Postgame Quotes
October 04, 2015 | Football
POSTGAME QUOTES
Arizona State 38, UCLA 23
Pasadena, Calif. (Rose Bowl)
UCLA head coach Jim Mora
opening remarks
“Tough loss, obviously. That goes without saying. I thought Arizona State did a nice job against us, stopping our run game. Something that we have been good at is converting on third downs and we struggled there. When those things are happening and you are playing a quality opponent like they are, we made it difficult on ourselves. We have to own it. It starts with me and our staff and our players. We have to get better and learn from it and move on. I do appreciate that our team has tremendous heart and fight, but that was not enough tonight. Once again, our hats are off to Arizona State and how they played. We have to find a way to rebound and we will.”
on UCLA's defense and recent season-ending injuries
“Our defense played well for most of the game. I think that as the game went on, we had some struggles. You don't like to blame injuries for performance. But, the fact that you have lost three quality starters, three of the top players in the country, that is going to hurt you. Marcus Rios spent three nights in the hospital this week and he tried to give it a go tonight. But, you can't use that as an excuse. You have to find a way to get it done. When your starting corner doesn't practice all week because he's in the hospital getting an IV drip, that's tough. These are high character, tough, competitive young men.”
on UCLA's fourth-quarter execution
“It's tough for me to talk about execution if I haven't looked at the film. Obviously, we did not get it done in the fourth quarter. We gave ourselves a chance and got back into the game, but we didn't get it done.”
on the decision to hike the ball out of the end zone in the fourth quarter
“You have to try to keep it a one possession game. You'd like to do that when you are down by five, rather than six. If you punt from the five and give them good field position and they kick a field goal, you're down nine. You want to keep it a one possession game and give your team good field possession.”
on the players' emotions coming off a big win last week at Arizona
“I don't like to use it as an excuse. It's not an easy week for our young men. Our guys are back in class now. There are a lot of new things happening to them. If you look at our history, we've struggled this week. We've got to figure it out. It doesn't get any easier for us. Now we have two Thursday night games. It's unbelievable that we're forcing them to miss six days of class with two Thursday night games. After the Cal game, they'll be taking midterms the next Monday. So, it's going to be a real grind for us these next two weeks. We have to manage our emotion and our time and we've got to do the right things. It's not going to be easy. It's going to be very difficult. I have a real problem with the two Thursday night games in a row. I think it's a real injustice for our young men.”
on quarterback Josh Rosen
“I thought that he did a good job of showing development throughout the game. Early, I don't want to say he was flustered, but he was not in sync. As the game got going, he found a rhythm there. He seemed to settle down and he did some good things. I think that it's going to be like that for a little while with a young quarterback. There are going to be some throws that you don't like. He had a throw where he tried to throw it across his body. I want to continue to see improvement. He's a tremendously talented and poised young man and I'm excited about him."
Arizona State head coach Todd Graham
opening remarks
“First of all, I'm just really proud of our players. We had not played very well for the first four games of the season. For whatever reason, things like that sometimes happen. I'm so proud of the leadership. Our guys just came up here, Bercovici, Norvell, Keith Patterson. Keith took over on the sideline and did a tremendous job . Our players deserve the credit. This program is an evolution. Sometimes we want things to happen really fast. But I'm really, really proud of how our guys came in here and responded. I'm proud of those loyal fans down in the end zone that came and supported us. Not many people thought we would come in here and do what we did tonight. We dominated the line of scrimmage, dominated all three phrases. They put up a valiant effort and fight, but our guys would not be denied. I think the best is ahead of our program. We still have a lot of work to do. For our seniors, for Mike Bercovici, he's had a good couple years, gone to the Coliseum and won, gone to the Rose Bowl and won, I'm really proud of him. I'm proud of what our team has been able to do. Our backs have been against the wall. We respond pretty good. I'm just proud of our players and proud of our team. I couldn't be more excited. It was overwhelming to me because it's humbling to me, you just don't know, and we just pulled together and every person committed to get better. It was all about every player, every rep and every coach fighting for everything that we've got. I'm really proud of our program.
on bouncing back after last week's loss
“I think that our motto, and what we believe in, when we've talked about coming here, I'm probably a little bit different. I'm a teacher. We believe in the high standards that we set. It was about character. What you see is that our character was exposed. It's not going to be easy. It's never been easy here. I'm not going to apologize for the expectations. We want to win championships and guess what, we are still playing for them. On the same hand, I don't blame our fans for being upset. They should be. We have not played very good. I was pissed about it. We were pissed. We played pissed tonight. Maybe we need to play pissed more often. I mean, that is kind of what it's about. What we do with our players in the classroom, on the field, the demands that we have of them. We hold them to high standards. What you see, when we face great adversity, you see their character exposed. That's what you saw tonight – a team with great character.”
on ASU's rush defense
“It was impressive. I am telling you, I knew what kind of rush defense we had. The big boys we have inside, these guys could not run the ball tonight. They ran a little bit before the half and they got a field goal out of it. We pretty much dominated the line of scrimmage there. We wanted to make them one dimensional and then we could give the new quarterback some exotics and get him after it. He is a tough guy and is a really talented young man. In my opinion, that's one of the best running backs if not the best running back in the league. On film, he has played as good as anybody. We dominated the line of scrimmage with him tonight. We are trying to get our rhythm and I am managing snaps. We had 90 snaps offensively, 68 defensively. If we can keep it at that, I like our chances.”
