TULSA POSTGAME QUOTES VS. EAST CAROLINA
11/29/2014 12:00:00 AM | Football
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TULSA HEAD COACH Bill Blankenship
Opening Statement
Bill Blankenship: We had the seniors that played their last game tonight, we had a little bit of a senior moment. At different times, people stepped up and made plays. Chris Hummingbird gets a sack. Luke Snider blocked a punt. Dwight Dobbins picked up an interception, DeMarco Nelson played all over the place. Davis Walton had a really good game on the offensive line, and I'm probably leaving guys out. You really want our guys to go out fighting and swinging, and I thought we did. I thought we stood in there and played very well and aggressively against a very good football team. Shane Carden, I think he's one of the best in college football right now, he and Justin Hardy and that crew, but I do think that we have some young ones who have a chance to be like those guys.
Again, hats off to Ruffin, class act, and again, we'll move forward.
Q. What was going through your mind as you were walking off the field there?
Bill Blankenship: Mainly just looking for some of those players that I wanted to congratulate. I don't usually get to see a lot of the opponent players after we meet with the head coach because they kind of go past me, but I thought it was important to find Justin and Shane and congratulate them because I've competed against them really all the way through, kind of watching them grow into being good players. I just wanted to find all of our seniors. Those are just special moments.
It didn't end the way we wanted it to, but I thought, again, we went out on a good note in the sense of what we felt like what was important was to play til the end. We talked about this three and four weeks ago, that we wanted to be able to look in the mirror and said we never gave in. This group never quit, never gave in. You could not accuse them of that. Again, I was in a pretty good place with that.
Q. As you reflect over the last two years, what would be your evaluation as to why this team only won five games over a two season period?
Bill Blankenship: It's hard now not to sound like excuses, and I'm not a big believer in excuses. We're a very young football team. We had a pretty significant void in the last two senior classes in terms of numbers, and it's been tough to rebuild that. We were very fortunate to there's two seniors this year that were in the first class, the transition class when we signed, and then we've honestly fought I've never had as many injuries in the last two seasons as what we've had. It's just been would we have done better without it? I don't know, I just always was a believer in the past that I always was able to take our best teams into the playoffs when we've been healthy, and we've had a hard time keeping them healthy over the past two years, and it just all kind of snowballs.
Q. What will be your routine over the next few days, recruiting wise or hanging out here wise?
Bill Blankenship: Well, our staff has already got plans for next week. We'll be heading out on in fact, some of them will leave tomorrow actually because we start the period in college recruiting begins on Sunday, and so I'm scheduled for some home visits, and we've got to put our ears back and get after it. The only way to solve the issues that we have is to recruit, and so it's a never ending battle. But we've got to get out and do a great job. We'll get a one week head start on some of the guys in the conference.
Q. There was some talk in the pregame about there was a coach that one coach had cleaned out his office, at least one. No?
Bill Blankenship: No, I would dare you to walk through our offices. Yeah. I mean, there's no quit here, guys. There's nobody that's not what we're about. We aren't going in and asking our players to do what we ask them to do, I just assure you that that's not going on.
Q. Denver Johnson had posted something on Facebook. I don't know if you guys are Facebook friends or not, but his words were, "the last goodbye is the hardest one to say. This is where the cowboy rides away." It's a George Strait song. That's pretty poignant going into tonight.
Bill Blankenship: That's the way we feel about our seniors.
Q. It's the season finale kind of thing, nothing about this is our last game as coaches or anything like that?
Bill Blankenship: No, we've talked about it the last several weeks. If there's something out there, I don't have it. I don't know it. I certainly understand that we've not achieved at the level that we want to achieve. I'm as disappointed, I promise you, as anybody, but I also think very strongly that we have a future here. I think we can see that.
You know, I love what we have in our young players that got a lot of experience this year. We've got to do a good job of recruiting to build around them, but so far we're in really good places with our recruiting.
Q. Earlier you talked about just like last year, everything is going to be on the table when you look back at this thing. What is that like for you when you have a staff that you're so close to? Does that color anything, affect anything?
Bill Blankenship: Well, probably. I think that I'd be lying to say that it doesn't, but there's still a mission to accomplish. I think one of the things I talked to our staff about in the past is the whole deal is hard decisions, whether they're mine or somebody else's, all are made when you have a focus on the mission, and when you lose sight of the mission and you start looking at all the other things, then maybe those decisions are hard. But we'll always do what's best for this program.
Q. What would be a good time frame, because of rumors or whatever, or because of the bad seasons, that you expect an assurance one way or the other as to whether or not you will continue here? What would be the time frame that you would?
Bill Blankenship: It's possible, but, I mean, we're going recruiting. We have to you can't recruit successfully with a possible something coming up here. Derrick has never indicated to me that we would play any games or do anything. We've always scheduled an evaluation; we've always done that last year, and we'll do it again. I totally get that.
Q. Do you think it would be necessary for him because of the rumors to make a statement one way or the other to the fan base or do you think it's necessary for him to have to do that?
Bill Blankenship: Well, sure, because you guys are going to let it not be that way. We're going to have to get some answers and some clarity. We know that. But here's what I have control of: None of that, or any of that. My mom would be mad at me for saying that. Any of that. So what I control is we have a plan. We have a plan to recruit, and we're going to do that. If somebody tells me not to go recruit, then they'll tell me that, but until then I owe it to this team, I owe it to my boss, I owe it to the university, I owe it to myself to do exactly what I'm hired to do.
Q. People are going to say why is Tulsa football heading in the right direction?
Bill Blankenship: Well, our offense couldn't move the ball outside of we said it was a broken animal, a broken mechanism. I don't know what the final numbers were, but Dane either finished as fifth or sixth in all time ever Tulsa has got a great tradition in passing, and for him to have the fifth or sixth best season ever, for Keevan Lucas to become the third listen, guys, the third receiver in the history of Tulsa football to have 100 catches? Okay, to be in the I don't know where our final ranking is, but we're in the top two or three in the conference offensively. A year ago I was partial to fixing that, and we fixed it.
I think you see a freshman Bishop Louie, I think you see a freshman D'Angelo Brewer, I think you see Keevan Lucas and Dane who are sophomores that are the playmakers on this team. None of those guys are on offense that are seniors. Do we have some problems on defense? Absolutely we do. We know we do. But we're going to graduate a number of players, and of that number, that 12, there were four fifth year seniors that graduated that came here on scholarship, two fourth year seniors that came here on scholarship. That's a total of six scholarship players when they first came here that are graduating this year. The rest were either transfers or walk ons that earned scholarships. This is a very, very hard for people to think that that's the reality, but it is the reality of what we have.
FastScripts by ASAP Sports
TULSA SENIOR LINEBACKER Jake Sizelove
On how important it was to go out and fight tonight
"I think in the situation we were in, where we are not making a bowl game, the work we put on the field was due to pride and what we want to have our name stand by. Just being able to finish this game, obviously we didn't get the win but just knowing that all of the guys on offense and defense gave it their best. I'm so thankful for the time I had with them and the memories I had with them as well."
On analyzing the team's record over the past two years
"We look at games every weekend and you see a game come down to two or three plays on their part, not creating big plays on our part and part of that is maybe you lose someone like Shawn Jackson who makes plays. We have a lot of young playmakers who are coming up that have been developing this year, but ultimately, especially as a defense, we talked about how it is our job to limit big plays, which I think we did against East Carolina in the first half, but that's a great offense we just played. And then making them have to work for every inch down the field and then creating a fourth down stop or a flag or something that we can take advantage of that's a mistake on their part, that's when we can play our defense. But when you give up a 60-yard run or a 60-yard pass that's when it gets hard to play our defense because it's one play and they have seven points. I think that's ultimately, especially on the defensive side, it's come down to these past two years, is not creating big plays on our end and giving up too many, for sure."
On the impact of Coach Blankenship's job security rumors in the locker room
"I think, despite our loss this last week, you see a team that is willing to fight for Coach Blankenship, because we know the man he is. Although we have had losses, in none of these games did I see or feel the people next to me quit or give in, and part of that is for the love of each other but it is definitely for a huge part due to the love for Coach Blankenship. I know for me, especially, the opportunity he has given me as a walk-on to show him that I can play that I know I wouldn't get at 95% of other universities. So I only have appreciative words for him, most definitely."
On what Coach means to him and what his strengths are
"I was here my freshman year with Coach Graham. The biggest difference of why I'm appreciative he took over was that I saw a team come together rather than people playing for their own selfish reasons, whether that was getting to the NFL or just playing for themselves. There is a selfish nature in college football that I didn't know of coming out of high school and watching Coach Blank bring that togetherness to us, it became so much more enjoyable to me. Caring about the person next to me, knowing the person next to me, more than I think most teams do."
On if he would be shocked if Coach Blankenship was not the coach next year
"I think that being `shocked' is a hard one to answer. I would be disappointed because I think he deserves another chance. I think that people on this team haven't give up on him and will be willing to play for him and I think that's ultimately what matters. He has shown he can win, he put up an 11-3 season, I've been here when he's done that. Take the sophomores on offense who started to click, there's still learning points, but you look at the offense who is returning everyone, except Davis Walton, with so many weapons, and those are people he's recruited. In my mind it's fair to give him another shot, but that's just my opinion."
TULSA SOPHOMORE RUNNING BACK James Flanders
On his performance tonight
"I just had to keep fighting for my team. My mentality was that I was never going to quit and that I had to go fight for the seniors for their last game."
On the feel of the offense compared to last year
"Like Coach Blankenship always says, we keep getting better and better. Even though we're a young team we're just going to keep getting better and better."
On what Coach means to him and what his strengths are
"Coach Blankenship means a lot to me. I've known him ever since high school because my older brother played against him. I think he means a lot to me and to the university because he's a Tulsa guy and he's been able to bring a lot to the program like recruiting in-state players and all of that, which helps out the Tulsa team."
EAST CAROLINA HEAD COACH RUFFIN MCNEIL
Opening statement
"I'm very proud of our guys. That was a team win. Wins on the road in our conference are hard. You can see that each week. I know Bill's still building his team here as well, but we knew it was going to be a tough game. We are proud of how are kids hung together as a team. We knew we would face a very inspired team on senior night. It was a special night for all of those seniors, and what a great group of young men as well."
On Tulsa answering the call early on
"It was very big. We have to understand that this league is very tough from top to bottom. Every game is going to be a fistfight, and that's how we approached it. I was proud of the way we stayed focused on our mission all week long, and now we will begin focusing immediately on our next game. I'm very proud of the way our team answered back against a team that can do special things."
"This offense is one of the top offenses in our league and they've been explosive all year long. Dane has played great. He's a dual threat quarterback and he has some good young weapons out there that they did a good job of using. But I was proud of the way we responded."
EAST CAROLINA QUARTERBACK SHANE CARDEN
On Tulsa playing inspired and not going away until the very end
"We understood what their position was. It was the last game for their seniors and they understand that they have nothing to lose. They're going to come out here and give you everything you got and they did. They are a good team. They fought hard and we were talking all season that we are going to need to weather every storm. Things are going to happen that aren't going to go your way that you can't control. We could have played better obviously. We have plenty of things that we can get better at. But we kept fighting. We kept believing.
On answering Tulsa's calls
"It's very big that we did that. We just have to keep trusting. We had a couple of drives that went a little short, we didn't do some things really well. But we kept believing in it even when it wasn't working before. Being able to respond and give our team a touchdown in crucial situations is what we needed."
