MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (October 3, 2017) – West Virginia University football coach Dana Holgorsen addressed members of the media on Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2017, at the Milan Puskar Center Team Room.
Opening Statement
TCU is always a fun one. I just think if you look at the similarities in the two programs, it builds a lot of interest in this game. Winning as many games as both West Virginia did and TCU did in their respective conferences prior to the Big 12, both won a ton of games in Group of Five conferences and were always in the BCS discussion and all that good stuff. It’s interesting that TCU joined the Big East prior to the Big 12. Everybody forgets about that, but that happened for about a month. Then, they go into the Big 12 and we followed them a couple of months later. It’s just neat playing this game based on the fact of what the past was and then going into the Big 12 at the same time. You’ve seen both programs go through the process of building their teams pretty similar, I think, as far as some early struggles with some big wins to building some depth to the point where I think both teams are pretty good football teams at this point.
If you look at this year’s TCU, obviously (head coach) Gary (Patterson) has been there a long time – 20 years. He’s won almost 75 percent of his games. That’s almost unheard of in college football. Who is at a program for 20 years anymore? It just doesn’t happen very often. Who wins 75 percent of their games? That hardly ever happens anymore, either. So, I have a ton of respect for Gary, you guys know that. I’ve talked him up for the last six years that we’ve played. This team he’s got is a really good football team. I think it starts when you can say that you have around 16 senior starters, that’s impressive. Their depth is very apparent with what their depth chart looks like. That thing used to have about two people on it, now it has three and four people at each position. I study the special teams more than I ever have and am understanding better than I ever have and when you have quality second-team guys, quality third-team guys that are screaming down the field making tackles and your starters don’t have to play very much on those units because your second-teamers are pretty good and your third-teamers are pretty good, that means you have a really good football team. That’s what I see out of TCU.
They’ve been doing the same thing defensively for 20 years and it doesn’t look any different now than it has back when they were really good a decade ago. That’s (Patterson’s) stamp on the program and his stamp on college football. They have a lot of guys on his staff that speak the same language that he does, so I have a ton of respect with what they’re doing.
If you turn on their film defensively, they’re playing really well and they have guys that I’ve been looking at over the course of the last three years. Obviously, they’re led by their middle (linebacker), the (Travin) Howard kid, No. 32. He started against us two years ago when we were at TCU. It may have been his first start, I can’t remember. He wasn’t at that position very long because he was a 6-foot, 190-pound guy that was playing middle linebacker. They had just moved him from safety. But two years later, he’s as good as anybody out there. He’s quite a bit bigger than he was and he’s all over the place making play after play after play. They’re deep; their front is always good. They rarely have to out-number you in the box, which is a different type situation than what we’re usually used to. They just do a really good job of just coaching their guys up with technique and them playing with high motors and doing a great job of getting off blocks. They’re as sure of tacklers as we’re going to see out there. And their coverages, they read routes better than anybody. They’re going to know exactly what positons they’re going to have to be in and they’re rarely out of position. So, they’re as good as they’ve always been defensively and their stats show that.
Offensively, I didn’t know what to expect, honestly, when I turned the film on based on what they’ve done the last couple of years with (Doug) Meacham running some things there. I didn’t know if they would change anything or if they’d keep it exactly the same. Sonny Cumbie is a guy I’ve known for a long time; he played quarterback for me at Texas Tech. He’s been there with them for the last few years. They haven’t changed much. They have another buddy of mine in Sonny Dykes that’s running around there being an analyst and giving some opinions. He was at Cal last year, the last few years, as the head coach, and you can see a little bit of his imprint on it as well back from our Texas Tech days and what they were trying to do at Cal over the last couple of years as well. So, there’s a lot of familiarity with what they’re doing; we know their quarterback well. He’s playing like a fifth-year senior. He’s played a lot of ball. There’s a lot of similarities between him and the quarterback that we have playing right now, he’s just a year older. Both had great high school careers, played early at their respective universities, transferred and are finding success where they’re at.
They’re running the ball extremely well; they have about four different guys that they can hand it to, their (offensive) line is big and doing a great job in covering people up, and then I can’t tell the difference really in about 10-12 of their receivers. They have a bunch of guys that are making plays. None of them have huge, huge stats because they’re playing everybody, they have a lot of depth. They have 10 guys that look the same and they’re all capable of making plays and are all capable of doing great things as well, which they have – all year they have. So, it’s a huge test.
Special teams-wise, same stuff. Their coverage unit leads the Big 12, they’ve given up zero punt return yardage, they’re perfect on PAT/field goal, their guy kicks touchbacks, places the ball exactly where he wants to play it. Oh yeah, by the way, they have the best return guy in the country in (KaVontae) Turpin. And then there’s two other guys that look just like him. But he’s considered one of the best in the country, so our coverage units better cover and we better do a great job blocking up front if we’re going to want to get any returns at all.
So, huge test for us; we’re excited about it. They’re deserving of their top-10 ranking, I think they’re eighth or whatever. They’re deserving of GameDay going there and giving them a whole bunch of publicity. We’re excited about getting there and seeing what happens. Questions? That was pretty informative so there should be zero questions, so you guys have a great day and we better go practice.
On how the team has tried to improve its run defense over the past week
It’s not scheme because we’ve been pretty good against the run here over the last two years. So, you didn’t see me sweat about it. Like I said, we have to do a better job up front of holding gaps, which we have depth, we need guys to step up and be real dudes. I think (freshman defensive lineman Lamonte) McDougle took a step in that right direction and I’m anxious to see if he can continue to play that way. We need other guys to step up and play Big 12 football. Holding gaps, getting off blocks, being tacklers. From a second-level perspective, which this is one, being a player, and two, having confidence in the scheme, which I do, and having confidence in having (defensive coordinator Tony Gibson) to call the right stuff and get people around the ball, it needs to look like (redshirt senior linebacker Al-Rasheed) Benton out there. He’s running and making tackles at a very high rate. I’d like two more linebackers and three more safeties to do the same thing. When you get your starters back, it probably makes it a little easier.
On if there’s a formula in defeating a Top-10 team on the road
Although I really think they’re deserving of their Top-10 ranking, no question, when you go into Arkansas and win the way they did and go into Stillwater and win the way they did, yeah, that’s a good football team, it’s hard to go anywhere on the road and win in the Big 12. It wasn’t exactly easy for us the last time we played. I just think you get familiar with your opponent, you practice and you go play. I think our guys understand every bit about that when it comes to Big 12 football. We’ve gone to Fort Worth and won before. They’re going to know what the hotel looks like and what the drive to the stadium looks like. They did a great job with their stadium, their stadium looks great, the locker room is awesome and our guys are going to understand what that’s like. We’re going to know our opponent pretty well and then you have to go in there and you have to play. To me, it’s pretty much as simple as that. Just because TCU is No. 8 in the country doesn’t make it any more important than going to Kansas. It just doesn’t, not from my perspective. You guys can say I’m full of crap if you want to, but it’s no different with how we approach it and how we talk about it and how we practice it and how we expect to go do it.
On how many players he feels comfortable with playing along the offensive line
We’ve successfully played six. I need to see more out of other people that you may or may not be talking about. I don’t know who else you’re talking about; there’s a couple of them that are first-year players and I’ve never had (offensive) line guys that are worth a crap at all as first-year players. It becomes a concern, it’s something that we focus on. I’m very happy with (redshirt freshman offensive lineman) Josh Sills and how he’s played as a redshirt freshman. That’s rare. So, we have to keep playing guys to see. We’re happy to get (redshirt senior offensive lineman) Grant (Lingafelter) back, he gives us experience, that’s for sure. The other guys you’re talking about are all first-year players. Since when do first-year players at (offensive) line come in and change things? I don’t know what your expectations are but they’re certainly different than mine.
On if success of professional athletes’ sons carries over like football coaches’ sons
In a different way, I think. I really haven’t thought of it that way. The competition aspect of it, I think there’s probably a lot to talk about just growing up in a competitive household where Dad rubs a kid’s head and goes and competes at the highest level possible. I think there’s probably a lot of developmental aspects of just the competitive spirit, whether any of that translates. Certainly the athleticism is something to talk about as well. But when I talk about coach’s kids, I look at Graham Harrell, Case Keenum, Clint Trickett, Will Grier, those type guys. Danny Amendola. Those kinds of kids that were truly coach’s kids from a football perspective whose dads coached them. That’s a different type of kid because that kid, when their dad coaches him, grows up in a place like this. They’re just around. I’ll walk in there and see (offensive coordinator) Jake (Spavital) and (son) Logan (Holgorsen) and Will Grier sitting there and watching film on specific things. It’s just an example of those guys growing up and understanding the football aspect of it. When I recruited Graham Harrell, I’d go in there and talk to his dad, Sam, who’s one of the most successful high school coaches in Texas at Ennis High School. This is like as a freshman or sophomore and me and him would be sitting in there watching film on practice and the kid would be in the corner paying attention. So, does that translate, the baseball aspect of it? It’s hard to say. But the athleticism for sure and the competitive spirit for sure.
On how many games it takes to know how good the team is
If you ask everybody, they’d probably all give you a different answer. I did an interview about 20 minutes ago that said that they thought it was three. “What kind of team do you have?” I’m like, “I don’t know.” It seems like a year-and-a-half ago that we played Virginia Tech at this point. I’m anxious to get out there and find out; I’m also anxious about eight straight weeks of the same thing, eight challenging games moving ahead for us. We’ll probably have a little better of an idea this weekend. It may take us 10 games to figure it out – I certainly hope not. I do think this team will keep getting better. I’ve said it a good bit – we have a lot of older guys but not a lot of experience. The older guys will continue to get better based on experience. Hopefully, we’ll be playing our best football going into Week 13. That’d be nice.
Opening Statement
TCU is always a fun one. I just think if you look at the similarities in the two programs, it builds a lot of interest in this game. Winning as many games as both West Virginia did and TCU did in their respective conferences prior to the Big 12, both won a ton of games in Group of Five conferences and were always in the BCS discussion and all that good stuff. It’s interesting that TCU joined the Big East prior to the Big 12. Everybody forgets about that, but that happened for about a month. Then, they go into the Big 12 and we followed them a couple of months later. It’s just neat playing this game based on the fact of what the past was and then going into the Big 12 at the same time. You’ve seen both programs go through the process of building their teams pretty similar, I think, as far as some early struggles with some big wins to building some depth to the point where I think both teams are pretty good football teams at this point.
If you look at this year’s TCU, obviously (head coach) Gary (Patterson) has been there a long time – 20 years. He’s won almost 75 percent of his games. That’s almost unheard of in college football. Who is at a program for 20 years anymore? It just doesn’t happen very often. Who wins 75 percent of their games? That hardly ever happens anymore, either. So, I have a ton of respect for Gary, you guys know that. I’ve talked him up for the last six years that we’ve played. This team he’s got is a really good football team. I think it starts when you can say that you have around 16 senior starters, that’s impressive. Their depth is very apparent with what their depth chart looks like. That thing used to have about two people on it, now it has three and four people at each position. I study the special teams more than I ever have and am understanding better than I ever have and when you have quality second-team guys, quality third-team guys that are screaming down the field making tackles and your starters don’t have to play very much on those units because your second-teamers are pretty good and your third-teamers are pretty good, that means you have a really good football team. That’s what I see out of TCU.
They’ve been doing the same thing defensively for 20 years and it doesn’t look any different now than it has back when they were really good a decade ago. That’s (Patterson’s) stamp on the program and his stamp on college football. They have a lot of guys on his staff that speak the same language that he does, so I have a ton of respect with what they’re doing.
If you turn on their film defensively, they’re playing really well and they have guys that I’ve been looking at over the course of the last three years. Obviously, they’re led by their middle (linebacker), the (Travin) Howard kid, No. 32. He started against us two years ago when we were at TCU. It may have been his first start, I can’t remember. He wasn’t at that position very long because he was a 6-foot, 190-pound guy that was playing middle linebacker. They had just moved him from safety. But two years later, he’s as good as anybody out there. He’s quite a bit bigger than he was and he’s all over the place making play after play after play. They’re deep; their front is always good. They rarely have to out-number you in the box, which is a different type situation than what we’re usually used to. They just do a really good job of just coaching their guys up with technique and them playing with high motors and doing a great job of getting off blocks. They’re as sure of tacklers as we’re going to see out there. And their coverages, they read routes better than anybody. They’re going to know exactly what positons they’re going to have to be in and they’re rarely out of position. So, they’re as good as they’ve always been defensively and their stats show that.
Offensively, I didn’t know what to expect, honestly, when I turned the film on based on what they’ve done the last couple of years with (Doug) Meacham running some things there. I didn’t know if they would change anything or if they’d keep it exactly the same. Sonny Cumbie is a guy I’ve known for a long time; he played quarterback for me at Texas Tech. He’s been there with them for the last few years. They haven’t changed much. They have another buddy of mine in Sonny Dykes that’s running around there being an analyst and giving some opinions. He was at Cal last year, the last few years, as the head coach, and you can see a little bit of his imprint on it as well back from our Texas Tech days and what they were trying to do at Cal over the last couple of years as well. So, there’s a lot of familiarity with what they’re doing; we know their quarterback well. He’s playing like a fifth-year senior. He’s played a lot of ball. There’s a lot of similarities between him and the quarterback that we have playing right now, he’s just a year older. Both had great high school careers, played early at their respective universities, transferred and are finding success where they’re at.
They’re running the ball extremely well; they have about four different guys that they can hand it to, their (offensive) line is big and doing a great job in covering people up, and then I can’t tell the difference really in about 10-12 of their receivers. They have a bunch of guys that are making plays. None of them have huge, huge stats because they’re playing everybody, they have a lot of depth. They have 10 guys that look the same and they’re all capable of making plays and are all capable of doing great things as well, which they have – all year they have. So, it’s a huge test.
Special teams-wise, same stuff. Their coverage unit leads the Big 12, they’ve given up zero punt return yardage, they’re perfect on PAT/field goal, their guy kicks touchbacks, places the ball exactly where he wants to play it. Oh yeah, by the way, they have the best return guy in the country in (KaVontae) Turpin. And then there’s two other guys that look just like him. But he’s considered one of the best in the country, so our coverage units better cover and we better do a great job blocking up front if we’re going to want to get any returns at all.
So, huge test for us; we’re excited about it. They’re deserving of their top-10 ranking, I think they’re eighth or whatever. They’re deserving of GameDay going there and giving them a whole bunch of publicity. We’re excited about getting there and seeing what happens. Questions? That was pretty informative so there should be zero questions, so you guys have a great day and we better go practice.
On how the team has tried to improve its run defense over the past week
It’s not scheme because we’ve been pretty good against the run here over the last two years. So, you didn’t see me sweat about it. Like I said, we have to do a better job up front of holding gaps, which we have depth, we need guys to step up and be real dudes. I think (freshman defensive lineman Lamonte) McDougle took a step in that right direction and I’m anxious to see if he can continue to play that way. We need other guys to step up and play Big 12 football. Holding gaps, getting off blocks, being tacklers. From a second-level perspective, which this is one, being a player, and two, having confidence in the scheme, which I do, and having confidence in having (defensive coordinator Tony Gibson) to call the right stuff and get people around the ball, it needs to look like (redshirt senior linebacker Al-Rasheed) Benton out there. He’s running and making tackles at a very high rate. I’d like two more linebackers and three more safeties to do the same thing. When you get your starters back, it probably makes it a little easier.
On if there’s a formula in defeating a Top-10 team on the road
Although I really think they’re deserving of their Top-10 ranking, no question, when you go into Arkansas and win the way they did and go into Stillwater and win the way they did, yeah, that’s a good football team, it’s hard to go anywhere on the road and win in the Big 12. It wasn’t exactly easy for us the last time we played. I just think you get familiar with your opponent, you practice and you go play. I think our guys understand every bit about that when it comes to Big 12 football. We’ve gone to Fort Worth and won before. They’re going to know what the hotel looks like and what the drive to the stadium looks like. They did a great job with their stadium, their stadium looks great, the locker room is awesome and our guys are going to understand what that’s like. We’re going to know our opponent pretty well and then you have to go in there and you have to play. To me, it’s pretty much as simple as that. Just because TCU is No. 8 in the country doesn’t make it any more important than going to Kansas. It just doesn’t, not from my perspective. You guys can say I’m full of crap if you want to, but it’s no different with how we approach it and how we talk about it and how we practice it and how we expect to go do it.
On how many players he feels comfortable with playing along the offensive line
We’ve successfully played six. I need to see more out of other people that you may or may not be talking about. I don’t know who else you’re talking about; there’s a couple of them that are first-year players and I’ve never had (offensive) line guys that are worth a crap at all as first-year players. It becomes a concern, it’s something that we focus on. I’m very happy with (redshirt freshman offensive lineman) Josh Sills and how he’s played as a redshirt freshman. That’s rare. So, we have to keep playing guys to see. We’re happy to get (redshirt senior offensive lineman) Grant (Lingafelter) back, he gives us experience, that’s for sure. The other guys you’re talking about are all first-year players. Since when do first-year players at (offensive) line come in and change things? I don’t know what your expectations are but they’re certainly different than mine.
On if success of professional athletes’ sons carries over like football coaches’ sons
In a different way, I think. I really haven’t thought of it that way. The competition aspect of it, I think there’s probably a lot to talk about just growing up in a competitive household where Dad rubs a kid’s head and goes and competes at the highest level possible. I think there’s probably a lot of developmental aspects of just the competitive spirit, whether any of that translates. Certainly the athleticism is something to talk about as well. But when I talk about coach’s kids, I look at Graham Harrell, Case Keenum, Clint Trickett, Will Grier, those type guys. Danny Amendola. Those kinds of kids that were truly coach’s kids from a football perspective whose dads coached them. That’s a different type of kid because that kid, when their dad coaches him, grows up in a place like this. They’re just around. I’ll walk in there and see (offensive coordinator) Jake (Spavital) and (son) Logan (Holgorsen) and Will Grier sitting there and watching film on specific things. It’s just an example of those guys growing up and understanding the football aspect of it. When I recruited Graham Harrell, I’d go in there and talk to his dad, Sam, who’s one of the most successful high school coaches in Texas at Ennis High School. This is like as a freshman or sophomore and me and him would be sitting in there watching film on practice and the kid would be in the corner paying attention. So, does that translate, the baseball aspect of it? It’s hard to say. But the athleticism for sure and the competitive spirit for sure.
On how many games it takes to know how good the team is
If you ask everybody, they’d probably all give you a different answer. I did an interview about 20 minutes ago that said that they thought it was three. “What kind of team do you have?” I’m like, “I don’t know.” It seems like a year-and-a-half ago that we played Virginia Tech at this point. I’m anxious to get out there and find out; I’m also anxious about eight straight weeks of the same thing, eight challenging games moving ahead for us. We’ll probably have a little better of an idea this weekend. It may take us 10 games to figure it out – I certainly hope not. I do think this team will keep getting better. I’ve said it a good bit – we have a lot of older guys but not a lot of experience. The older guys will continue to get better based on experience. Hopefully, we’ll be playing our best football going into Week 13. That’d be nice.