Tom Matukewicz, Southeast Missouri (2024 Big South-OVC Football Media Day)

recording is going uh coach toque just thoughts on this upcoming season well considering my comments last year didn't age well I want to start this by saying this is the worst roster I've ever had since I've been the head coach at seimo I'm looking forward to this season there's a lot of excitement every year uh certainly when you underachieve and you feel like you didn't coach as well as you could have you're uh looking forward to seeing if um you can rebound and so uh I'm certainly looking forward to that the schedule's exciting getting to open up college football and a kickoff Classics fun uh opening up at home against UT Martin uh you know so there's just a lot of great uh exciting things on our roster and we've been working hard and getting prepared thanks coach uh I'm going to go in order I'm GNA leave Tony plenty of time I know he's got questions I'm GNA go Dan Luke and then Tony so Dan prair State pick skin if you want to go first for Coach toque with your question hi coach to good to see you again same here uh Western Illinois join the League and I just want to get your thoughts on on adding them as as a member I mean I don't have an opinion I two years ago I gave up on the this whole expansion the OBC and the Big South thing appreciate your time you bet and and we also have we'll go Luke Randall and and Jake and Tony so Luke goad coach two quick questions obviously last year tons of injuries Rock the squad Paxton obviously going out against Tennessee Tech when you have an injury crisis like that I know you can't control it but are there things that you can do in like practice and training uh lifting are there things that you can do to try and cut that down or mitigate it at least absolutely I don't believe in luck I don't believe in things just happening you know I believe there's always things you can uh do better number one how about we just protect him better if he doesn't get hit as much that's going to help him stay healthy so but there's a thousand things that we're looking to try to get better at from the off season the the strength and conditioning and all those type of things and o line play and and stuff like that but uh certainly uh we have several stars and we're going to be a lot better um Team if we could keep them healthy and you kind of touched on it but you're going into week zero obviously that's a week less to prepare does that kind of do you have to rush anything you know going into that being the first FCS game or do you kind of just take your time as normal well we get the same amount of time and so we get to start fall Camp a week before everybody else and so it kind of rushes my director of football operations May quit because we had to get our gear we had to get all these stuff a week earlier and so he's scrambling um but um you know there are some class conflicts that are normally over now they're they're a problem first 10 days of fall camp but really it's it's pretty minimal and more than anything just a lot of excitement about getting to be on ESPN at 6 pm on a Saturday that's a tremendous opportunity to show off this University in our region let's go to Tony from the Southeast Missourian next go ahead Tony I always struggle with the mute for some reason I'll start with U with Bryce Norman he was tapped the this a precin Award right um Defensive Player of the Year yes yeah um we just talk about the journey that had from Norman be recruited locally to be now one of your top players and now the top defensive player in the conference I think he'll tell you he's kind of Mr Simo you know his dad and lots of relatives went to Simo uh and he loves everything about it um he is a a great football player a great teammate and it's hard to believe this is year four and this will be the last year with him feels like he just got here um but I'm going to try to soak up him and several of these seniors that this will be the last time I get to be their coach speaking of seniors um with Pon deloren coming back as a third-year starter how much has he developed as a leader of this team and how much he developed tangibly as a quarterback you know I uh once you get good it's hard to get better and really he came in pretty good in a lot of areas but you know here we believe in getting better at everything and we have challenged him in all aspects uh to try to improve in in every one of those areas and he really has he's really um embrac that there's things that he can improve uh he got to go down to the Manning Passing Academy in June there in Louisiana and uh it was just a great opportunity for him to uh see what how he measures up against other great talent but also just how those guys interact with others their presence how they come across all those type of things was great for him and this is his team you know last year it was still uh you know kind of Gino and Lawrence and there was a lot of other names in there and now this is you know certainly offense unquestionable unquestionably he is the the face and the the voice of of our offense and our team and last question from me um despite how last year ended you guys were picked to finish third in this conference what was that say about maybe the reputation of your program or the outside belief in your team um rebounding after last year I was shocked I would have voted myself 10th I can't watch it film it it looks so bad uh fundamentally stupid penalties uh you know just it I mean it made my eyes bleed there's there's little blood coming out of my pores when I was watching uh the film this off season so I appreciate everybody helping me out and still think we're going to be okay but unless we fix some of those things we're we're going to be four and seven again thank you for your time we'll go to Jake from wsil next go ahead Jake hi coach how are you I'm well sir good to hear hopefully no more Bloods coming out of your eyes not now and not in the future um but I do want to ask what are who are some star players on this team that fans should start to be aware of you know given the departure of so many key guys from a year ago yeah and we have some newcomers that have have kind of stepped up that I have been impressed with um I hate to start naming them but I'll try here Jaylen medles is an offensive lineman that came in who was a transfer from UAB uh and quickly uh ascended and now I moved him to left tackle because we want to be great there so he's been been a surprise um I think uh at receiver we we bring back Dorian Anderson who played a little bit last year but not a lot kind of overshadowed I think he's going to have a bigger role Tristan Smith was a junior college kid out of Hutch um that has been really impressive he's another 65 type guy um coming in um so he's been really good at linebacker we really feel like uh we got to be able to rush the pass better and uh we did recruit a couple transfers that we feel really good about Casey McCoy was a outside linebacker for Trinity Valley and zier thoron an outside linebacker from the Mexico state has really come in and uh turned some heads we got to be better in the past defense and so a couple of junior college and four-year transfers have come in and and are already repping in the two deep uh Justin Johnson was a starter for Murray State and then Adrien Peterson was a uh a corner out of Coffeeville that were been here since January and all those guys have have done really well I know you guys have been practicing hard but right now would you say the offense is in front of the defense or the defense is ahead of the offense offense is significantly ahead of the defense got a lot of new coaches a lot of new faces on defense and so it may take us a little bit to just understand uh what our players are really good at and emphasizing that I still feel like we're going to have a a top one two defense it's not that it's just uh putting it all together may take us a little bit offensively uh you know they we've kind of we already knew our Personnel pretty good our old Line's doing really well so we don't have to change kind of some of the schemes that we've had so I feel like they're going to be able to start pretty strong and you know I know just a question or two ago was mentioned about Paxton you know taking on more of a leadership role going to that Manning Academy over the summer uh you mentioned it's his team now what do you want to see from him as he enters this season I just want him to be Paxton Paxton's all we need and that's all he needs to worry about um you know enjoy the ride uh this is his last college season you know all those type of things and uh he doesn't need to uh you know put the whole offense on his back you know he's got some great Playmakers we we're going to be good in a run game you know and so all we need from him is just to be uh him thanks for the time coach you bet let's go Adam Wells WPSD hey coach you're heading into your 11th year uh with Simo uh have you or had have you had to change your approach to getting a team ready for a season in that time uh especially coming off the season like you did last year yeah yeah I mean that's a that's an interes question because that that's what I would say my mistake was last year my mistake last year was I changed and how I prepared my team because of the roster that I had and basically I was fearful that I was going to get a player hurt and so I changed the way we prepared and you could tell I think there is some things that need to be adjusted year in and year out depending on your team but what I've learned again is it takes what it takes like you you want to be a good football team it's going to take XYZ and you got to figure out how to be good at XYZ and so uh you know it's the one thing you can't cheat you know there's one way to get good at football and you got to go outside and practice until you get good at it um and that's exactly what we're going to do this year thanks coach appreciate it yeah you bet we got two or three more minutes with Coach if anybody has a follow-up question for him please let me know down in the chat Tony back to Tony Bob go ahead Tony all right um I know since you guys started practicing uh who what has the uh competition been for running back or who's taking Gino spot in the offense yeah so we we practice starting Wednesday uh but since um January uh we've had a couple of running backs come in and compete um Brandon epton is a transfer from from Hutch who came in and has been repping with the ones and then we kind of had a surprise uh pton Brown was a true freshman that early enrolled in January from Hillsboro High School so just just up the road there a little bit he's come in and and really done a nice job so we we keep wondering is is he that good you know because it's just a little quicker than we had thought but those two guys have put some really good practice film out there and they're going to have to redo it here in July and August but um we feel like uh we do have some pretty good depth there too and I do one more I noticed this um recently because I say a year ago you had your spring game at Scott City and we have our SEO ball awards every July and five uh incoming freshmen were featured so I know you guys brought a lot more local talent has that been a new initiative um from your recruiting strategy or is it just a good year for local guys to join the team um we've always had two to three every year I mean that's a it's a priority of mine I recruit local I do a lot of the conversations and so that's it's always a really important um aspect to our program here um we want kind of our heart and soul to be with people that really care about the program um and so those local kids um do that and we've been able to have a good enough brand that those local kids even want to stay at home even though that's not always the case thank you we got one final one for Coach Luke from kfbs one last question go ahead go ahead yeah coach uh obviously playing week zero you kind of get the double bye to set up for the war war for the wheel and then you've got one to set up for lyndenwood um have you ever had two uh by weeks as a coach and you know what kind of advantages I guess might it give you we're fixing on finding out I don't know I've never had uh two by weeks I've never played a Zer week game um and so you're just wondering how to process everything I think an early bi-week we'll probably still be trying to get better so I would I would assume that by week we will be really still practicing on weaknesses and early prep for uh SIU uh that second by week uh you know we'll either be resting for a championship or I don't know maybe drinking because we're 4- seven again I'm not sure what we'll do on that last by week that'll be one of the two I guess well coach appreciate your time this afternoon best luck to your team uh this year thank you