Tim Brewster Press Conference Transcript (Nov. 18, 2008)

The following is a transcript of Minnesota Head Football Coach Tim Brewster's weekly press conference from Nov. 18, 2008: 

Opening Statement
Obviously we’re disappointed in the loss to Wisconsin, but I could not have been more pleased with our team’s mindset going into the game. I thought we did a lot of things very well in our game. We had a lot of freshmen in the game against Wisconsin make some great plays and some not so great plays. Obviously we turned the ball over some and that was disturbing. But I could not have been more pleased with the way our team prepared to go into that environment. Minnesota teams have really struggled going into that environment at Camp Randall. When you look at the way Gopher teams have played Wisconsin the last ten times at Camp Randall Stadium, it has not been pretty.

We did a great job in the first half, taking a 21-7 lead into halftime. We just didn’t finish the game out. And that’s what the game is about, playing in the second half when the game really counts. It’s a 60-minute football game and you don’t get half an axe in that game. You have to play sixty minutes to win to bring the axe home. There was great disappointment in not bringing the axe home.

As an extremely young football team, I could not have been more proud with the way our team played. Guys like Brandon Green, Brodrick Smith and Shady Salamon really stepped up for us. Shady got his bell rung and came back with some good, hard, physical things for the team. If you look at how our defense rose up to the challenge of playing against a hard-nosed physical football team in Wisconsin, it was impressive. I believe Wisconsin had a 5-23 record when they rushed for less than 200 yards. We held them to 116 net yards, 2.3 yards per rush. It’s a tremendous testimony to how far we’ve come on the defensive side of the ball.

You don’t have time to lick your wounds. This week we have a huge football game against an outstanding Iowa team. An Iowa team that comes in here with a lot of momentum and a lot of confidence, having beaten Penn State and Purdue the past couple weeks. It’s a tremendous challenge for us to win back the Floyd of Rosedale (trophy). But more importantly from our perspective is it’s our seniors' last game at the University of Minnesota. We’ll honor our seniors on Saturday night and there’s a little bit of sentiment to it to be the last game in the Metrodome. We want to go out the right way. We want to have a great week of preparation and we want to play well. Iowa has the pig and we want the pig. There’s always certain bowl ramifications and of course we have a tremendous rivalry game against a good Iowa team.

As you look at Iowa’s team, offensively they’re very similar to Wisconsin. Shonn Greene is as good a back as there is in the country right now. He’s a 235-pound kid, hard-nosed, physical guy. If we’re going to have a chance in the game, we’re going to have to swarm and have multiple kids tackling him on every snap. That’s the only chance we’re going to have. We have to play really sound football up front.

Stanzi, their quarterback, is playing very well right now. You can see he has a high level of confidence about him. Up front, their offensive line is as good as any in the Big Ten. They’re a big, physical group. Kirk Ferentz does a nice job. He’s an offensive line guy and that’s his specialty. The Iowa offensive lines have always been good and that’s due to him.

As I look at Iowa’s team, they look like a Kirk Ferentz coached team. Very sound, very solid fundamental football team. Again, right now I think the big thing is that they’re playing with excellent confidence. You look at them on defense and you see one of the best players in the Big Ten, Mitch King. I love the way the kid plays, he’s like a rolling ball of butcher knives. Both their defensive tackles are as good as any in the Big Ten and they present a lot of challenges to our very young offensive line. We’re going to have to have a great week of preparation and that’s the story.

For three straight weeks we’ve played for trophies. Obviously, we haven’t won a trophy and the challenge for our team is to have a great week of practice and go out to win the trophy and have a great game for our seniors.

On problems caused by turnovers
Turnovers are a part of the game. The team that eliminates the turnovers has the better chance to win. We knew if went into Wisconsin and held them to under 200 yards rushing and didn’t turn the ball over, we would have a good chance of winning. We turned the ball over. You don’t make excuses but we have a young football team. What you better understand is that mistakes are part of the game in the growing process. That’s where I’m at and I think that’s where we are at as a football team. We’ve got a large number of young football players. They’re very talented players going through growing pains right now. That’s part of the deal.

On Decker’s potential impact
I think Eric Decker will have a big impact. He’s a great football player and he’s hungry to get back on the field. He’s probably not going to be 100 percent, but he’ll be close. It’s a meaningful game for him, being from the state of Minnesota. I think he’s going to have a good contribution.

He’s a Biletnikoff finalist, and is one of the most outstanding wide receivers in America today. He’s had an unbelievable season and unfortunately he had to miss that game last week against Wisconsin but I really anticipate him to come back and play great against Iowa.

On Minnesota’s mindset against Wisconsin
We were very pleased with our team’s mindset. We were an extremely confident football team going into Camp Randall Stadium. There wasn’t a coach or a player that didn’t expect to win that football game. Unfortunately, we didn’t get it done. But I could not have been more pleased with the confidence we showed going in there.

Update on Kyle Theret and Lee Campbell
They’re both day-to-day. I don’t think either will practice full today but they’re both day-to-day. They’re both ankle sprains and we hope to have them Saturday. We could have them both ready or we could have neither. It’s just a matter of how they progress throughout the week.

On Mike Rallis’ performance against Wisconsin
He’s a lot like Kyle (Theret) in that he is an extremely intelligent football player. The first person to come in and get his game plan book each and every week is Mike Rallis. There’s a reason why a young kid can step in like he did against Wisconsin and play with such confidence, line up properly, and go make plays. It’s because of his confidence and his preparation. He’s an extremely smart football player and he’s talented. He’s a big kid who can run and he tackles extremely well. He goes in on his first play last week, goes one on one with P.J. Hill, and gets him on the ground. I couldn’t be more pleased with Mike Rallis. He’s one of our many young outstanding football players we have on the team.

I expected Mike Rallis to be really good. He was offered a lot of scholarships. He chose to walk on to the University of Minnesota. It didn’t take him long to get a scholarship here. We knew he was going to be a very good football player and we were just fortunate to initially get him as a walk on.

On Rallis’ potential impact against a physical team like Iowa
I think he’s very comfortable being in the box. I think Mike feels like he can get in the box and he can be a physical tackler. He’s an excellent tackler. For a young guy, he’s very fundamentally sound. He comes from a great high school program in Edina. He’s been very well coached and he came in here ready to play and ready to help us.

On Shady Salamon’s contributions against Wisconsin
Shady Salamon is a very tough, hard-nosed, physical kid. You can see that’s the way he runs the football. He was involved in a couple violent collisions in the game against Wisconsin. He’s a good football player. He’s a smart, heady kid and a downhill runner. I really like the element of toughness he brings to the offense.

On expectations from Wide Receivers against Iowa
I really feel good about our group of wide receivers. Last week our young guys made some big plays at Wisconsin and you have to feel good about their contributions. You knew they were coming because they are very talented football players. Then you add a guy like Eric Decker back in and I anticipate our whole team to play well this week, not just the wide receivers. We’re in game 12 of the season and I think our kids feel good about their development and where they’re at right now and expect the passing game to really take off. We have some weapons in the passing game, especially at wide receivers.

On stopping Shonn Greene
He’s a big, physical back just like P.J. Hill was last week. You cannot tackle him with one guy. There has to be multiple tacklers hitting this guy. We have to swarm and get around him. Our defensive line is so critical in getting gap control and stopping the run and a guy like him. To be honest, you don’t stop a guy like Shonn Greene. You cannot just eliminate him from the deal. What you have to do is limit the amount of yards he gets. To me the critical thing is the explosive runs, the runs over 12 yards.

On imitating Shonn Greene at practice
It’s hard because we don’t have a big, physical guy like that. Jon Hoese is a guy who can probably simulate him somewhat. He obviously doesn’t have the speed of a Shonn Greene but he can do a decent job of imitating the physicality. It’s hard to simulate someone like that. I don’t know if there’s anyone better than Greene in the Big Ten.

On using Eric Small in goal-line situations
He’s been in that package all year long. He wants to slip out into the flats and catch a pass. I told him to just do a good job and continue blocking. He’s a 300-pound athletic guy who does a good job of blocking movement. I think it was a nice job by our offense of getting in a heavy personnel grouping, which we haven’t done a lot of, and knocking the ball in the end zone from the one yard line.

On impressions of the dome as a player at Illinois
I think despite whatever reasons the dome was built, I’m just an outdoor football guy. I don’t think the dome is conducive to college football. I don’t think the dome is conducive to a gameday experience for fans and kids. I think we’re all genuinely excited about going to TCF Bank Stadium. It will just be a boon to all of us.

I think the experience we had at Camp Randall with the weather with snow flurries does not get any better. That’s football. That’s the way football is supposed to be played. I think we’re all looking forward to getting back to playing outdoor football in the state of Minnesota.

I don’t think there’s any way you can overestimate the good that this will do to our football program or the good it has already done our program as far as recruiting is concerned. It is truly the most beautiful new stadium in America. I think next September 12 is just going to be amazing. It’s going to be a home field advantage for us. I feel like when we walk into TCF Bank Stadium we will feel like this is a home field advantage. There’s a waiting list for tickets at TCF Bank Stadium. I don’t think there’s a waiting list at the Metrodome.

I think everyone knows how big it is to play in front of a packed house. We’re going to have a great crowd on Saturday. Unfortunately a large part of it is going to be Iowa fans. What I look forward to at the University of Minnesota is a packed house full of Gopher fans and maybe a thousand Hawkeyes down in the corner. That’s when we’ll know we’re where we need to be.

On getting a trophy game win for Minnesota
It’s truly important to our football team and to the state of Minnesota. It’s a huge game. Our state kind of fights back and forth between which rivalry game (Wisconsin or Iowa) is the most important. It’s just important to our fans and the team to win a trophy game and that’s what we need to do. We need to win these football games and we will.

On keeping confidence throughout the recent losing streak
We lift our team up, we don’t beat our team down. That’s what we do as coaches. I want to pound the positives and focus on those. I want to accentuate the good things our football team going into the Wisconsin. It’s my job as the head coach to see that our mindset is extremely positive and that we expect to go into every football game expecting to win. We’ll go into this game against Iowa expecting to win because our preparation was complete, our preparation is very thorough.

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