UW head coach Chris Petersen met with the media Monday morning for roughly 20 minutes. The No. 10 Huskies travel to Salt Lake City, Utah this weekend for their first conference game of the season against Utah.
Below is the transcription from Petersen's press conference.
Opening Statement … “Yeah. Looking back analyzing the tape its, thought our defense played extremely well. Thought our special teams played really well. And at times on offense obviously we did some really good things, but we were stumbling over ourselves too many times on offense. Certainly in the run game, and so we got to clean some things up there. I thought Jake, you know it’s always different on tape, I thought he did some really nice things in the pocket. You know there’s probably three or four throws that he’d probably like to have back. The interception, the one the guy just sat on the out. He’s trying to time things. On the other one he just kind of missed the throw. Scramble throw a little far too inside. But he was, he did do some really nice things in the pocket and we’ll just keep building on those things.”
On Jake Haener after reviewing the tape … “Jake was good. Yeah, he kind of practices like that. He’s been a pretty good deep ball thrower for the last year and that kind of showed up in the game. It gives those guys a chance to make plays for him and those receivers been doing that, so that was kind of how he’d been practicing.”
On how much he evaluates who and when Haener is playing verses production ... “Yeah. I mean you got to keep this in perspective. I mean it’s different than crunch time, you know, where we’re trying to win the game. It’s a different feel. I think you can play a little more relaxed. That certainly matters. But he has been practicing well so it’s good to see it translate to the field.”
On Petersen explaining how UW stumbled in the run game against North Dakota … “It just wasn’t clean enough. They’re a movement defense. Twisting and looping and all those things, and I think our guys were probably playing a little too tentative. When you do that usually it doesn’t look good.”
On how the offensive line has looked after two weeks … “Yeah. Like I said it was so much different of a style than we saw in the first week. So it was, I don’t think you realize how different that is in terms of their preparation. It’s completely different. Sometimes certain styles give people more issues, but you got five guys and one of them messes up it’s going to show up in there. And that’s all it takes is one guy to be on an edge or something and it can look really bad. So we’re still building. Still working. Trying to figure out the right combination of guys.”
On why Cole Norgaard replaced Jesse Sosebee for a few series on Saturday … “Boomer lost his shoe. You know I wouldn’t have any problem putting Cole in. He’s worked hard. He’s made good progress and he’s going to keep getting better, he really will. We’ve been pleased with him and I think he and Boomer were battling for that second spot through camp. Boomer’s got a lot of reps under his belt. So Cole will keep getting better so it wasn’t a problem to get him in there.”
On difference starting and the build up leading up to the game … “Or you could play better. You know a little of what Softy’s talking about of it could be you haven’t been thinking about it. You put a guy in and away he goes. He doesn’t over-analyze it. Or sometimes I guess you can play mind games with that whole things. So I do think it’s different whether time of game a guy goes in, when he goes in, if he’s starting, building up. All we can do is try to study our tail off and figure out who we’re going against and then practice really really hard.”
On what the true freshmen on defense showed on film … “You’d like to see them out there more. That’s always the problem you get in that fourth quarter and it always seems to go so fast that you’d like them on the field longer. So a couple of them only got a few plays and it’s really hard to tell. Two others might have got 10 or 11 plays and it’s good to get them out there, and we’ll kind of see.”
On if there was a concerted effort to get Chico McClatcher the ball more … “Not really a concerted effort, you know, we’re still just bringing him back and kind of evaluating him week to week. It is good to see him get out there and get the ball. He’s an electric guy and I think he’s making good progress. We’ll just keep bringing him along and make a plan week to week.”
On the screen game and getting the ball to more players on offense … “Yeah, like you said we got some guys that we’d like to get the ball to. I mean you got Myles in the backfield there. Then you got Salvon, and then you talk about Chico and trying to figure out how to get him the ball maybe besides just being a wide receiver. And then I thought those other two running backs performed really well too with Sean McGrew and Kamari Pleasant did a really good job. So at this point that’s a good problem to have, and certainly we don’t see it as a problem at all. It’s a long season and all those things. I think those guys are playing at a good high level. We got to get our guys in front blocking for them a little cleaner and we’ll make some progress.”
On going down to the wire every time UW faces Utah … “Well really even the last three years. We had a couple turnovers three years ago and then they kind of blew it open late. But that’s a good team, good program. This defense is as good as I’ve seen, and they’re always known for defense in terms of what they’re doing. I mean they have some really good players that have played for them for a long time and they are extremely aggressive. Yeah this is one of the best defenses in our league for sure, if not the best. I mean we’re early in the season and they stay healthy and all those things those guys do a really good job.
On getting Ty Jones and a couple other recruits from Utah, and UW’s efforts recruiting the Mountain Region … “I think they play good football over there. Pretty good population base in the Salt Lake area. That’s what recruiting is. It’s kind of population based. If there’s a lot of people usually you’re going to find some pretty good football players. And I think those high school coaches over there in Utah really coach those guys well, very prideful about football. I mean it shows up in Utah’s program themselves, the University of Utah, and there’s just been a lot of good players to come from that state.”
On having impactful conference games early … “I think if you have it your ideal way you probably like to play your non-conference first. We just have so much more building to do, and you’re building throughout the year but certainly these first few games you just really feel like you got some things to work on. And then you put this really meaningful, impactful game against a really good opponent it’s just the way the schedule has fallen this year. To start with Auburn and then go to Utah which is, I see it every bit, the styles are a little bit different, but every bit the same. Like we’re going to an extremely hard place to play. Harder than where we played back east, because now you’re truly on their campus. A team that is super well coached and is going to be one of the better teams in the country when all is said and done.
