TicketsSept. 13, 2005
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Head Coach Mark Dantonio's comments from the September 13 Press Conference on the Penn State loss and upcoming Western Carolina game.
Recapping the Penn State Game
"I thought the Penn State game was an opportunity for our football team to experience one of college football's greatest environments. The environment was good. They have a good football team--a senior-dominated team. We're a young football team but I thought we competed very well. We threw an interception on the third play and they took it in for a 7-0 lead, but it remained like that throughout the entire first half. We had opportunities. We had initial starting field positions inside or near the 50 three times in the first half. We managed a field goal. We drove 70 yards for that. They made it 14-3 right before halftime. Coming in at halftime, we felt very good as a team. We felt like we got done what we needed to do to stay in the game. We came out in the third quarter and really were in it the first seven or eight minutes. Then we fumbled. They hit a long pass and then it just sort of started. We gained a little bit of composure in the fourth quarter and scored a couple of times at the end, just refusing to quit."
"I thought (Dustin) Grutza played very well. He showed poise, moved around and created plays. Brent Celek and Connor Barwin had a couple of nice catches that led to two scores. Our young players are continuing to play. At one point in the game we had seven true freshmen playing on defense. We played nine true freshmen in the game."
Previewing the Western Carolina Game
"This week, we're going to reach out to Jonathan Ruffin, who was our Lou Groza award winner in 2001. He's going to be our honorary team captain. Jonathan was living in the New Orleans area and lost everything. We're going to ask that the people reach out to him and make a donation to the University of Cincinnati's Hurricane Katrina efforts. We're also going to have Mike Brown whose family is living on the second floor of their home down there right now--the first floor is flooded. I want to make that known and ask fans to do what we can to help them move forward with their life.
"Western Carolina is a good football team. They beat a No. 2 Furman team that was 10-3 last year. It was 27-0 at the beginning of the fourth quarter. Western Carolina is going to be extremely enthusiastic. They're going to play with great effort. They can execute and they've got toughness. They're going to run around and make plays. We will need to stay focused. We're not the type of football team that can look past anybody. Our attitude needs to carry us through this game. We better come out with a chip on our shoulder and be ready to play. They're going to hit you. They're full of confidence. We're going to have to earn their respect. We better be ready to play. We've got to be emotionally charged. We better not just throw our helmet out there because if we do, we'll get beat."