Everything Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman said in Boise State week news conference

On Monday, the frustrated, searching-for-answers Marcus Freeman of Weeks 4 and 5 was gone. Reporters saw a head coach who was clearly encouraged by what he saw on Saturday as Notre Dame defeated Arkansas 56-13.

Here’s everything Freeman said at his weekly press conference as Notre Dame wraps up Arkansas and prepares for Boise State.

Note: Questions are often paraphrased. Freeman’s answers are verbatim.

Opening statement

“Really good win for our program. Saturday was a big win. We needed that. I think there was a lot of good in all three phases. Improvement from week three to week four for our program. As you reflect, why the improvement? I think it’s a reflection of a lot of younger guys, on even offense and defense, just improving with experience, improving with time. I think it’s a reflection of guys understanding what they’re being asked to do, right and why they’re being asked to do it and how they’re going to get their job done and how it can be attacked, right, how you can be attacked. When you understand all those things, you play with clarity and you play with the velocity that it takes to be successful.

“As you’re seeing, really important on offense, it’s the consistent execution, right? It’s consistently executing. I say that as a reflection of, again, what you’re willing to tolerate in practice as coaches and players and your daily habits. I know a lot of probably questions would be about why the defense improved from week three to week four and what did you guys do differently. I think for me it’s understanding there is no secret formula, right? It’s always the hard work that I believe you have to put in. 

“Every week, you have a similar process. You’ve got to decide what you’re going to do and who’s going to do it. You’ve got to make decisions on how you’re going to play and then you’ve got to teach it. You’ve got to teach it in a way that your players can understand how to do their job, right, how and why they have to do their job this way and then you’ve got to go do it. You’ve got to do it in practice and ultimately carry over what you do in practice into the game. That’s to me, again, a reminder of our process, a reminder of what it takes to have success. New guys and new things improve with experience. It’s no secret. 

“Sometimes experience can mean failure at times. Failure makes you uncomfortable, but failure helps you grow. I always say this. The pain of failure is not much different than physical pain. When you have physical pain, the first thing you want to do is you want it to stop. It’s the same when you have pain from failure. It’s a reflection of you’re uncomfortable.

“What are you going to be willing to do to try to eliminate that discomfort? Our guys did a really good job of going to work, kind of tuning out the noise and staying together and putting the necessary effort in to achieve a better result on Saturday. I want to say I’m surprised, but I’m not. That’s the makeup of the leaders on our defense, the makeup of our coaches and that’s why you ultimately get the results you did.

“Our challenge as we move forward is to continue to be uncomfortable and continue to find ways to grow with success when it’s natural to feel good, feel satisfied. We have to be uncomfortable because that’s the only way you grow. We’ve got to get back to work. 

“Obviously, we have another great opportunity, great challenge on Saturday with Boise State. You think about the history of Boise State and somebody told me it’s the second-winningest program since 2000 in college football. I mean, that’s a credit of a program. Spencer Danielson, I got a chance to meet him. I think he’s 18-4 in his years. I met him at a couple of the coaching award things that I attended. I just got a lot of respect for him as a person and what he stands for and obviously the job he’s done as the leader of that program. 

“Their offense is explosive. They’ve averaged about 500-plus yards in four games. I always say it starts with that quarterback. They’ve got a good quarterback that’s experienced, that’s tough, gritty, takes care of the ball, so it’ll be a good challenge for our defense again, and then their defense is a high-pressure attacking unit. We’ll see more pressure if they continue to do what they’ve done than we’ve seen all year and it’s going to be a great challenge for us to protect our quarterback. That’s going to be important. So looking forward to a challenge on Saturday, obviously in Notre Dame Stadium for Irish Wear Green.”

You’ve mentioned the word uncomfortable a couple times. How does the Notre Dame offense keep improving when things seem comfortable for them?

“I think discomfort comes from a place of need, and there’s ways to get better all over the place, but it still comes from a need of each individual, right? If you don’t feel like you need to get better, then you don’t really obtain the wisdom that is out there for you. Me and you could be sitting in the same room listening to somebody teach us, but if our needs are different, I’m going to get something out of it differently than you. They have to understand there’s areas of improvement all over the place. 

“We weren’t perfect. We played really, really well. We weren’t perfect, and so if they’re honest with themselves and they feel like they have that need to improve, coach me, help me get better, that’s the discomfort that will help them improve.”

Is this Notre Dame team getting into a groove like last year’s did around this time?

“I think as you look back at last year as a whole, you say, ‘Man, they got momentum and they got rolling.’ I hope at the end of this season we’ll look back and say the same thing, but in the moment you just got to focus on constant improvement, right? Somebody said, wasn’t that fun to win a game like that? Fun? I’m like, no, because every play you’re stressed to win it. You’re focused on staying in the moment. Let’s win this play. What do we have to do to win this play? When it’s over you go, man, we did a good job. And so that’s just the challenge, man, is to stay present, stay in the moment, improve, and hopefully we can look back and say, man, we had a lot of momentum as we move forward.” 

What are the benefits of having both Notre Dame coordinators on the field, and who are their eyes in the press box?

“We have multiple people who have multiple roles in the booth. The pros of being on the field, I was an on-the-field coordinator, is you can lead, you can talk, you can verbalize things, face-to-face communication with the coaches and players and not have to use a headset on down. There’s different ways of communication in person and through a telephone headset.

“I think the only way to be down is to have a comfort that the people in the booth are getting you what you need to see. There’s a person responsible for personnel. There’s a person responsible for, hey, what each position did up there. There’s a person responsible for a lot of different things aou have to make sure that you feel supported and have a comfort with who’s up top.” 

Since you were an on-field coordinator, was there con for you? What did you ever struggle with?

“You can’t always see, right? You’re always saying, where’d it hit? Hey, what happened there? Who missed it? There’s things from the field level – you just can’t see the far side of the field. You can’t see the little details of that ball split the defense. They got six yards, who misfit so we can get it corrected? That’s probably the thing, the disadvantage of being on the field is there’s certain things you just can’t see that you have to get from the booth.” 

You mentioned Boise State likes to bring pressure. What did CJ Carr and the offensive line do well against Arkansas’ blitz last week that can translate?

“I think the protection was so important, right? You guys give me crap for loving up those O-linemen, but there is no great quarterback without protection. They protected him, but you have to be in the right protection, right? The protection is also protecting his physical work. We’ve got to protect our quarterback, but it’s also a schematic term. Like we have to be in the correct protection and that’s something that CJ was able to do.

“You can see a pressure and say, OK, I want to change the protection to pick up that pressure. I thought he did a great job of recognizing the pressure. Our O-line did a good job of protecting him and executing what protection call we had to give him time to, again, like I said, if you’re going to bring pressure and I know this from the defensive of the ball, you’re asking your guys to cover for less time than you do if you only bring four. When you bring pressure and we can pick it up and protect our quarterback, it gives them time to throw it.” 

Cole Mullins played well against Purdue in garbage time, and he earned snaps while the game was in doubt against Arkansas. How much do you take those reps into account for future playing time?

“Please don’t call it garbage time to me. Every play is important. Every single play is important. Here’s why I tell you that. If Cole or any of our guys had the mindset this is garbage time, then they don’t understand they’re being evaluated the exact same way as the starters are. It’s important that they have that mindset because we’re going to hold you, our second group, to the standard we hold the first group to. That’s the only way to do it. I know I’m not exactly answering your question, I’ll get to it, but our second group on offense played extremely better than they did the week before, and that was a huge challenge. It’s not, hey, this is game reps, man. You are not guaranteed a lot of these, so make the most of them.

“Cole has done that. When Cole got in the game versus Purdue, he produced. He did a good job and he is a high motor guy. He plays extremely hard. Him and Elijah (Hughes) – those two guys play extremely hard and they’re getting better with some technique, their size and stuff like that, but guys who play the game really, really hard usually are rewarded.”

Is there a tendency for coordinators who move from college to the NFL to overcomplicate at first and need to simplify later?

“I just think different coordinators have different philosophies of defense and that’s in terms of the tactical aspect of it. I’m not talking about the core fundamentals of how you play the game, block destruction, tackling, pursuit to the ball. 

“I think when you have that experience in the NFL, you probably have a lot of answers. A lot of answers to combat what an offense does. Answers are only as good as execution. You know what I mean? Sometimes through failure, you’ve got to say, OK, this looks good on paper, but our guys aren’t executing at the level we need them to execute. I think that’s what you saw from week one to really week four, is that they’re executing what they’re being asked to execute at a higher level. 

“Does that mean that we’ve simplified? Maybe. Maybe we’ve condensed. I don’t know if the defensive play calls were that much different. But we better find ways to teach it better. You guys might notice it, but maybe we played with a little bit of a different technique in certain positions. I think it’s an accumulation of all those things. But it’s a different kind of philosophy in terms of your answers to what an offense is doing.” 

You had talked the previous week about some of the techniques not coalescing. The secondary played fast against Arkansas. Was that technique or a frame of mind?

“I think we went into the game knowing we cannot give up the explosive plays that we gave up, the explosive pass plays that we gave up the week before. That can’t happen. We’ve got to keep the ball in front of us. That was definitely a mindset going into the game, and that could be technique-driven. 

“The other part of it is being situational masters and understanding when you can be aggressive because of the down and distance. That’s important. So, again, they played faster. We played man. We played zone. I think what you saw in some zone coverage, we were intentional about working more pattern match type periods in practice, so making sure our guys understand, OK, here’s cover four, here’s cover three, here’s cover two. OK, what is this offense going to try to do to attack these different coverages and let’s make sure you have clarity on how they’re going to try to attack us. Then you can be aggressive in jumping routes and things like that, but they played really well.”

When you improve the pass defense, do you have to surrender some things in the running game like you did in the first half against Arkansas?

“No, you don’t have to surrender. You can eliminate explosive pass and run game, but it takes being disciplined. They had two runs that were, I think both the quarterback, that were explosive runs. I don’t know if they were 40 or 50 yards, but they were too much. Both of those happened because of technique issues, right? 

“If we have the quarterback, we’ve got to be perfect in our technique to guarantee he hands that ball off, or we can make the tackle. In both situations, I can remember right now, we did not play with the proper technique, and the quarterback kept it and outran us. So that’s the execution part of it. We’ve got to take what we’re doing in the practice field and make sure it translates on every play because for 90% of the plays, we did play with perfect technique and either hand it off or we were in a position to tackle them. But those two plays cost us 80-plus yards.”

What have you seen from Elijah Hughes in an expanded role at Notre Dame the last couple weeks?

“Very similar to Cole Mullins. Elijah is a guy who plays extremely hard. He might not be physically as big as some of those other tackles, but he plays hard and that’s rewarding. He’s becoming more consistent in what he’s being asked to do. That’s what sticks out to me more than anything about Elijah and Cole is that those guys play hard. They make up for maybe some of their size physically with the aggression and how hard they play.”

What have you learned about Mark Zackery the last few weeks that you didn’t know going into the season?

“What I’ve learned is that he is not a blamer. He doesn’t point fingers. He wants to be coached. He wants to improve. We knew he had talent, but sometimes in failure, you learn about a guy. Is he a competitive individual who wants to take ownership and say, how do I make this better? Or is it ain’t my fault type of guy? 

“I knew that just because I know his parents. I knew the way he was raised, but that’s what he’s done. He’s owned the issues just like his coach has, just like we all have. He’s really been intentional about the work in practice and understanding that we’ve got to treat practice, the speed of practice, even though it might not be replicated, in my head, it’s got to be like a game. 

“We’ve got a lot of trust in him and whenever Leonard gets back this week, maybe he’s questionable right now if he’s back, we have confidence that now Mark can spell Leonard and Christian (Gray). We need that. You’re not really comfortable with just two corners, not with college football right now. We’ve got to have a third guy that we feel like can roll in and help.”

You talk about the bumpy road. It’s been pretty bumpy for Notre Dame defensive coordinator Chris Ash. What have you learned about him and how he’s handled that?

“The bumpy road leads to better as long as you work, attack it and own it. I haven’t been in the fire with Coach Ash. I know people who have. I’ve learned this week who he is when he’s in the fire. He’s a competitor and he’s a leader. He’s not pointing fingers at other people. He’s saying, I have to get this fixed. It’s just my responsibility and we’ve got a lot of people who are doing that. He’s done a really good job of being crystal clear on his expectations. Hey, we failed in this area. Let’s attack it and fix it. Let’s be crystal clear as coaches and as players on what we’re expecting here. And he doesn’t waver. He goes to work. I’ve learned a lot about him this past two weeks.”

Did you reach out to Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman after he was fired? And did he say anything to you after the game about running a fake punt up 29?

“No. You never want to see somebody in any profession lose their job. He’s a man who has a family, but this is the profession we chose. The human side of you feels for him and his family. But he’s going to be okay because he’s a – I don’t know him personally, but I’ve heard he is a competitive, great human. Competitive, good, selfless people succeed. That’s what we need on our team and our world, like competitive fighters who are selfless, who put others in front of themselves. I’ve heard those types of things about him. My interaction with him pregame was great. Everything I expected from what I’ve heard about who he is. 

“In terms of the fake punt, I didn’t want to relax. We had to come out of that locker room with an aggression no different than the first half. There’s no lead that’s comfortable. There’s no lead that’s comfortable. When we went three-and-out, I think, on that first drive, I felt like it was the right time to send a message to our team. This was about our team that, hey, this is something we’ve worked on. Let’s go execute it. 

“That also is something on film for the next opponents, right? I’m not even thinking about this opponent, but I’m thinking about I want to make sure the next couple opponents see that. I could really make them think deeply about how they want to attack our punt unit. That’s what went into that decision-making. We didn’t get any points off of it, but it was a mindset that we have to be aggressive. There is no taking your foot off the accelerator. This is what we’re doing and they executed it well.” 

What were your emotions when you saw former Notre Dame defensive back Jaden Mickey go down with a scary injury, and has Boise State head coach Spencer Danielson reached out to you about him?

“No. I never talked to Spencer about Jaden Mickey, but I would tell you the same thing I would tell Spencer Danielson, is that I love that guy. You never want to see anybody get hurt, but somebody you truly care about get hurt. I didn’t see it on Saturday. I was made aware it happened Saturday, but I saw it as we were preparing on Sunday. I just wanted to make sure he was OK. And he told me he was okay. That’s what matters.

“I know Jaden Mickey, if he’s going to be available to play, he’s going to find a way to play on Saturday. But all I care about is his health. Love his family, and have been through some tough times with that young man. These guys, they often make sure they understand they’re not cars, right? Like, you don’t rent them for a couple years, and then when they leave, that’s it, right? That’s it. You sold them. It’s done. These are relationships that last forever, right? You invest into these young people, and for the rest of our lives, we’re going to have a relationship just like you do with every one of your players.” 

What kind of physicality does DeVonta Smith bring to the nickel position that’s different from the first four games or Jordan Clark last year?

“He’s obviously a little bit bigger physically than Jordan (Clark) was, but the experience he has playing in big games and big moments, the understanding, he knows a lot of defense. He has experience playing all different types of defense, and so he knows the type of techniques you’ve got to play with. He’s aware of what things can hurt certain calls and coverages, so he can play faster than a guy who’s still trying to figure out exactly what the coach wants out of this play call or this defense. It’s great to have him out here. He’s a really good football player. He’s a talented football player. He plays the game fast and plays with velocity.” 

How do you simplify the defensive playbook, but not do less?

“It’s spending time, more than anything, making sure your players understand what is being asked of them and how they can get it done. I always say you’ve got to know what you’re doing. You’ve got to know why you’re doing it, and you’ve got to know how to get it done. I think that’s what we spend a lot of time as coaches saying, OK, let’s decide what is going to be our game plan. Do we need to shrink it to two calls? Or can we continue to have this philosophy in what we’re doing? OK, how can we make sure that our players know the intricate details that each call is having? 

“And so, not getting too much into it, maybe the types of defenses weren’t that much different, but how we played them were simplified. Maybe less checks, maybe less versions of playing this type of defense were simplified so they understood, OK, you can play Cover 3 five different ways, or you can play Cover 3 one or two different ways. I think that’s maybe how you saw us simplify.” 

You said the offense isn’t perfect, but it looks pretty close. How creative do you want the system to be without getting away from feeding Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price?

“You see that fourth-and-two turnover on downs, and the first drive of the second half, we’ve got to get that fixed. We’ve got to get that one fixed. If we would have got that one and scored that drive, we would have scored on every drive, except for the last one. Then I would have said it was probably close to perfect, but it wasn’t. 

“We’ve got to know what our strengths are. And our strengths is the ability to hand the ball off to 4 and 24, let our O-line grind it and get bodies on bodies. Or, you know what, if you’re going to put an extra guy in the box, we have to be able to go over top. We have to be able to take free access if you’re going to give it to us, give it to our quarterback and we do that.

“We can’t get crazy. You know what I mean? Let’s do what we do really, really well. Now, we can hide it with some window dressing. We can shift. We can motion. We can give you a little eye candy is how we like to call it, give the defense a little eye candy and still run that same play and that’s the creative side that we’ll continue to have. You don’t need to be too much more creative than what we’re doing right now.”

How far ahead of the game is CJ for his experience level?

“To be – this is his fifth game coming up. To be where he’s at, it’s rare. It’s rare to be a second-year college football player playing in your fifth game and performing at a level he’s performing at. It’s rare, but I think CJ Carr is rare. 

“He’s got great talent. He’s blessed with great talent. He has this unique trait that very few people have that he is a – I said this after the game – a competitive, selfless individual. It’s not about CJ Carr. He’s not so competitive that I want to be able to throw for this amount. It’s like whatever we’ve got to do to win, if I’ve got to motivate, if I’ve got to put my head down and run, if I’ve got to throw the ball, whatever it takes to win, he has that trait. He hates to lose.

“Then he prepares. He’s mature in the way he prepares. Now, that could come from dad. That could come from – maybe it’s mom. Mom’s dad was – he was a coach and grandfather was a coach. But he prepares in a way that is really leading to improvement and really good results on Saturdays.”

You mentioned celebrating success but being honest about failures. What were some of the hidden failures that didn’t show up on the scoreboard?

“I’ll start with defense. We have to eliminate some of those explosive runs, right, and execute exactly on every play what we do in practice, like perfectly, so that the quarterback can’t keep the run. 

“On both offense and defense, there was one or two plays where one guy got the wrong signal for some reason, right? The signal – we’ve got to be very intentional with how to hide signals and things like that. It’s just a game of college football. We’ve got to be so dialed in. We know what the right signal is. We missed a couple signals on both sides of the ball that we can’t have. 

“We’ve got to protect our quarterback, right? I don’t ever want to see that quarterback on the ground. There were one or two times he was on the ground, so there’s always room for improvement. We’ve got to enhance the things we’re doing well, but dive into those things that we didn’t perform perfectly and make them better.”

Looking at Boise State’s running back depth, how do they impact the dynamic of your defense?

“We always want to stop the run. It’s going to be another great challenge this week. They’ve got a few running backs. They’ve got a running back by committee. They’ve got some guys that can take it the distance. They’re going to keep fresh guys in there and make you stop the run. We have to understand that. We can’t always just put an extra guy in the box and blitz and do those types of things because you’ve got to protect against the pass, too. We’ve got to be gap sound. We’ve got to be aggressive, and we’ve got to tackle well because these running backs, if you miss them, they’ll go the distance.”