CARDINALS

Weekly Q&A with U of L coach Bobby Petrino

Jeff Greer
Louisville Courier Journal
Nov 8, 2014; Boston, MA, USA; Louisville Cardinals head coach Bobby Petrino talks to his defense during the second half against the Boston College Eagles at Alumni Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Bob DeChiara-USA TODAY Sports

Because of an odd Monday that featured back-to-back head coach press conferences and a basketball game, my schedule hasn't exactly been conducive to posting full transcripts.

So, please accept this offering of Bobby Petrino's comments from Monday's weekly press conference:

From Monday

Opening statement: We had a good week off. I guess it's not really a week off, but a good bye week. We practiced hard a couple days. I thought our players did a good job. We worked hard on our technique and fundamentals, worked on some aspects of Notre Dame every day, which should help us get ahead in our preparation this week. We did give them a couple days off, which I think was good for them. We'll come back and have a short practice this afternoon and basically of that again, to work some on Notre Dame, some on technique, and make tomorrow's practice better. You always worry about when you have some time off on being rusty, but we'll go out there and throw the ball around today and work on some prats of the Notre Dame game plan, and then get back to a normal week on Tuesday.

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Unfortunately we won't have (quarterback) Will (Gardner) with us. I feel really bad for Will, because he put so much into it. He's very dedicated, great attitude. I thought he did a great job of leading our team. I thought he did a great job of working hard to get better each week. Not everything went easy for him this year, and exactly how you would like it to go, but the last three game he really improved and showed how much hard work pays off. So, I hate it for him that he's not with us, but I'm excited for (quarterback) Reggie (Bonnafon). I think Reggie has shown that he's developed and matured. Certainly the experience that he had early in the year, I thought, showed up in the second half of the Boston College game. I know he's excited to get going and get ready to go play at Notre Dame.

I think we have a chance to have (defensive end/linebacker) Lorenzo (Mauldin) back. It looks very encouraging, but as the week goes on, you never know what happens out on the practice field. I think we also have a chance to have (defensive tackle) Pio (Vatuvei) back, which would really help us. He's really good against the run, and a very athletic player inside. He's a good football player for us, so hopefully everything goes well with both of them and they're ready to play on Saturday.

On the bye week: I don't know. I think it was good for us in the sense that, you know, we've had a long year. We've had a lot of game in a row. It was our time to have a bye, and a time to refresh with two real difficult games coming up back-to-back.

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On the significance of playing at Notre Dame: Being here in Louisville, with the Catholic community we have, and Paul Hornung, and all the ties that the city of Louisville has to Notre Dame, I think that's significant. I think we'll have a good crowd up there. I know that everyone was talking all summer long about they've got tickets and on their way up there. You
know, I grew up getting up on Sunday mornings at nine o'clock and listening to Lindsay Nelson saying, 'Notre Dame was unable to sustain a drive, so we'll move to further action.' You know? So I think it's cool that we'll play there and coach there, simply because of the way that I grew up when I was young, and what I got to listen to on Sunday mornings at 9 a.m.

On if he has ever been to South Bend: I have never been there. Nope. Never been there.

On the status of wide receiver James Quick: He has an opportunity to play. He's got some stipulations that he has to get done this week. It's a very tight schedule, and I'm hoping that he does everything that he's supposed to do.

On if, with the injury to Gardner, it's necessary to limit the amount of times Bonnafon runs the ball: Well, I think you have to play to his strengths. He's a great athlete and he did a really nice job the other night of running with the football. At the end of the day, when you look and you get 86 yards rushing from your quarterback, that's a significant difference in the game. We are asking him to be smart, to make sure that he gets the first down and takes care of himself, knows how to get out of bounds or get down on the ground.

He's a really, really good athlete. In those runs the other night, he never got hit hard one time. It was great to see, something we really look at. But he's also a good thrower, I think he can do a good job of, particularly, throwing the ball down the field.

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On Petrino watching Notre Dame games as a child: Well there were three channels at that time, you know. It might have been the only one at that time, but my grandparents were fans of Notre Dame, so I always went for the other team. You know how you are when you're young, right?

On Notre Dame: They're a good football team. When you watch them on video and they're very, very physical on defense. Their defensive front does a good job against the run and rushing the passer. They have a linebacker that is really active, that can run and make a lot of plays against the run and against the pass. They intercept the ball, and have a number of interceptions, so that's concerning. Then offensively, they just keep going and scoring points. They have turned it over, but they keep scoring points, so you know that you're going to have to move the football and get it in the end zone. Even when you look at the Arizona State game, who jumped way up on them, they came back and got it back 34-31, so it's a situation where you know you have to continue to move the ball and get it in the end zone.

On the weather affecting the game plan for Louisville: I don't think it will affect it a whole lot. It'll be nice if we can get outside here, one of these days this week. It is artificial surface, that's a good thing. I was cheering this summer when I heard they were putting in turf, because I didn't like watching games in mud and the old deep grass that was about four inches longer than it should've been, so I'm excited that they have the artificial turf and that really takes some of the elements away.

On what Petrino has seen from Notre Dame quarterback Everett Golson this year: Yeah, two years ago I don't know if I even watched them play, but Golson is a really good quarterback. He's another one of those threats that can throw the ball and run it, which is a real concern. He's got a great arm; real live arm so he can throw the ball deep downfield. He can throw the outs from one hash to the far sideline and he's a great competitor. He's certainly a guy that we have to game plan for.

On the defensive performance at Boston College: I think the thing I was most happy about from our performance at Boston College is we felt like we were going in and playing a real physical team that prided themselves on being physical on the offensive line and the defensive line, and I felt like we were the more physical team, so that was something that I was proud of. Our assistant coaches were proud of our players really playing physical and hard, and being aggressive with how physical we were going to play and our defensive front was a big part of that, so without those two guys (Vatuvei and Mauldin) in there, I thought they did a great job.

On concern about being "wowed" by the Notre Dame atmosphere: No, I don't think so. We've been able to play in a lot of big stadiums and be a part of it and I guess the only concern is I understand they don't have a jumbotron, so we won't have anyone on the sideline looking up at replay. We've kind of got used to that, on the sideline when you're trying to coach your guys and they all keep looking up at the replay, so we'll have a little bit more focus on the sideline.

On whether he has concerns playing a team that may be struggling at this point in the season: You know what you really do is concentrate on ourselves. We just need to have a great week at preparation, good week of focus, understand our game plan and go out and play our game, play the game we know how and I think we will have an opportunity to win the game. You focus on the schemes and what other people are doing but basically it comes down to doing our job in our preparation.

On Kyle Bolin, who will move into the second-string quarterback slot: I think one of the big things Kyle has done and this started the minute he got back here this summer is really being aggressive in his leadership, taking a stronger role in how to handle the huddle, how to call plays, how to handle it at the line of scrimmage which is something we talked to him in the spring that he needed to do a better job in and he did that immediately. He had kind of a tough fall because he was coming off of an injury and a surgery over the summer which put him behind but he keeps working hard every week in practice and keeps getting better so I think it is a situation where he is definitely our number two quarterback.

On how to be more effective in red-zone situations: Well we work hard on our hand-offs, making sure the exchange is perfect and we have put all exchanges on the quarterback. The running back has things he is looking at and he has to make sure he gets his elbow up the right way and his thumb down where it is supposed to be but we believe that it is the quarterback's job to set the ball right in his stomach. We have worked hard on that the last two practices we had, we did a little extra time on what we call our run-timing where we are working on our tracks, our hand-offs, ball handling, and fakes. Then we have to do a better job of keeping our pads down, having the exact splits that we want down inside the five yard line and finishing our blocks. I felt like we should have gotten the ball in there when we went for it on 4th and 1 and we just didn't get it blocked correctly.

On the improvement of the offensive line: I think some of it is familiarity with the schemes and what we are asking them to do. We have been able to keep the same five guys together so we have gotten better in our run blocking and some of it is our quarterback is getting the ball out of his hand quicker, receivers are getting open a little quicker. Everybody has improved a little bit to help us get better on the offensive front.

On when the offense doesn't move, does he contribute it to the O-line: I keep saying in the meetings here it is all 11 guys, we need all 11 guys to improve and get better and that is what we have worked hard at. Coach K (Klenakis) is a really good offensive line coach, I think our technique has gotten better. We still need to improve on our pad level, that is going to be really important this week because they are big physical guys and we need to have real good pad level and be able to finish.

On the significance of a win at Notre Dame: I think it would be great, it would get us to eight wins this year and certainly give us some momentum going into our next game. It should also give us some momentum on the recruiting trail so it is fun to go on the road, at a very prominent program and get a win. I think that is very positive for your program.

On how teams have found success against Notre Dame in recent weeks: I think it is the balance is what you have seen people have the ability to run and throw, Northwestern was very balanced. I think they rushed the ball for 270 and threw it for right around the same amount of yards. I think if you can get the ball in the secondary, we have some guys that can run after the catch with some speed that will help us get big plays. I think that is the one thing that shows up is that people have gotten big plays against them.