UT coordinators talk USC

Texas offensive and defensive coordinators were made available yesterday. Thoughts post-SJSU, and looking forward to the big challenge in Los Angeles.

Todd Orlando, UT DC

On how USC compares to Florida State and Oklahoma: It’s up there. Everybody on that field, skill wise, is fast. Sometimes you say you can measure a guy at 4.5, and they legitimately have guys that are 10.3 100-meter guys. I they I think they do a great job. Sam (Darnold) does a great job of distributing the football and getting guys in space. If you make one mistake they’re down the sideline. That’s what makes them, when you watch them on tape, very difficult to defend. Defensively, there’s going to be times you do make mistakes and they really make you pay for them. He’ll find the open guy if you bust in the back end. If you give (Ronald) Jones a little crease or (Stephen) Carr a little crease. It’s not one of those, run them down for an 18-yard gain. It’s block right or block left because they’re kicking an extra point. That’s the part of this offense that’s going to be hard to defend.

On the pass rush: It’s a little disappointing, in my opinion. I believe we have two sacks right now and one was towards the tail end of last week’s game. It’s been addressed. Tackles for loss have been down too. In this package it should be a lot higher than what it is. It’s not like we’re sitting there and playing base stuff. We’re trying to move guys around. It’s been addressed and it’s got to pick up. It’s the way this package runs. We get people in second and long and get them into third and long. We’ve addressed it and to me it’s just technique and fundamentals. Just finishing plays when we have a chance to.

On how to boost the pass rush: I think there’s some merit to getting some different guys in there. Some guys that have shown they can make plays. It’s just one of those things, it’s like turnovers. How come we don’t have this amount of turnovers? Sometimes it’s you’re just not getting any turnovers. I don’t want to sit here panic off of it, but when I look at those numbers and know what this package is about, in my opinion, we have to pick that up to be able to make this package work.

On how to prevent receivers from getting behind defense: It’s eye discipline. You saw it last week. A couple of guys got behind us. It wasn’t a bust in coverage. It was staring at a quarterback instead of looking at your man. (Darnold) is going to find that one and he is going to put it right on the money. It’s another thing where you get out of this game and you say, ‘ok, you shut them out.’ But from our standpoint we could have played a lot better. There were some things out there that if they convert a couple of those passes we’re talking about then we’ve got a 14-14 ballgame. Who knows after that part? So it’s been addressed.

On if his opinion of his players has changed: I see a lot of guys still pressing. I thought they would just go out there. There’s too many times where it’s ‘I need to make this play or I want to make this play.’ It doesn’t have anything to do with the scheme, not anything to do with the person. You just get into this situation where you want to do well. They’re great kids and they want to please. We played Gary Johnsonquite a bit in San Jose. He’s over on the bench and I’m telling him to calm down. He wants to make every play and it’s like, relax big boy. You’re going to make your plays. Don’t press. To me, just play relaxed. Calm down. Go through your training. That’s the biggest thing we continue to hit these guys with. That’s stuff we teach you in practice. That stuff that we see you do in practice. Just because there’s 80,000 or 100,000 people that are sitting in the stands, you don’t change. It’s the same way that you approach it. That’s the part that we continue to drive into these kids is to say just go out there and do what you’re taught. If they make a play because of something we coached, put it on us. We’re good. But don’t try to press or do something outside of the scheme.

On possibly not blitzing Darnold a lot: It depends. To me, he’s so accurate and crafty with the football. We went back and studied every game from last year and the two games (Darnold) had this year. There has to be a balance of it. If you let him sit back there and just pat the ball he’ll just pick you apart. He’s also a good athlete. I don’t think he gets enough credit for being a good athlete. We’re all so used to wanting to see a 4.5 or 4.6 guy. He’s got guts, I’ll tell you that. He’s not afraid to put his shoulder down and try to run. He’s very impressive. Some of the throws that he made last year, even the throw that he made against Stanford. He trusts his arm and in his opinion he can put the ball wherever he wants to. Most of the time he is right.

On Malik Jefferson playing with Gary Johnson: I would like to see Malik finish a couple of more plays. There’s some plays out there that I think he should be able to do. But he’s been solid. When we put Gary out there I was impressed with his retention of the position. That was something we did in camp and we did the following week when we played Maryland. That part of it is impressive. That is two different types of positions. I’m happy where he’s at right now, but I think me and him, if we were sitting in a room one on one, we want more. I think every week in practice he is trying to do that part. We’re still a work in progress. I think he’s got to take his game to where he can dominant a game. Where we can go four or five plays in a row and he is all over the place. That’s the expectation of a guy with his talent.

On Gary Johnson: His explosiveness and his speed. He was one of those guys that made a couple TFLs out there. He can run with the best of them. It’s really his first game reps going into it. Like I said beforehand, he wants to make every play. Which is great that a player wants to make every play. But at some point you have just got to relax a little bit. I caught him on the bench and just said calm down. The ball will come to you so just do your job. I thought he pressed a little bit. To see him out there, it gives us more speed. Anytime you have more speed, if you do make a mistake or something busts loose, you have the ability to get it on the ground and play another play. That’s going to help you.

On preparing his defense for Darnold’s athleticism: If I’m them, I’m trying not to run him too much. That’s me personally. You see it on film and there will be some designed quarterback runs. They’re normally on critical goal line, red zone stuff or short yardage stuff. Where he’s really good is at moving around the pocket and still being able to keep his head down the field. I think that’s where he’s really good. There was a couple guys that we defend, but not this young. They were normally seniors that could scramble around and do things with it. The part that helps him more than anything else is they’ve got two dynamic backs. If you went into their offices, they’re going to say their offense is predicated on running the football. They come into this saying we’re going to run the ball and then take some shots down the field. Third down, they do their thing. You can go into it saying ‘ok, he is going to sit back there.’ But he is in and out, can keep his head on the run, and can throw the ball in a bucket. It is really impressive.

On Breckyn Hager: He goes extremely hard. He’s physical. He’s tough. He’s playing on our sub-package on third down as a defensive end. You get out of Maryland week, and insanity is playing with the same crew and not changing. We took a look at options. Gary was an option. Breckyn is an option. We’re trying to get different guys in there to really sit in there and say “can these guys give us plays?”

On holding top team’s running attacks: If you call a game, and I think this came into Maryland. If you call a game and it is second and three and they just ran the ball for seven yards then if you are the offensive coordinator it is pretty easy to know what you’re going to do next. As a defensive coordinator you are kind of limited in the stuff that you are going to do. It is not like you’re going to put everybody back and cover people. So then it sets you up that if they want to throw the football, you’re probably not in the best coverage’s you need for the pass game. It is critical for us to get tackles for loss, to make sure that if it is second and nine or second and ten that you get a sense of what they are doing. That is really what happened in San Jose. In San Jose you get into it and they run the football and it is a loss of two and second and twelve. I think that even if you put yourself into some pass coverage and they run the football, maybe gain six, it’s still third and six. It is really, really important to be able to control that stuff. Like I said before, with these guys it’s not like “oh we got a fifteen yard gain.” It’s like shots. Jones can fly. That is the thing that is going to be the key to this game is making sure that they can’t sit there and get us in the second and two and second and three. Its going to be a real long night if so.

On if his playcall changes if his guys are on their heels: Not really. I think being down on the field you get a good sense of how the game is running. You get a good sense of your kids and their energy level. A lot of that is predicated. Then what is going on in the game. The majority of the time that I am on the sidelines it will be simply watching what they are doing. When the series is over with, getting information from the guys up in the box formationally what they are doing. Then putting all that stuff into my brain and then looking at a sheet to say, “Okay, this is what we call. This is what we do.” So all that stuff gets processed. Normally through a game guys stay with what they want to run. A coordinator will come in and game plan, just like a defensive coordinator will game plan. They stay true to their course. As a play caller you just take all of that information in and say to yourself what you need to do. Do we need to rev our guys up and start to try to create stuff for them? Or do we need to, this game, they are doing this with this formation. So there is a lot of stuff going on. I think it is a big feel deal. A lot of us that coordinate, and I think it is the same with offensive coordinators, you can’t come in and it isn’t a video game like “this is the stuff that you do and we stay the course.” Every play and everything that you constantly do constantly changes your approach to calling it. That is a big feel deal and it is really predicated with what is going on with our players and with what is going on in the game.

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Tim Beck, UT OC

On if he has a quarterback ready for the game: Yeah, I’ve got three of them. Right now, we’re just waiting and seeing what happens. We’re plugging away as scheduled, working hard, putting together a game plan, practicing, and obviously as the week goes on, we’ll have more information.

On Sam Ehlinger: Mostly positive. Went in as a first-year guy. I thought that he was gritty, just like I thought he’d be. He made some key plays at times, kept drives alive, protected himself, took care of the football. He played really hard, played with a lot of emotion. He made some big plays for us, scored on a two minute drives before halftime to give us some momentum. So there were a lot of really good things that he did for his first start. I think that he missed some throws that we needed to make and probably could’ve had a really big day had we made those. I think he knows that. That would probably be the only negative that I’ve really thought about.

On using the middle of the field: It was kind of what they were giving us. [San Jose State] did a lot of things defensively. I thought Sam played well. They pressured us quite a bit, played a lot of different coverages. So, to be able to settle down and say here’s what we’re looking at, here’s what we’ve got, here’s where we want to try and go with the football, I thought he responded well to the in-game adjustments that we were making as that was happening.

On Jerrod Heard: I think you saw first of all, he’s extremely well thought of on this football team by the coaching staff and the players. He always has a smile on his face, I don’t think he ever has a bad day. He’s great to be around. To have him go into a game and have the success that he had kind of lit a fire under everybody — our offensive guys, our defensive guys, coaches. Seeing him back there doing some of that stuff and even Shane and Sam get a kick out of it. It was a bolt of energy for us, and obviously he provided a spark with his feet to be able to do some things that we were unable to do with just having Sam in there.

On his offense’s identity: You’ve got to create offense, you have to find ways to win. You have to be able to gameplan to what you and your staff feels “this is what we need to win the game.” I thought every one of those coaches — Derek Warehime, Drew Mehringer, Stan Drayton, Corby Meekins, all of the Graduate Assistants and the people who help, what a great job of, “hey coach, we need this” or “what about this, did you think of this?” This isn’t a one-man show by any means. To have that group, to be able to sit down and say “here’s what we’ve got,” and I try to decipher through it and say, “okay, what do you guys think?” Takes a long process, it weeds out, but eventually it kind of comes out of the oven smelling really good when we execute like we did. We did a good job of that.

On if Chris Warren needs more touches: I don’t know. I try not to get too caught up in those things. I’m going to do what’s working. I feel like Chris and Kyle (Porter) are interchangeable backs, believe it or not. I think that either one of those guys in the game are going to do whatever we need them to or are asking them to do, so rarely am I sitting there going get so-and-so in for this play. I trust Coach Drayton, he knows. He’s going to put the guys in who he knows. He might say that one guy runs this play better so let’s try to get him in on this play, but that’s entirely up to him.

On the freshman running backs: I thought that they did a great job at the end of the game, they have a bright future. They just have to continue to grow, continue to learn the offense and mature and learn what college football is all about.

On Lorenzo Joe playing: Not necessarily, it’s just trying to keep guys fresh. He can do a lot of things for us, he played quite a few plays, we asked him to do a lot of stuff. We’re running guys in motion, it’s a lot of running. We want to keep guys fresh and play hard, and reward guys who do what we ask them to do on a daily basis.

On OL depth concern: That is a concern. We’ve got a solid group, a core group of 5-7, 8 guys. Other than that, we’re real young and inexperienced. We’ve got to stay healthy there.

On Pat Hudson: Really well. We liked where he was at and where he was going. Another guy who’s got a bright future.

On Reese Leitao: He’s getting better. For a while there, obviously it’s tough getting reps for all of your guys. We’ve gone through attrition there. His role is increasing because of need. He’s a step behind some of the other guys just because he hasn’t had as many reps. Physically, he’s a tough kid, he works really hard. He’s not afraid to throw his face in there, that’s for sure.

On if a QB can take control of the team: That’s a part of it. I think that certainly anybody that could ever do that would have an advantage. But they also need opportunities, Shane has only played one game. Sam’s played one game. So to sit there and try to compare Maryland and San Jose, it’s not fair. In just the way the game transitioned, it being the first game, so on and so forth. We’re progressing, we’re moving forward, we’re seeing how things develop and kind of play it by ear.

On what stands out about USC’s defense: Fast, athletic, as you would expect. Well-coached. I think Coach Pendergast does a really good job with them defensively. They know the defense. They play good team defense. You got to beat them. They aren’t going to give you a lot. We are going to have to execute at a really high level. We have to take care of the football. We have to convert third downs and stay on the field. It’s going to be one of those games that there will be ten to fifteen crucial plays that we will have to make plays when we get to those times.

On what he saw from Kendall Moore and Cade Brewer: I thought both guys played well. Again, you still have a lot of work to go. It is just technique and fundamental work that those guys need. Being young players that weren’t getting as many reps with (Andrew) Beck and (Garrett) Gray getting most of the reps. They are good players, they are going to help us. Obviously they are helping us now. They will continue to do so.

On keeping the USC defense on the field: You say, “do we have to establish the run game,” but we have to get first downs. Whatever that means is whether it’s running or throwing the football, it is whenever those situations apply themselves. I thought we did a better job of eliminating the self-inflicting wounds. There weren’t a lot of penalties or a lot of negative yardage plays. We weren’t sitting there looking at first and twenty, first and fifteen, second and twelve or second and twenty. We weren’t in those situations a lot. We were in second and four. So if you can be in those situations, be it by bootleg or a run, I don’t know that it matters. But it does matter to be in those situations.

On how many plays he scripts to start a game: I have a script of about six to start off. There is probably a list of 12 to 15 that I’m going to get to. In other words there’s an order I usually try to get to. But other than that there are plays I usually try and get to just because I want to see something.

On Reggie Hemphill-Mapps’s second half play: We are still building the culture here. Building our guys inside out. We have to have everyone do things the right way. He has a long career ahead of him. He has to do the right things. He will get his opportunities.

On Collin Johnson: Yes. Some of the past game they played a little clouding the boundary or gave him help over the top. We aren’t going to force it. We are going to take what they give us and try to take advantage of the holes in the defense, wherever those may be. We aren’t going to force throws to people all the time.

On playing Heard without disturbing the offensive continuity: I think you have to be creative with what you’re doing and when you’re doing it. If there is a plan in place and the people involved understand the plan it is not a big issue. Both Sam and Shane are really good with the fact that Jerrod is in the room. There is no resentment, there’s no anger, there’s no ealousy. They want to win too. They know that he brings a little different element to the room, so have at it. They cheer him on. It is a great room. I am really proud of the guys to be able to do that. I’m proud of all of them. It is not an easy situation that all three of them are in at this point.

On if he is uneasy about putting a true freshman in this weekend: If I were uneasy then I wouldn’t play him. He wouldn’t play. Probably the biggest strength in that kid is that. The more you tell him he can’t the more he is going to.