Colorado State University Athletics
Fairchild: Nwoke gets better as game goes on
11/28/2011 12:00:00 AM | Football
Nov. 28, 2011
Opening statement: “Looking back at last Saturday, obviously what we felt important going into that football game was winning the turnover battle. When you play a team like Air Force, that is a must; we did not do that. We really emphasized, like we talked about prior to and after the game, not getting hurt with the deep ball. I thought we practiced that and emphasized that but obviously they did a nice job and got some deep balls on us. That broke the game open and like I said it got out of hand in the second quarter, so give them their credit. On the positive side I thought we, particularly up front offensively, played another physical football game. Obviously Chris Nwoke and our running game got on track again, which is positive. Having said that, we’re excited to have one more chance to put together a game and get the winning taste again. We’re exciting to be playing in this rivalry game, the Border War, and excited to get a home football game.”
On why Chris Nwoke has been so successful as of late: “Well I think we’re probably fitting up the run game a little better than we were earlier. Obviously Chris is better but when somebody has the success to the magnitude that he has within the last few weeks, he’s getting some help. When you look at everything we’re probably fitting up the run game a little better, blocking downfield a little better. He certainly is finishing runs. You can see that go to a new level in the UNLV game. With his physical stature, that has to be part of his game. As he learns how to do that better and more consistently, he’s going to have quite a career I think.”
On the keys to Nwoke’s success: “The key for Chris is to not be going sideways. He’s got some speed and he does have some elusiveness. That’s part of his game but it’s not the focus of his game. When he gets caught sideways he’s much easier to bring down. When he’s squared up and accelerating he’s hard to handle, particularly in the second level.”
On Nwoke learning not to hurdle people: “Yeah, we haven’t talked about that. Like you guys know, last year and even through spring ball he’s got some fine athletic skills so you don’t want to take those things away. But the more feet on the ground, the more square he is, generally with any running back those are good things.”
On if that is harder for younger running backs to learn: “You know, running backs, kind of like quarterback delivery, I’ve had a chance to coach a lot of good ones; I’ve had the chance to coach running backs in the NFL. They all have their own style. A little bit of it is based on their athletic ability. A little bit of is based on their dimension, too, just how they’re built, how low to the ground, how wide a base, how strong, those sorts of things. There are some principles obviously. When you accelerate into contact, you’re always running behind your pads, you’re square as much as you can be, and those sort of things. And then I think the underrated part of the run game is the timing and the entry relative to the other players on your offensive football team. If you enter some of the runs, be it a gap-scheme or a zone-scheme, in front of a puller or behind a zone block, it can really hurt the scheme.”
On Nwoke’s 810 yards over the past five games: “We’ve had that around here before with Kevin McDougal and some guys. He’s just staying healthy. He’s getting a lot of carries, which is good. As the game goes on, he gets revved up and plays a little better. Twenty-nine (carries) the other day is kind of a high end for a running back. You can wear a guy out with too many games like that. He felt good about what we were doing. He just had that look.”
On his fondest memory of the Border War: “Well I was playing so long ago, it’s foggy. It’s kind of hard to remember. It’s like our Air Force game and our CU game; it’s got a lot of heritage. It’s probably more important in some ways because it’s ongoing longer. I do remember going up there in Sonny’s (Lubick) first year and playing well. There have been good games by both teams. It’s quite a rivalry and I know it’s important to their university and their community, and it’s obviously very important down here.”
On if the week leading up to the game is just as important as the game itself: “Yeah. It is. It’s probably talked about the most, next to the opening against CU. This one’s probably got more dialogue and that sort of thing prior to the game. I know that gets everyone’s attention. I know our kids felt like we didn’t play very well last year so I know everyone in our football program is looking forward to playing in this game.”
On what makes Wyoming’s defense so effective: “Well they’ve got some good players. They’ve got some good guys in every area. When you look at the secondary and front, the linebackers, they’re experienced, good players. Marty (English) is a good football coach. Lately they’ve been keeping the ball in front of them and not giving up big runs and passes. That’s always key. They are playing good defense, particularly in the second half of the season.”
On the turnover battle: “They’ve been real good in that. We know that, next to points, that’s as important a stat as you can get.”
On what Utah State did against their defense to have success: “Utah State is a funny football team. I think they’re one of the better football teams out there, to be honest with you. They just didn’t win some tight games early. Utah State does a very, very good job running the football. They’ve got talented backs, they block well, they’ve got a good scheme. They were able to hit some runs and get some things going.”
On if the key to this week is to keep Nwoke involved: “Yeah. Obviously our mode of operation is we would like to run, which means Chris is going to be a big part of it. Unfortunately against Air Force we got in a situation where when you’re down by that much it’s hard to run as effectively as you’d like. Getting Chris going sets up a lot of things. It helps the quarterback, it helps the protection, it helps our defense. There is nothing like being able to run the football.”
On the quarterback situation: “We’ll prepare Garrett (Grayson) again to be the starter. I would feel more comfortable on that once I see Pete (Thomas) on the field tomorrow. I anticipate Pete being available. To what degree we use Pete Thomas will depend on how much practice and what we think of his practice during the week. We don’t want to put him out there too early. If he can get some things going Tuesday, Wednesday, maybe getting a few team things Thursday, he’ll be available. That’ll be a good thing.”
On if Thomas will practice in pads Tuesday: “We’ll talk with Terry (DeZeeuw). He’s still not 100 percent last week running. He looked good dropping back and throwing the football. I would anticipate Terry will work with him tomorrow and it will be a lot of individual. If we come out of that with a positive feeling then we will judge Wednesday and Thursday from there.”
On Grayson’s performance against Air Force: “He’d be the first to tell you he’s dropping his eyes and leaving the pocket too quick. So that affected our ability to throw the football. Like every quarterback, when you get behind by a number of points, it’s a must throw. That’s not a good thing for a quarterback, particularly a young quarterback like he is. He did not play as well in the pocket as he did against TCU. He’s a young guy; that will change. We’ll develop him. He’s very, very talented but again, he’s a true freshman. He’s got to grow up a little bit.”
On what Wyoming has done to turn its program around: “I think they’ve won a couple close games. I haven’t followed them that closely. I’ve watched them on tape and that sort of thing over the past 48 hours. I think they’ve won a couple close games. The freshman quarterback looks like he’s playing well. If you play good defense, you’re in every game. They’ve done some nice things.”
On if he is surprised with QB Brett Smith’s success as a freshman: “That speaks to the guy’s coaching and their scheme. He’s done a nice job. There’s no question.”
On if he is more worried about Smith’s ability running the ball or throwing the ball: “Both. He’s a dual-threat guy. He certainly can tuck the ball and go. He’s got some speed. You’ve got to be aware of his ability to run. Then they spread the ball out and throw the ball around that way. They’ve got a good little scheme.”
On if anything changes this week, the last with the current senior class: “We won’t start anybody that’s not a starter. Certainly talk about who is going to play and we will honor them in a number of ways. We will talk about it in team meetings. It’s their last chance to go out and put on a uniform and play at Hughes Stadium. I know it’s an important game for those guys. I think our entire football team would like to send those guys out on a positive note.”
On if pregame will change: “Normal senior day thing, where they walk out. It’s nice. I think it’s good for the parents.”
On what this senior class has meant to him: “I’ve said all along this is a fun team to coach. I really do love these guys. I think coming out of last year, people had a bad taste just because of the way we finished. Our record is not what we’d like but it’s a completely different feel. I would give credit to that senior class and guys like Myke Sisson. They were just determined to do it the right way starting last January and they have. They’ve trained the right way. They play for each other. They’ve really been a pleasure to coach.”
On if the seniors will have to lean on the younger players this week: “They have all year. And I think we’ve played hard all year and I expect us to play hard Saturday.”
On if that will carry over to next year: “Yeah, I hope so. Every team is different. But if you’re talking about waking up in January and all of a sudden you don’t have a Myke Sisson out in front, you’re curious of who is going to step up. I think we’ve got a ton of good candidates in that regard and a lot of guys that have played a lot of football and played it the right way.”
On his quote after the Air Force game about giving his best effort this week: “That was a tough loss just because they whipped us pretty good. Then you look to the fact that you have one more game. I’m very confident if I had said that or not that our team would respond in a good way. It seemed like the right thing to say at the time. I was thinking about that the other day. I would like for them to have a win. That would be a nice thing for our senior class. But what I would really like is for them to just play their best game. We’ll let the chips fall. If we line up and play our best game of the year I will feel very, very good.”
On rating the Wyoming rivalry on a scale of 1-10: “It’s probably our biggest rival. I don’t know about a scale. I’ll give it a 10; how about that? It’s a long-standing rival that’s not only important to athletic departments and universities but just a lot of people and a lot of alumni. It’s kind of cool. I remember I didn’t know much about it when I got here as a player, and I remember the first one I went to, I knew, this was different. It’s a neat thing to have that.”
On how important it would be to end the season with a win: “It would be huge to go out with a win. It would be fun for our kids, fun for our team. It would be a nice way to send our seniors out.”
On Blake Jones’ injury: “We’ll know more. He’s probably out for the year. We’re talking now about when to do the surgery and his availability for spring and summer conditioning and those type of things.”
On if it is an ACL tear: “It looks like it. I don’t want to say I’m 100-percent sure but I would be surprised if it wasn’t. You have to calm those things down and then you are looking at Christmas break and the timing of spring football and summer conditioning, those types of things. Him going down, too, in that game really put us in a bind in terms of some personnel packages. He does some specialty things for us and that was something we did not react very well to.”
On if Kivon Cartwright can fill his role: “Yeah, we are trying our best to get Kivon more involved and when we do, he does some nice things. He is very young, too, so there is only so much you can put on his plate. He is a hardworking, intelligent guy who seems to produce when you throw it at him. He will probably take some of that.”
On how he continues to coach with speculation regarding his job security: “I think we approach it the same every week. I don’t have time for outside distractions. We just go about getting our team prepared so we can play our best game on Saturday.”
On the CSU program being in better shape now than when he took over: “I believe this program is ready to take that huge step. I think the kids feel it, I think anyone around can see we have tremendous talent. We had to grow up a little bit this year because of some injuries but I feel very good about this football team.”
On players’ comments about wanting the entire staff back: “I love these kids. I learned a long time ago in coaching, you can’t fool kids. They know who the best players are, they know when they are being coached right, and they know when they are being treated right. I have said all along that I think we are a good football team without a good record. It has a very good feel inside our locker room, the way we prepare. I think we have a lot of talented guys that are going to come back so I think it looks good.”
On if there is added pressure this week because of the outside speculation: “There is pressure every week. There was pressure in the opening ball game of my first year. That’s just college coaching. Sometimes you have to step back and look at it and say, ‘Where is it headed, what does the roster look like, and what is going on with the program?’. We will see. I anticipate we will play very well Saturday.”
On where he thinks the program is headed: “I think we are headed back to where we can compete for the conference championship year in and year out. I think we have built this the right way. There is no quick fix. It takes a large number on the roster to get to that point. I anticipated it. I knew it would be into my fourth year. I anticipated it, showing more this year, and it hasn’t, and there are a lot of reasons why. Like you said, I believe it is right around the corner.”
On if he thinks it would show up next year: “Yeah. I would be surprised if that team in the locker room that is coming back doesn’t compete for the championship.”
On the disappointment of losing in 2011: “I thought (success) would show a little bit more on the field. We got dinged up a little bit and we were probably younger in some areas than I thought we would be. I have been doing this long enough; I am disappointed for our fans. At this point, for people who care about Colorado State football. They deserve a better team, a better record, and they are going to get it. I am quite confident we are doing the right thing.”
