Virginia Head Coach Al Groh Quotes

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Virginia vs. Boston College
Head Coach Al Groh Quotes
November 14, 2009

On Virginia’s performance:
“We made a lot of progress with our team today. I’m proud of the effort the players put into it and the fight they showed. We’ve been working for 10 months to have a performance like that. Unfortunately, though, we did some things that made it difficult on ourselves.”

On special teams play:
“We left 10 special teams points out there today that we could have had. Clearly that would have been the difference in the game. Those kind of points get forgotten but they are the kind of points that change scoreboards. Leaving those points out there had more effect on the game than the final few plays did. “

On the close game:
“The closeness of the game is reflected in the fact that there’s a five-yard differential between the two teams and a two-inch differential at the end of the game. It was an evenly played game. The scoreboard reflects that and the final drive reflects that and it’s important for me, despite the bitterness of the loss, to keep in perspective that very little separated the two teams.”

On QB Jameel Sewell:
“A tremendous effort on his part. Thursday was the only day that Jameel has practiced in the last two weeks. That was brought about by the fact that on Wednesday night, (Backup QB) Mark Verica was ruled out of the game (due to an injury). Under the circumstances, I thought it was one of Jameel’s most courageous and best efforts here at Virginia.”

On close plays:
“They call it a ‘game of inches.’ The Boston College touchdown was close enough to review and so was our last offensive play of the game. So, for probably a total of less than six inches in the entire game, that was the difference in the two teams.”

On the interception and touchdown return by Chris Cook:
“It was a terrific play. It was something we had worked on during the course of the week – that type of situation. He had a really good idea where the ball was going to go and he made an aggressive break on the ball and showed a great deal of skill getting the ball into the end zone.”