Everything Sherrone Moore said during his pre-Maryland press conference

On evaluating a team that is 8-2 and has many self-inflicted errors 10 games in

Yeah, I mean, first of all, one, like I said, we’re 8-2. All our goals are in front of us, we’re playing for a lot. You’re playing meaningful football in November, which is what you ask for as a football coach, as a college football player, just any player in general in this game.

And when you’re in November and you’re playing for something that means a lot, especially with a young football team. You go out there with six freshmen on offense and a bevy of them on defense and special teams. Yeah, the mistakes are there that we’ve got to fix, but you’re also very blessed to be able to be in that position of being 8-2.

But yeah, you’ve got to self-reflect and look at everything that you’re doing and make sure that you’re doing everything right. Offensively, you talk about where we are and obviously the turnovers you’ve got to clean up. The kids have already been in many times throughout yesterday, today, to watch the film, evaluate the film. The coaches have attacked that. They’ll do it again later on here today. Everybody’s very aware of what we need to fix and what we need to do, but there’s a lot of positives in the game.

Bryce, you’ll talk about, people will talk about the turnovers, but I hope people talk about that third-down throw to Andrew Marsh. Not just the first one that led to a touchdown, but that second one that led to the game-winning field goal. Or the third down run that he had on third and five to escape to make sure we get a field goal. There were some heroic plays that young man made in the game that people need to highlight. He had mistakes that we all have to help him out as a team, but he had some plays that were outstanding, along with Andrew and some of the other guys.

I thought defensively we played really well. You put them in those positions, and they held them to two field goals early in the game, and that’s the game. I’m very proud of the resiliency of this team because five turnovers. Last year, SMU had six and won and that was it. Don’t ever want to be in that position again, and we’ll do everything we can to make sure we’re not in that position.

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On whether putting more on Bryce Underwood’s plate was in the gameplan heading into the game

He just saw it really well. As you went through the bye week, you just saw him progress and progress and progress. It just felt like he’d be in a great position, and he was. He made a lot of great throws and made a lot of great plays. We did a little bit more with him, but we did some things that we’ve already done. We just formatted it a little different. The way that they played allowed for some different looks and some different things to happen. That was a big piece of it, too.

On Zack Marshall’s health status and what he brings to the offense

Yeah, he’s doing good. I actually saw him here this morning. He was here bright and early. I got here, and he was just pulling up, so that was good to see getting treatment. But he’s in good shape. It looks like he’ll be fine for the week.

And he’s meant a lot, man, because he’s one of those guys that he just does everything right. You know, the big pass the week before against Purdue, the trick play, he’d never ran that in practice. It was the first time him running it. Marlin goes down, he goes in, knows exactly what to do, exactly how to do it. That’s the type of guy he is. You can trust him. He’s going to work his tail off and go make plays.

On Underwood being more comfortable in the pocket and working on it with him during the bye week

Yeah, he’s great. He just continues to just, again, playing football, getting used to it, playing speed in the Big Ten. He’s done a really good job of adjusting, and he just watches film tirelessly to get better at it, and, you know, practices help and putting him in those positions in practice to help him.

Going against our defense more and more in practice helps. So he’s just done a really good job, and, you know, the O-line has helped. Obviously, there’s some protection things that we’ve got to fix, but that’s also on they blitzed a little bit more than we thought based on wanting to stop our run game, and we had to adjust in the game, and that’s what good coaches do, to adjust, and that’s why the protection as the game went on and got better.

On Jordan Marshall’s health status and what to expect from Bryson Kuzdzal with a bigger role

Yeah, Jordan Marshall, same kind of thing I told you after the game, X-rays were negative, you know, feel good about where he’s at, but we’ll see. We’ll take it day by day and see where he’s at. But if Bryson has to be the guy, feel very comfortable with him. He’s explosive. He’s probably faster than Jordan, probably not as strong, but maybe, he’s a strong kid for how built he is. He’s about 5’11”, 6 foot, 210, 215.

He’s got bursts probably right below Justice in the speed, but maybe right at that. He can get there. But a physical runner, he’s got more physical. Great kid that’s just worked his tail off to get where he needs to be, and I’m excited to see what he does.

On whether Marshall’s injury is a shoulder injury

Yeah, yeah.

On whether Underwood’s interceptions was being locked in on a target

The first one, he just moved off the first target too quick, and the second one, he was heat checking. You know, that’s what you call that one. Sometimes that happens. He had a couple big plays on it, and then just holding it way too long, should just probably hand that one when that happens. But those are the things that happened. He’s eating himself up about it, but he should also look at the incredible plays he made throughout the game because those were special.

On whether he spoke to Underwood about the turnovers

Yeah, I mean, yeah, absolutely. Just keep him calm. Let him know we trust him, that we’re still here with him, and he’s got to go do something at the end of the game to go win it, and he did.

On having trust in Dominic Zvada and whether the game-winner will bring his confidence back

Yeah, I mean, just trusting him because what you see in practice, and he missed the first one, the second one was 60 yards, and I saw him, actually watched him warm up. He knocked it through. So when you see it, you’re like, okay. And it’s with the wind, got a chance, and it had the distance, just wasn’t there. But I remember I just looked at his eyes, right, we’re going on that drive, and I was like, all right, we’re in the position where we need to go, probably get it in field goal range, call timeout to make this the last play. And I just looked at him, he just gave me the nod. I was like, oh, yeah, he’s going to make this kick. So that, you know, full confidence in him.

On Justice Haynes being out for the season

Yeah. You know, I don’t think he’ll be — we’ll see as the doctors go, but as far as done for the year, I wouldn’t put him in that category.

On the final game before Ohio State week being a potential trap game

Don’t even talk about the final game. Not doing it. Don’t even do it. Don’t even do it. No, it’s not a trap game. This is a good team, man. This is not a trap game. There’s nothing about this game that is a trap game. There’s zero trap game on this.

This is about a really good team that, if you don’t play well, you will get beat. So there’s that trap. The trap is like the Nick Saban poison comment trying to get us. No, not a trap game. And everybody knows what’s ahead, but we’ve got to go execute. We’ve got to go prepare for this one like our lives depend on it. It’s a playoff game for us in this building, and there’s no trap game with this one.

On playing tight games at Maryland

Oh, yeah. We know they’re a good team. They always are, and that’s how it is. There’s no trap mentality. We know that it’s always tough to go there. It’s always tough to play there. They’re always a tough team. They always play us tough. So, yeah, we’ve got to be ready to go.

On identifying Andrew Marsh on the recruiting trail and what stood out

Everything you see, just ball skills, ability to separate, how smooth he was, and just the ability to go make plays. I remember going to watch him at a high school game, and on the first play, he catches a post. The next play, he’s getting handed a reverse. The next play, he’s catching a slant, taking it. He’s going there, throwing his body in there, and blocking. Just an all-around great player, and he just continues to make plays, and he’s going to probably be in here right after class watching the film again. So, yeah, I just think he’s a special player for us.

On the confidence level of having Jordan Marshall for Ohio State

We’ll see. I’m pretty confident, but we’ll see.

On the admiration he’s had for Davis Warren

Yeah, I mean, I think I talked about how much I appreciate Davis and what he’s just gone through, not only now, but in life. To be able to be where he is. It’s pretty special, and I learn things from all our players, but especially Davis because he’s been through a lot. And to have the attitude and the work ethic and the things he still does right now is awesome.

He keeps helping Bryce. He keeps helping all the quarterbacks, and I love having Davis around and happy for him.

On working with a mechanics position like kicker

Yeah, like I said before, I’ve never kicked before. The closest, like I mentioned in the press conference after the game, was someone mentioned Madden and the little beam. That’s as close as I’ve gotten to kicking a field goal, but I can imagine the exuberance and the happiness that he had after that kick was amazing.

There’s a lot of confidence. I called him last night. Was it last night? Yeah, last night and talked to him. He just talked about it. His dad sent me a text about thank you for trusting. When people go through adversity, trusting people in those situations. The kid just works his tail off to do what he did on Saturday. That was his first game-winning, time-expiring kick he’s ever had.

I hope it’s his last. If it isn’t and we still win, that’s great, but I’d like to eliminate the time-expiring part from it. He’s just done an unbelievable job. I hope it gives him a lot of confidence. He should have a lot of confidence in his abilities. The team has a lot of confidence in him.

On his message to Semaj Morgan

Just stay positive. It ate him up, having the fumble, and he was just trying to do so much for the team. He broke like three tackles, but at the end of the day, because at some point you’ve got to know when the journey’s over and you’ve got to get down. And you’ve got to bolt the ball at the end. But we’ll still support him. Still support him. We’re going to need him.

On critiquing the offensive line and where he its playing well and areas of improvement

Yeah. You don’t want me to critique them too badly because it gets dirty. As you know, that’s the group. But I’m very proud of them. I really am. I really am proud of them. Again, I’ve said this on record, how many times, I’ve never been a part of three redshirt freshmen starting. And for consecutive games, to have another 200-some-yard rushing game, I’ll have to check the record books, Dave, on how many in a row we’ve had. Do you know off the top of your head? Yeah, we’ve had a few. But for them, for what they’ve done, I’m very proud of the fight, the physicality that they continue to have. I’m proud of Grant Newsome and that O-line staff and what they’ve done.

Yeah, it’s always never perfect. But those guys have put up a great fight and put us in a great position to win games.

On Haynes being done for the regular season

Yeah, probably, yes.

On dealing with a player who is struggling with confidence

I mean, continue the positivity because the world that we live in is so negative, and we’ll pour so much negativity into these young men. And our job is to support them and love them and take care of them like they’re our own. So that’s going to be the continued message from not only me but the rest of our staff.

On his thought process behind calling the timeout late in the game

I just want the best runs possible, the best thought process possible. You don’t want to rush in when you have a timeout, and you call on,e and you’ve still got one left. You’ve got control of what you want. You’ve got control of the clock. So you can bleed it down to a certain point. So we want to make sure we’re in the best possible run that we knew that we could execute and get the yards and get the ball where we needed to because I think we were on the right hash still, maybe, and we wanted to get the ball over.

On whether there’s urgency to ramp up the touches for Marsh after the last game

Yeah, just allow the quarterback to read through his progressions. We’ll put him in different positions so that people can identify exactly where he’s at, but just try to space the ball out and get it to the open dude, and he just found him a lot, ironically, but he knows how to get open.

On whether the opportunities for the tight ends aren’t presenting themselves or the first reads aren’t there

Yeah, I think it’s more of that. They’re getting targeted a lot too, but just kind of how the game went, and as it molded, it became more of the game it became and allowed Andrew to have more targets and Donoven to have more targets than the tight end. So they’ll be targeted throughout the game as we go through here in these last two.

On whether it was a missed assignment or good defense on the fumbled reverse

Both. It was a good defense. We could help them too with the call and make sure if we see anything. Pre-snap did a good job hiding the pressure and allowing that guy to get upfield. So it’s two-part. We’ve got to help them, too.

On how often he hears from player parents and how he handles it good or bad

Nobody knows their kid more than the players’ parents. They’ve bred them and brought them up for 18 years, so 17, 18. So you hear from them more positive than anything, which is awesome. And there’s always people that, the naysayers out there that say things, but our players’ parents are awesome. They just support our kids and do everything they can to keep them positive.