glad he's on our team.
Q. You talked about moving on. How hard or easy is it for you to keep your guys playing at the level that they've played at, because they do seem like a different team the past two games?
COACH HERMAN: Well, I sure hope it's not hard. It wasn't hard last week. Again, because I think there's a genuine belief in the way that we do things. And a genuine now that we've had the added testimony to that with a couple double-digit wins here in the last couple of games against nationally ranked teams, I think -- how could you walk into this building and not want to do it that way again and again?
It seems counterintuitive to a degree now that you've seen and felt the rewards of doing it our way. And so I don't anticipate it being very difficult to motivate them moving forward.
Q. How would you describe the identity of your offense at this point? And how close was Saturday's game to being it? And what do you remember most about Caden's recruitment?
COACH HERMAN: I think the identity -- yeah, you know, to have that kind of balance, to have that kind of conversion success on some deep shots, to have the second half success on third down that we had certainly don't want to start 0-for-8 on third down and was disappointed in, I think, in especially two third-and-ones we didn't get in the first half. That was disappointing. But from a philosophical standpoint, I think that's about right.
And I think the key is -- and again balance is being able to win the game the way that the defense dictates to you, because when the ball is snapped, they have the chalk last, so to speak. Right? So if they're saying we are going to crowd the box and not let you run and you're going to have to throw it to beat us, can we? And if it's, hey, we're going to play soft because you've got some really good wideouts and can we move people around in a favorable box count in the run game?
And if you can win the game either way, to me that's balance. It has nothing to do with attempts or this, that or the other. It's about being able to win the way the defense dictates.
And what do I remember about Caden? Probably his maturity level is the one that sticks out. His mother, Brandi, phenomenal woman. I think -- and Caden would be the first to admit that having an older brother that played Division I football was probably a big help to him in terms of his maturity level and how he approached the game. But he was a really, really mature guy that his mom -- I mean all the moms in that class fell in love with.
Again, it's something we're really proud of around here is that as highly regarded as that signing class was for their play on the field, all of those guys are our kind of guys in terms of character, in terms of the way they were raised, in terms of their family structure.
And they're all different. Don't get me wrong. But they definitely fit our way of doing things because normally the apple doesn't fall far from the tree on those things.
Q. Breckyn Hager isn't making the statistical impact that maybe a lot of people thought he would. When you watch film on him is he making the impact you hope he is on defense?
COACH HERMAN: Yes. Yeah, he's doing good. He's getting close to the quarterback. He hasn't had a lot of numbers show up just yet. But I think they're coming.
Q. And then on that fourth-and-one play, is that -- are you okay with the call, with everything that you did, or is that a moment where you say as an offensive mind I need to be patient in a game that's been pretty defensive to this point?
COACH HERMAN: No, we're going to -- when the defensive coordinator is on the headset going go for it, that's -- that's always a good sign. And so no, fourth and one, yeah, around midfield, I think is where we were, we better be able to in the future be able to get fourth and one.
Hats off to TCU. That's as good as a defense we've played thus far this year. And we knew that going in. But we've got to be able to make those plays.
Q. Let's talk about Gary Johnson a little bit. Do you feel like after the first game with the targeting situation, do you feel like he's tore it up like he really had to make up for what happened in that game? He's all the player we expected him to be at this time of year, isn't he?
COACH HERMAN: Yeah, I don't think it has anything to do with what happened in the first game. That's just who he is, man. Again, I'm glad he's on our team, because he can run and hit and he's like the Energizer Bunny, keeps going and going.
He's had a real good stretch here and hopefully it continues this week.
Q. After you lost, your recommendation was to read some John Steinbeck. You've won three games in a row. What's on your reading list for your guys?
COACH HERMAN: Apparently I screwed that up, too, right? (Laughter) the message -- the message was received. I guess I wasn't -- I didn't have all my facts exactly right. But certainly not Twitter or Instagram, that's definitely not on our suggested reading list right now.
But I think nothing -- I didn't suggest reading "Of Mice and Men" I was trying to tell a story to Gary. Certainly I don't think a 22-year-old guy is going to pick up "Of Mice and Men" unless it's for a class assignment.
No, I think we're in a good place. I don't think we need a whole lot of that other than continuing to go out and stick to the formula in terms of the way that we prepare.
Q. I was going to ask about Hager, but I'll end on an interesting note.
COACH HERMAN: Here we go.
Q. My man Coach Lovo, he's quite passionate out there. He was almost to the hash marks, I think, one time. What is his role on game day?
COACH HERMAN: Oh man.
Q. And I use Coach affectionately knowing Fernando.
COACH HERMAN: He is my liaison to the officials. (Laughter) passionate liaison to the officials. And I think -- I'm not quite sure -- is he like supposed to hold me back from the officials or am I holding him back from the officials. So, that's kind of his role. During a TV timeout I'll say get me the white hat I want to talk to the referee, whatever it is. But he loves football. I said Fern -- because Matt Smidebush is in our operations department, he's like a Mini Fern. But those guys, they like winning. And they like success and they take a lot of pride in what they do because they know that their jobs directly impact winning and losing, just like coaching does, just like athletic trainers do, just like academics does and just like strength and conditioning, nutrition, every hand that touches our program has a direct impact on whether we win. And they have a lot of investment in that.
