Notes and Quotes From Tom Allen's Week Four Media Monday
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Image: Sarah Miller Hoosier Huddle
Written By Lauralys Shallow
Media Monday
Players of the game vs. Ball State
Offensive player of the game: Peyton Ramsey
Defensive player of the game: Raekwon Jones and Jonathan Crawford
Special teams: J-Shun Harris and Hayden Whitehead
Indiana hosts No. 24 Michigan State to open up conference play for the 2018 season.
Player Interviews from Monday
Here are Coach Allen’s thoughts from his press conference:
On finishing conference play undefeated:
“Encouraged by the growth. To be able to conclude our non-conference slate at 3-0 is what your goal is. We took care of business with that. Now we have to move forward into conference play.”
On freshmen play:
“Ronnie Walker is a guy that sticks out to me when I think about our freshmen. Scored his first touchdown, showed balance and explosion. His confidence continues to rise each and every week since he's been here.”
“James Head, another guy that really got his first chance to play. A few snaps earlier in Virginia, but this was his real chance. Showed some real burst that we saw. Had an injury that kept him out the first week. James is back now, get his feet wet a little bit. Going to continue.”
On Michigan State as a whole:
“When I watch the film, it's the same team we played last year. One of the youngest teams in the country, in the Big Ten last year. Pretty much all the same guys that we played last year are back. Bigger, faster, stronger. They're a year older.”
On injury updates on Gavin Everett and Mackenzie Nworah:
“McKenzie is a guy we're hoping to get him back. Getting better and better all the time. He should be back soon. I don't know how soon it is. Hopefully within the next week or two. He's progressing very well.”
“Gavin is a guy that could have gone if we needed him. Kind of a game time decision. Wasn't really sure. As the game unfolded, we felt like it was best to keep him rested. Should be ready to roll this week. If he continues to progress. Mackenzie will not be playing again this week, but hopefully he'll be ready to go very soon.”
On Stevie Scott’s fumble vs Ball State:
“He didn't do it at all the previous week under really, really bad conditions. Then a beautiful, sunny day, no inclement weather, he puts it on the ground before he has a chance to score.
We got to learn from that. Basically if you put the ball on the ground, we're going to take you out, let you think about it a little bit. That ball is precious. We want to keep it on offense and take it away from you on defense.”
On last year’s loss to MSU:
“We didn't finish last season. It was 9-3 in the fourth quarter, had opportunities to hopefully score touchdowns in the red zone. To their credit defensively, that didn't happen for us. They were really good on defense.”
On MSU’s Brian Lewerke:
“He's an accurate passer. They got big receivers that can be matchup problems. He's athletic enough to beat you with his legs. He's tough enough to run over you. That's kind of always a big challenge with a big quarterback like that because the rules are such to protect him. He comes barreling at you, runs you over, instead of sliding sometimes.”
On the 12 true freshmen Allen has played to this point and the four game rule:
“Basically of those 12 guys, I'd say probably eight of them are probably going to just keep on playing. There's probably three or four in there that kind of based on some of those guys have played a certain amount of games already, if a guy has played three, more than likely if they played him that much at this point, he's probably going to continue to play. The guys that played maybe one or two at this point, we're continuing to look at.”
On defense creating big-time, game-changing plays:
“We know it's a big part of creating momentum in games, field position, all those things, helps to set up your offense. But we're getting there. I just think we have to create a lot of things pressure-wise, which is what we do. We've done it ever since I've been here. We got to continue to do that.”
“To me it's just a matter of continuing to grow and develop our defense, develop our depth, our offense, allow us to finish what we want to finish.”
On concerns for preparing for MSU after its bye week:
“A lot of question marks. They only played two games. Already having their bye week, we don't have a big body of work to study on them. We have previous seasons. They're coaching staff has been pretty consistent on that side of the ball. I think it definitely puts you at a disadvantage in some ways.”
“You have to adjust on the run. You basically build or plan up based on what you know. That's what I try to do, build on what you know, adjust on what happens that you may not know. You don't want to chase a bunch of ghosts, what may or may not possibly happen.”
On where this team needs to go next:
“Win Big Ten games, period. That's what's next. We got to win Big Ten games. One at a time. That's the way I approach it. I told our team today, they understand how I think. This is the biggest game of the season, the most important game of the season for one reason: it's the next one.”