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00:00 - [Moderator] Questions for Coach Leslie, John?
00:02 - I got to start it.
00:04 We're back on the good side now.
00:05 You played that, you had that strict there.
00:08 I think there was what, four possessions,
00:09 they had like 18 yards.
00:11 So you're back on the good side.
00:14 - Oh yeah.
00:15 Yeah, I mean, wasn't a whole lot of flash plays, honestly.
00:20 But I think it's one of the better
00:24 total football games that we've played.
00:28 And I know there toward the end,
00:30 we rotated some guys in,
00:32 and it probably doesn't look like that from the outside.
00:34 But watching the video with the first half,
00:37 and there in the third quarter,
00:42 I thought it was one of the more complete.
00:45 Good fundamentals, good run fits,
00:47 playing with good leverage, pad and hand leverage.
00:52 Their scheme, I said this last week,
00:56 we're really familiar with it
00:58 going back with Coach Satterfield's days at App State.
01:01 And it's hard, man.
01:02 There's a lot of ways they can get leverage on you,
01:06 and get your leverage going one way,
01:08 and bend their plays back the other way with misdirection.
01:12 I thought our guys handled it really well.
01:15 I think we held them well below their average of rushing.
01:18 And I don't know if I said this to you guys last week,
01:22 but I said this to our players going into the game,
01:25 is really, their statistics were really misleading
01:29 in a lot of ways.
01:30 Thought they were really, really,
01:33 they were better than their record.
01:35 But their offensive statistics were really good
01:38 in a lot of areas that really didn't match up
01:40 with being three and seven.
01:43 So I thought our guys did a really good job
01:45 against their strength.
01:46 - Four straight 200 yard rushing games coming in,
01:49 and you held them considerably below that.
01:51 - I think 140, I think is what it was.
01:53 - Whatever it was, yeah.
01:54 - Were you surprised that they came out
01:57 with the other quarterback,
01:58 and then they kept kind of going between them?
02:00 Did that catch you off guard a little bit?
02:02 - No, they had been doing that since probably
02:05 three games ago.
02:07 Had been rotating guys in.
02:10 For what reason, don't know.
02:12 You know, that's a them question.
02:18 But we were expecting that.
02:21 I would have not known that 16 was gonna start.
02:24 But we were familiar with his game,
02:27 we studied his game for the majority of the week,
02:30 just 'cause we knew we were gonna see
02:31 probably a second series,
02:33 or I figured they would go every other series with him.
02:37 Probably would have seen him more,
02:39 but I think he dinged his ankle on the Q draw
02:41 in the red zone there, and they pulled him out.
02:44 So probably would have seen a lot more of him.
02:46 - One more here, flip around to this week.
02:49 Heat could be an issue.
02:50 You go into it thinking, I've gotta play more guys
02:53 with a potentially of heat down there?
02:55 - You know, I mean, this time of year, maybe.
02:59 It's a little warmer, seasonally warmer than it is,
03:02 but it ain't gonna be no hotter than UCF.
03:04 - It's nine o'clock at night too, so that's--
03:07 - Yeah, it's not, I don't think it's much of an issue.
03:09 - I was wondering if you could tell us
03:13 about Day Day a little bit.
03:15 'Cause we've never met him, but in every video,
03:17 it seems like he's having the time of his life.
03:20 - No, yeah.
03:21 - You know, dancing or, I mean, just,
03:22 other than a football player, what's he like?
03:26 - I mean, what he brings is a ton of energy.
03:29 And, you know, Day Day, he's a big personality,
03:33 and I think that's important.
03:34 I think it's important to have, especially defensively.
03:38 I mean, the guy, his energy hardly ever changes,
03:42 and he's always, he's just as excited to practice
03:46 as he is to play.
03:48 And, man, that brings a lot to the table.
03:50 Brings a lot to the sideline.
03:52 And particularly when things are going good,
03:56 when things are going bad.
03:58 And Day Day's that type of guy.
04:02 You know, like I said, big personality,
04:05 and that never changes.
04:07 You know, he's constant, whether it's pregame
04:10 or the walkthrough we just got out of.
04:13 He's the same guy all the time,
04:15 and he's a high energy, high juice guy.
04:18 Brings a lot, you know, picks us up.
04:21 But a lot of fun to be around.
04:22 I love having players like that around.
04:24 - What study did you do?
04:27 Obviously, from afar, it looks like Ben Cutter
04:30 is growing before our eyes.
04:32 Is that what you're seeing when you evaluate him?
04:34 - Yeah, I mean, he, and, you know, I think for him,
04:38 is, you know, obviously you feel what,
04:42 you feel you know what you're getting
04:44 through the evaluation process in recruiting.
04:47 Which is a guy that plays hard,
04:49 is extremely physical, has a motor that runs hot,
04:53 and runs all the time.
04:55 You know, and I think a lot of that,
04:57 you know, but you still know there's a lot
05:01 you're gonna have to teach,
05:02 whether it's the leverage, the hand placement,
05:05 your footwork, you know, your keys,
05:08 and how that's so much different from where he was
05:11 while he was playing 12 months ago.
05:13 And that's really, really hard on a true freshman.
05:14 And any criticism of Ben throughout this process
05:18 is 100% not fair.
05:20 That's a lot on a freshman.
05:22 And that's a true freshman out there,
05:24 at your start, Mike Leinbacher,
05:26 which is a position that, in my opinion,
05:29 is just vital to the success of a defense.
05:32 And he's been handed that role.
05:35 He earned that, I say been handed,
05:37 he earned that role through practice and preparation.
05:40 It was probably thrown on him before he was ready,
05:42 but the growth over the last, you know, four to five weeks
05:45 has been tremendous to watch.
05:48 Ben Cutter's gonna play a lot of ball here,
05:50 and he's gonna have a really good career here.
05:53 And, you know, he's a guy that, you know,
05:56 he's fun to coach.
05:58 He's more critical of himself than Jeff and I,
06:02 or Neil is, and that's important.
06:06 But it's, he's, you know, it has,
06:10 it's been fun to watch him grow.
06:12 And he played, you know,
06:14 I think the best part of his game the other day
06:15 was how he fit the run,
06:16 and it's not gonna show up on a stat sheet,
06:18 but where he fit, how he fit, you know,
06:22 he really saved us on, there was one play
06:25 they really had us on, we adjusted at halftime.
06:28 A little wind back, what we call an insert play,
06:33 where the fullback comes back.
06:37 We did not play it right off the motion.
06:39 And he defeated the block and made the tackle.
06:42 If he stays on that block,
06:43 which he probably would have three or four weeks ago,
06:45 that play goes for a ways.
06:48 So, yeah, his growth is definitely something
06:51 that's exciting.
06:53 You talked with Neil about the ball operating stat,
06:56 and you guys leading the country,
06:57 but then also how that could mean
06:58 you're missing interceptions and missing turnovers.
07:00 And he did bring up that being one point of the defense
07:03 that could have been improved against Cincinnati.
07:06 What are you noticing about maybe why those takeaways
07:10 and interceptions and things like that
07:11 are not happening as much the last couple weeks
07:13 as comparison to where they were?
07:16 He mentioned, you know, leaving your feet,
07:17 things like that.
07:19 Yeah, I mean, there's a ton of things that go into--
07:23 Yeah, I mean, it's,
07:26 the simplest one is catch the ball, you know,
07:30 catch the ball.
07:31 But there's, you know, there's a couple of plays in there
07:34 where, you know, we're in a zone defense
07:38 and guys are, I think there's two where they break
07:42 essentially on the route instead of the ball.
07:44 So they end up at the point of contact,
07:46 they make the play, it's incomplete,
07:48 and it's a good play, but it could have been a great play.
07:51 So there's tons of things that go into that,
07:55 and just like anything else, if you do jump,
07:59 it's when you time your jump, did you need to jump?
08:03 There's all kinds of things that go into that.
08:04 All you can do is continue to practice it,
08:06 and we go through ball drills,
08:08 and every day, every day of practice.
08:11 But there's, you know, if there's a specific one
08:16 you ask about, I could probably give you a better answer,
08:19 but there's a couple in there that I think were
08:22 breaks that were on the route instead of the ball,
08:27 is the easiest answer to give you.
08:31 - And his ability to fit the run against Cincinnati,
08:33 you always credited Jarrett Bartlett
08:35 and saying he did a good job of that.
08:37 Just give us your impressions of what you saw
08:39 against him in Cincinnati,
08:40 and is that kind of hope doing your 111 for part two?
08:42 - Yeah, I think it's the same thing with Ben
08:46 that I talked about, just really in a different,
08:49 a little bit different light being up on the ball
08:53 most of the time and on the edge,
08:55 especially against an outside zone stretch team
08:59 that's gonna try to push you and then cut.
09:01 And Jarrett did probably play the best football game,
09:06 honestly, since he's been here.
09:08 And I know everybody always goes back to, you know,
09:11 having a three sack game at Virginia Tech
09:13 a couple years ago and those things,
09:14 and there's nothing to take away from those games.
09:17 But when you talk about a complete football game
09:20 as an edge defender, there's just doing your job.
09:23 You know, I take the first stretch of the game
09:29 that goes for about four yards,
09:32 and he does a really, really,
09:34 he essentially plays two gaps,
09:36 he forces the ball back and he overlaps the play,
09:39 makes a tackle for a gain of four.
09:40 And that's not something, again,
09:41 I said this at the beginning,
09:42 that's not something that's gonna be flashy
09:44 or people are gonna look at it and say,
09:45 "Oh, that was a great play."
09:46 But if he doesn't do that, again,
09:48 that play hits us for a big run.
09:52 And he does it about six or seven other times
09:56 throughout the day that are just routine plays.
10:00 And one of our messages has always been to our guys is,
10:05 you know, everybody always wants to make
10:08 the three or four plays that are gonna flash
10:10 or they're gonna be on highlights
10:11 or they're gonna be at the end of the night on ESPN
10:14 that people are gonna talk about.
10:16 But if you take an 80-play game,
10:17 there's 75 other routine plays,
10:20 those are the ones that win you the game
10:22 that nobody talks about.
10:24 And Jared had a ton of those,
10:26 more than he's had all year,
10:27 that he's just simply doing his job
10:29 and the fundamental that he's taught to do it
10:32 and executing that even when things are moving fast.
10:35 And I thought it was the best football game he's played.
10:38 - Number one, the sharing with Baylor.
10:40 - You know, I mean, they do a really, really nice job.
10:44 It's very similar schematically to what we just saw,
10:47 but they give you more moving pieces pre-snap to that.
10:53 A lot of shifts, a lot of motions,
10:55 changing the formation,
10:57 changing the strength of the formation,
11:00 moving the back,
11:03 just doing the same,
11:05 running their offense,
11:06 just presenting it a lot of different ways,
11:08 which can get your eyes in some bad places.
11:12 And then I think the tight ends,
11:14 you know, their tight ends are,
11:16 yeah, they're threats.
11:19 They were, you know,
11:21 89, I think, is the one kid last year
11:24 that really gives us some issues.
11:25 He's a big athlete,
11:26 can line up anywhere across the field
11:29 and hurt you.
11:33 Can line up in the slot,
11:33 can line up on the ball,
11:34 can line up even at the one receiver.
11:36 And I think the quarterback's really good.
11:39 I think Chapin is a really good player.
11:41 - I haven't studied the stats closely.
11:43 Are they doing a high number of fourth downs
11:46 and adorn them in strange places?
11:49 - Yeah, I mean, if it's across the
11:51 minus, which is,
11:55 you know, their end of the field,
11:59 if it's across by the minus 35 or 40,
12:01 you're playing however you want to look at it.
12:04 Two second downs, two first downs,
12:06 you're going to play more than likely four downs
12:08 if the distance is manageable.
12:10 So, and I think that's been their tendency for
12:13 since the head coach,
12:17 since Coach Rand has been there.
12:18 - Sometimes minus 20.
12:20 - Oh yeah.
12:21 - Yeah.
12:22 - Yeah, I don't, we're always,
12:23 you're playing these guys,
12:24 even going back to last year,
12:25 we prepared our kids for it all over the field.
12:28 - So you got to win first and second down
12:30 to try to get that to third or fourth and long.
12:32 - Oh yeah.
12:33 - That's the deal with it.
12:34 - Yeah, yeah.
12:35 Yeah, if you, and like I said, I mean,
12:37 it's however you view it,
12:40 whether you're playing,
12:41 you want to approach it like you're playing
12:43 two first downs and, you know,
12:45 one's a run tendency or one's a pass tendency,
12:48 just, and I'm just using that as an example,
12:50 not that that's theirs,
12:50 but or you're playing two second downs
12:53 where you get a good first down
12:55 and that next down, no matter what,
12:57 usually the distance, if it's short,
12:59 you say, all right guys, this is a waste down.
13:00 They can take a shot here.
13:02 Theirs doesn't matter.
13:04 It could be second 12.
13:05 That's essentially a waste down.
13:06 So you're going to play another second down next
13:08 and your third down is a fourth down,
13:10 just however you want to view it, you know.
13:12 - And I think you throw any other variable in here
13:14 is that this is their last game.
13:17 So that could open up a whole bunch of things.
13:19 - Yeah, I mean, it's, you know,
13:22 teams and like this and those situations
13:25 are extremely dangerous, you know,
13:27 and, you know, we just have to go and execute
13:30 and do the things that we've done.
13:33 We've played our best, but it is, you know,
13:36 it's always, you know, one of those, you know,
13:38 why wouldn't they kind of, correct?
13:41 So you got to prepare for that going in.
13:46 - I think James played once, not maybe something like that.
13:49 - Of course Simmons played.
13:51 - I was going to say, I just thought about that to you.
13:52 Cause I saw him out there on the line.
13:53 I figured that was the fix.
13:55 Just get him in.
13:55 - Yeah.
13:56 - Okay.
13:57 It's a good timing for Jared to have that game though.
14:00 - Yeah, yeah it was.
14:01 - Anything else?
14:07 (indistinct)
14:10 - Is it like that all with shaping?
14:15 Cause you watch him play and you look at his numbers
14:17 and they're really good, but then it's like,
14:19 why do they only have three wins?
14:21 - I mean, there's a ton, tons of factors that,
14:24 that there's more than statistics
14:26 that go into winning a football game.
14:29 You know, there, it's just, you know,
14:32 it's the only way I really know how to put it,
14:35 you know, whether it's special teams plays,
14:37 whether it's, you know, how the defense,
14:41 it's just all kinds of situational things that go into,
14:44 you know, I just look at preparing for an offense.
14:47 You know, you look at the statistics
14:51 to determine where they're good.
14:52 And those are the things you really have to focus on.
14:56 Stop in Cincinnati, for example,
14:57 they're good at running the football.
14:59 You know, go back to UCF.
15:01 You know, I think UCF at the time we played them
15:03 was somewhere around between 240 and 260 a game rushing.
15:08 And we hold them to 180,
15:10 which is not necessarily a good number,
15:13 but it's well below their average, you know?
15:15 So like, I'm happy at the end of that
15:18 because of what we were able to do that day.
15:20 Now the overall stat doesn't look good.
15:22 You know, everybody's going to say,
15:23 "Why couldn't you stop the run?"
15:24 Well, okay, if they give up 260,
15:27 that they give up their average,
15:28 they probably would have won the game,
15:29 held them to below their average, win the game.
15:32 That's all, the only stat that matters
15:33 is the win and loss at the end.
15:35 So there's, there's all kinds of things that go into that.
15:37 You know, I can't, I'm not deep enough into,
15:40 into Baylor yet to know whether it's a,
15:41 what the issue is,
15:43 but you just go off the, the stats and the players,
15:49 you know, the tight ends are extremely dangerous.
15:50 Running back, even going back to last year,
15:52 the Reese kid, this kid is, has dangerous speed.
15:56 And then I think the quarterback is,
15:58 is probably one of the most underrated in our league.
16:00 You know, this is the same kid
16:05 that when Baylor won the Big 12,
16:07 come in and in the Sugar Bowl and won the game.
16:09 You know, same, same guy,
16:12 you know, this, this guy doesn't really change.
16:15 And so, you know, you know where they're good
16:18 and you prepare, that's what you have to stop.
16:20 - Do you have sympathy for opposing defensive coordinators
16:25 who see, who see Garrett Green put the ball
16:29 in the White's belly and don't know
16:30 where it's going to wind up?
16:32 - No.
16:32 No, no, no.
16:35 No, no.
16:36 Yeah, that's right.
16:39 That's right.
16:40 No, no, I don't.
16:42 Nobody has sympathy for me,
16:44 zero blitz in Oklahoma and watching him
16:47 not get there either, so.
16:48 Absolutely not.
16:51 (laughing)