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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Ole Miss Vs. Southern Illinois Postgame Quotes
9/10/2011 | Football
Sept. 10, 2011
Recap | Notes | Photo Gallery 
Postgame Quotes
Head Coach Houston Nutt
Opening Comments:
"There's nothing like winning. Winning is very precious. I am proud to be in the locker room celebrating with these guys. We have to learn how to win. There were a lot of new faces. Without our starting tailbacks it is a lot different and little bit harder. I think Jeff Scott stepped up. He had over 200 all-purpose yards. Devin Thomas and H.R. Greer stepped up. I was really proud of how hard our guys played. Wayne Dorsey got a good interception. Our special teams were good all night, which is what we needed. Southern Illinois is a good team and we knew that coming in. Our guys are getting turnovers and being stingy in the red zone. I am very proud of that. We have to keep working as we turn our heads down and go to the SEC. Preparation is going to be critical and we need all hands on deck. We all know how tough this league is."
On game strategy after the first half:
"I like winning, and that was the whole goal. When you have that many new faces you don't ever know what is going to happen, like when the ball slipped out of Zack Stoudt's hand. I had every intention of playing Nick Parker and some of the younger guys, but we didn't have that opportunity."
On quarterbacks:
"I think that Zack did a good job. They did a lot of stunting and blitzing on us. The one thing that he can do is sit in the pocket and take a hit. His eyes are always focused on the receivers. It takes a really good player to be able to sit in the pocket. You know you are going to get hit, and he can handle that. Randall Mackey has quick feet and he can make things happen. I thought both of them played very well. For not having played recently, Randall did very well. Zack did a good job getting the ball down the field for us. He is an excellent thrower. We would've liked to have had the play where the ball slipped out of his hand back. That happened at a crucial time."
On injured players:
"We don't know how quickly Brandon Bolden and Enrique Davis will get back. We will be using Devin Thomas, Jeff Scott and Chief Brown. Those are our guys because those are the cards we have been dealt."
Ole Miss Players
QB Zack Stoudt
On the first win:
"It was good. It didn't come as clean as we wanted it to. We made a lot of mistakes, but it was great to get the first one and have a celebrating locker room with your teammates."
On the start of SEC play next week:
"SEC week is totally different. It's an entirely different practice and mentality. It's going to be a very serious week of practice. We're going to have to be really focused. We're just looking forward to jumping into the SEC season."
On Jeff Scott:
"He takes a lot of pressure off of you-knowing there's a guy that can make plays like he did tonight. He's good with communication. He knows what he's doing. He can block, he can run, and he can catch. It's helpful to have a guy back there that can do several things to help not just me, but the entire offense."
WR Ja-Mes Logan
On the first win:
"We feel a lot of relief. There's no more pressure. There's a lot of talking, smiling, and laughing. It feels really good to get that first win."
On Jeff Scott:
"It's a lot easier with Jeff Scott back there. We all followed Jeff. He put the team on his back and we just followed."
RB Jeff Scott
On the first win:
"It feels extremely good to get that first win. We've been out for so long. It's been a big disappointment because we knew we were supposed to get the win last week. We just have to keep moving forward, and tonight we went out and did that."
On the offensive line:
"They make my job much easier. I'm already small and quick and sometimes the defense can't see me. When they are on all of their blocks, I can just hit the holes and I'm gone."
On his punt return touchdown:
"It was huge. I didn't expect to return a punt for a touchdown today. I've been watching so much film, and my coaches kept telling me they felt like I could return one. I did."
LB Mike Marry
"We try to believe in the scheme, play every play, and get as many turnovers as we can. We told each other that we had to come back and pick our intensity back up, and get the game sealed."
"We always felt confident but we never got to the place…we try to act like the game is 0-0 and play hard every play. When you think you have the game sealed, that's when they come back to beat you."
"It had been a while since we got a win. We're going to feed off this and take it into SEC play."
DE Wayne Dorsey
On the interception:
"I just saw the quarterback lob it. It popped up into the lights and came right back down to me."
On if he thought he would score:
" I did actually; I looked back to the right and there was nobody coming, and then I looked back to the left and there was a guy diving at my legs. I was kind of upset I didn't score, but I was glad I made the play."
On the blocked pass:
"Coach (Tyrone) Nix and Coach (Terry) Price are always telling me to get my hands up so I can be a difference maker even if I don't get there. It seemed was like I was going to be in a good window to get the pass."
On the difference of play from last year to this year:
It's knowing what to expect. Going into anything the second time you know what to expect and what will happen."
Southern Illinois Head Coach Dale Lennon
On first quarter:
"That's not the start that you want. We gave up 21 points in five minutes, which is a team's worst nightmare. The thing is we did weather through it, and that was good and something that we can build upon. I think the speed affected us to a degree, and it took a while for us to settle in."
On turnovers:
"I think if you minimize the turnovers, we have a better chance. We really did let some scoring opportunities slip away. You have to take care of the football. You can't have four turnovers and expect to be successful against anybody."
On second half play:
"I liked our sideline and chemistry of our player-how they hold together. There were no players getting on each other and being negative. We were able to focus on what we needed to do. With six minutes left we had a shot, but there's still many things we have to learn. Hopefully, we can take a big step here and take it into the next game."
On special teams:
"We knew that they had a couple good kickers going into the game, and we knew they had one of the best return guys in Jeff Scott, so that wasn't something that was lost on us. That punt return for a touchdown was pretty disappointing. We had some guys free down the field but just gave up the containment and he had an easy sprint to the goal line. So it was just little mistakes here and there. They spent a lot of time on our side of the field, and they did a great job kicking the ball."
On defense:
"They were put in many bad situations that you don't want to put your defense in. They came away enough times with success that you can feel good about the things we were doing today. But we wish we had a few more stops in there and more turnovers."
Southern Illinois Players
28 Steve Strother and # 34 Jayson DiManche
On defending Ole Miss:
DiManche: "First we wanted to stop the run, and then we wanted to get after their quarterback like we always do. Our plan is that going into every game. They did a good job blocking us off the end, but we were getting a lot of pressure. There were a couple of times where we made mistakes on our blitzes, and those were opportunities we needed to take advantage of. We need to be better on the assignment part."
On Ole Miss' offense:
DiManche: "The height of their offensive line made it very difficult to see him [Jeff Scott] and their quarterback if he was stepping up. We tried to use their height against them by playing really low and using pass-rush moves where we could get under them. We could've done better with our pass rushing."
On Jeff Scott:
Strother: "He was really quick and we missed a lot of tackles. There were a lot of times we thought we had him wrapped up and he broke out of the tackle. We got in the position to make tackles and we just couldn't do it. We need to work on that and practice our tackling."
On the fourth quarter:
Strother: "It lets us know that we have another quick team with a lot of heart. No matter what, we are going to play until the last play of the game. They jumped on us quick, but we were confident in our offense. We knew we could run and pass the ball. We played our game."