Opening Statement
Effort does not show up in the win loss column, but what happened out there on the field, that's the team I want to coach. That's the way I want us to play. Proud of our guys. Every coach says it but these guys played so hard and made so many plays. Really excited about that. Washington State made a few more plays than we did. Crunch time situation, hey, give it to Minshew. That's an unbelievable throw down the middle. Probably about six inches off one way or the other, it's incomplete. Made a great play.
Give their coaches a lot of credit. They stopped us a couple times when we needed first downs. So they deserve the credit for that. Both sides, both teams, just played so well. That was a great college football game. We just ended up on the wrong side of it.
Q. You have said that you would stick to your game plan, your philosophy, but you would occasionally tweak it depending on the opposition. In this game, you threw 43 passes. There were several others that you got interference calls against Washington State. This seems to be more of a tweak. Why did you go to the paying in this game?
You can ask our players about the post game locker room when we played up in Washington State last year. It was a very difficult game for me to take, and I took it really hard. This game plan, honestly, started that night.
So this was the way we wanted to play against these guys. We thought this gave us the best chance to win. We came out and played extremely well in the first half. Took a multi-score lead. Didn't get enough stops, and the second half on the defensive side, still played really hard. They made some great pays.
Offensively, we got some third and shorts and third and mediums that we didn't convert that we have to convert. Otherwise, this is a different game. We had an opportunity to really put ourselves ahead of a very good football team and we didn't take advantage. But bottom line, yes, this was a tweak but this was the way -- I tell you that night in Poehlmann last year, this is when I knew how we were going to play against these guys.
Q. You mentioned the great pass that Minshew threw to set up the field goal. How did you think he played against your defense and how do you think your defense played against him?
Well, it's hard to say he played well when a guy is 40 or 50 for 438 yards. For the most part we played well.
We have to get pressure. We just have to get pressure. We did not get enough pressure, and the two times we got pressure, we got him on the ground a couple times, but you know, he flipped the ball out a couple times. Dangerous place. But he didn't have to pay for it because we didn't intercept him. And he was out of the pocket, so he didn't get intentional grounding penalties.
So those plays ended up working. We him a couple times and he got rid of the ball.
Q. What about K.J. Costello's performance in this game? Very accurate and made some plays with his feet, as well.
The ceiling for K.J. Costello, I'll say it again is very, very high. I don't think he's there yet but tonight was a great performance. Rumors that he was banged up; rumors that he wasn't going to play. I don't know where that comes from, but he's at that point midseason where he's banged up, like a lot of players, and he went out there and played extremely well. Made some big-time throws.
You know, learned a couple lessons. You know, it's hard. You can't check the ball down on fourth and two, unless the checkdown is beyond the first down marker. That was a tough play.
Besides that, he stepped up in the pocket and made some great throws. Made some great scrambles. You know, did what you hate for a quarterback to do, but cut back in instead of going down and sliding, but he's trying to get the first down. This is the kind of quarterback that you want to follow. It's the kind of quarterback that you love to have out there representing your team.
Q. How did the pace help this offense get on track early and do you see that as one of the bigger differences from previous games in terms of getting on track early?
Yeah, we've been good all year in the two-minute drill. So to utilize that in the first quarter and second quarter, I think really helped us.
Take into account, also, that you know, most of our backs are banged up. Nate Herbig couldn't play today, so there are a lot of things that we could have done outside of the no-huddle that were just unwise to do. We tried to use Bryce in spots. Tried to use our running back in spots to try to run the ball in spots.
But with the way that we were banged up, this is the smart way to play.
Q. The fourth down throw to Bryce, was that K.J.'s first read on that play?
No.
Q. They outscored you 17-7 in the fourth quarter. In a game like, this do you think Washington State has a little -- at least a little bit of an advantage over you in terms of a team that's used to passing all the time?
No, I don't think so. I think they are very good, and I would say earlier in the year against Utah, the first three quarters against Oregon. Against Notre Dame, we gave a lot to the opposing team. We gave a lot to those guys, whether it's turnovers, whether it was blowing coverages, whether it was a ton of missed tackles. There were still some missed tackles today.
This game, they earned it. They flat-out earned it. We had guys in coverage. We had guys there. Quarterback made the throws. Guys made the catch. Guys made some guys miss. It wasn't just guys diving on the grounds. They have some guys that have some wiggle to them, so made some guys miss. Made some big plays. We had the lead and we just couldn't extend it and we couldn't keep it.
Q. You talked about wanting to play four quarters of your best Stanford football. What changed from the first half to the second half?
I think they made plays. I thought we still played well. Bottom line for me is we got to a fourth and short, and a couple of third and shorts that we didn't convert. Their guys made the plays instead of ours. We got to a couple of third downs, short third downs, when they had the ball and we were on defense and they got those first downs.
To me, that was the big difference in the second half. We got a few more third down conversions; we get ourselves in position to score more points, especially one of them being plus-50 on our side of the field. Get that first down, now we're getting points.
Q. For a guy who wasn't a go until game time, Bryce Love looked great in a couple of situations there. How close is he to 100 percent now?
Not very. Not very. He's just a tough kid. He's just a tough kid, and we weren't sure this morning who was going to play. Went through the pregame warmup, and was able to demonstrate that he could plant and explode and run. Not up to full speed but I'd love for somebody to find me a tougher guy in America. This kid just grinds through it and he pushes through it. He knows this is not a long-term, career-threatening deal.
So if he can't go, he won't go. But if he can go, he wants to go. That's just the kind of person he is.
Q. You mentioned the pass rush. It was really difficult to get to Gardner with four guys. What about this offense makes it difficult to bring more than four guys?
They spread you out sideline-to-sideline. If you bring more than four, they are going to find a hole. They are going to find a spot. You try to play a bunch of man-to-man, but they have a bunch of guys that can run.
So part of it is matchups. They have the players that fit their scheme. Part of it is just the pure width of the field that they utilize.
We tried to do a little bit of that, also, ourselves. Spread them out and use our matchups. We did pressure them. We did send some blitzers. Probably not a high percentage but enough to try to get some one-on-one pass rush opportunities. We got to the quarterback a couple times, and it wasn't enough.
Q. Given what much of the conversation has been this season about the offense trying to get better, what's your first reaction to how the offense did, and overall, whether you consider it progress or not?
I think we made progress. I think we played really hard. I think we played a lot of plays. I think we had a lot of guys make a lot of plays: Cameron Scarlett coming in there making some big runs at the end of the game. A couple of really nice kickoff returns.
Trevor Speights had some great runs and great pass protection pick ups. Quarterbacks and receivers, tight ends making plays. Got great protection. I think they were on our quarterback just a few times. Other than that, you know, he was pretty good in the pocket. Could push up in the pocket and make some big-time throws.
I thought the two-minute drive, you know, in the fourth quarter to tie the game was outstanding. It was outstanding. We needed a stop to take the game to over time and it's anybody's ballgame but we couldn't get the stop. They made a couple of huge plays that put the game in their favor.
Effort does not show up in the win loss column, but what happened out there on the field, that's the team I want to coach. That's the way I want us to play. Proud of our guys. Every coach says it but these guys played so hard and made so many plays. Really excited about that. Washington State made a few more plays than we did. Crunch time situation, hey, give it to Minshew. That's an unbelievable throw down the middle. Probably about six inches off one way or the other, it's incomplete. Made a great play.
Give their coaches a lot of credit. They stopped us a couple times when we needed first downs. So they deserve the credit for that. Both sides, both teams, just played so well. That was a great college football game. We just ended up on the wrong side of it.
Q. You have said that you would stick to your game plan, your philosophy, but you would occasionally tweak it depending on the opposition. In this game, you threw 43 passes. There were several others that you got interference calls against Washington State. This seems to be more of a tweak. Why did you go to the paying in this game?
You can ask our players about the post game locker room when we played up in Washington State last year. It was a very difficult game for me to take, and I took it really hard. This game plan, honestly, started that night.
So this was the way we wanted to play against these guys. We thought this gave us the best chance to win. We came out and played extremely well in the first half. Took a multi-score lead. Didn't get enough stops, and the second half on the defensive side, still played really hard. They made some great pays.
Offensively, we got some third and shorts and third and mediums that we didn't convert that we have to convert. Otherwise, this is a different game. We had an opportunity to really put ourselves ahead of a very good football team and we didn't take advantage. But bottom line, yes, this was a tweak but this was the way -- I tell you that night in Poehlmann last year, this is when I knew how we were going to play against these guys.
Q. You mentioned the great pass that Minshew threw to set up the field goal. How did you think he played against your defense and how do you think your defense played against him?
Well, it's hard to say he played well when a guy is 40 or 50 for 438 yards. For the most part we played well.
We have to get pressure. We just have to get pressure. We did not get enough pressure, and the two times we got pressure, we got him on the ground a couple times, but you know, he flipped the ball out a couple times. Dangerous place. But he didn't have to pay for it because we didn't intercept him. And he was out of the pocket, so he didn't get intentional grounding penalties.
So those plays ended up working. We him a couple times and he got rid of the ball.
Q. What about K.J. Costello's performance in this game? Very accurate and made some plays with his feet, as well.
The ceiling for K.J. Costello, I'll say it again is very, very high. I don't think he's there yet but tonight was a great performance. Rumors that he was banged up; rumors that he wasn't going to play. I don't know where that comes from, but he's at that point midseason where he's banged up, like a lot of players, and he went out there and played extremely well. Made some big-time throws.
You know, learned a couple lessons. You know, it's hard. You can't check the ball down on fourth and two, unless the checkdown is beyond the first down marker. That was a tough play.
Besides that, he stepped up in the pocket and made some great throws. Made some great scrambles. You know, did what you hate for a quarterback to do, but cut back in instead of going down and sliding, but he's trying to get the first down. This is the kind of quarterback that you want to follow. It's the kind of quarterback that you love to have out there representing your team.
Q. How did the pace help this offense get on track early and do you see that as one of the bigger differences from previous games in terms of getting on track early?
Yeah, we've been good all year in the two-minute drill. So to utilize that in the first quarter and second quarter, I think really helped us.
Take into account, also, that you know, most of our backs are banged up. Nate Herbig couldn't play today, so there are a lot of things that we could have done outside of the no-huddle that were just unwise to do. We tried to use Bryce in spots. Tried to use our running back in spots to try to run the ball in spots.
But with the way that we were banged up, this is the smart way to play.
Q. The fourth down throw to Bryce, was that K.J.'s first read on that play?
No.
Q. They outscored you 17-7 in the fourth quarter. In a game like, this do you think Washington State has a little -- at least a little bit of an advantage over you in terms of a team that's used to passing all the time?
No, I don't think so. I think they are very good, and I would say earlier in the year against Utah, the first three quarters against Oregon. Against Notre Dame, we gave a lot to the opposing team. We gave a lot to those guys, whether it's turnovers, whether it was blowing coverages, whether it was a ton of missed tackles. There were still some missed tackles today.
This game, they earned it. They flat-out earned it. We had guys in coverage. We had guys there. Quarterback made the throws. Guys made the catch. Guys made some guys miss. It wasn't just guys diving on the grounds. They have some guys that have some wiggle to them, so made some guys miss. Made some big plays. We had the lead and we just couldn't extend it and we couldn't keep it.
Q. You talked about wanting to play four quarters of your best Stanford football. What changed from the first half to the second half?
I think they made plays. I thought we still played well. Bottom line for me is we got to a fourth and short, and a couple of third and shorts that we didn't convert. Their guys made the plays instead of ours. We got to a couple of third downs, short third downs, when they had the ball and we were on defense and they got those first downs.
To me, that was the big difference in the second half. We got a few more third down conversions; we get ourselves in position to score more points, especially one of them being plus-50 on our side of the field. Get that first down, now we're getting points.
Q. For a guy who wasn't a go until game time, Bryce Love looked great in a couple of situations there. How close is he to 100 percent now?
Not very. Not very. He's just a tough kid. He's just a tough kid, and we weren't sure this morning who was going to play. Went through the pregame warmup, and was able to demonstrate that he could plant and explode and run. Not up to full speed but I'd love for somebody to find me a tougher guy in America. This kid just grinds through it and he pushes through it. He knows this is not a long-term, career-threatening deal.
So if he can't go, he won't go. But if he can go, he wants to go. That's just the kind of person he is.
Q. You mentioned the pass rush. It was really difficult to get to Gardner with four guys. What about this offense makes it difficult to bring more than four guys?
They spread you out sideline-to-sideline. If you bring more than four, they are going to find a hole. They are going to find a spot. You try to play a bunch of man-to-man, but they have a bunch of guys that can run.
So part of it is matchups. They have the players that fit their scheme. Part of it is just the pure width of the field that they utilize.
We tried to do a little bit of that, also, ourselves. Spread them out and use our matchups. We did pressure them. We did send some blitzers. Probably not a high percentage but enough to try to get some one-on-one pass rush opportunities. We got to the quarterback a couple times, and it wasn't enough.
Q. Given what much of the conversation has been this season about the offense trying to get better, what's your first reaction to how the offense did, and overall, whether you consider it progress or not?
I think we made progress. I think we played really hard. I think we played a lot of plays. I think we had a lot of guys make a lot of plays: Cameron Scarlett coming in there making some big runs at the end of the game. A couple of really nice kickoff returns.
Trevor Speights had some great runs and great pass protection pick ups. Quarterbacks and receivers, tight ends making plays. Got great protection. I think they were on our quarterback just a few times. Other than that, you know, he was pretty good in the pocket. Could push up in the pocket and make some big-time throws.
I thought the two-minute drive, you know, in the fourth quarter to tie the game was outstanding. It was outstanding. We needed a stop to take the game to over time and it's anybody's ballgame but we couldn't get the stop. They made a couple of huge plays that put the game in their favor.
