Rich Rodriguez press conference summary: post BYU
West Virginia head coach Rich Rodriguez addressed the media following his team’s 38-24 road loss to No. 23 BYU and WVSports.com provides a summary of what was said.
–Rodriguez felt that redshirt freshman Khalil Wilkins played hard and was into the game. He would like to have a lot of plays back but he competed his tail off and true freshman Scotty Fox did too when he was in the game. They need to get some help and they couldn’t score from the one inch line. They got shoved around on offense and defense and that’s not good. They have to get better at that.
–On defense they couldn’t make a play on the ball in the air. They did whatever they wanted. They punted once. If you can’t make the other team punt you’re probably going to lose. That’s two games in a row.
–Rodriguez didn’t know if they blocked any better. They had to have the quarterback run game to run anything so he isn’t sure if they blocked any better. The two young quarterbacks are freshmen so in that environment they acquitted themselves O.K. and Scotty Fox made some nice throws and some nice runs and Khalil Wilkins made some nice runs and probably had a few things he’d like to come back but that was a tough environment to have your first start in and a guy that wasn’t able to practice all the way up until August due to his injury so he was proud of those two.
–Rodriguez hadn’t been here for a game but had heard about it. Their students got into it. When they were backed up it was hard to hear and they did a good job with the whole atmopshere.
–Rodriguez said that it was a little bit limited with two young quarterbacks but they can’t pass protect to drop back pass. They can’t get open versus press man sometimes but sometimes they can. They have to try to create some ways for those guys to have success. He didn’t want to say they need to be perfect, but they have to be pretty close to on mark. The hard part is everybody is going to play different fronts and change things up and they can’t overcome negative yardage plays. That was a part of it that killed some drives.
–They made Bear Bachmeier look like the Heisman winner in the first half. He’s a good player, tough, runs and everything they thought. His accuracy on his deep balls was great. Their guys made some nice plays and West Virginia didn’t but Rodriguez thought he was outstanding.
—Tye Edwards, they have to help him a little bit up front.
–Rodriguez said defensively they played a little more coverage earlier in the game but it pretty much was what they thought they would see. They’re a long, athletic team and have a couple NFL quarterbacks.
–Rodriguez said he hasn’t seen Nicco Marchiol, he isn’t on campus yet. Jaylen Henderson he didn’t travel. He might have been able to go as an emergency quarterback but he wasn’t ready to go. They got an open week so they’ll see if Jaylen can come back in two weeks and he won’t make a decision on who is starting until game time the next game. They need an open date. They’re tired, they’re beat up, mad, frustrated and all the above.
–Rodriguez didn’t notice anything differently between the second and first team offensive line. They’re going to evaluate everything they do every day. Win or lose they evaluate, they’re going to evaluate what they can do better and coach better. He asked in the locker room is everybody doing everything they can to help them win and if they are and they still aren’t winning he knows how to fix it. Some of it has to be fixed after the season but are they doing everything they can to win? Every person in the program? He’s not saying they aren’t, but there is another level they can get to.
–Rodriguez said he knows exactly how they will be practicing and meeting during the open week. He’s been around a little bit and he knows exactly what they need to do and they’ll do that.
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