Al Groh Postgame Quotes

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Virginia vs. Southern California
Aug. 30, 2008
Coaches’ Quotes

Virginia head coach Al Groh
Opening Statement:
“USC was a big, powerful, fast team with superior quarterback play today. We were anything but big and fast. Our quarterback turned the ball over too many times.”

On USC:
“They are a very good team. We are very impressed with them and the team coach (Pete) Carroll has but the attitude on our team is that it’s not ok to play like that.”

On opening the season against USC:
“We knew what we were opening up with when we scheduled the game. We wanted to take a challenge against a team that is in a league of its own. We knew it was going to take a lot on our part to pull this off. To play as poorly as we played is not acceptable.”

On poor field position throughout the game:
“Field position is the key thing in all football games and when you play a team that is in a league like USC is in, the only chance is to play with advantageous field position. We gave them far too many short fields for us to play against an offense that was obviously going to be very hard to stop.”

On the USC defense:
“They are big, fast veteran players who know how to run their scheme. They were second in the country last year. They are a very talented defense.

On the USC defensive personnel:
“The holes closed awfully fast. Those two linebackers can really run and their safeties play like linebackers. They have all the ingredients to have a great defensive year.”

On the Virginia offense:
“We have got to do better than that. It just wasn’t very good play.”

On how the loss will affect the team heading into next game:
“We’ll see what it brings.”

On Virginia’s overall performance:
“It wouldn’t be right for me or anybody to say that anybody played well today.”