University Southern California Trojans
Coaches Talk About USC-WSU Football Game
June 21, 1999 | Football
October 13, 1998
LOS ANGELES -- Following is a transcript of USC football coach Paul Hackett's media conference on Tuesday, as well as the teleconference held by Washington State Coach Mike Price with the Los Angeles Media on Tuesday:
USC COACH PAUL HACKETT
"It's a new week. It's a new day. Obviously, it was a very disappointing game on Saturday and you can continue to mull it around and find any number of things that turned the tide on us. I think that the most significant part of the game is the fact that for this young team, this was the first time in six weeks that we had a comfort zone. Anytime you can have a three-touchdown lead late in the third quarter, you've got to feel like you're finally doing something right. We had been biting and scratching for everything for six weeks and all of the sudden we had a game we were in control of and all of the sudden, it unravelled. Exactly why and how come and all of those things, you just don't know.
You learn about the team and about yourself and about where we are when this happens. It was the first time we had had prosperity and things going well and we didn't handle it very well. I'm trying to be as philosophical as possible and say that this was a lesson for all of us. We have to, some way, find that killer instinct and find the way to put teams away. You've got to give Cal a lot of credit. We had played well, they had not played that well and they found a way to gear it up and change the momentum of the game. Once the momentum changed, it was difficult for us to regain the momentum that I felt we had early in the game. Maybe, collectively, offense, defense and special teams, we may have played our best half of football all year and certainly our best first half. That's the thing that was disappointing. We didn't find a way to finish the job at hand, to put them away. That's one of the wonders of college football and one of the things you have to be better at if you're going to be a championship team.
But that's in the past and we start today on our road-trip part of the season. We have to go to the Northwest and play in a hostile environment once again. At a time like this, I'm very grateful that we had the Florida State experience because at least we had the noise and the atmosphere. We at least have been through that once. That will serve us well. We're playing a football team that had a very strong start and has had some difficult games against some fine opponents. They're also making a quarterback change, which is always an emotional thing to do. I really like their speed on defense. They're undersized but very fast and take an attacking approach on defense. They've got the third-ranked kickoff returner in the nation, so they're scary that way. They're a wide open offense, creating mismatches throughout the game. Of course, (there's) Paul Mencke, (who) ran for a long touchdown last week. He's an enthusiastic, fired-up guy and I'm sure that will add into the equation in terms of the difficulty we will face up there. This is a real crossroads game for us. How do we bounce back from what was a very disappointing one-point loss? It will be a real benchmark game for us in terms of how we respond to adversity and that's part of this game.
We've been in some tough situations this year. I thought that the situation against Purdue at halftime (was tough) - 120 degrees on the field and down at halftime - and I thought we responded well. I thought that Florida State brought out the best performance from us to date. I see a certain ability to respond and I think we will. It's one game, it didn't go our way. We played good enough to win but we didn't win the game. We're half way. We're 4-2. We've got six games to go. We have to take one at a time and that's been my approach. I think sometimes coaches have a tendency to hang on to things longer than the athletes do. They put it in perspective. It doesn't mean that they are not terribly disappointed, because they are. But we've got to move on. We can't dwell on that. That would affect our play for what's ahead, and what's ahead is all that's important.
(On if he is pleased with progression of offense)
Not at all. I think we're the second to the worst in time of possession in the conference. We are a big-play, hit-or-miss offense right now. We are somewhat disjointed in terms of how we do things. Whether it's a dropped ball or a missed block, then all of a sudden you see a spectacularly blocked play and a guy fly out of there for a touchdown. Or you see fabulous pass protection and R Jay Soward catch a big touchdown. We scored three touchdowns in the first half, which is the best our offense has played. But as far as the flow and consistency (we haven't had that). We don't expect that we'll be that for a while. There's too much newness. When you're young at the line and also young at the tight end and in the backfield and at quarterback, you don't have that flow and continuity that you strive for. What I like is the fact that Petros Papadakis stepped up and had two brilliant runs, one of which got called back at a critical time. But this guy took a step to make up for Chad (Morton) that makes a difference. That means that we have a semblance of a running game even without Chad. And that was a big concern. The passing game continues to be hit or miss, but I was really excited about our quarterback (Mike Van Raaphorst) - outside the pocket twice, running, making plays that he has not made this year. He had some dropped ball at some inopportune times. We had some penalties that hurt us. We're not smooth at all. We're sputtering. But what was nice, when we sputtered - (we had a) couple touchdowns. We went back to sputtering in the second half. We needed to shift momentum with some good offensive play and we couldn't do it.
(What's slowing down the offensive progress?)
Youth. Unfamiliarity with the system. Struggling with the clock and get it in and get it lined up and having to change the play. All those things that take time. Carson (Palmer) is struggling more than Mike is, but we would expect that. We've talked about wrist bands and sending people in, but I feel like we need to keep doing what we're doing because it will improve . . . Changing a play at the line of scrimmage is a function of doing it under the pressure of the game. You can go out at the practice field and do it all you want, but when you get it into the game and the defense moves into it late . . . Cal did a wonderful job with adding a whole new defense in the bye week. They added it and some of the time, they hit it just right, but it also was the defense that we ran 65 yards for a touchdown. It's hit or miss and you get a little disjointed when you're trying to change the play. That's all part of the growing process . . . We could simplify the offense, which is something we do each week. We reduce and reduce. I think the system is fine it is just a lack of time and a lack of operation within the system that is slowing us.
(Growth of quarterbacks)
I think pass protection is an issue, I think the receivers' consistency is an issue, the youth of tight end. The quarterback position is really dependent on other positions more than any other. Part of that is their development but also part of it is us developing. Mike has played two really good halves of football. I think the first half he threw the ball very well. I think he's right about where I anticipated him being. If you don't play the game without Chad Morton, it's a different game. It puts more pressure on the quarterback. I'm not sure if our quarterbacks are up to carrying the load right now.
(Washington State's blitz)
Washington State is going to do it a lot. It's one of those things where it's feast or famine. You block it up and get a big play or they get a big play on you. It's very similar to Cal's approach - loss of yards for five plays in a row and then Petros goes 65. We're not consistent enough on offense that defensively, we can take a chance on that. R. Jay may run for a 70-yard touchdown, but they may stop him. That's the way this conference is. In this conference, if you're an inexperienced quarterback, you get some heat.
We're dealing with a veteran receiver corp, which is a strong point. Chad Morton is a strong point. We need both of those pieces to best complement the development of the quarterback. If you take one of those away, there's a little more pressure on them and they have to fight through that. They have to play better because they don't have Chad Morton. It needs to be equated a bit with the guy across town. When he played as a freshman and a sophomore and a junior, I'd like to see how he did. That's the best judge of what happens with us. He's a marvelous football player and was one last year, but you're still talking about the early years. You can't learn in the classroom, you can't learn on the practice field. You have to go out in the Coliseum and line up and get behind by 17 points and find out how you respond. That's the way it goes.
(Penalties)
That's the part of the game that is haunting us. I've been saying for three or four weeks, you can not make penalties and shoot yourself in the foot and beat good football teams. We've been escaping it for a number of weeks. I've said it to the team. They know exactly how I feel about it. I've appealed to them and told them you can't do things that are foolish, and we had a number of those things happen to us in a game that we had in hand and they contributed to the turning of the tide. You also can't turn the ball over. You have to win the turnover battle. In the two games we've lost the turnover battle, we lost both games. When we've won the turnover battle, we've won the games. Not to minimize one play, but there was a momentum issue that was far different in that game because we were in control of the game. It was the first time in six weeks. I put myself first. We did not find a way to get that killer instinct and knock them out. A lot of that, you have to take your hat off to Cal. We could not turn the tide in the fourth quarter. We couldn't turn it defensively, we couldn't turn it offensively and we couldn't turn it on special teams. Someone needed to turn it up and until now, we did it every week in the fourth quarter with the exception of Florida State.
I think our defense has played well in the first half of the season. The Cal quarterback got on a roll. In the fourth quarter, he was spectacular. It makes us go back and say alright, how did the defense play with the lead. It was the first time we played with a lead on defense. Maybe subconsciously you relaxed or you're not aggressive enough or your play calls...We look at everything. As you evaluate the first half of the season, the strength of the team is defense, the next strength, equal to defense, is special teams, and the offense is playing at its best right now and that isn't good enough for us to carry the game. So I don't think there's any shock or surprise right now where we are. The shock or surprise is, should we have been 5-1? We had a chance to be 5-1, but we're 4-2. The true question is how do the last six games unfold with four of six on the road? How does this team respond to a tough situation? People have said it's been easy, but I think that's bunk. It's never easy, as we found out against Cal. Now the measure is how we respond. If you attack it any other way than one game at a time, you're crazy. Every game counts. Every play counts.
(Play calling)
I call them all. I call them all and (offensive coordinator) Hue (Jackson) and I are in constant communication, back and forth, about the play calling and sometimes it's good and sometimes it's bad. It was really good in the first half and really bad in the second half.
(How long does it take to get transition to calling plays from sideline down?)
I think it takes a year or two to get the whole process down. It's an ongoing process. The problem you have is the actual vision to the play is basically nonexistent when you're on the sidelines. You can handle the strategy but what you can't do is know exactly what happened as to why the play broke down or why it was successful. That's why, the most important person to the play-caller is the person that has the eyes and can see and can transfer that information to the next series. It's very much of a transition. It's nice and quiet in the booth. In the sideline, you get affected by what's going on . . . The best scenario is two people, in constant communication, one with one vision, one with another vision and working together so they can feel and know each other and get the best of both worlds. Are we there after six games? Probably not. That will improve over the next six games.
(On field goal at end of first half)
I wouldn't (have changed the call). There were 13 seconds and only one timeout. If I had anything to do differently, I would have three timeouts. Then I might have thought it through differently. With one timeout and 13 seconds, the decision is very simple. Do you pass or run? My feeling was that we had not been in goalline offense since Purdue. We've not seen their goalline defense against our goalline offense. The best thing to do is give the ball to your best guy and run your best play, which we did. If you've seen it close, it's a phenomenal individual effort by Petros. Extraordinary effort, and we were a little short. I knew if we didn't get in, we'd have to kick a field goal. I was not going to put the three points at risk by calling another play. I don't think you have two plays there. If you pass the ball there, and it's incomplete, that's just a different way to stop the clock, but it's still 13 seconds. So now it's down to six or seven and you say to yourself, If I go with another play, and it doesn't score, we don't have a two-touchdown lead.'
To me, having a two-touchdown lead is the key. I want a 14-point lead in the lockerroom. Yeah, we'll take a shot. Did I know what was going to happen? Let's go over the other play. Carson comes into the game and scrambles for 20 yards. A hold and we're back on the 8. If you're playing that game correctly, you're conservative. Run the ball three times and punt. That's what we've done all year long. Instead, we said, Aha. Let's take a shot at a play down the field.' Well, we didn't block the play correctly. They jump into a new front and take a two-point safety. That still means three touchdowns to score. That's why I made the call. I said, if we get a safety, that's still three touchdowns. Not two-and-a-half, three. Those are the things that are going through your mind when you are making those decisions, but you don't have the benefit of saying, But yeah, pretty soon, things are going to unravel.'
You're always looking for 21 points. Then, as Petros is running into the end zone, you're thinking that's 38, we're in pretty good shape. It wasn't to be. ....If we had thrown (at the end of the half), there might have been one second left. But if it hadn't been, we'd be in here saying, he's the dumbest son-of-a-gun.' . . . And you can't do that to your punt pressure team. You've got a unit that is the most confident team on the field. They're going to block one and if you don't get any points, I'm not willing to pay that price. It was an issue of 13 seconds, one play, if you don't get it, kick it and you have a 14-point lead. End of discussion. I didn't think about that one again. That one was easy. That lead, 24-10, was as dramatic a half of football as we've had this year. I walked up the tunnel feeling very good about our development. You don't want to put it in the hands of uncertainty when you can put it in the hands of certainty. If we had had a second timeout, there might have been an argument, but it's still iffy . . . The other thing was, Why did you punt the ball with three minutes to go in the game?' That's not the error. The error is only having one timeout. We had wasted two timeouts earlier in the half. You always kick at three minutes.
(Penalties)
There are two kinds of penalties. There is the penalty which is biting, scratching, fighting to do your job and something goes wrong. But if you're in the situation when you're running down the field, he bumps you from the side and you go hunt him up and blast him in the face. To me, this is two totally different issues. You have to analyze the penalties. You never block behind the ball carrier. Never. You learn it in Pop Warner, in high school. You never do it. But the emotion of the game and of making a contribution sometimes carries you away. But you have to be careful. I don't want to limit someone's playing time because they're making combat penalties. But if someone is making foolish penalties, I'm going to limit their playing time. But our kids our great guys and no one out there doing anything intentionally.
(Chad Morton)
I'm not encouraged. He'll try to practice this week and it may come right down to game time. It's week-to-week. I'm not willing to say yet that Chad is back.
WASHINGTON STATE COACH MIKE PRICE
"I hope we've played two of the best teams in the league in UCLA and Oregon. We're going to find out Saturday night if that's true or not with USC because I think USC's pretty darn good, also. If they aren't, we're in trouble because UCLA and Oregon got after us pretty good. We had a good second half against Oregon. We've been struggling. We're young, have had tons of injuries, have had more injuries in four games than in 12 games last year. We have a lot of freshmen making freshman mistakes and new players making mistakes. We're kind of messing up at quarterback a little bit, which we're not used to happening here. We're making a change there. We're going with Paul Mencke at quarterback. Not that Steve Birnbaum did poorly, it's just what we think we need to spark our offense. Steve did not by any means lose the job or by any means lose those four games for us. He just lost the job for this game and Mencke will be our starter. Kevin Brown has done a nice job at running back. Our wide receivers are improving. Our offensive line is improving. Our defense has hung in there. The last two games, it has been bending too much and they have broken a couple of long passes against us, whereas that did not happen in the first few games. The defense was playing spectacular even though we were banged up early. Our special teams aren't as good as USC's and we have to play a lot better in that area. USC may have the best special teams in the conference.
(Quarterbacks)
"Steve is a lefty, a real active passer, real quick release. He has as quick of a release as any quarterback that I've coached. He understands the offense a lot and understands what needs to be done, but hasn't been clicking. Paul Mencke is a younger quarterback and more athletic. He was the MVP of the state in high school in basketball, but only played quarterback senior year. He doesn't have the experience Steve has, but is more athletic. They both throw a good ball. Steve might through a better- looking pass, but Mencke seems to make things happen - good and bad."
(Fans response this year)
"Our fans have been great. I couldn't ask them to be better. They are awesome. We had a full house vs. Oregon. I don't know what we'll have Saturday. It will look full. TV takes away sometimes and it will be cold and the weather will be a factor. Our fans our pretty hardy. They have been very supportive. They were disappointed last week, but are aggressive fans and very positive. They cheer for us and cheer against the enemy."
(This week's match-up)
"I think USC looks like they're getting their offense together much better than earlier in the year. Their defense has great talent. They probably mentally and physically let down against Cal and it got close and they couldn't get it done when it came down to the very end. They probably feel like they should have won that game. They are an improving team and will be a factor not only in the Rose Bowl race but in the opportunity to go to a bowl game. We feel like we need to win this game Saturday for us to go to a bowl. That's a major concern for us. I'm glad we have them here, I'll say that. The turf is slippery, it will be wet and cold and I think our fans will be typical aggressive Cougar fans that we all love."
(On Lamont Thompson)
"He can be one of the best defensive backs in the country. I think he's one of the better defensive backs in our conference right now. He hasn't been playing up to his potential in the last couple of games. He was bruised and hurt the last game. I think Dee Moronkola has really taken over in the secondary and has been the best player for the Cougars right now. Lamont probably has the best talent and has a great knack for picking off balls in the air, but right now Moronkola is probably playing our best. If Lamont is healthy, we look for him to have an improved game. Last week was kind of a bummer for him.
(Evolution of passing game)
"We're kind of down to the Fab Zero. Actually, Leaford Hackett from L.A. Valley Community College has come in and has done a great job for us. He got 11 receptions last week and has done very well. Nian Taylor has a muscle pull behind his knee and this is the first time in his career I've seen him say he couldn't go. He did not play in the last game. He will always give effort and he is really tough. Against UCLA, he was in tears on the sideline when he couldn't play. It's a different injury. I don't think it will be permanent, but right now he is having trouble running at top speed. I'll know more this week. For a while, we were relying on him. Early in the season, he was looking like he was going to have the best year of anybody, but the injury has really sidetracked him.
