Ed Orgeron Weekly Press Conference

OPENING COMMENTS

Obviously we looked at the Florida tape and graded it. We were really pleased with the play of our quarterback. He’s made a lot of improvements. We’re doing some things that he can do.  We’re really pleased with the deep ball and some of his decisions that he is making.  Mike Wallace is probably the most improved player on our team. The bomb at the end was a great play. It is great to see him on offense.  Michael Hicks, Shay Hodge and those guys are really impressive as far as wide receivers. I thought it was going to be a weakness going into the season on offense has turned out to be a strength, so we are pleased with that. On defense, we held them at some key situations. We were again not pleased with our tackling.  Too many yards rushing on us, but I thought John (Thompson) called a good game and held a very powerful offense.  We still need some improvement obviously on our kickoff team. We are still going to make adjustments there and continue doing the best we can we just don’t have the kicking ability to kick it down the field like we want right now. 

Moving on, today is going to be a Monday for us. We are going to deal with Florida the way we deal with the rest of our teams, and we are going to move on to Georgia, who is a very good football team. We came very close to Georgia last year. We made some good plays, but it looks like they are a much better football team this year. Watching on TV Saturday night, it looked like the speed of the game between Georgia and Alabama was a little bit different than what we saw last year.  Obviously, Matthew Stafford has 845 yards passing, six TDs, three interceptions and looks like he is throwing the ball better.  The guy I am impressed with is running back (Knowshon) Moreno. He plays hard. He is quick. They throw screens to their backs.  They are a good screen team. We have not done very well on the screen this year, so we have our work cut out for us on defense. They are similar to what we have been seeing, zone blitz team, another team that is very very fast.

Q: Talk about seeing more of a conventional offense with two running backs.

A: It is going to be good to see two backs in there, and they are two very good backs that we are looking at. It kind of fits in to what we do.  They changed their offensive coordinator. It’s a different play call from last year. It’s a little bit more complex, a little bit more training and a little bit more different personnel groupings.  So there is some work cut out for us. It is going to be good going against some 21 personnel.

Q: What is the difference in Mike Wallace?

A: Confidence. He went out there and made a couple plays. Mike’s always been fast, with the ability to catch the ball. Since he’s gotten here, he has gotten bigger and stronger, and now he’s gotten some confidence about him. He clearly outran their defenders.

Q: Were you better on assignments?

A: A lot better. We made mistakes but it was nowhere near the amount of assignment busts against Vanderbilt.  Our coaches simplified a lot of things, and we got back to fundamental work and we are little bit better. 

Q: Is that the first time Seth Adams has given you the vertical game?

A: We threw a couple deep balls against Vanderbilt and had some success and gave us some confidence. Everybody has been packing the box on BenJarvus (Green-Ellis), so we are using a couple plays to get our guys deeper. He is doing a good job of it.

Q: Talk about how the receivers and how they have come along.

A: We changed wide receivers coach. Coach (Hugh) Freeze is doing it, and he has done a good job for me.  He is an excellent coach, has a lot of experience. He has worked a lot of drills with them catching the ball. He gives them a lot of confidence. Plus last year those guys went into the season with out a lot of snaps. Most all of them got a bunch of snaps last year, so they are more experienced this year.

Q: Are you more dangerous when you have more balance on offense?

A: Yes, I would like to be 50/50. There is no doubt anytime we can run the ball and any time that BenJarvus can get a 100 yards rushing, we can have some success. Bruce Hall looked very good in the game. We can play him more, and the more balanced we are the more success we are going to have.

Q: Were you better at linebacker?

A: We did OK. Jamie Phillips did about the best he could, but just sometimes we just get bulled over. We just aren’t physical enough, and a lot of times with Tebow we get wrapped up and they just ran us over. So we need to get bigger, more physical guys. And Chris (Strong) is not ready yet. He is too heavy. He made a couple of plays. Tony (Fein) is inexperienced. He made a couple of good plays. You can just see our inexperience out there.  I watched the Georgia film from last year with Rory (Johnson) and Patrick (Willis), and it is just a different type of football player out there right now. They’re just not at that stage.

Q: Is Georgia more physical on offense this year?

A: I think they have some concerns with their offensive line, because they’re young but they’re big and physical. But Knowshon Moreno is a hard running powerful back. He gives excellent effort. They have good schemes up front. They’re fullback is an excellent blocker. But this guy will make you miss. He has tremendous balance. He looks like he has great lower leg strength. He’ll be one of the best backs we see this year. 

Q: How difficult is it to achieve consistency?

A: You have to have players that have played in this position for a while to be consistent. Our linebackers are learning on the run. Cassius Vaughn is learning on the run. This is all new to him.  I think you can see that our offense is a little more consistent. Those guys have players with experience. On defense we are very inexperienced.  Our defensive line has played with experience. A guy like Greg Hardy makes tackles. He rarely ever misses tackles. Peria Jerry rarely misses tackles. Guys out there for the first time are missing plays and missing tackles, so we have to gain experience. We’re very inexperienced in the back seven.

Q: What has been your impressions of Cassius Vaughn?

A: He is alright. The biggest thing that we did, the difference in the Florida game and Missouri game, is we didn’t give up the deep ball. That is the basis of our defense. We did a better job of that against Florida. We didn’t get beat deep.

Q: Is there chemistry in the passing game?

A: I think there is chemistry there and protection from the offensive linemen. There were two sacks. We broke down twice. We are disappointed about that, but I think there was time for Seth. He is a smart player. I think that the receivers believe in him. I think Seth is going to run the offense. He is going to do almost exactly like he is coached to do. He is going to understand his reads. I think those are the things you are doing this year.

Q: Talk about Michael Hicks.

A: He has always struggled with being a big wide receiver or a little tight end. He is a little in between. We are just using him a little better this year, and I think he has improved on his catching ability. Last year he missed a couple balls right in his hands. Again, more confidence the more times he is on the field.

Q: How big a part does last year’s game play in preparation for this year?

A: I think that we have confidence in the way we played last week. We are getting better. It’s a new team. We could refer to last year’s game, but I don’t think it does us any good. And I think I need to be really careful of that. We were playing Georgia at home. They look like a much improved team to me. I hope we can take them by surprise for sure. I think last year we took them for a little surprise, and we had some success in the special teams. I think we are looking at a different team. I think our team will have some confidence going into the game with a lot of respect for Georgia playing them at home.

Q: Are you surprised by Adams’ success and Green-Ellis’ struggles this year?

A: That’s why you play the game. There have been a couple things happen that we didn’t expect, but that’s football. I’m happy to see Seth have some success. I’m not happy about the other one. But when we get it both together, we’ll have a very good offense.

Q: Was there anything you saw that made you believe Seth Adams could have this success?

A: Toughness. All the things we thought he had, just being around him, the intangibles. He is showing it. He came out recruiting with us after the game. He was smiling. We were behind in the game, and we challenged him to get down the field. He said, Coach, this is where I want to be.’ He has those qualities about him in a quarterback. He wants to be our quarterback. He’s very confident in his abilities.

Q: How important is motion in playing the game?

A: It always is, especially when you are not living up to your potential. So you need to dig into that aspect of the game, but you can’t look for that every week.  But what we have to do is stoke the fire. We have to keep it burning. That was a different team last Saturday than the previous three weeks, so what we need to do is keep the fire burning, stoke it, keep challenging the guys, and continue to build on what we started last week.

Q: Talk about Dustin Mouzon.

A: Really consistent and becoming a leader on our football team. I think Coach (Chris) Rippon came up with a couple of different wrinkles. With him being from Syracuse and playing the option all those years, we came up with a couple different wrinkles how to defend their speed option. You saw Dustin make those plays in the backfield, and you have to give Coach Rippon that credit. He came up with those schemes and it was an excellent scheme.

Q: Talk about Jamie Phillips.

A: He walked on in the spring. We didn’t anticipate losing Rory (Johnson). From the first year, we signed a lot of linebackers and not many of those guys made it. And because of that, and losing Rory, plus he was here in the spring. If some of these linebackers would have been here in the spring, they would have more experience and played more, but they can’t learn our defense in two weeks. It’s too hard.

Q: Do the players get more excited on the road?

A: Just looking at it, I get more excited playing Florida, Georgia, Alabama, LSU. I guess it just comes from the head coach. I love playing those games. Our guys do to, and hopefully that continues on. We don’t need to only be excited to play, we need to win and we need to go play well on the road. And I know it’s going to be a hostile environment. We haven’t won a road game in the SEC, but we are very close. So we are going to go after it and find ways to dig in and win.  I’m not so concerned about working on Georgia right now. I’m more concerned with building my team, building my team’s confidence, get better at the fundamentals and get ready to go play another play.

Q: How frustrating is kickoffs?

A: Yes, it’s really disappointing. We try and try new things, and we’ll try and try again. We have another practice on Monday, and last Monday, we practiced it three times. We’re doing things but we’re still not doing them right, and we still can’t get the kick right. I think Chris (Rippon) did a good job of adjusting to use the squib kick. I don’t know where they started, maybe the 38. For us, that’s great field position.

Q: Any update on Jonathan Cornell and Dexter McCluster?

A: Cornel is not going to play. I think its going to be a ways away. I think Dexter is going to the doctor again today. He wants to play, but I don’t know what’s going to happen. 

Q: How do you improve in punt returns?

A: The games have been where we needed to block the punt. We felt that we could have converted a couple of times. We are going to focus on blocking punts. We had a couple returns, but where they were punting the ball, we thought we could block the punt and change the game so that is what we’ve been focusing on.

Q: How frustrated is BenJarvus Green-Ellis?

A: Obviously, he is a little frustrated. Ben is not a selfish guy. He is a team guy. He didn’t practice much last week, and he is a little tentative in the game. I think you’re going to see a better BenJarvus this week. We got a lot of football left and he has a lot of carries left, but as far as him showing his own personal side, you’ll never see that about BenJarvus. It’s team first for him.

Q: Were you surprised at how Brent Schaffer has stepped up in meetings?

A: He’s been fine. Brent is a senior. We were playing Florida, and it was an emotional game for him and he wanted to win. He is about as good as we can expect him to be. I think you’re seeing a changed Brent Schaeffer, a team guy and doing some things he needs to do. I expect him to continue that.

Q: What will happen when you finally get the big win?

A: I think it’s going to give us some confidence, and hopefully it spills over. You just keep on pounding the rock. It’s going to break. You can’t quit swinging the sledge hammer. You just keep on pounding the rock. That’s our motto for this year. Just keep on pounding the rock, and eventually it is going to break. We’re just going to keep on doing it, and I know our guys are looking forward to seeing our team today. I am looking forward to showing them the film and looking forward to moving on to Georgia.

The University of Mississippi Athletics

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