Notes on Mike Gundy’s Texas Press Conference

I was there. It was awesome. I watched it again. It was even more awesome. Let’s jump in.

• Gundy opened by saying that he had the same speech whether OSU won or lost.

• “We couldn’t convert short yardage, couldn’t kick field goals, weren’t very good at kickoffs.”

• I love it when Gundy asks his media relations folks questions and expects answers to sometimes obscure questions like who the Ray Guy Award finalists were last year. Amazing.

• “I told the team in there it was the best defensive play that I’ve seen in a long time.”

• Said he knew Ramon would make the catch at the end. I’m not sure any of the rest of us did. ?

• Talked to Sam Ehlinger after the game and told him he was upset the game ended that way.

• “We lose the toss. We lose more tosses, pregame and overtime than anybody in college football. We’ve had seven games this year; we’ve lost six tosses and an overtime. So that pretty much told me to stay out of Las Vegas and quit playing cards, from here on out.”

• Loved A.J. Green’s effort in OT despite getting pass interference. “He’s a freshman, he’s going up, he’s fighting for his life, he’s in overtime.”

• “We’re going to shower as fast as we can and pack up and get on the bus and get on the plane before somebody changes their mind, and we have to play again.”

• Said Texas has smart coaches and knows OSU is down a couple of linemen.

• Texas flipped its defense after the first quarter.

• “We’re in two fourth downs … everybody is screaming at the TV back home, why is Coach Gundy not going for it? Well, because we got a couple of linemen down, we hadn’t been able to get a yard anyway why would we be able to get a yard if they know it’s fourth and 1?”

• Debated going for it on 4th down in OT.

• Said a lot of what OSU did was self-inflicted — drops and FG miss.

• “The offensive guys know that I like ’em, but we stunk in the adjustments we made in the throwing game, period.”

• Said there are holes in the Texas defense and Oklahoma State couldn’t find them.

• Part of that was because of personnel (specifically the OL), but the adjustments were not good.

• Said he doesn’t talk to or hang around kickers. “I don’t want kickers to ever start to affect my mental process, so I stay as far away from those guys as I can, because I’ve never understood them. I don’t know what makes ’em tick.”

• Noted that they have to keep Ammendola in the game because “he may have to kick another one.”

• Didn’t think Mason was off. The other team was on and “we didn’t adjust very good. Our coaching on offense has got to be better than that. I’ve done that, too, I’m not throwing Yurcich under the bus, or all those cats. I’ve done it. I’ve made mistakes.”

• Pointed at fumbles and inability to score in the red zone as things that exacerbated the issues.

• Liked that Ehlinger was rolling but going backwards on the final play.

• “When we don’t adjust on offense, I don’t breathe very good. So I was potentially — potentially on a respirator at that particular time.”

• On Ramon: “Good things happen to guys that do the right thing all the time.”

• Said they won because of culture.

•  “Backs against the wall and 95,000 people here, how much does this place hold?” Another question for media relations. “It’s a fish store. It’s 120,000 people here! It’s like Soldier Field in the 60s, playing the City Championship in high school. There are 125,000 people here, and our backs are against the wall, and he made a play. It’s great for (Ramon); I’m sure all of his people are here.”

• Did he watch the FG in OT? “I’m usually still bitching and complaining about not getting it on third down. Honestly, I don’t watch anymore. I just watch our sideline.”

• Said it’s always been “offense saved us.” Wasn’t the case on Saturday. “So the defense, played their ass off, period, and won the damn game, and that’s what you take from it. Okay, the offense stumbled over their own feet, couldn’t make a play and the defense did.”

• Mentioned field position as a big factor in the game.

• Said OSU got 150 yards “but we had probably 80 carries.”

• “1.3 per rush? There is no way anybody could have convinced me that we would have been able to accomplish that.”

• Said it was a drag for an offensive guy like himself.

• An all-timer here: “I’ll buy drinks for everybody in here right now. Got no problem with that. I just told Holder I needed a raise. That will be good for our relationship, won’t it? And you know what he said? “You get one!” You’ve got to pin him down on it, because he won’t remember that. I’d buy drinks for everybody in here, too!”

• Didn’t dance because this is becoming routine. Guys who have one or two years left have never lost at Texas. “They’ve gotten so used to winning they don’t even ask me to dance.”

• Compared it to the 2008 Missouri game. Or agreed with Bill Haisten’s comparison.

• Looked at Mark Cooper: “I’m thinking about trying you out (on the OL), looking at you sitting over there, we might need to get you some cleats. We’re down to the bare minimum, I’ll put it that way.”

• “I originally thought Lundblade was going to be a six-week guy, and I think he will give us something this week. I don’t know for sure, we’ll see how he holds up. But it’s definitely thin over there.”

• Teams in the future are going to copy TCU and Texas.

• Thought Texas’ defense was in punt formation at times on defense because their safeties were so deep.

• On what he was thinking about the long sideline play for UT: “Shit! That’s what I said to myself when it happened. And let me give you an example of — No. 4 took a play off. He’s a freshmen, No. 8 is a freshmen. They get tired, they took a play off, and that kid is a good player. He stayed in bounds and ran and made a play.”

• Why didn’t they challenge it? “The reason we didn’t call timeout and try to review it, he’s wearing white shoes, it’s white line, it was close, whether his foot was like this or that, you couldn’t tell, so inconclusive, they’re going to say it’s okay and let it go, and quite honestly, the kid made a really good play. It probably should stand anyway.”