Post-Game Quotes: Michigan

Michigan State interim head coach Harlon Barnett

Opening statement…
We played a top 10 team, they were far more superior than us, we got our butts kicked, and we got to learn from it. The 24-hour rule is still in place, and we have Minnesota next up.

On what life lessons he can share with his team and people in general dealing with his current situation…
Well, you got to be a man. Being a man is taking responsibility in everything that you do and being accountable and that's a life lesson within itself. You live long enough, you will go through some things in life that will make you say, "this is life," when somebody asks, what's wrong, it's life, you never want to turn anything down; this too shall pass at some point in time, in my faith, I don't know when, but it will pass at some point in time, I believe in it, I'll never lose faith in that, it's just where we are right now.

On how he handled Michigan sign stealing reports and how it made it tougher on Houser in his second career start…
I wouldn't say complicated, you saw earlier in the game he was going to the sideline; it was something our guys have done before with teams that do it, in the game, there's teams that are good getting signals within the game, which is legal, and we know that. So, running to the sideline then back to the huddle to tell the guys as to supposed to everybody getting the signals from the sidelines, but that's not an excuse, I don't like excuses. We must play better and that's the goal, to start playing better and not beat ourselves.

On biggest home lost in the history of the stadium and what he tells the players to move on…
Rather you lose by one or 49, it's still a loss. What I told them was, I've been trying to make sure we all stay together, that has been my number one thing since I been put in this position and doing that, I been, "that's okay that he did that," nothing crazy, but that's not really who I am as a person, I was trying to be compassionate to the players. Now, I'm just going to be me all the way. I told them, I was trying to be compassionate, we been through this now, we know what it is, we are in an adverse situation and now we had enough time to roll over where now it's let me be me. If you're not where you're supposed to be on time every day, all day like you're supposed to be, now you won't play; because that's me, that's me. I am a compassionate person, I understood the position we were in, I was trying to make sure everybody is staying together. Now it's going to be, who you see out there are guys you know are all in and going to give us everything all day, every day, I'm talking on and off the field. It wasn't nothing super egregious before, but I'm real big on time stuff and respect and that's what's going to start showing up over these next several weeks.

On his plan to address the penalties…
Very important, it was 11 again, that's what it was against Washington, you can't play top 10 teams in the country and have 11 penalties. It was the exact same number, the exact same number against those guys and you saw very similar results. We got a ways to go to get to that level, but we played top 10 teams and had our worst penalty games, we can't do that, we can't beat ourselves. We had started getting better at those things, but we still got to continue to work on it, obviously.

On illegal formation penalty, how can it be fixed…
That was a different guy, last week it was a guy in the line itself and this week it was a guy out wide, a gunner type guy and I think he checked with the ref, I got to watch the film, I just don't want to say anything. But at practice we always check with the ref and do all the things we're supposed to do. That's part of being disciplined and doing the little things right and we can't continue doing that.

Secondly, you've got a couple more top-10 opponents and notable defenses on the schedule, I'm wondering how you figure out how to get enough juice out of your offense in the coming weeks and enough playmakers and what not?
Well, we're really going to have to steady up with who's available for us, who our playmakers are and try to get them the ball as much as possible in any kind of way. Because, we do have some guys, some talented young men on the offensive side of the ball that can make some things happen and so we have to figure out what's best and what works best for us to be able to attack those different teams that we're facing coming up and see if we can make some things happen.

This team has gone through a lot of adversity this season, but is this just the lowest point yet?
It might be. I thought it was low last week, lower. But, you've got to shake it off and keep fighting, that's all I know. That's all I know is shake it off and keep fighting.

With Michigan's defense, what exactly made them so hard to score on this game?
Well, like I said going into the week, earlier in the week, they understand the defense, they understand where they're supposed to be, their assignments and they're coached well. When you're a sound, disciplined defense that's been coached well and guys do what they've been coached to do, then you have a chance to be pretty good, and so that's who they are and that's what they showed tonight.

On keeping the team together…
From the locker room that I saw in there, that was part of me saying what I said too - they keep fighting man. They are. You've got guys speaking up, guys that are passionate and they care and correcting others. Man, I love this group. I love this group. I know that we're not getting the results that we want but I love this group of young men, I appreciate all they've been doing and I think we'll be fine. I really do.

On whether you watch this game to learn from it…
You have to watch it, you have to face what really happened, and then get better from it. Like I said, it's still the 24-hour rule, but you want to learn from it just like we watched last week's film. You have to get better from it and look to finish out the season the right way.

On the Michigan sign-stealing allegations…
I got a call Wednesday night from our Athletic Director Alan Haller, and he had got a call from the Big Ten and the Big Ten had got a call from the NCAA, from my understanding what happened. And that's when I found out. There was talk of, I was asked, 'what could we possibly do to them, what do you think,' and I said what I said but I wasn't really expecting much to come from it to be honest with you. At one time someone did mention possibly not playing the game, but I was like, 'let's play the game.' It doesn't get you until it gets you, just remember that.

On the quarterback situation…
Yeah, those guys are getting better and are good players, Sam and Katin, so I'm glad they were able to get reps. Obviously Katin is the starter but even Sam getting some reps tonight I thought that was good because any time that you can get game reps is good. I'm glad Sam was able to get some and I told Jay, 'I'm thinking about putting Sam in, what do you think about it,' and he said 'let's go, let's get him some reps,' and so you never know when you may need him, so that's where we are.

On re-centering the team…
Good question. Well one of the ways, first of all, when talking to them and making sure they all understand that hey, I think they do, but you've got to say it again to make sure that they stay there, understand how penalties and turnovers and not getting off the field on third down, are things that you can't win football games if you're doing those things. You've got to talk to them about it again, put a heavy emphasis on it again, make sure that they all truly understand, because you can feel the room; 'everybody understand?', 'yes, we understand.' If there isn't mumbling, then they truly understand. If there is mumbling then you say what is it that we don't understand about what we're doing wrong to get better and then they will express themselves, so you've got to have some dialog with the team, back and forth. I can tell you, I feel like most of them are going to say, 'yes, we understand we're beating ourselves, we've got to get it corrected and this is how we're going to get it done,' and then we stay together, stay unified, we hold each other accountable on those things and then we have a chance to improve and get better and possibly win some football games.

Michigan State Graduate linebacker Aaron Brule

On the what the players tell each other and keep it together…
Obviously we got a group of guys that really want to win. We're itching for that victory. When you got a team full of guys that's hungry for success like that, things will get heated in a sense. Just wanted to expect the best out of everybody. We've got five more opportunities to win, but I think we will get that out to you to get those five wins.

On if there was anything Michigan was doing early that was giving them success…
They weren't doing much special early on. Actually, I had a player I messed up on. They got the edge around on one of the third downs. So no, they weren't doing nothing really spectacular. It was just us really doing our jobs, and giving the back end less time to cover and get some rush up front so they can cover less time. Some of those third downs we didn't get that opportunity, give those guys the opportunity to make plays because we want to get back there fast enough.

On Aaron's feelings/emotions through the game, and how he takes his performance tonight into
the rest of the season…
Usually my energy feeds off of my teammates. Guys like Zion, and all those guys like that. Usually, it's who I feed off of, and I know it's hard for guys that came before me, and things like that. So, I think that's what I really want to play for.

On what the players took from Coach Barnett after the game…
We just got to stay together, that's basically what he's saying. He's just saying stay together. Cause in situations like this, teams that don't have discipline and don't have people to really keep guys together, they can fall apart. I don't think that's the case with us, we just really want to win. I think we'll eventually take that step to pull these last five wins off.

On what gives the team confidence that they can turn this around…
The guys are gonna go to class. We're gonna do everything right off the field. Leading up throughout the whole week. Like Coach Barnett has done every week. We're gonna make sure the guys are doing things right off the field, and hopefully, that leads to success on the field. Make sure the guys aren't missing practice, if it's a little mixing booze, everybody's gotta be at practice. We gotta practice harder each week, and we'll get through this.

On how tough the past month has been…
I don't think it's as tough as we think. We've been shooting ourselves in the foot, honestly. Yeah, that may have played a part in what's going on but, we can't put the blame on that. We've got great coaches that were put in place that do what they do. They're calling things right, we've got to make plays. That's much on that.

On what it is about J.J. McCarthy that makes him so hard to defend against
I think it's their scheme, it's not necessarily him just doing all the work. I think those guys are put in a great position to do what they do and they capitalize on all their opportunities. That's the difference between top ten teams and teams outside of the top 10 and things like that. They do the little things really well and when they have mistakes they fix them immediately. I think that's what they do really well, they're just really good at executing their game plan.

On what the differences between Washington and Michigan were...
They're both really good teams. Washington's a big play team, they take a lot of shots down the field, they've got great receivers and things like that, and obviously a really good quarterback. Michigan, they're schematically sound, they do everything right upfront, their quarterback makes checks and things like that pretty nice. Not much of a similarity there, just two different styles of offense really.

On how this tests their leadership...
People say once you're done with football, a lot of people like to hire football players due to the fact that they're pretty stable in what they do, they're pretty consistent in the work that they do. I think moving forward, like Nate will probably piggyback off of this too, moving forward we just want to do everything right. We don't necessarily want to do anything different, there's nothing much that we need to change in what we're doing. It's just executing and being more physical, and that's what we're gonna continue to do.

I think this is really some of the easiest stuff we'll face in life. Once you get into the real world, as most of you know, life is way harder than just football. I think what we have going on here, if you can't get past this, you'll struggle with when this is done. I think just doing what you can here and I guess practicing for the real world and the adversity that we're having right now is going to lead to better things after football is done.

Michigan State redshirt sophomore running back Nathan Carter

On the difference they had to make to plays, and the adjustments to the offense…
I'm gonna say it wasn't that big of an adjustment. We practiced huddling, you know, going off of signals throughout the week. So, for us, we knew going into the week, that we needed to huddle a little bit. Just to slow the game down and for us as offense, we can control the game on that aspect. So, I want to say that wasn't a big change for us.

On their thoughts on Michigan's defense…
Yeah, they're a very, very good team. They're very strong, especially in their interior. The strength in their team is their alignment. So it was a challenge for us to be able to get those holes, push through piles. To be able to go out and move the ball. They're a really good team, and obviously, there were times where we executed well, and succeeded, and there were times where we didn't execute well, and it didn't work out. So we have to control what we can control, on the matter of the play out there. To be able to go out and score some touchdowns is our job as offense.

On what they would say on the vibe in the locker room after a loss like this...
I mean, you can imagine why we were definitely upset. No one wants to have their rivals beat them in their own house the way that we lost. I mean it was definitely tough and we have to be able as men to keep our heads up and to learn and grow from this. We still have five more games left in the season and we have to go out there and do what we can to win those last five games no matter what team it is. So that's our mindset right now we're going to continue to push forward and do our jobs to finish this season out strong.

On what the differences between Washington and Michigan were...
I'd say that both those teams, they're very disciplined. We can see that they had little to no penalties between both of those teams. They executed well, they did the little things great, and capitalized on opportunities that were presented to them. If we as a team want to get to where they are we have to be able to be disciplined, we have to be able to capitalize on the opportunities that we have.

On how the team found out about the signs situation and what was the reaction...
We didn't really think about that too much. We found out probably how everyone else found out, from social media. We were practicing the huddle and we were practicing signals throughout the entire practice so then they changed up what we wanted to do going into the game. We knew we wanted to slow down and really make some smart plays and we came in to work. So I wouldn't say we focused too much on as far as changing up what we wanted to do offensively.

On how this tests their leadership...
I think this goes beyond football, I think this is a principle for life. In life you're going to face adversity, you know what I mean, tough times. You're going to have to be able to not just fall down to the adversity, but to continue to fight. Coach B tells us every single day that he fights, he was born fighting, he can't do anything else but fight. He puts that to the running backs, as our mindset, I believe that's just a lifestyle. You have to be willing to fight cause life, the road, throws crap at you, you have to be able to stand up and fight. Where we are right now we have to continue to fight, we can't break down, we have five games left in the season, we gotta continue to finish strong. We're gonna continue to go out there and play our butts off because this may be the last season for a lot of us and nobody knows what it is. How do you want to be remembered? Do you want to be remembered as the guy who quit on the team and got laid down, slapped, or do you want to be remembered as someone who fought and finished it through it all. As a leader we have to be able to go out and share with the guys and the guys they have to respond to that.

Michigan Head Coach Jim Harbaugh

Opening statement…
First of all, I just want to say congratulations to our players, coaches, and everybody. Tremendous job of playing football. That was one of our best games. I also want to congratulate my daughter, Addi Harbaugh. Just came back first quarter grades with straight A's and got her first round win in field hockey state championship.

On if all the distractions affected them…
I think everyone had a single mind. Getting prepared to beat State. Pretty much if anyone around the building wanted to talk about something else, they didn't want to. They wanted to just talk about the game, the preparation, the practice and getting ready to execute. I thought they played their best. Got a little saying around here that says what do you do, speak so loudly, we can't even hear what you're saying. I thought our guys did a tremendous job of taking it one play at a time, and they were really a buzzsaw. Just played really great football. There's been stuff, there's been attempts to diminish the team in a lot of ways. Starting with the easy schedule, too easy of a schedule these guys aren't very good. We'll get on to the next one and move on with humble hearts. That's a heck of a group and I just congratulated them. Their focus was laser, laser like. Staying strong, focused, just on a mission.

On if JJ McCarthy's fumble in 2021 in this rivalry motivated him tonight…
J.J.'s just a great player. That's just what it is. The drop back game was just great. A plus-plus. Talk about lasers. That was some of the best tight end play I think anyone's probably seen in college football. The catches they were making, the routes they were running. The contested catches our tight ends were making. Only a few inches to spare from where J.J. was making the throw. Bang, there was the hit, and to be able to hold on to the ball, pretty amazing.

On the high success rate of the offensive play calls…
A lot of credit to Sherrone Moore. Had a great gameplan, called a great game. Michigan State is one of the best third down teams in the country, well documented. We were really picking up the third downs, third and longs. There weren't a lot of third and one, third and two. When we got in those positions, we were able to convert. They had the perfect defense called, and the one was a really well-timed blitz. Must've been seven guys in the backfield, and somehow he was able to escape. He's so dangerous when he's out of the pocket. Picks the open receiver or runs it himself. It's a double edge sword with J.J. MCcarthy, can beat you in so many ways.

On the team's reaction to Ja'Den McBurrows interception…
The whole sideline erupted. I mean everyone loved it. He made maybe three or four open tackles in the game as well. Long run saving tackle up the middle. He made a great hit on the perimeter, and when he got the tip and the interception, what a great thing.

On if there is a target on the team's back…
I think success does that. People hate to see people successful. Everybody has pointed that out from the beginning of the season. Our guys have just gone about their business. Wake up, take care of business today. We still got to get the guys back to Ann Arbor and take care of business again.

On how this team has defied gravity…
They done it with work, the good old fashioned way. They play for each other. There is no question about that.

On what was addressed to the team regarding the latest accusations…
Same thing I said in my statement.

On how having a target on his back makes him feel…
First rule of being a champion, don't let up.

Michigan Junior QB JJ McCarthy

On what he saw that led to involving the tight ends in the game...
Honestly, the game plan wasn't really targeting them or anything, it just happened naturally and that's the most beautiful thing that could have played out. The boys were open, and they finished the play, so great job by them.

On whether or not the allegations coming out were a distraction or if the tunnel incident was motivation at all for this game...
We didn't really have any rah-rah speeches about anything like that, we were just keeping the main thing, the main thing and that's winning a football game, winning each snap that comes our way and the rest just plays out for itself.

On whether they think that this was the most complete game...
I don't believe so. I still think that we haven't reached it yet. You know, we're just a time that will continue to climb, and we're never going to feel like we're settled or anything like that so we are not even close to our peak yet. There are so many ways we can grow and so much more stuff on film I'm sure we're going to see and learn from so definitely not our complete game yet but it's coming soon.

On how Coach Harbaugh addressed the team after the allegations were publicized:
He just let us know what his stance was on it. I think it was Wednesday, when it just came out and he was totally upfront about it with us, and he just told us that it wasn't going to distract us and keep focusing on playing ball."

Michigan Senior TE AJ Barner

On the patience that AJ Barner had while others were having their game...
I think that it's knowing that I have a great QB to get me the ball and all the OL men and Colston (Loveland). I think that we just feed off of each other and it doesn't matter what happens the week before and if you didn't have a great game yourself or on paper, I just think that each week we just come in with that mindset of this week could be the one. The biggest thing is that we just want to win at the end of the day.

On what went into those success throughout those third downs...
Personally, I wasn't here last year but he works extremely hard. He's a guy that we love and care about, and we all knew that this game meant a lot to him so we're all extremely happy that he made that play.

Michigan State University Athletics

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