Connect with us

Football

Notes on Mike Gundy’s Pre-Texas Tech Press Conference

Mike Gundy’s weekly press conference was full of gems.

Published

on

Mike Gundy talked Texas Tech, his stint as special teams coach and why they don’t want to run Taylor Cornelius as much as they did on Saturday for the remainder of the season.

• “The postgame conference was pretty ackrut.”

• Said Tech looks to be “the same Tech that’s been around forever.” They have a young quarterback that’s come along. He’s a really good player, and “this league will be disappointed to see him for 3-4 years …”

• Thinks his team bounced back well at practice on Sunday night. “I see a chemistry that’s being created among the leaders.” Leadership should help the younger players help the importance of preparation.

• Gundy talking about Cornelius is literally the same thing every week — “good demeanor, mature, older, tough.” He’s done “pretty good on the first 2-3 holes on the (golf) course.” Thinks he’s developing into being a pretty good college QB.

• “Corndog doesn’t talk a lot.” Said that’s good because “we do have a lot of players who talk a lot.”

• Doesn’t celebrate birthdays on the team. Becomes a bit of a distraction.

• Said Jarrick Bernard is unusual in that he’s getting run on the defensive side and special teams as a true freshman. “He comes from a really good background.” Said it’s advantageous for OSU to have him out there.

• Said there’s an advantage to anyone coming in in the spring. “They learn how to handle all the stress physically and mentally of being a college football player.”

• Took over punt return for the last week — I think he was kidding (maybe?) — “we’ve come up with really good plans, and the players have bought into it.”

• Likes what defensive staff came up with. Things “we haven’t really seen here.” Mentioned guys on defense that have a lot of versatility.

• Noted different styles of offense and the challenge that creates in the Big 12. Said he wants to evaluate overall (and specifically with Jim Knowles) after about six or seven games. He hasn’t seen at practice what he saw on Saturday from Knowles.

• Pleased with the tackling on Saturday. They’ll be in space a lot against Tech a lot, though.

• OL was better in the second half. “Not very good in the first half.” Popping backs through in the second half. Said they’ll have to improve each week at run blocking. “It’ll have to.” Has the group they’re rolling with.

• On Mason Fine (North Texas QB): “We liked him. He is a great illustration of a really quality and productive player who gets overlooked because of his size.” Sometimes perspective is lost when you’re smaller because everyone is trying to project.

• Gave a short FAQ on how high school stats affect recruiting. “We don’t pay a lot of attention to numbers.”

• Said Tylan was “mature, physical and things didn’t bother him.” New players have a hard time maintaining where they’re supposed to be when they get into college. Everything affects them.

• OSU has 18 more real football practices this season. Weird.

• “Thursday (at practice) you’re in PJs.”

• It’s hard to play catch up when you only have 18 practices left for the rest of the year. Noted the importance of prepping for the season in the offseason.

• Mike Leach is the only one still running the true spread. Everybody else has combined it with different variations of other offenses.

• “We brought the inverted wishbone back.” Said OSU lays claim to that. The diamond! “I don’t think prior to us doing that that anyone else was doing it.”

• Married Dana’s passing stuff to OSU’s rushing stuff and play action.

• Wondered “every day” for two years whether Brailford would be healthy enough to contribute in his early days at OSU. “We’d certainly like to keep him healthy. I think he’s a really good player.”

• LC (Greenwood) has had nagging injuries. Tough to play guys who don’t practice. Braden and LC are the guys behind 13, 1, 17, 2 and Wolf. Next two are Braydon Johnson and LC. Said they’ll have to play. “We’re getting to the point in the season where you get into track meets. We’re going to need some guys.”

• Said it’s pretty easy to tell who cares and who’s engaged in the program. If guys come running into a 1:30 meeting at 1:29 after watching SpongeBob in the locker room, “How important is it to them?”

• They used to start practices over when Pat Jones was the coach because there weren’t time limits. Sometimes they’d be an hour in!

• One of their program’s core values is focus.

• Thought OSU was really physical up front on defense on Saturday. Also went to his offensive staff and said to watch Boise if they wanted to see how to run block. Point was that he was concerned at how effective Boise’s OL was and his defense’s physicality “shocked” him.

• On Dru Brown: “He is the backup quarterback, and he is getting those reps. That’s been going on for a number of weeks. Every day he gets better …”

• Had to run Corndog too much on Saturday. “It was there so we used it.”

• Thought Sinor was going to punt on Saturday, but he didn’t go out there. Asked him if he’s still a college football player. ?

• “They could have been pen pals on Facebook,” is a phrase that was used about his special teams coaches. Feels bad for them and for Yurcich. “They have to listen to all the dumb ideas I have.”

• Likes bringing in coaches who have worked for people who have values that Gundy can leverage (borrow) to make OSU better as a program. Smart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPYoAdbVBDI

Most Read

Copyright © 2011- 2023 White Maple Media