Oct. 12, 2005

Transcript Of Head Football Coach Paul Johnson's Comments Following Practice On Tuesday, October 11

Q. There are a lot of guys on their roster from this area. Is there anyone on Kent's team that you remember recruiting at all?

A. No. They have a lot of guys that went to Prep Schools, a lot of guys that went to Fork Union and Hargrave. Most of the time we don't get to recruit those guys.

Q. What kind of team do they have? How do you evaluate their personnel?

A. I think they have some good athletes. You watch them play and they aren't the biggest team we've played, but they have a lot of guys that can run. They are like any Division I team. Everybody has some good players. They have a couple of guys on the defensive line. The defensive end is their career sack leader and closing in on the career tackle for loss lead. They have a linebacker that ranked fifth in the country in tackles. They have some good players. Offensively, they have good speed at wide receiver and their quarterback is bigger than anybody we have. He's 6-6 and we don't have anybody that big.

Q. Yesterday you talked about it being a trap game, are you happy with the way practice has gone the last two days?

A. I thought we had an okay practice today. We just have to continue it. You can't fall into the trap.

Q. You said you talked to the team about that. What did you say to them?

A. I told them straight up what it is. You're coming off an emotional game with one of your chief rivals and everybody is patting you on the back and telling you good job and all of a sudden you forget you have to play on Saturday. This team coming in is going to be excited to play so you better be ready to play. We are probably going to have a bigger crowd than they normally get for their conference games so it will be a big deal.

Q. They look like they can score some points.

A. I guess. They are averaging 20 points per game.

Q. They are getting beat, but they are scoring.

A. Some games more than others.

Q. Your team handled prosperity well last season.

A. We don't have prosperity right now; we're setting at 2-2. Last year we were 5-0, that's a big difference. We're struggling. We've only won two games, one by seven and one by three. We still have a lot of work to do. We have a long ways to go.

Q. Can you talk about David Mahoney?

A. He played better in the last game. I thought he had his best game of the year on Saturday. He looked like the David Mahoney from a year ago. He made some really big plays, he fought through some blocks, and he did some good things. He needs to be a good player for us.

Q. How about Chase?

A. I think Jeremy would be the first to tell you that he's looking to play a little better. I haven't noticed him. That doesn't mean he's playing badly, but he hasn't made the statement plays that we are accustomed to seeing out of him. I'm sure he's looking to make more plays.

Q. Can that be attributed to who else is on the defensive line? If he's the guy that teams are concerned about and maybe they are doubling him. I don't know.

A. No.

Q. When Carney was able to roll out at the end of the half was that Jeremy over pursuing or was there supposed to be somebody else there?

A. It depends on what defense you're in and how you're lined up. Sometimes it might be the defensive end's fault, sometimes the secondary contain could be a linebacker and sometimes the outside linebacker has contain. It just depends on what defense you're in. On the long touchdown pass when we lost contain that was our defensive end.

Q. Who let the guy get behind him?

A. It really doesn't matter.

Q. Do you think that young secondary of yours is going to get more of a test this week?

A. Yeah. I mean certainly they are going to throw the ball. That's what they do. They throw that thing.

Q. I was trying to look this up today. If on third down and you line up for a field goal and it's a bad snap you can cover it up and kick it again on fourth. Can you run a fake field goal on third down?

A. Why couldn't you? It's just like another play.

Q. Isn't the smartest thing to do if it's a bad snap is to throw it away so you don't lose the yardage?

A. If you get outside the tackles you can. You have to be outside the tackles.

Q. So did you really intend to kick it on third down?

A. We won't ever know will we?