All right. Good morning, everybody. Thanks for being here. Just want to start the press conference by wishing Coach Don all the best as the women's basketball team opens tonight. Really excited for her and her team. And then just to encourage everybody to go out there and vote. You know, big week in the United States here come tomorrow. Just like we talked about our football program being a life program, we wore the stickers to vote—the Big Ten initiative—last game, and I think that's the best way for everybody's voice to be heard. So go out there and make your voice heard.

A: The best way I can say it is they've got an extra week on us, and, you know, our team is looking to be 1-0, period. We've got a lot of preparation to catch up on, you know, going in from a bye week. They probably spent a lot of time on us, and we've got to catch up really quickly. So we moved down to them yesterday pretty quick. But the whole focus is us—the kids continuing to get better, continuing to be 1-0, finding a way to be better than we were last week. And that takes a lot of energy. It really does. It takes a ton of energy, and that's where energy is focused.

A: I think coaches, just in general, have to find a way to take the game plan as it comes and what's on the screen, listen to the data, and look at that particular team. You do everything you can to have some familiarities, but other than that, you’re taking the data off the screen, and that’s the best way to continue to make game plans. There’s a lot to dissect with them, and we’ve got to find a way to be the best football team we can be come Saturday.

A: Well, we just got to him, you know, late, late, middle of the day yesterday. You know, they're he he's doing what you know he does. I mean, he's throwing with the RPO game and he's hitting his check downs and the receivers are making plays and you know, they're moving him and running him a little bit. So I mean, you've got to be able to have everything around him being very, very sound because the way their structure is set is to make sure that they can. If you're going to stop the run, they can RPO you, they can throw the ball down the field. If you forget about the quarterback in the run game, he can run and he's a really good athlete. So you know, we've got to play really sound disciplined defense.

A:You know, it's a great question because, you know, Quinn and I talk a lot. We have a lot of meetings where he'll just pop in and want to chitchat. You know, at the beginning of the season, Quinn asked me, "Are we going to move me from guard to tackle, tackle to guard, or are we going to solidify something?" And I was like, "Well, in a perfect world, I want to keep you at guard." That's what I hope for. I remember when we moved him out to tackle in one of the games this year, I got this little tap on my shoulder during the game, and Quinn said, "Coach, I thought we were going to keep me here." I replied, "We'll handle this tomorrow. We'll talk tomorrow." And he's like, "Okay." Because he takes every conversation we have very seriously, and I'm very truthful and honest with him about everything we do. But he's all about what's really good for the team. He will do whatever is necessary. He’s the greatest teammate anybody could ask for because he is willing to go between guard and tackle. Now, it's not like if you give somebody a choice, "Would you like to keep swinging around or would you like to be in one solidified position?" They'll probably pick one solidified position, and that was that whole point.

Then, I talked to him on Sunday after the game. I said, "Listen, I know I said this, but this part isn't ready. The part where we can solidify you just isn't there yet. It will be there. But I can't sit here and have our conversation trump that. I've got to make sure we do what's right for the football team." He said, "Coach, I understand I'd prefer that, but I'll do whatever the team needs," and I think that's a perfect example of what you saw this past week. He was one of our players of the week. He was one of our elite playmakers. You could see how fast, athletic, and tough he played. But the guy at right tackle, I thought, played well too for his first start. And don’t think that Quinn and him didn’t have a ton of meetings all week leading up to that, because that's Quinn's leadership. Quinn is going to take people under his wing. He's going to make them better. He’s going to help them get to where they want to go. He's just such a selfless teammate, and I couldn't ask for anything more out of a leader and captain than him. I'm really glad he's playing at a high level because I think he's elevated that whole line room. And again, we have to be able to move some people around, and we’ve got to be flexible. Nobody has been more flexible than Quinn. I would have loved it if it didn't have to be as flexible, but that's college football. Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't. He's had a great understanding of that.

A: We're going to do everything we can to make that happen—that’s the mission. But we’ve got to keep improving. Phillip played really well; he's tough and aggressive, but he's still a redshirt freshman. He took a huge step in his growth, and now he needs to take a big leap forward, and I know he will. He’s a transparent learner who wants to get better.

With Quinn's leadership, that room works incredibly hard, putting in both required and extra effort. Phillip is right at the top of the list for work ethic. He got that first start out of his system and played well, but just like anyone on this team, the expectation is to "change your best" and be better this week than last. We’re staying hyper-focused on that.

A: I think that you get what you emphasize and what you demand. And I'm not just saying that from a coaching perspective—you get that from a player's perspective too. You can emphasize and demand anything you want as a coach, but if the players aren’t buying into that and doing it, you're not going to get it. So our job is always to create that trust. Whatever we put in front of them, they need the time, consistency, and proof to see that it works and how it influences games. That’s my job as a head coach: to show how takeaways and turnovers impact a game, whether it’s in the NFL, college, high school, or even Pop Warner. It all matters.

And that's part of that 78%. I’d be remiss—I don't know if we've had a streak of 14, whatever it is, but that's not what this team is focused on. They’re not focused on streaks, the last four weeks, or any of that. This team has learned to let go of the event and live in truth. That Michigan locker room moment was a line in the sand, a choice made by the players. They didn’t have to respond like that; they could have thrown a pity party, felt sorry for themselves, complained about calls that didn’t go our way. But that wasn’t what happened in that locker room.

In my 12 years as a head coach, I can remember only a few locker rooms like that one in Michigan. You could tell we were going to take off from there—not necessarily win games, but grow in confidence and direction as a team. Last year at Western Michigan, for example, I think we went eight straight games without a turnover, which is the only streak I remember because it was so unique. That’s why that team was undefeated; they valued the football. Across the country, you see the consequences when teams don’t value the ball, and even when we don’t but maybe get away with it. This team, though, is hyper-focused on improvement in four areas: 78%, the ball, tackling, and explosive plays. They’re committed to truly living in the moment and in truth.

That transparency and focus is rare, especially in 2024. I’m not saying this team is more transparent than any other, but they are coachable. They love football, and they love to be coached. That's getting harder and harder to find.

A: No, because we've been doing it. I mean, we do it every week, Andy, you know? Every week of my eight years here, we have a new theme per week. It's hard to connect last week to this week. We have a theme for the year, but then we have weekly themes to keep that turnover right. We celebrate on Sundays—that's the reason we celebrate in the locker room the way we do. We celebrate on Sunday for you, and they all get to pat each other on the back and high-five each other, and then they truly move on.

And I think that's what you need to be able to not let things run together, whether that's losing or winning, because last week has nothing to do with this week. I don't believe in momentum—you know that I don’t. I don’t believe in shifts. It either is or it isn’t, and why was it not, or why was it? Focus on those things. You can't emphasize everything, so what do we emphasize in winning? You know, the ball, tackling, explosive plays. If we can play really sound football, it puts us in games and gives us a chance to win the football game at the end. Then we’ve got to make one more play than the other team.

A:I I think that there's just a lot of there's you look at both sides of the ball, there's a lot of people have a lot of connections and that can't be the focus and that that that's not going to be the focus. The focus is on going to get this football team better. They're going to work on being better, I'm sure, on their other side. And we're going to focus on being better. They just have an extra week ahead of us. And so we've got a lot of work to do to play catch up. And you know, to get our football team better to find a way to be 1 to go against a really good team.

You know, I don’t like to compare players to players, but he’s got a lot of Mohammed Ibrahim in him—only probably faster. He’s hard to find behind that big line they have. They run a lot of inside zone, outside zone, and they do it in different ways, putting themselves in the right looks. And the minute you get an extra hat in the box, they’re finding ways to exploit that with their wideouts. He’s got the speed, the power, great leverage, balance, center of gravity, speed, and toughness. I mean, he delivers blows. We’ve got to be really good tacklers this week, and that’s going to be a huge emphasis for our football team. I think he’s one of the best backs in the country, let alone the Big Ten, because he gets those hard yards.

You know, anybody can run through the holes, I get that part. But what do you do when it’s not there? He’s still getting three to four yards when there’s nothing there. That’s what I thought made Mohammed Ibrahim so good—getting those hard yards naturally, using his body structure to his advantage. He’s a very, very talented back, and we have a lot of respect for him and what he does.

A: You go through the season and everybody gets bumped and bruised and you know we listen to our medical staff about what people can and cannot do and then we listen to our players throughout a game, he started the football game and ended the football game. Period. Started. Ended and I think his presence was felt throughout that entire game. We have the ability to get to a lot of different packages. I think you saw different packages on that field and the versatility and guys at different positions and that's something that we can continue to do no matter who's in the game.

A: I thought he took everything he's been taught and everything he's learned over his years here, and it looks like such a simple, routine catch. Well, it’s supposed to look simple and routine, but that is actually more difficult than people might think. To be able to slow down, keep that person on your hip—not showing your hands too early, using late hands—keeping your feet and balance, and almost letting your whole body go dead on the low end, then making the catch over your outside shoulder and staying in bounds, is tough. The way he controls his body to do that, the awareness to pull it off in that moment based on the ball and its flight—there’s a lot that goes into it. It’s partly natural, and then it’s partly something you learn by failing and doing some of the wrong things.

I think he put it all together on that play, and that’s where his growth shows. Something as simple as an inside fade or a go route on the outside—it’s almost so simple, it's complex. I'm just glad he was able to put it all together and make a great play. That’s what’s so fun about him: he can play outside, he can play inside, he can make vertical plays like that, he can run short posts, and he has all the options. That’s what makes him so versatile; he can do it all. And that was a huge, huge play in the game on second-and-10—a big play.

You got a good eye because you're right. It was his best game this season. I think, again, it just comes back—sounds boring and isn’t fun to write about—just getting better. Like, he just keeps getting better. And these guys don't judge themselves or live in judgment; they truly live in truth. On Sunday, they put their leather vests on and ask, "What can I do better? How can I help the team even if I didn't play my best? How can I get my teammates to play their best?" When you're playing for each other, that's different from playing for something. This team has always played for each other; that’s something I can always say.

And Greg Johnson, at the beginning of the year—yeah, I mean, he had a lot of areas of improvement, and he's closed the gap on all those, you know. Nine games into the year, that’s what you want. You want your football team to get better from the start of the season to the end. We said at the end of the year we’ll look up and see where we're at. We're not judging ourselves right now. We're not talking about anything external; we're not talking about fighting for something. We're talking about playing for each other, growing, learning, and living in truth, leaving the events behind. I think our guys are really doing that on the field and off the field.

I feel like the relationships are better off the field, too. Talk about a life program—they’re working really hard to make their lives better in every area, which is hard to find in 2024 with teams. This team, win or lose, has continued to do that. And Greg Johnson is a great example of that. He's playing at a high level and with a lot of confidence, but that was bound to happen at some point. If we just keep believing in him, he keeps believing in himself, and we keep showing him what he needs to get better at—X, Y, and Z, specifically—not just "get better."

Our guys have specific things to improve on as individuals, given by their position coaches, and then as a unit—offense, defense, and special teams—and then as a team with me. When you focus on those things, you hope your guys really buy into it and get better. And this team has.

Nope. It's just the next one. I mean, we know we've got home games, we know we got away games, parking lots, aircraft carriers, you know, and the mud and the rain and the sunshine and cold and warm football, you have to be ready to play in at all. I'm sure you all flipped on or saw the, you know, the Lions and the Green Bay game yesterday. I mean it doesn't matter if you're home or away, the elements. You can't let the circumstance dictate your behavior. We've got to play our best football for three hours, no matter where we go, and we know they'll create a great environment over there, that's for sure.

No, we won't find a new way. We'll stay consistent. You know, I was joking with our HR department that I gotta fill out a workers comp form, you know. He got my head a little bit. I was just kidding. Trisha. We were joking around just but I kept it low. I had to dive pretty low, but I've been in that locker room before, so that's that not new. I knew that I had to keep it pretty low.

Well, I think look at look at Week 1. Right. And we go back to that dragon Kesich, right? We miss. We miss a a game winner. That's not why we lost the game, but it was the last play to go win the game. We had a chance to win the game. We didn't. Cody Lindenberg runs out to him first thing he says to him. I love you. And we don't win that game without your gon. Kesich hit going 4 for four. We don't win Iowa last year without Dragon Kesich going 4 for four. That statement in that moment under that situation and that circumstance, the first thing that kid hears is I love you from one of his best friends and his teammate, period. That's the best example I can give you, cause it didn't matter if we won or lost from there out. This team had each other's backs. We remember. We're not. We're not so. Somewhere. We didn't do anything yet. Right. That we we're gonna judge ourselves at the end of the year. That's all we're going to do. We're not judging ourselves now, right. We're just loving each other, staying connected. Keep doing it for each other. And it's moments like that that, you know, you have a really, really special team, no matter if we win them all, lose them all. Like the team is special. And I think that's what's so fun when you're coming to work every day. Working with young people because I know everybody can't say that and I don't take that for granted. I don't take that for granted. One day of being able to coach this football team like it, it it. It's fun too. And I know our coaches feel the same way. Our trainers feel the same way about their commitment level. You know, our equipment managers would say the same thing. Our student coaches would say the same thing. Our our video staff with Matt Childers would say the same thing. It's a unique team and it's truly A-Team. And we just got to find a way to continue to give ourselves the best chance to go win. Against really good opponents like we have coming up this week. Appreciate everybody.