Quoted: Idaho

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – As the second game of the season inches closer, Indiana football offensive coordinator Walt Bell and defensive coordinator Chad Wilt, along with a handful of student-athletes spoke to the media about the week one win and areas of improvement as Idaho looms on Saturday (Sept. 10) inside Memorial Stadium.

Check out Austin Render's one-on-one interviews with AJ Barner, Charles Campbell, Dasan McCullough, Noah Pierre and Beau Robbins at the links near the top of this story or at IUHoosiers.com/watch.

Below is a partial transcript of the coordinators press conferences, while video of the full media sessions can be found near the top of this story or at IUHoosiers.com/watch.

Walt Bell | Offensive Coordinator
On his evaluation of the offense as a whole against Illinois…
WB: Overall evaluation, we were good in spots, and we weren't very good in spots. I think a lot of the typical first game [stuff], not necessarily that weren't prepared. We had a lot of kids that this game was unbelievably important to, as opposed to just needing it be mission focused, and how do you play good football. That's techniques and fundamentals. We had at times guys that did too much, but when we settled in and played good football, we played good football.

I think if you were going to go with what was disappointing, we left three or four giant chunk plays on the field. What we call GAP plays or game altering plays. We had two or three guys back there open and it's going to be an even bigger day than it was. There was probably [100 more] passing yards that we left on the field overall. Missing the chunk plays but then only having one pre-snap penalty which was a motion error, is a good thing, especially in the first game.

We've all watched first games where there is a ton of pre-snap issues and that's a huge credit to Coach Allen, on how much we have gotten to play live football throughout fall camp, and in preparation. To only have one pre-snap penalty, obviously we want that to be zero, but being realistic about it, watching college football in the first week there is simply a lot of those. I think ultimately, we won the football game. It's never going to be pretty or exactly how you want it to be, we survived a big lull there, had a dropped ball interception, we had a critical error that was somewhat uncharacteristic of some of our young kids, and we found a way to win and that's what good football teams do, they find a way to win. When the best is required, and the best was required with two minutes left and no timeouts and 75 yards to go, we found a way to get it done.

On the performance of the offensive line versus Illinois…
WB: We all, and I don't say this in a smart-alecky way, I don't want anyone here to get offended, if you watched the football game and we knew in preparation if we had five people in the box, they were going to have six. If we had six people in that box, they would have seven. If we had seven in there, they would have eight. In using simple math, we knew we would have to throw the football to win the game.

When we did run the football, it was really to poke the bear and at least let them know we would try. Now that's probably the most I've ever thrown the ball in a game in my life, but at the same time we knew we would have to throw the football explosively to win the game. We knew that. Math alone tells us, we had six blockers and they had seven guys in there, it's not going to be a good day.

With what we asked our O-line to do, I thought they did a fantastic job. Our quarterback only got sacked one time and there was more pressure and more outnumbered boxes than probably any game I've ever been a part of in my life. Uncharacteristically for them, a lot of pressure... there was a lot and for those guys to only give up one sack. I think they did an incredible job. Do we have to improve running the football, absolutely. Do you have to run the ball to win games, absolutely. But at the same time, for what we asked them to do, I thought they did a fantastic job.

Kahlil Benson played a bunch of snaps in that game for the first time in his life. Parker Hanna had to play a Big Ten football game for the first time in his life and had to play a lot of plays, somewhere around 40-50 plays. Going into that game we knew we had to throw the ball explosively to win. I know those kids prepare, they care, they do everything we ask them to do as hard as they can do it, and it's our job on offense to make sure were putting them in good spots.

On if the game winning drive went how he envisioned it…
WB: You know, the jail break screen or the tunnel screen he hit in the middle of the field was more just they were structurally built in that situation, much to man, wasn't anything left in the middle. It helps that D.J. [Matthews Jr.] had the ball in his hands. I'm really surprised he got tackled by the lone guy in the middle of the field. you know the option route on the third down to get the drive started.

Absolutely we were going to iso this guy and let's go see if your guy can cover him. D.J. found a way to get open. Same thing, Emery [Simmons] come into to spell D.J, we go to the deep ball, thought it was a pass interference, but we have a lot of guys who can make plays and within that drive we had a bunch of guys who got their hands on that ball and made good plays. But within that drive, that ball ended up in D.J.'s hands four or five times. That's not typically a bad thing.

Chad Wilt | Defensive Coordinator
On what the gameplan was going into a matchup with such a tough running game…
CW: We are not a bend and don't break type of defense. We are going to bring pressure; we are going to be aggressive. That's just not our MO, and that's not our identity. Fortunately, we've got some good players on the outside. You look at Tiawan [Mullen] and Jaylin Williams, they didn't give up those explosive plays over the top of their head, but that certainly wasn't our mentality and mindset.

[Chase Brown] is a talented player, he's in the upper echelon of this league and he showed it. We need to do a better job tackling and how we tackle. We gave him some yards that he shouldn't have had but credit him. That's part of that too, but we need to do a better job in our approaches of tackling and our finishing of tackling. We were able to get him down when we needed to.

On Bradley Jennings Jr. and his effort in the season opener…
CW: Sure, Bradley wants to get better every day he shows up. He is here on a mission, let's not hide that fact. He knows what he wants to get done and where he wants to go and how he needs to go about his business. I give the young man credit. He texted me Friday night around 1:30 [in the morning]. We were texting about how he needs to be better, and he initiated that.

"Coach I know I got to work on this and get better at that."

He has the right mindset, and the right heart. You take those two things and you put in the work behind it, he's going to continue to get better and continue to help us win football games. The play he made on the sack was a great play. We showed the group this morning when we met, when you do the little things rights, we have success as a defense. There was another player on that play that took away the first route, and his technique allowed Bradley to make that play. Bradley made the play, but we made the play as a defense. When we do the right things and the little things right, we're a really good defense.

On Beau Robbins fourth-quarter sack…
CW: Work, work, work, work. [Beau Robbins] Keeps his head down doesn't say "boo" and just keeps working. A little bit like Bradley [Jennings Jr.]. Then that happens, you keep getting better, you keep making progress, you keep having those... We know Rome wasn't built in a day, but you stack a brick each day and keep making those walls grow, keep building the buildings brick-by-brick and that's Beau Robbins in a nutshell. Just keeps his head down and doesn't say "boo". Keeps attacking every day and attacking his craft and you really saw that show up.
That was one of the plays we showed this morning. You know guys just doing the little things right. We talked about the pass block move … If you keep doing the little things and keep working it will come up and show up in the game, so really proud of Beau. Really stinking proud of that young man.

Indiana University Athletics

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Players Mentioned

AJ Barner

Kahlil Benson

Charles Campbell

Parker Hanna

Bradley Jennings Jr.

Dasan McCullough

Noah Pierre

Beau Robbins

Jaylin Williams

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