Notable Quotes From Tosh Lupoi Following Oregon's Second Practice of Fall Camp

Oregon’s defense is going through a big transition this year after losing three defensive linemen and its entire secondary from last season. On Thursday, Oregon defensive coordinator Tosh Lupoi met with reporters in Eugene following the second practice of fall camp.

Below are some of his most notable quotes.

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On impressions of true freshman OLB Tobi Haastrup

Lupoi: “Tobi athletically, exactly what we thought. Take a lot of pride in our evaluations, so felt strong of who we were getting there from an athletic standpoint. Tobi’s still new to the game, so sometimes those are the funnest guys to be coachin’. And kind of mold their technique. But I think the guy’s got the right mentality, certainly got the right athleticism. Has a freakish explosive capability and now it’s just directing that in the right technique: where eyes are located pre-snap, going through our keys, our demeanor, our eyes, our post-snap finish. All the important things where we’re doing the right thing.”

On how Jahlil Florence compares to his 2023 form

Lupoi: “It’s constant improvement. Made a great play today. I think he’s bringing back his confidence and it’s been a daily stride to get there. Speaking from experience, when you experience a major injury it is traumatizing. Mentally you overcome that, but you still have the physical aspect that you gotta get over and I think we’re seeing that. He’s letting it rip. He’s going full speed now. Doing some good things for us. Competing his butt off to compete and be a major contributor.”

On what he’s seen from younger players on defensive line from spring to now

Lupoi: “I’m challenging them every day. I’d say out of any group I challenge them most after our first day. To be honest I was a little disappointed in our performance just based off of effort. We’re out there in spiders and we’re gonna play with fundamentals and technique. We’re executing our assignments pretty strong, but I called the D-line out yesterday. Was like ‘We just lost roughly $42 million between three guys up front, as far as their salaries in the National Football League. We’re looking for impact players. We’re looking for guys that have been chomping at the bit to get those reps and this is your opportunity.”

On what he’s seen from Northwestern DB transfer Theran Johnson

Lupoi: “Expectation is being the best version of him. And that’s part of trying to raise his game to the next level and then hopefully that contributes to raising our defense as well to a high level of play. When he came in he was fighting his butt off to finish a degree. A tough degree and did a heck of a job doing that. At times he probably sacrificed some workout time. He’d probably be the first one to admit that. So honestly somebody came in that was thrown into the fire. He came into that unique quarter system entry point where we’d actually done two practices already. So you can imagine getting thrown into our defense at that point. Thought he reacted as best as possible but just getting in shape and then adapting and then mentally in shape as well. What’s obvious now is he’s a lot more confident in his assignments and that’s gonna equate to making more plays. There’s no doubt in my mind he has all the ability to do so.”

On what length in defensive backfield allows him to do differently as a coordinator

Lupoi: “It’s not necessarily a whole bunch of differently, just one what can we do better? But also just fitting our scheme really well. Having five absolutely amazing DBs last season that played their butt off and the tallest guy being 5’10 1/4 and can’t respect more what they did for us. But certainly our system is built around guys with length and of course speed and then short-area quickness and a physical tackler. That’s what we’re looking for. We get all that, then we get guys like Christian Gonzalez that can play at a really high level. So it’s not necessarily doing a whole bunch of new stuff, but what we can do better probably caters to us and maybe getting away from a little bit of smoke and mirrors to possibly hide some matchup issues and things of that nature when we do lack some length and speed.”