Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Tuesday Press Conference - Offense

Georgia head football coach Mark Richt, along with several players, addressed the media on Tuesday ahead of Saturday's game against Southern University in Athens. They offered the following comments:

Coach Mark Richt:

On the offensive line…

“Our line is doing a very good job. I know pass protection, especially this past week, was really outstanding. It’s one thing to not get sacks but it’s another thing to really provide a big pocket and Greyson has a lot of space. His vision was pretty clear as far as not having guys squeezing the pocket on him and things of that nature. There’s always plays where the back will go for 60 or something yards and they’ll look around like, ‘hey man, did you get your guy?’ Those backs can make them look good at times, but there’s a lot of times where are our linemen make our backs look good. You can’t run the ball like we are running it without the linemen doing their job. They also know it is a week-to-week proposition, too. You start getting a little too happy and that’s when you tend to maybe not focus like you should.”

On the importance of getting the ball to Malcolm Mitchell…

“We try to. Again, when I was talking about the ‘RPOs,’ the run-pass options, a lot of times it depends on how the defense plays as to where the ball goes. Most of our system has a progression read, meaning Malcolm might be the first progression of a certain read like those little hitches we were throwing. If they’re playing cover two, he’s not the first option. Quite frankly, he would’ve not been an option at all. It would’ve been the tight end down the middle, to the flanker on the go route, to the check down. It happened to be soft coverage weak side so he got the ball two times in a row if you remember. We hit him twice to start the second half. He was the first read in that coverage but if it was a different coverage he might not have seen the ball on those two plays in a row. There are some things where you try to make him a primary target, but if you start trying to force it to anybody then you’re going to throw picks, you’re going to throw incompletions. You must be willing to take what they give you. There are some things, like a little tunnel screen, where you can make sure he gets the ball. But you can’t have too much of that because if everybody’s like ‘we’re going to stop this particular guy,’ then you’re going to be battling uphill.”

On senior wide receiver Malcolm Mitchell’s quote about him having fun again…

“I think a big reason he is having fun is I don’t think he is worried too much about his wheels anymore. He’s just playing again and he’s producing and doing some of the things he hoped to do all along. I think you see a lot of his energy in practice. I mentioned to him before. I don’t know what setting I was in talking about his work ethic, but he had a great summer, a great fall camp. He missed very little, and if he missed anything, it was just us trying to be careful with him. I’m happy for the guy. Anytime a guy overcomes an injury, and when you come back from an injury you are not automatically 100 percent because mentally you are wondering if this could happen again and all of that. You are just trying to test it out — first time you get hit, first time you make a hard cut — all these things start running through your mind. So, for him to just be able to play and enjoy it means he is not thinking about that, which is good.”

On sophomore tailback Nick Chubb’s 100-yard rushing streak and his playing time…

“We don’t really think much about it. At the end of the game we just look at the stats and think well he did it again, but we are not sitting there tracking it, I can tell you that.”

On Greyson Lambert’s response to a strong performance against South Carolina…

“I don’t know how he feels, quite frankly. I’m sure he was excited about having a good performance, and I’m sure that helped his comfort level somewhere along the way. But if he was uncomfortable going into the last game maybe we need to make him uncomfortable again, I don’t know. I think we all — and I say we all as myself, the offensive staff, players, quarterbacks — I think we all know we’re doing the right things. We know what we’re doing, we’re teaching it right, we’re doing the right things against the right defenses. It all comes together. Are we going to have a performance like that every week? I don’t think that at all. But I think it’ll be somewhere in between the first half of Vanderbilt and what happened this last game.”

Junior Center Brandon Kublanow

On having a quick start against South Carolina...

“I thought we just had a good week of practice. We were prepared for them. I thought we just came out and did what we needed to do.”

On confidence gained from early play against the Gamecocks...

“We had a pretty good idea of what we were going to do against them. We had a good game plan. As long as we went out there and executed I knew we were going to be okay.”

On a botched snap in the third quarter...

“It was just a mental error on my part. I’ll fix it. It won’t happen again.”

Senior Wide Receiver Malcolm Mitchell

On having fun on the field...

“I think the previous years were a challenging time in my life personally. I wasn’t on the field. So the comment ‘I’m having fun again’ just relates to my ability to perform on the field.”

On advice for freshmen contributing to Georgia...

“(I would tell them) To just relax and play the game as you’ve been playing for the majority of your life. That’s what I tell them. When you start worrying about other things that you can’t control, that’s when you begin to make senseless mistakes.”

On freshmen being overwhelmed playing in front of a Sanford Stadium crowd...

“I went to a high school, we didn’t have 92,000 people in the stands, but I went to a high school where the games were pretty packed. So I’m not sure that it bothers the freshmen that are playing now. It didn’t bother me. I know as a receiver group we like the bigger the crowd because that’s a bigger group that’ll see you do well.”

Junior Tailback Keith Marshall

On not overlooking Southern…

“We hear it around campus, but in this building we’re focused on Southern. They offer a good challenge. Coaches will make sure that we stay focused and the older guys will make sure we stay focused, so it won’t be a problem.”

On challenge of covering Southern’s kick returner Willie Quinn…

“We have seen have seen a little bit on him. I know that he has taken a good amount of kick returns back during his college career. It will be a good challenge, but we’re going to fly down there and try to make plays.”

Sophomore Tailback Sony Michel

On wide receiver play vs. South Carolina...

“Being able to throw the ball always opens up the run game in any football game.”

On quarterback Greyson Lambert’s performance vs. South Carolina...

“He had a great game. A successful passing game, which helps us a lot. It let teams know that we are able to throw the ball.”

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