GREG SCHIANO: Okay, guys. Thanks for sticking around. Really proud of our guys. Proud of our coaches, and proud of our players. Certainly that’s what chopping is about. You know, to go down 14-0 and have things start the way they did after what happened 15 days ago really, really could have caved in a lot of teams. Man, I thought that they just stayed in the process of chop and believed and did it and were able to overcome some pretty substantial early adversity and find a way to win the game. So really proud of them. I think without a doubt God brought some special people into this program for a reason. I’m really grateful that I have a chance to coach the players and work with the coaches because that was really special today for me.
Q. First game with Nunzio as the OC. Your thoughts on how he performed?
GREG SCHIANO: I thought he did a really good job. I thought the whole offensive staff… We knew we were going to have to play complimentary football. These guys I think ran 102 plays against somebody. I forget who it was, but they’re averaging 82 plays a game. They’re the fastest team in football. Going into this game, they had run more plays than anybody else. That tempo, you could see at the beginning it took our team — no matter how much you do different things in practice, it’s hard to really simulate that at the speed with which they do it. I think it took us a series and a half to get used to it, but then what an unbelievable job the defense did. I mean, that was phenomenal. Really good football. Again, the complimentary part of it is offense really ate the clock. I think we had close to 39 minutes time of possession. That’s the way you do it. You keep their offense on the sideline. It’s the best way to defend them.
Q. What did Sam Brown show you today with his performance, and is he okay because it being looked like he limped off the field in the fourth.
GREG SCHIANO: Number one, it’s not just today. We’ve all seen him progressing. It’s a progress, you know? If you do it too early when the guy is not ready to take that load, it can have a detrimental effect. I think Sam continued to show us each week that he deserved more touches, and today he got plenty of touches. Now, he did have something wrong with his lower extremity deal that we’re going to see how that is tomorrow. I don’t know. But I’m very confident in our backs, you know, with Shorty and Kyle Monangai. And you know Aaron Young hasn’t been back full force yet. So I’m pretty excited about that room.
Q. Was the plan to ride with Noah the entire game, and is that the plan going forward at quarterback?
GREG SCHIANO: Well, the plan was to start Noah. The key that we thought to win this game was make sure we don’t turn the football over and keep their offense on the sideline. As the game went on, Nunz and I talked about it a number of times. Gavin is definitely improving every day, and I’m excited to see what he is going to become. And when is his time to jump in there? I don’t know. He was the 2 this week. Evan, I thought, had a good week too, but I think… as I said to Gavin, he improved between last Thursday and this Thursday a lot, so if we can do that again this week and next week… But I think what Noah did is exactly what we asked him to do. You know, be the point guard out there and distribute the ball to his play makers. You don’t know it, but he was under center some, which was different, and he was doing some run checks. And to me when you make the right run check, that’s as good as throwing an eight-yard pass. Some of those runs are coming out because we’re checking it, and Noah knows exactly what to do. So I think right now our quarterback room is growing, and we’ll figure it out week to week how we deploy those guys.
Q. (Off microphone) — to snap a long losing streak, to do it with a new offensive coordinator, to do it with a veteran quarterback that’s back from injury, was there anything more special about today’s locker room?
GREG SCHIANO: I think more than any of those other things, I think it was what we went through two Friday nights ago. I mean, that was as hard a loss as I can remember. I’ve been in some big games and lost some big games and won some big games, but that really hurt. And it hurt the kids. It hurt the coaches. Then to be able to start out the way it did and be able to overcome that, you know, I think there’s guys downstairs that are starting to see what that means. Again, that’s all part of growing as a program. I told them after the game last week, we need to get better. It’s not complicated. We’re not good enough yet to win. I’ve got to coach better. You have to play better. We got better. It was, fortunately, good enough to win this week. Will it be good enough to win next week? We’re going to find out. I know we have to get better this week. That’s really our goal. When you are building something, you just keep getting incrementally better, and we’ll keep doing that.
Q. Coach, a win is a win any way you can get it, believe me, but in the back of your mind somewhere, particularly in a game like today, isn’t it good to see maybe a smash-mouth, ball-control game to what you can say, yeah, my offensive line is as good as I thought it was?
GREG SCHIANO: I can’t lie. I do like to see when you can run the ball because in our league — now, today was a beautiful day, right, but we know the back half of your season in the Big Ten you’re going to have to be able to run the football. There’s days that you can go out there, and it’s just prohibitive to throw it with the wind and the elements. So I am pleased. We’re far from where we need to be, but we’re much better than we were, so that’s kind of the journey.
Q. When you are recruiting Sam Brown, what did it tell you that he was First Team All-Philadelphia Catholic League in both football and basketball?
GREG SCHIANO: Yeah, that’s a great point. He is a tremendous athlete, and you can see his athleticism with some of the cuts that he makes. It’s a 220-pound man, and he sticks a foot in the ground and changes direction. That’s special stuff. So he has to continue to develop, but he’s got a good head start.
Q. Sam Brown finished with 28 carries. Was there more of an emphasis to give him the ball during the bye week?
GREG SCHIANO: Well, he became the starting running back, as you saw that today. So when you are the No. 1, you get more carries. Every game, as I’ve said to you guys many times, every game takes on a personality of its own, it takes on a story of its own. And as he is running the football, he is making yards. I always look at this, are they falling this way, or are they falling that way? And he was falling this way. That’s important, right? Because that’s a yard and a half, yard more every time you fall that way. Yeah, he showed up today. I hope he is well.
Q. When you made the move with Sean you talked about believing this team could win games this season. I’m just curious what this win does in the big picture just for the season as a whole?
GREG SCHIANO: Yeah, you know, Steve, I don’t have any idea what it does for the season as a whole, but I know that we’re 1-0 today, and that was what we set out to do because the two biggest bandits that I know are the past and the future. They steal from now. We couldn’t let that loss get us twice, and we can’t let the future get us. We’ve got to learn to stay in the moment, and that’s our process. Chop the moment. I was really pleased that they did that because the past, go down 14-0, that’s the past, real quick. You let your mind live back there, you’re going to mess up what you are trying to do right here. So it’s so important to us that we learn to do that as a program. We’ve always had certain guys that could do it, coaches and players. But then there’s others that have trouble doing it. When we can get better at that, I think we have talented guys. We need to train this as much as the whole body and learn to chop, and we’re getting better at it. That’s the key.
Q. Where do you feel like you’ve seen the defense kind of improve the most collectively as the season has progressed?
GREG SCHIANO: I think they’re really playing extremely hard, detailed football. Sometimes when you play hard, I liken it to a bad golfer. The guy may have a big driver, but if he hits it far but into the woods, it doesn’t matter, right? Not only are we playing hard, but we’re playing smart, and that’s a tribute, I think, not only to our players but to the defensive coaches that have done a great job of really getting these guys to be focus and in the moment.
Q. I know you have to watch the film, but Aaron Lewis, a couple of tackles for a loss. What have you seen from him this season and his gap assignments taking on multiple blockers, just the impact he has?
GREG SCHIANO: I think Aaron, his career has kind of gone like this. Right from the beginning we saw that he is what we call twitchy. He can suddenly do movements, and that’s hard to block. Now he is getting bigger. I don’t know what he was. 220 pounds maybe. Now he is up over 250. As he continues to get bigger and bigger and stronger and stronger with that same twitchy athleticism, he is becoming a force. We need him to be that, and I think the whole D-line is kind of growing up in front of our eyes. They’re a young group with the exception of Feddy. It’s a young group. They’re growing up. We need them to because your D-line and O-line, that’s always where you start in my opinion.
Indiana Head Coach Tom Allen
On the team’s play after the first quarter
Tom Allen: The second drive we drove down, after the penalty the game was really tough. My guys stepped up and played the best game they could play. We got to capitalize on first downs and maximize the tempo. Got to do the best we can on the chances they give us.
On the opening kick return touchdown
Tom Allen: That’s huge. We’ve been needing to start better. The freshman is the faster player on our team, He’s a special talent and we got to find more ways to give him the ball. That’s exactly how you want to start.
On a possible quarterback change
Tom Allen: Well look at every possible option, no question we got to improve at QB. We wanted a different outcome today and we’ll have to evaluate that during the bye week.
On the defense
Tom Allen: Greater focus on pressure and capitalizing on 3rd downs, we need to get better at that. Rutgers punter was tremendous. Getting better at defense will fuel our offense. Bottom line is the takeways need to be a bigger part of our game.
On tackling Rutgers’ running backs
Tom Allen: We got to accelerate and make contact more effectively. The yards after contact were big for them. Defensively I’m upset they didn’t make the plays to help us win.
On players stepping up in leadership
Tom Allen: Noah and Tai did a really good job hyping us up, created a positive environment for most of the game, we need more of that.
On issues for the wide receivers
Tom Allen: We can’t only target one guy. More people have to fit into these roles. With that we can make more and less drops.
