Southern Illinoise University Athletics
Coach Lennon football press conference transcript
10/20/2014 | 12:00:00 | Football
By Elizabeth Robinson
SIUSalukis.com
Opening Statement
It’s homecoming at SIU, so we’re definitely excited about the upcoming week and what that all means, and right now the best thing for our football program is to get that next game. We’re excited about the opportunities still in front of us and preparations are well underway as far as getting ready for the Sycamores of Indiana State.
What was the mood yesterday at practice with the team?
Naturally, there was disappointment. I would be very disappointed if we were anything but that. Yesterday was a process of basically putting the game behind you; and once you do that, you have to move on. You just can’t be hanging on to anything negative for more than a 24-hour period. It’s time to move on.
Indiana State has had the biggest FCS turnaround from last year. What stands out to you about their improvement?
I think the biggest thing is they’re healthy. That was the thing last year is they were decimated with injuries. Any time you have a new staff coming in and taking over and you have the injuries factor going in, it just makes for a very difficult season, and that’s what they experienced. I think they’ve benefited now from that, just from the fact that they played a lot of players last year, so they have an experienced football team. A lot of those individuals played a lot of football last year. Now they have their playmakers healthy, and they’re making plays. They’re a very gutsy, determined-type team. They never give up and they always give themselves a chance down the field. It’s been impressive watching their film and how they play the game.
Gary Owens, who was injured last year, what stands out from him?
His level of play is definitely impressive. I think the thing I’ve been really impressed with is the quarterback, (Mike) Perish, just what he’s been able to do running the offense. They had a little setback last week against North Dakota State, and they were limited in what they were able to accomplish; but other than that, they had some very impressive games against Illinois State and Northern Iowa, and not to mention the non-conference opponents that they were very successful against. Right now they’re running a pretty confident offense that’s capable of moving the ball.
(Indiana State QB Mike) Perish is 10th in the nation in passing yards per game. How do you slow that down?
You have to be assignment sharp. You have to tackle. There’s only so much you can do with pass defense. You have to be able to come up and make a tackle; and when they make a mistake, you have to be able to be in position to capitalize on that mistake. The one thing with being effective against passing-type offense is you have to have a patient demeanor; and when they do give opportunities for either a sack or a big play, you have to be there and ready to make that play.
They haven’t run well recently. What do they like to do in the passing game?
I think number one, they do have a good running back core. They have had some successes running the football. Against North Dakota State, you almost have to throw that game out completely because that’s not characteristic of what (Indiana State) has been able to do. In fact, I think that even with Perish out – he didn’t play at all against Illinois State – they were very effective at moving the football with the run and pass. So I expect that they’ll come in and we’ll see a pretty evenly balanced offense that will execute at the high percentage with throws that they like to make and also have a good north-south run game.
Connor Underwood is really their playmaker on defense – what makes him so effective at getting to the quarterback?
He’s an athlete. Natural instincts. There are some football players where that’s just what they are: They’re a football player. And I think that probably best describes him. The game I think comes easy to him. He has great instincts and he plays at full speed; and most of the time, he’s right.
Does he remind you of Tyler Williamson at all?
Any of those players that are instinctive, a lot of times you try not to over-coach them; because if you coach them too much, you take away some of their natural ability, and Connor Underwood would be in that category.
How is SIU looking health-wise, specifically (Malcolm) Agnew?
Malcolm is going to be out for at least a couple weeks, so we’ll be without Malcolm this week. That’s the nature of the game. That’s why you have the guys that you have in the backfield ready to go. We’ll plan accordingly, and hopefully Malcolm heals up fast. It’s a foot injury, and we’ll just leave it at that. I expect to get him back; we just don’t know when.
Will you use Ken Malcome more? Cameron Walter?
Ken, he got in a little bit last Saturday and (we will use) Mika’ll McCall. Tay Willis is another one who’s pretty effective at the tailback position. Now, we’ll definitely be doing a running back by committee, so you we’ll have Tay Willis involved, Cameron Walter, Mika’ll McCall, Ken Malcome, so that’s your running back core right there. They’ll all be involved with the game plan and what we’re working on.
You don’t have a ton of room for errors the rest of the season – do you feel like that’s a positive thing in terms of helping you focus and start quicker in games?
You really don’t have much room for errors anytime in the season. Every game is critical, and it’s no different this week. You talk about having a playoff mentality, and that’s kind of the nature of this league. You have to get those wins where you can. Naturally, had we won at Youngstown that would’ve put us in great shape down the stretch, and obviously that didn’t happen. Now we have to win our games at home. I think that’s very important. But you can’t look too far down the road. You have to take care of what’s in front of you, and that’s Indiana State. Right now we have to get our game plan ready for them.
What improvement are you hoping to see from your offensive line?
We have to get some movement. That’s the biggest thing to have an effective run game. You have to have some north-south movement and that will create the seams that you’re looking for. It’s a little disappointing the last couple weeks where we haven’t been able to run the ball better, but we have shown the ability to run the ball in general. The offensive line is another position where hopefully we can get healthier, too. Kijana Evans did not play last week, and he’ll be a day-by-day evaluation this week. He was available. He made the trip last weekend, but he wasn’t at 100 percent. Again, just getting the right combination of linemen in there can significantly help your run game.
Early on you did a nice job of distributing the football, but it hasn’t been as successful the last couple weeks. Is that still a focus for you?
Most definitely. A lot of that goes with the need to run more plays. The longer you’re out there on the field, the more opportunities you’ll have to spread the football around. The last two weeks we’ve probably had a few more three-and-outs, the short drives that really inhibit you offensively and defensively. We have to be able to get the ball back to the offense quick enough where they can get back out there and make those plays. The way you become successful offensively is you have to run plays; and the more plays your run, the more you can distribute it. The more you can distribute it, the more successful you are.
If Tay (Willis) gets more touches at tailback, who will you use at his position as a wide receiver?
Josh Sullivan has been getting a lot of playing time for us, so he’s been prepped, and Connor Iwema is another one that’s really starting to develop his ball game. So now some of those younger receivers, its their turn to step up and earn their keep. Israel Lamprakes is another one that has shown some ability, so it’s their turn to step up.
There’s been an increase in three-and-outs over the last couple weeks – is there a reason for that?
That’s correlated to our third down success. The higher your third down conversion rate is, the longer you’re going to be out there and the less three-and-outs you have. We’re playing a pretty good schedule right now as far as the challenge is concerned, and we knew that coming in. We just have to be more efficient as far as the execution of our offensive plays and defensive plays.
Would you say the key to third down conversions is what you do on the first two downs?
We’ve missed on some third-and-longs and some third-and-shorts, too. You have to be able to get the chains moving. Conversions on third-and-medium, third-and-long, if you can accomplish that now you really get some momentum going. A lot of times, our first-down philosophy was trying to get a big play. We took some shots, and you’re trying to be aggressive with your play calling, but the negative of that if you don’t convert on it, now you’re second-and-long. That becomes a little more challenging, and now you have the third-down conversion. It’s just a matter of getting things clicking and feeling confident in what we’re doing.
That would be where losing a guy that averages about five yards a carry could hurt you…
We’ve got running backs that can get four or five yards on first down. Losing Agnew is not a good thing –you don’t want to lose your starting tailback. But we have tailbacks that can step up and play, and it’s their turn to play. That’s the nature of the game.
Youngstown and North Dakota State have spread you out defensively – can you talk on that?
I don’t know specifically that North Dakota State did that. Youngstown State, the one we got hit on, it was third-and-long and we were in a nickel-type defense, and they just ran the ball up the middle. They took a chance on it, and we didn’t respond well and gave up a touchdown run. Other than that, I don’t think our run defense has been horrendous. We need to be able to defend the field and that’s what we’re trying to do, and we have to be a little more efficient with our defensive efforts and not have as many extended drives as we’ve had.
Are you encouraged by the fact that you have been able to put opponents in third-and-long a lot this year?
Our run defense has actually been pretty good with our first and second downs, and we’ve given up some third-and-long conversions. That’s the thing we’ve got to get better at is stopping the third-and-long. It’s easier to play defense when it’s third-and-long, but you’ve still got to do it. You have to find a way to make the stop and sometimes you bring pressure, sometimes you do the ultimate zone coverage where you’re only rushing three, and it’s a little bit of a guessing game with how you want to go about it. The bottom line is you have to make the stop.
It was said that Youngstown was moving their offensive line in unusually close. Is that what happened with how they got better protection on their quarterback, or was it something else?
A lot of their protection was max protection. They were keeping eight guys in, seven guys in, and only doing two receiver or three receiver routes, and that’s not uncommon. We see that every week. We have a good reputation of putting pressure on the quarterback, and that’s what offensives have to decide is whether or not they want to max protect where they don’t get as many receivers out in the route or whether they go with the five-receiver route where they leave their quarterback exposed. It’s just game planning.
Have you sensed anything different about this team the last few weeks? Have you been able to pinpoint why you started so slow against Youngstown on Saturday?
You have to give credit to the opponent. If it was simple where you could just fix it or you could give a pregame speech that would guarantee a victory – athletics doesn’t work that way. You have to show up; you have to be ready to perform. We had a good week of preparation going into the game. It’s not like we were out of position; they make some plays. They executed what they needed to do. We didn’t do that offensively. It’s just a momentum type thing. You can’t control how you start. You’d like to think you could, but the reality is when the ball is kicked off you just hope for the best and you just play the game. You can’t overreact. If you have a bad start, you have to regroup, come out and keep fighting away. If you have a great start, sometimes the worst thing you can do is have a great start. Then, you let your guard down and next thing you know you’re hanging on for dear life. That’s just the game of football.
Kenny James started Saturday. Is someone not doing well or did he just have a good week at practice?
Kenny’s doing pretty good. We’re challenging our guys. We don’t want anyone to get too comfortable out there, just thinking the start is going to be automatic. Kenny had been playing well and we thought that we’d give him a shot at it. Ryan Neal was banged up, so it gave us a reason to go ahead and give Kenny a shot, and it worked out pretty well.
Trying to avoid a three-game losing streak and with Homecoming, would you label this as a must-win game?
They’re all must-wins. I can’t emphasize that enough. This is the next game. We can’t get overwhelmed. I know it’s good media to be able to put that label on it, ‘This is a must-win, do-or-die situation;’ but for us, it’s the next game. We have to have that mentality that they’re all must-wins. We play in a very, very unforgiving league; so if you lose, the league isn’t going wait for you to catch up. It’s going to pass you by, and that’s pretty much the nature of the game.
