News From The Locker Room
9/7/2002 12:00:00 AM | Football
Sept. 7, 2002
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Michigan State Head Coach Bobby Williams:
"We had a tough game. For any of you guys writing these articles about how we have an easy schedule, I'm telling you that was a tough ball game. That was a very good football team; they played very well and were well coached. Their players really came here prepared. I thought they did an outstanding job."
On the second half: "We had to go in and make some adjustments at halftime. We got after them a little bit. We had to challenge them in all three phases, and they came out and responded well...extremely well."
On the special teams: "The special teams were the difference in the game. They've been working hard on the kicking game, and we got some real positive results."
On Coach Miller and the defense: "We worked over a year preparing for this game. We worked in the winter and through the off-season in spring football and over the summer. We worked throughout the preseason. He put together a great defense for this game. We had to change our whole defense to get ready for this ball game because we don't see this type of option attack in the Big Ten. He just did a fantastic job. The players had to learn this defense in one week and they did a tremendous job in coming out and really hanging in there; having a lot of patience and poise, and coming out in the second half and really finishing it off. It was a good win for us. We got challenged today and our players responded very well."
Rice Head Coach Ken Hatfield:
"Congratulations to Bobby Williams and MSU on a good victory. I thought they came out and played extremely well in the second half. But, I thought our team made a vast improvement from the first game. I'm proud of the way we played."
On Rice Defense:
"When you give up three scores to a good football team you're going to have a hard time winning on the road. That being said, the greatest thing that happened was that our defense played the heck out of the running game. I thought we made some corrections and we're a better football team today by playing the running game a lot better. They had to resort to throwing it a bunch."
On Charles Rogers:
"He's such a great threat. You've got to pretty much double cover him. He's just so good that it makes their offense that much more effective all the time."
K Dave Rayner:
(On his 50-yard field goal) "The coaches told me we were going to kick a field goal and I said 'OK, it's 50 yards, but I just have to hit it like I hit the last two.' I hit it well and it went through. It got my confidence up a little bit and I had a pretty good game."
"Coach Crossman always tells me if I miss one the next kick is a whole new kick and to forget about the last one. I tried to do that today and it worked pretty well."
QB Jeff Smoker:
"We didn't have the ball a lot in the first half. They really did a good job of keeping the ball from us. The defense was able to get a couple of turnovers in the second half and we started to execute. Good things happen when you execute and in the first half we weren't executing well."
"They were trying to play Charles (Rogers) one-on-one and I think that is impossible. When they do that he is going to get open and that is what he did today."
TE Jason Randall:
"Coach Williams stresses to keep running on punt coverage and good things will happen. We all ran down there full speed. He dropped the ball, recovered it and (DeMario) Suggs slapped it out of his hands. The ball was sitting right there and I jumped on it. It does a lot for my confidence."
LB Mike Labinjo:
On stopping the spread offense: "On every snap they have so many options out there. They bring the fullback and the quarterback, they have guys coming in motion. It is really difficult. I think our coaches came in with a good game plan. We were a little shaky in the first half, but in the second half we came out and shut them down."
On making second-half adjustments: "The coaches pointed out a couple things. They were running more lead options. The quarterback was trying to keep the ball a lot more. We told our outside containment guys to play the pitch first, that way the quarterback is forced to run the ball."
"We wanted to build off the last game and build upon every game this season. We want to take it one game at a time. Our main responsibility is to put our offense on the field as much as possible and allow them to score points. We knew if we did our job, the offensive would get in there and score some points."
WR Charles Rogers:
On the offensive performance: "We have to go back and work on the little things. I think the little thing slowed us down. Our special teams did a great job out there. Now we are getting ready for California. One thing about our team is that we want to improve every week. That is our main focus and that is what we are going to do. We have to keep fine-tuning our offense."
"They held on to the ball a lot and were trying to slow down our tempo because we are a fast tempo team."
On the play of WR Ziehl Kavanaght, TE Eric Knott and the other receivers: "I know those guys can do that because I've seen those guys make the plays in practice. It's just about going on the field and doing it. They did a great job out there. Everybody feels good about this win. Now we are getting ready for California."
