Pac-12 Media Day Round-Up, Day 2
Jul 24, 2014; Hollywood, CA, USA; UCLA Bruins quarterback Brett Hundley (second from right) and UCLA Bruins linebacker Eric Kendricks (right) talk to Pac-12 football analyst Rick Neuheisel (second from right) and Curtis Conway (center) during the Pac-12 Media Day at the Studios at Paramount. Mandatory Credit: Kelvin Kuo-USA TODAY Sports
The second and final day of Pac-12 Media Day has come and gone, which means two things: not too long before fall camp starts and it is time for our Pac-12 Media Day Round-Up! On Day 2, coaches and players from Arizona State, Colorado, Oregon State, Stanford, UCLA and Washington joined members of the media to answer questions about what they can expect this coming season. Here are a few tidbits of information from the coaches of these schools and an opening statement from the President of the Pac-12 Network, Lydia Murphy-Stephans. For full transcript of the interviews, click on their names.
Note: UCLA is excluded from this piece as Go Joe Bruin will be bringing you two separate pieces. One will be on Jim Mora and the other on Brett Hundley and Eric Kendricks.
Pac-12 Networks President, Lydia Murphy-Stephans
Jul 24, 2014; Hollywood, CA, USA; Pac-12 Networks President Lydia Murphy-Stephans talks to the media during the Pac-12 Media Day at the Studios at Paramount. Mandatory Credit: Kelvin Kuo-USA TODAY Sports
Media Day on the Pac-12 Network: “This year Pac-12 Football Media Day is being made available to all of our fans live on Pac-12.com. For fans who currently don’t get the Networks, it’s an opportunity to sample our programming and get a feel for the access we have with the coaches and the student-athletes from all 12 of our universities.”
Pac-12 Programming to start the season: “Starting August 5th at Arizona State, Pac-12 Networks will telecast a one-hour show from each campus. As we get close to the first game of the season, we’ll launch our 12 days to kickoff programming by replaying the top Pac-12 games from last season on the 12 days leading up to opening night.”
Pac-12 Network expansion: “That expansion includes the recent availability of the network on all Cox systems nationwide, and Time Warner Cable will be making all seven of our networks available to their customers in the LA area, in the Midwest, and on the East Coast where we know so many of our Pac-12 fans and alumni live.”
Pac-12 going International with YouTube: “On the digital front, I’m thrilled to announce Pac-12 Networks will have international distribution via YouTube this fall. The Pac-12 national network will be the first 24/7 network available on YouTube’s platform. We’ll launch the online subscription service in 27 countries and add more countries throughout the year.”
First time viewer? Thanks!: “For those of you who are sampling the network for the first time today, we hope you enjoy what we have to offer. Thank you all for coming to Pac-12 Football Media Days. This is going to be a great season, and I know that you and the fans will surely enjoy it on the Pac-12 Networks.”
Arizona State
Jul 24, 2014; Hollywood, CA, USA; Arizona State Sun Devils head coach Todd Graham talks to the media during the Pac-12 Media Day at the Studios at Paramount. Mandatory Credit: Kelvin Kuo-USA TODAY Sports
Arizona State were the Pac-12 South Division winners last season, but had a lot of players on the defensive leave the program. Head coach Todd Graham expands on that:
His thoughts on ASU: “This will be the best offensive football team that I’ve ever coached. Probably special teams is the area where I felt like in the spring we could obviously make the most improvement. So I really feel a lot of confidence there. Obviously, most of the questions and stuff we talked about the guys we graduated on defense, and Arizona State, we’re going to play defense. I’ve got a lot of confidence in the speed and the guys that we have coming back and looking forward to this season.”
Special teams: “I think it was our nemesis last year. It was the worst thing we did, the punt game. Then later in the year, our first year, we lost 15 players due to the transition from a standard standpoint that didn’t meet our standard. So it created some holes. So a lot of starters had to play those special teams. We wind up giving up big returns.”
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Sun Devil goals: “It reminds us every day when we talk about National Championship as our goal, we’re not talking about the game. We’re talking about every day, every rep, everything that we do, academically, on the field, off the field. We feel like the team that has the best character in the Conference. It’s the smartest team, the most disciplined team and toughest team will win it.”
On his offense: “We’ve developed this system and adapted it and geared it each year. It’s been one of the most explosive offenses in the country for that long a period of time at several different schools. But our system is designed for our players. It’s very quarterback centered. It requires a guy that’s very disciplined in distributing the ball and doesn’t turn the football over.”
Colorado
Nov 23, 2013; Boulder, CO, USA; Colorado Buffaloes head coach Mike Macintyre in the first quarter against the Southern California Trojans at Folsom Field. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
The Buffaloes made some progress last season under Mike MacIntyre and look to improve on that this fall. Here is what the Colorado head coach had to say:
Adjusting to the job: “When I first went to San Jose State everybody on my staff was brand new. So I had to teach them what the defense wanted, the offensive, special teams they came in with me, so now all we had to do was tweak things. This spring we went through and looked at the strengths of our quarterback, different strengths of our offense, defense, and different things we needed to do to stop people in the Pac-12. So we were able to tweak some of those type of things to help with the strength of our players.”
Gaining success in the Pac-12: “I think it’s relative to every league. You always see guys rise up and move on… But we’ll move up eventually. I hope it’s this year. But we’ll keep moving up. We’ll do it. I think it’s all a process of building it. I think you see it all the time.”
Where Colorado has improved: “I think we’ve improved in a lot of areas, but specifically on the football field we need to be able to play better on third downs, both sides of the ball. That’s not where you go and it’s just unbelievable. But you have to improve three or four percent from where you were last year. Get two more first downs than you did the year before. All of a sudden you’re in drive, going into the red zone, getting into the end zone one more time a game, two more times a game type of thing instead of kicking a field goal. That is a big, drastic change.”
Fan frustration: “I guess you see some of the frustration because they want to be good again, and we will. And I think they see it going in that direction with everything not just the facilities, but the team focus, the atmosphere, all of the things that are going on. I think they feel like it is building back towards the right way.”
Oregon State
Nov 1, 2013; Corvallis, OR, USA; Oregon State Beavers coach Mike Riley reacts during the game against the Southern California Trojans at Reser Stadium. USC defeated Oregon State 31-14. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports
Mike Riley and the Beavers had a really good season last year… until it wasn’t. The longest tenured coach in the Pac-12 dishes on what he hopes to do going forward.
Talking about Sean Mannion: “I think the course that he took when he looked into coming out put him on the radar as far as talking more about him. Whether it was to be in the NFL or you folks in the media. But I think the biggest factor is he’s a good player with a lot of good numbers, so he belongs in any conversation about quarterbacking in this country right now.”
Running game improvements: “I think it’s just one of those things we just stayed with and finally got better at. We had a lot of disruption in the offensive line early. Then when we needed the running game and we got a little more stable in that group, we played really good defenses and top three in the league three games in a row weren’t very effective.”
Success of the passing game: “I think it’s just one of those things we just stayed with and finally got better at. We had a lot of disruption in the offensive line early. Then when we needed the running game and we got a little more stable in that group, we played really good defenses and top three in the league three games in a row weren’t very effective.”
On being the longest tenured coach: “I don’t ever think of it like that. I try not to. I’m thankful for it. I will say it’s changed dramatically. They keep us on our toes and it’s grown so much since we first started and we were meeting down by the airport for half a day in the morning, so I can appreciate that. ”
Going against Oregon: “I think we just have to keep fighting like crazy to improve what we do. We have got the team that’s been the best team in the league probably over the last five years is a general statement that’s probably right. They just happen to be in our state, which is obviously difficult.”
Stanford
Jul 24, 2014; Hollywood, CA, USA; Stanford Cardinal head coach David Shaw talks to the media during the Pac-12 Media Day at the Studios at Paramount. Mandatory Credit: Kelvin Kuo-USA TODAY Sports
The champ is back and head coach David Shaw goes into what his team has in store for the new season.
Playing the Pac-12: “But bottom line is every week we play it’s going to be tough. Our opponents in the conference are tough top to bottom, and that’s just where we are. So it’s going to be an exciting year, and we can’t wait.”
The running back rotation: “I love it. I’d love being able to rotate guys. Stepfan Taylor had a phenomenal career for us. His last year was kind of our main bell cow. But the year before that, we played him. We played Tyler Gaffney. We played Anthony Wilkerson. Rotated guys in and out, and played Jeremy Stewart. We had a four back rotation that worked for us, and took us to two straight BCS Bowl games over the original Orange Bowl and Fiesta Bowl.”
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Ty Montgomery: “We are going to be cautious with Ty at training camp. We’ve had an arm issue that we’ve taken care of. It will be close after that first game. We might just hold off on that first game completely. We’ll see where he is with the USC game and see where he’s ready to play. Bottom line for Ty, when he comes back, he might be the most explosive player in college football, and he’s going to touch the ball in every single way possible.”
Playing on the road: “We try to not concentrate on who we play or where we play. We concentrate on how we play.”
Kevin Hogan: “The next thing is mastery and leadership, being a leader of the offense, and eventually leader of the football team.”
Quarterbacks in the Pac-12: “Never seen anything like this. Never seen anything like this where you have multiple guys in our conference that you could say could be the number one pick overall in the draft. You have multiple guys in the conference that could be All-Americans and could lead the nation in quarterback rating or lead the nation in yards and yards per attempt in touchdown passes, and that could be any of five or six guys that could do this that this year.”
On Jim Mora and UCLA: “I think you make a case of what Jim Mora has done in the last two years at UCLA is as good as what anybody’s done in the nation. As far as rebuilding a program or given a program an identity or recruiting-wise, as far as what they’ve done and style of play, they’ve become a physical, get-after-you football team.”
Washington
Jul 24, 2014; Hollywood, CA, USA; Washington Huskies head coach Chris Petersen talks to the media during the Pac-12 Media Day at the Studios at Paramount. Mandatory Credit: Kelvin Kuo-USA TODAY Sports
The new guy in town did well at a small school, so the big question is, can Chris Petersen be successful at Washington?
The return of QB Cyler Miles: “I think he’s done a good job. He’s done everything right or he wouldn’t be with us. He’s done everything right. Guys make mistakes. Certainly at that age group, we always say, hey, the age group we’re dealing with is the dumbest age group in America, and it happens to be so public. Guys make mistakes, and the important thing is we learn from it and become better people.”
The speed of the Pac-12 offenses: “I don’t know if there are too many tougher jobs in America than being a defensive coordinator in college football. I’m sure there are a few, but I know that’s one that I probably wouldn’t like. It’s just there are different styles. It spreads you out. There is so much speed out there. You’re right. It’s hard.”
Running the no-huddle: “Yeah, so we were no-huddle last year at Boise, so that style, we’re used to, they’re used to. We’ll do some of that. We’ll huddle up on occasion and do some different things.”
Transitioning to a different program: “No, you know, I think we were really confident in what our process of how we do things. So I think what the trick is to get everybody on the same page like, hey, this is how — and really trick, it’s a hard trick because everything is different. That’s not right or wrong with the whole staff. It’s just we know our way.”
Did he ban Twitter?: “No, I did not. We kind of said we’ll see how this thing goes. Trying to get out of the dark ages. I know how important social media is to everybody and certainly our kids so hopefully they use it correctly and use it in a positive manner. As a way to draw attention to the program. So that’s a balance.”