Pitt Coach / Player Quotes
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Pittsburgh Head Coach Dave Wannstedt
Opening Statement:
“I’ll tell you exactly what I told the players. I don’t believe we are as bad of a football team as we have showed the past two weeks. But, and it’s as big but, we are what we are right now. We haven’t given ourselves a chance to show what kind of team we are or what kind of team we can be. I have been on one-win teams in college and in the NFL and been on undefeated teams in college and Super Bowl teams. We doing everything in practice that championship teams do. Our kids are working as hard as any team that I’ve been on. When we get into games, especially early on, we haven’t been able to keep it together. I wish I could give you a reason why.”
On his team’s defensive performance:
“I think tonight was the first night that we missed some tackles. Tonight we missed tackles and didn’t get off of blocks. Was it us missing or was it their speed? It was probably a combination of both. I don’t know why we can’t come up with a turnover. We are struggling to come up with one. The only one we got tonight (was on special teams). We got our hands on some balls out there today, but didn’t come up with any.”
On the onside kick on the opening kickoff:
“That’s a play you have all seen us use. We are four out of five on that. We work on that 10 times a week. It is one of the best things we do. I haven’t seen a team (like Virginia) in a long time set up their return people 15 yards off the ball. If there was ever was an opportunity to make that play it was tonight. We discussed it all week. We worked on it all week. Our players were excited about doing it. We missed the kick and they touch it before it goes 10 yards. That’s what happened. I thought it would be an way for us to steal a possession.”
On Jameel Sewell:
“He is a great athlete. He is playing with a lot of confidence now. A year ago at this time, he probably didn’t look like he did tonight. With confidence and experience, which he has now, he is making some plays.”
On Virginia’s fake field goal:
“We have been on both sides of the coin on those. My philosophy is we have to stop them. It is our responsibility to stop them. If somebody wants to throw the ball on the last play, then throw it. We should sack them or intercept it.”
On getting down early in the game:
“I thought once we got through that initial storm in the beginning that we settled down. I thought after halftime we were going to come out and our defense was ready to play and we just got worn down. Same old deal. They had 40-some plays to our 20-some in the first half. I’m not sure exactly how many plays our defense played tonight, but I guarantee it was a ton.”
Pittsburgh Player Quotes
Chris Vangas, senior center
“We have to first play better, come to practice working hard, and be positive about everything. If I get down on myself then the whole team is going to look at that and see that I’m down. I’ve got to stay positive, work hard every day and try to get back and get a win. I’ve got to just to play better and show myself on the field and be a leader out there.
“I don’t think we’re going to quit because we worked too hard in the off season. The last two games, I know it’s not saying much, but we didn’t really give up toward the end and I don’t think we are going to give up on the season. It’s still a long season; there are a lot of games to go. We’ve just got to come out and practice hard and keep on working.”
On what went wrong
“It was penalties and we just aren’t executing. We have good practices. We come out in the game, we’ve just got to play better and execute better. We’re killing ourselves; we’re beating ourselves. We get behind early and we have to play catch-up the rest of the game. We can’t get into our game plan and it’s tough to do that. We can’t just kill ourselves like we have been.”
Scott McKillop, junior linebacker
On the game-opening onside kick
“We prepared our worst case scenario to be thrust into a position like that. When we’re thrust into bad situations like that that we have to react well. We have to stop the ball and there’s no reason why we can’t be three and out and punt the ball. That’s just a risk that we were willing to take, and it didn’t pan out for us. Our defense has got to step up, and I take personal blame for that. I didn’t get our defense prepared; like last week, we were really shell shocked. I think we need to step up and react a lot better.”
“I think it was just a game that the coaches thought about. With film study we noticed a couple of things that they did that we might be able to capitalize on. It’s just a risk factor, and we took it. You lose some; you win some.”
On the defense
“This week and last week, I don’t think our defense came out to play as well as we should have. Last week’s game, we didn’t play as well in the first half. In the second half, we came out and played. We’ve got to be able piece our halves together and play well. This coming week, we’ve got a week of preparation. It starts with myself, middle linebacker, getting everyone set up right. The crowd was definitely a factor and I’ve got to get the calls more clear. I’m going to take blame for it; it’s my fault.”
“Right now, there’s been no finger pointing on our team. We’re sticking together. Coach always wants three things trust, accountability and desire. We’re sticking to that. We’ve got to react and play better as a team special teams, defense, and offense.”
Eric Thatcher, junior defensive back
“I don’t know. It’s a tough situation. We went our there and lost today, but like I say every week, it’s over, we’ve got to move on to next week. Virginia put a spanking on us today, and we’ve just got to step up next week against Navy and come out and play.”
On what went wrong
“It was executing; that’s what they have been doing all game. Virginia executed great all the credit goes to them. They picked us apart. On our end, we have to step up. When we go to the sideline, we’ve got to listen to the coach’s adjustments. We’ve got to go out there and apply them to the field. We can’t take anything away from Virginia; they came out ready to play. They were fired up; the crowd was too. They played right off of that crowd.”
On third downs
“We’re just not executing. Maybe I didn’t knock a ball down, or I didn’t get a pick that I could have gotten or something like that. It’s nothing with our defense; it’s just individuals not executing. All eleven of us out there on defense, we’ve got to step up, including me.”