Dan Lanning: "We didn't finish the game."

Monday evening Dan Lanning met with media to talk about his upcoming game with Rutgers. Of course he was asked a few more follow-up questions on the loss to Indiana.

Here are his top comments and the video included below.

Opening Comments:

“We’ve got a great opportunity in front of us to go play a team in Rutgers that does a lot of things that really challenge you. Coach Schiano is a guy that I’ve got tremendous respect for. His name speaks for itself, what he’s been able to do over the years, his teams. When you watch them play, they play with a brand of toughness, and they challenge you in a lot of ways. Obviously, he has a history in special teams of being very aggressive when it comes to pump block, but you see it in all phases.

You see it on defense. They’re in your grill. They play tight coverage. You see offensively, they got real weapons outside. A wide receiver, one of the better running backs, if not one of the best running backs we’ve seen this year in the way they’re playing right now. So it’ll be a really fun challenge for us. Our guys came to work today and excited to see them get back out there on the field.

On the team’s response:

“Yeah, just that, you know, guys ready to go attack it. You know, that nobody was satisfied with the result on Saturday. And there’s a lot of pieces that could have been better, but, guys ready to go attack it. You know, that nobody was satisfied with the result on Saturday. And there’s a lot of pieces that could have been better, but these guys came to work today.

On Dante Moore’s response:

Yeah, I think he’s handled it the right way. You know, everybody looks internally and then goes back and says, okay, what could I have improved on? What could I have done better? And I think he saw a lot of right way. Everybody looks internally and then goes back and says, okay, what can I have improved on? What can I have done better? And I think he saw a lot of moments in that game that he could have played to a higher degree, and what he’s capable of.

He’s proven that he’s a good quarterback and he didn’t play to his best on Saturday. He knows that. We didn’t put him in the most advantageous situations on Saturday as well, but he came in today and attacked it really well.”

On Making Improvements:

“Well, I don’t think you look at that game and say everything was broken either, right? So it’s not like we’re a team that has a million, we lost to a really good team. We’re tied in the fourth quarter. We didn’t finish the game. Did we play our best game? No, we didn’t play our best game in the first half, but what success looked like, it looks like improvement. It looks like us getting better, not making the same mistakes we made in that last game, doing a better job identifying what’s working for us and what’s not as coaches, right? And doing a good job of leaning in on what’s working for us and then having good answers for what the opponent’s doing.”

On Jordon Davison’s Increased Role:

“Yeah, I think he’s earned those opportunities. He did a good job at times. There were some runs that were really successful for us on Saturday, and there were some runs that weren’t. And that’s, you know, scheme-related, but it’s also, you know, the way some of our backs do a certain good job at certain runs and some of the runs that Jordan does a really good job at showed up for us on Saturday.

In terms of the things that Dante could have done better and looking back at it then what were some of those things were those things that he just missed and didn’t see at the time or those things that Indiana was doing defensively to kind of mess with what his reads might have been? Probably a combination of both, right? But we got off of some of our initial reads a little too quick at times. Didn’t key through the things that we’re supposed to key through at times. The routes weren’t always ran in the right place, right? So the guy that he’s supposed to be throwing the ball to and he’s expecting to be in a certain spot wasn’t where they needed to be.

So it’s always easy to say, oh, that’s the quarterback or the call, right? The wide outs need to be throwing the ball to and he’s expecting to be in a certain spot wasn’t where they needed to be so it’s always easy to say oh that’s the quarterback or the call right the the wideouts need to be in location where they’re supposed to be at the moment right when he’s looking to deliver the ball and so all those things add up and those are things we’ll sharpen up.”

On the Coaching Landscape:

“Yeah, it’s just, that’s, that’s the business that we’re in. You know, it’s a heavy pressure position.
There’s high expectations. Fan bases want to win. They expect that, you know, there They expect that. There’s some really good coaches that it’s really about what have you done lately, and that’s college football, and that’s the world we live in. So it is what it is, right? There’s not a lot that you can say about it other than go do your job and try your best to go win games.”