Colorado State University Athletics
Postgame Quotes: CSU vs. Weber State
9/12/2009 12:00:00 AM | Football
Sept. 12, 2009
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Colorado State Head Coach Steve Fairchild
General
“First off, hats go off to Weber State. He had them ready to play. They played a great game and in some ways we didn’t really play smart enough to win the football game, but we made enough plays that we were fortunately able to come away with the win. Like I said all week, there’s not that big of a difference from top to bottom in college football. If you look at the athletes they had out there, they had some good players and a good coaching staff and we didn’t really play good enough to give ourselves a good chance to run away with that.”
On the effect of last week’s on this game
“No, I think we knew that was going to be a talented quarterback, receiver and running back. And offensively I thought we played a good first half. I think we scored on three out of four possessions but then we made a couple of errors offensively in the third quarter and they kept moving the ball and we jumped offsides on fourth down. There’s just a few things we did that made it difficult for us to win. But we were fortunate enough to get that turnover late.”
On Weber State opting not to kick the field goal on third down
“In some ways yeah (he was surprised). But I know they were trying to run the clock out. I know that’s the thought process but they did a good job coaching and it would be the last thing I’d want to do is stand up here and second guess anybody’s coaching after what I did today.”
On the fumbled snap late in the game
“At this point, I didn’t care. All I wanted was the ball out, somehow, some way. I wanted either our guys to block it or it to go off the upright. But like I said, we made a play and we got the ball back.”
On the penalties
“That’s the thing we did last year that gave us the chance to win. We led the conference in least amount of penalty yards. There were some untimely ones. There’s a lot of things we have to work on. Obviously we aren’t that good on third down offense right now and sometimes you have to grow with yourself with a new quarterback in that regard but we’ve got to improve there in a hurry if we want to make any run at being a good football team.”
On James Skelton’s interception
“That was a great play. You tell guys this: You don’t care if they’re a five-play guy or a 50-play guy, every play is precious and that last snap where they fumbled the ball is a perfect example. In a football game every play is precious and you end up needing everybody. And if they’re just covering punts and that’s all they do, they may be the one guy to make that play and win that game. That was a big play by James and we’re certainly fortunate that he made that play.”
On third down conversions
“We were awful. Two weeks in a row we’ve been awful on third-down offense. We were fairly good last year. I think we were about a 47 percent or something and we’re just not even close this year so we’re going to have to look at what we’re doing and so forth. But sometimes you can be a little too conservative. We’ll evaluate it. I know we’ve got to get better in that regard if we’re going to make any run.”
On the fumbled snap late in the game
“You could tell he fell back and the ball fell out and when that happens you usually have a pretty good chance of one of your defensive linemen falling on it. And it was Guy Miller. Give credit to him because those things become ugly when the pile goes on and he fought hard enough to keep the ball.”
On the possibility of putting Jon Eastman in
“No, Grant made a couple of errors but he was the least of our worries today. There were a lot of opportunities on some deep balls that we just didn’t make. We made a few. We made enough to score some points but if we do it again, we should be able to get over the top of that defense more than we did.”
On the Eric Peitz catch and subsequent review
“The booth decided to review that and it’s clear he caught it. There was a few that were very clear that they had to go to review.”
On the fourth-down spot review
“To me it looked like he got stopped a yard short. We had him stopped. The knee went down and then he gets pushed forward. Without it being a televised game you don’t have enough TV cameras and angles to verify something like that and that’s a tough one. I was worried about the one – I stood there on the interception and his foot was clearly out of bounds. It was not even close. And we’ve got to go ahead and challenge it and then you worry that there wasn’t a good TV angle in a game like today.”
On Lou Greenwood’s future playing time
“Probably more and more now that we’ve decided to use him. He’ll certainly have a chance to try to work his way into the game plan, but like everybody else he’s got to produce to keep getting carries and balls thrown his way.”
On what to work on this week
“Like last year, we’ve just got to get better. We’ve got to get better every week. We can control what we do this week in practice and there’s not any area of our football team that I think is championship caliber right now.”
On Chris Nwoke
“I thought about it today and again, I’d like to step back and review the situation first before I decide.”
On John Mosure’s injury being the reason Greenwood was used
“Yeah, probably the main reason, but Lou’s been in the back of our minds all camp. He’ll help us in the return game as well.”
On Chad VanderMolen taking over kickoff duty
“Yeah, because we weren’t getting it down there as well as we’d like. A couple of the short ones had some decent height and we were able to cover them well but there were some that just didn’t. We’ll still evaluate it.”
On whether he was upset by the number of penalties or the type
“Both. There was one where we stop them on fourth down and jump offsides and we had Rashaun open deep, and we missed the throw, but we get a holding call on something we didn’t need to get there. We just need to play smarter and that all comes back to me. I obviously didn’t have us ready to play today and we’ll certainly address that with the football team next week.”
Weber State Head Coach Ron McBride
General
“It was our game to win. I mean they made one play in the second half, period. It was our game to win, period. That’s all I got to say. Stupid. You can’t take a quarterback exchange when you’re down there trying to get right in the middle. You throw a screen, you throw a pick on the screen. We got two chances to put this game away. We can’t kick an extra point and a chip-shot field goal. The team played their butts off.”
On the play of the Weber State defense
“The defense studded up and just kicked it in the second half. I’m telling you what, Colorado State’s offensive line is excellent and so is their defensive line. I’m proud of the way these guys played because they rose to the occasion. They didn’t take a backward step from anyone. I’m disgusted because this opportunity doesn’t come around all the time. That’s a game we should have won. It’s our game, period. Anybody got a different opinion, they’re wrong.”
Colorado State players
DT Guy Miller
On coming away with the fumble: “I saw him bobble it when I was past the center and I just fell. I did not expect that and it was good. I’ll take it.”
On Weber State’s play: “They played a good game. They threw a lot of different stuff at us. They were fast, they were quick and we were just lucky to come out with a win.”
LB Michael Kawulok
General: “We cannot come out next week and play like this if we want to beat Nevada. Our team made a lot of mistakes today and we just did not play well enough.
“We kept beating ourselves in making penalties and costing ourselves situations. We beat ourselves on a lot of those third downs on plays we should have made but we made miscues. We cannot do that next week.
“We know we got lucky today. We have to put this one away and start thinking about next week.”
On the last-minute fumble: “That’s why you have to keep playing. I looked at Guy Miller, he had the ball in his hands, and then emotions went going.”
QB Grant Stucker
General: “A win is a win no matter how you look at it. This is going to be good for us because we are defiantly humbled by this experience and this is going to be good for this team. This is something we have to take to the Nevada game, knowing we are going to have to play a complete game.”
On the last-minute fumble: “I was in total shock. I could not even move or understand what was going on. For whatever reason, God showed his favor. We should not have won that game and I give a lot of credit to Weber State. They (Weber State) came out and played a great football game against us and they are a team that just keeps sticking around.”
TE Eric Peitz
General: “We have to thank God for that one. It does not get closer than that, but we are 2-0 and that is all that matters. We had missed opportunities on those long passes. At times I thought we looked great and then at times we just did not have that edge. That first half I thought we were going to roll and we just stalled out a bit.”
On the final touchdown catch: “Honestly I did not know if they were going to call it a touchdown. We both had the ball and we were scrambling for it. I guess the tie goes to the receiver. It could have gone either way. I was just so happy when the ref put his arms up.”
WR Rashaun Greer
General: “That’s all that matters is that we came away with the win. It wasn’t anything pretty but that’s all that matters and we can move on.
“One day you are on and the next you are off. One thing you have to do is stay positive and just focus move.”
Weber State Players
QB Cameron Higgins
On the last drive: “Everything was working for us, we ran all the right plays. We just fumbled the snap.”
On the fumbled snap: “I was going to just get the snap and center the ball myself. It all happened so fast. I let my team down. They fought real hard and did everything right.”
On whether he was as stunned as CSU: “It’s tough. The game is in your hands and you let your team down like that. You just have to bounce back from it and look to next week.”
On what they can take from this game: “I have to start being a leader. I can’t make these dumb mistakes. I just have to lead the team to victories; I’m sick of being a touchdown short or a point short of losing a game where I had the chance to win the game.”
TE Cody Nakamura
General: “We wanted this win so bad, it just ended bad. We were unlucky.
“You just stop thinking about this tonight and start preparing for Idaho State tomorrow. We have to bring it to Idaho State now to get our confidence up.
“It’s going to be a long bus ride home that’s for sure, but we played our butts off, so we’ll bounce back from it tomorrow.
“If we can hang with Colorado State we can hang with anybody.”
K Mike Snoy
On being eager to kick on that last drive: “I was so ready; I had it playing in my head. I was getting carried off the field; I was going to drill it.”
WR Tim Toone
On the message in the halftime locker room: “Just finish. Coach Mac just kept telling us to finish. We had them on their heels going into the half so we just wanted to keep that going.
“It’s just another experience, but little mistakes cost you and that is what happened to us today.
“You take the game for what it’s worth. We played really well and you build on that. Next week we focus on Idaho State.”
S Jordan Brown
General: “Coming into the game we knew what we were supposed to do. We just got into the speed of the game; they (CSU) were running a lot, so we knew we had to stop the run.”
RB Treyvn Smith
General: “We had to make some adjustments. We were motivated; we had the momentum going into halftime.
“Football is football and a win is a win but we played our butts off and I’m happy the way things went.
Obviously I would have rather had the win, but I’m not that disappointed. I think that we were the better team and I think we should have won, but things happen for a reason and that’s just going to make us hungry for next week.
“It’s just one week at a time and that’s how it goes. We have our rivals next week and we are going to be ready to play them.
“We were night and day from the first game to the second game. The play calling today was great and I was very happy with the way it went.”
On whether they felt they had the game won: “Absolutely, I think we played our butts off, I think if one play goes differently we win that game.
“We practice this play to get the ball in the middle of the field so we can kick it. We have gone over it and gone over it, so when we got down there I knew we were going to run it, and unfortunately it didn’t work out.”
