2024 MEAC SWAC Challenge: FAMU Press Conference

uh looking at them and some of the things that they did and then they come out and don't do any of it but uh you know we I think we persevered um I thought offense did a really really good job of answering you know once we got down 14 to zero and let us get our wits about ourselves and uh and ultimately great football game I told uh I told Rattler Nation uh that I was hoping for a little adversary well well damn I don't think you wanted it to be that much but uh congratulations uh to our team uh heck of a job uh persevering and and and working through the adversity and uh extremely excited to head home uh one of them okay we'll now take questions for the student athletes I'm going to start over here to the right green shirt and then on your shirt thank what's up coach D Rich Mari um Jal Thomas T Democrat um this Marian Daniel U tell me about you know coach said he want y to go through some adversity y'all boys went through some adversity today um talk about what y'all learned about the team here I know Daniel this was your first game here Mario you not been for a year what what what did y'all learn about this team it's like okay well being down 140 that's when it that's when it hit certain guys like oh man like you know this this one University hit the fan coach said it's going to be some time when they going to punch you in the MTH it's about responding how you how you going to punch your right back and at the end of the day I I felt like you know uh we were we were very calm you know a lot of guys we had a veteran line a lot of guys have been there before and they said last on the sideline we have been this position last year in Atlanta you I was on a team but they were down 14-0 as well in the championship game so you know I felt like we we we came out you know we started off slow but pick back up yeah for the most part exactly what he said I was on that last year Team National Championship we down 140 but oh we look at each other night y know we got to go through we gota both fight we got to both Crown we got to work a little harder so that's all it was though we don't we don't really like take we don't really take too much pressure take pressure and ride with it K yeah k s Sports um this for um um Daniel um you started out the game one to three 10 yards you finished the game between 86 yards three touchdowns games MVP um was it a matter for you just settling down after those first couple of driv to really get yourself and in Rhythm and having your comforable out there yeah it was just you know just getting in Rhythm getting getting The Playmakers that's what it was I wasn't really trying to rush everything getting the Kings out and you know old L said they got me so you know TI make plays tonight question right FR Don ston DNA Sports Talk you got the ball back with a little over six minutes to go been pass the ball most of the the gang what was the mindset and the the Huddle light knowing that you had to play ball control well coach cozy came over there I was like we going to pound him and you know that's what we did and we just you know managed the game you know we was second second and long we had to throw a little throw outout to him and you know we made it happen after that and just kept going you good but miss you heard the crush Sports Talk uh this a question for Daniel talk about having a playmaker like two uh in just any kind of situation knowing that you give the ball he going to make a play for you I feel like he's special I mean you know especially in practice he be like man give me the ball be open you know just little stuff like that but I feel like all our guys can make plays you know he made plays tonight but all our guys you know can make plays it's all love though I [Laughter] SC yeah uh Mr Richardson Troy white fat moue Sports there was a key play you star down the Blitz and through the wide receiver screen was that something that you were seeing that was a possibility throughout the game or did you game plan for it what came about what made you be able to make that po look like um I mean we just on the sideline we drew up cuz they were they brought a different bunch of pressures tonight that we you know didn't go over I mean we went over it we seen it before but you know they they came out play different fronts odd front that we haven't seen on film and you know when they coach made adjustment on sideline you know they bring that pressure just be ready to dump it down and that's what we did Jake McDonald CAU through 6 Sports Daniel uh did you think you would have to throw the ball 30 times a game and Jamari uh were you happy that he had to throw the call 30 times I mean you know at the end of the day uh we play complimentary football you know we got to be able to run the ball open up and got to be able to throw the ball so I feel like we did that hey I feel like the game plan was great throw the ball throw the ball throw the ball you know that's what I just I go block sometimes where they tell me to throw the ball you feel me catch the ball so yeah I feel like the game plan was czy we going to go over here to your right in the black shirt oh Justin fa tomor the sports network you uh this question for Javari uh was there any match up that you seen on film that was favorable considering you got to the end on twice over or receiving yards uh they matchups uh not being cocky but I just go out there and play my game I really look at who in front of me I just go beat me and hey if you I'm a dog so you got to come with it you feel me every whole game like you said this it's we've got four quarters as name g for a reason I come with gas get tired that's just what it is right here Jared off sports.com Daniel and Jamari you know you guys are this is your first game together and you look pretty good I'd say you know so two-parter how good do you guys think your connection is right now and how much better can it get as the season progresses it's going to be great I know I played him my freshman year when we was at Buffalo he was at C Michigan he ran for 200 yards against s so I already knew that who he was and what potential he had I already knew he was a gamer I know I'm a gamer so like you know what I'm saying we dogs we just going to go out there play and do what best for the team so I think it's just pay off from the summer workouts you know just you know after I mean before practice get get some RS in and just just building that chemistry that's all it is okay blue shirt right here yes my name is Rocky Miller with HBCU Coaches Corner you guys Coach Co I want to congratulate you on the victory you Daniel and you as well Mark um coming into the game you guys had a new head coach new new offensive coordinator new defensive coordinator it seems like at the beginning of the game you guys were searching to find what your true identity is as a team and anyone who wants to answer can answer this question going into the game what what did you think your identity was going to be and then coming out of this game what do you think your identity actually is just just players just the players I to going to the game I think the game is that we just always don't finish we always going work you know what I'm saying uh a really too much to it we got a game plan like you said they came out something different but we stick to our game plan we made a little tweaks but we stick to our game plan he said it best Ela Cooper with the faman this is for Richardson and cassette with you guys being down early in the game having to go on the road and then usual side game and having to face adversity early and being able to adapt how do you feel like that's going to help your confidence throughout the season and especially being able to come home next weekend and play at home at Brad well first thing we don't lose at Brag I I will say you know watching film we have to start faster on both sides of the ball and special teams and you know when we start fast we get in the Rhythm uh I don't think nobody can stop us final two questions in the back first with vgh then lady in V with hpcu game day Capital out look Daniel you said last year December 16th you had already decided you going in the portal and you watched the celebration bowl and you said wow this school's got a winning culture was it everything you expected leading the team today definitely definitely felt it especially being down in uh guys is like man we've been here before we got this and you know God stepped up to the plate and we made it happen and just saying like he knew coming in like we got the Target on our back we just want a championship everybody going if they zero and 10 never one again they going to play us like like we out of B something like they go come hard so he already know what he stepp Sydney wicker wctb Sports Jamari um coming into this game rler Nation had no idea who Daniel was you said you knew him from your last school but you guys obviously got to know him a lot better throughout practice what do you think rler nation and the whole world honestly learned about Daniel tonight hey that he ain't going to never quit he going to find a way to make it happy Mr make it happy that's what I'm especially especially when it was a play down when I found them in the end zone uh which you were trying to get the defense jump off sides and I seen the the CL time was running out and I was just like man I'm going to check it so I just check the different play and you know was kind of a little screw up but I just made something happen and found him back in the end zone yeah that second touchdown was on the Fly he C it right for right for the uh clock one just ch ch ch and I was like okay bet so R do found you going to make it happen kind of said Daniel was our MVP of the game congratulations and thank you fellas good luck save some chck all that'll be left okay we're going to open it up for coaches uh questions for um coach what that says in the backe uh coach obviously being Atlanta is nothing new to uh you guys were just here won the title here um what what is about Atlanta that's so special with HBCU Athletics you guys get a chance to have this platform and just this experience for these guys as well what does it all mean being here right I think we call it the second tallah has is what I'm what we think we call it ain't Devon we call it obviously a lot of I'm not here I mean and Atlanta is the place you have to come to win the championship so I mean this just happens to be that uh you know getting a chance to start here um and hopefully end here and that's kind of been the motto since since taking the job in late January so you know exciting place it was great atmosphere uh you know a little bit closer than I wanted it to be but uh obviously being on the right side of it is is always a blessing uh coach over to your right coach uh Earl kitchings quari back Awards could you speak to the uh your thoughts about the leadership of Daniel today uh coming in as a new quarterback although he had experience but could you speak to his leadership for leading FAMU uh starting today well you know to me tonight you know I think he just did his job you know we uh you know it wasn't a whole ra ra speech it wasn't any of that it was just a man uh you know we had a game plan obviously had to make some tweaks when you got down 14-0 and he was doing what was asked of him by our offensive coordinator on our quarterback UPS right we you know that that on that last Drive um you know we we actually weren't going to even run to play when it was uh third down you know we weren't even going to run to play we wanted to try to draw him off sides and uh we got in the Huddle we talked about it you know he was he was pretty adamant about you know what we were doing he went to every lineman to say we're not running a play you know what I mean so but you know he was it's a young man that he when he decided to come here you know he wanted to win wanted to be a part of the culture and uh you know today was his first tonight was his first step coach we go St to what's up coach jald Thomas T Democrat um first off congratulations on your first win thank you he fam you um coach like you said like I asked the players about the adversity you wanted the adversity and I feel like of course you've known more about this team that the world may know seeing your team rally together and make that comeback effort on the national stage once again as they did last year what does the world not know about family Football under James Coy the Third well first of all let's let's let's talk about that picture that you found of me in the article yesterday when you had you guys did an article about me yesterday and you found a picture of me when I was 8 years old now you got to understand I have no idea where that picture came from okay so I'm going to start with that but now ask that question again cuz while while you were talking all I could think about was that picture you ask that question please if you don't mind yeah go yall making another comeback on the national stage as y'all did at the celebration bowl and all doing it here at the M SW challenge what is the world know about family Football under James Co thira well well first of all I don't want I mean we didn't ask to get down 14-0 uh that wasn't something that was planned nor what we wanted um you know what what this team what it did show with this team is you know we we we spoke about adversity you know last night and and and throughout the week right just being able to understand that things might not happen the way you want them and you know as they mentioned there wasn't a lot of you know you know R Ry it was just guys understanding what they needed to do we had to take care of some details defensively um offensively you know we we we had to take care of some details as well cuz defensively they were doing some things that were a little different so hats off to our coordinators for making the proper changes and uh obviously at the end you know we we it was extremely similar to the last year's game against against Jackson State where they you know they held the ball the entire fourth quarter you know we were we were we had the game we we were winning the offense got the ball with eight minutes left and Jackson State never got the ball back tonight had the ball six minutes left you know North Folk State never got the ball back so these are situations that we talk about you know we talk about the end of the game situations four minute situations and uh you know hats off again to what Coach Henry and the offensive staff did you know you know they they they got us that victory victory tonight and uh again extremely excited just to be happy to be one and0 but you know when when you you got another MEC school that you're going to be playing next week so uh South car state you know they have on film what was successful against us so now we got to make sure we're ready to get get ready for them next weekend we're going to go with v in the back and then ma Wilson ke look HBCU game day coach with about four minutes left the offense got a first down and you had a big smile on your face because the offensive lineman had just blocked and had done what you felt the team was going to be able to rely on this year you had a big smile like okay was that smile okay the guys that we knew we could depend on are coming through well a little bit of a relief CU at that time you know we needed that first down um you ultimately when we started the game that's what we thought we'd be able to do uh you know be able to pound them out you know and and eat the clock and know get our running game going you know I we it was 247 you know and and we were doing that and then we have the fumble obviously changed a little bit of the momentum but uh at that time and at that stage of the game we needed a first down we needed the clock to run North Folk state was running out of timeout so that first down allowed us to kind of you know rethink about what we needed to do for the remainder of that drive so off offensive line of all it's going to be our strength they've been our strength you know three three preseason All Conference players couple other guys that obviously play really really well but uh for us to be successful our offensive line has to be great and uh I think they showed that in the second half Mak coach miss you heard the crush Sports Talk talk about resetting a championship culture guys can kind of get complacent but you come in and you have to redirect these guys just talk about that process this summer and get to this point right here well believe it or not it started in the spring you know obviously when everything was going on and you know we I was name to interrupt uh but you know the beginning of January you know I was attacking this as the head coach right we you know we had just won the championship first week of January everybody was back in school you know we were lifting and training getting ready to go again uh then then you go through spring practice you finally get your staff together and we knew that we still had some work to do and uh and as they mentioned in the summer you know we we had 85 guys there in the summer you know training and working and uh you know doing everything imaginable to to to possibly be in this type of situation of being able to overcome it so I want this St here to reset you know believe it or not we are a much much different team than we were last year that's some new guys new guys in different spots new guy new faces you know obviously know you lose a player of the year on both sides of the football some other guys are going to have to are going to have to play better um and at times we did and at times we did so what it did say about our football team is is that you know what we we we do understand that it's we got to play the full game and uh they did that tonight we didn't get down we didn't get down we got down and uh I'm extremely excited that it's something to build on we know that we can come back uh and but but I'm not trying to make it a plan to be down every game 14 to zero that you can't believe going coach sector R Jared Hof been HBC sports coach first of all congratulations on your first win as head coach of Florida A&M thank you uh just talk about the mentality of this team and training camp and what went into the decisions you made about the Personnel that you wanted to go with going into this game well that's a great question actually the mentality for us was for me was to try to make this try to make training camp as hard as we could you know we we were trying to get a gauge on on some of the guys that we had you know you you I didn't need to test Jamar g i I didn't need to test uh TJ Lee I didn't really need to test Jaylen cost you know but with the amount of transfers that we did have coming in we knew that they were talented but uh we we needed to find out how much fight they had in them so you you asked them we we we we had some tough afternoons we had some tough mornings and and that was that was by you know for a reason I wanted to see where we were who we could trust at this time who's going to be accountable who's going to take care of the details so mentality wise I thought we got over a hurdle you know a lot of people thought we were going to come in and and and this is going to be an easy football game for us but you know we had to readjust our mindset we had to readjust some of the things that we did offensively defensively and even special teams so I appreciate our guys get to the sidelines getting on the iPads making making the corrections and then showing on the field but you know we're one to0 uh we got a long way to go if if we're trying to get trying to get back here you know in December but excited about what we did but we still got a lot of work to do justtin favor is tomorrow Sports Network um your players talked about how out 14 nothing and um it allowed them to wake up or whatever so you guys scored off the first half come out the second half what was the message to the team collab at well we we talked about the uh the middle eight and uh we we discussed the middle eight we talked about the last four minutes of the second quarter and then the first four minutes of the third and uh you know we had a chance at the end of the second quarter to get some points you know and we didn't you know we we failed in our two-minute attempt but we got when we got to lock at half you know we talked about you know being able to go down the field we had some things that we thought we could do offensively and and again it was important for us to you know grab the lead and uh just just to show you know that you guys come in have time work on our Corrections and it's always great to talk about it in the locker room and then get it you know let the transfer into the field so it builds confidence in the coaches it builds confidence in the players you know we had different guys at different moments make some really really good plays and uh so you know again it's week one we got we still got work to do and uh and I'm hoping I can't wait to get get back to work tomorrow so we can get ready for next week right here in his friend Don Stinson DNA Sports Talk coach odms uh appraise your team for having a lot of discipline in this particular game maybe a little bit more so than last year what areas did you see the discipline having an effect in this game well I think he's being very very generous uh you know we had a couple situations where they gave them some first downs um me you know those those are things that can't happen I guess you know maybe in the past some things you know might have maybe got out of hand but you know we had a we had a big third down stop and and know we had we had a hand you know we had a hand to the face and then then we had a face mask uh you know in the first half so those are things we we have to ultimately negate because they extend drives and normally when you extend drives that gives up points but uh you know we we strive to be better I don't necessarily know how many penalties we may have had but uh you know we we had two comes to mind and and that's three too many right so uh you know we we we continue to work on that we we'll do some running and do some disciplines for some of those things that happened tonight but uh you know it's things we can learn from it didn't cost us tonight but ultimately it could cost us later so ultimately we I I I'm always going to feel that we need to be better with our discipline you to go to your right over here coach yeah I'm K watch sports um coach you walked out of tunnels football field i unnown t Network times how was this walk out to from the tunnel to the field tonight different how was that walk from the field after the wind different say that one more how was it how was it different walking out on the field tonight being the first coach considering joh took to get here how was it different walket officer than that know you have the first win this head C SC Dan here well I'll tell you this you know my first two years I was I was in charge of the captains so we I would walk the captains to the 50 you know what I mean tonight I had to run yeah the're very different right I'm not used to running from the from one side to the other and I do that sometimes just you know not as a head coach that's that's probably the first part for me um secondly you know it was uh you know little butterflies that's some B some butterflies in there and uh and obviously excited to see our fan base you know my family was was in the stands and uh you know but but the best part was walking off one and0 uh you know that that's something that you know you strive for uh and and and again I you know I won't be able to relive that moment ever again and and uh but but it was exciting for me exciting for the team excited for the staff excited for the you know president everyone affiliated with our program rer Nation you know we got a lot of people come watch this football team we had a lot of people watching this football game on TV so I I think uh you know the mixy challenge was the number one ticket tonight and and that's that's great to see and great to hear okay we got our final two questions I'm going to go with Coach Johnny and then we're gonna go with Jake hey come tell you don't what HBC you C to scoring we'll meet you next week yes but of course the victory was great sweet that's what is all about at the end of the day but giv up $257 rushing can't do that SC talk about NY Che of course and I know you got to get back and watch video what was really happening because you guys were get H up in the mixed direction right and once they popped through the first line they you know the second year had to get him and they had to make one yes could you know down what was the issue or of course you know that that's a whole bu y ask about question well I mean the standard of our of our defense you got to stop the run you know we we can't have the success that we need to have if we don't stop right and you over the last know two or three years we we've been one of the best in the country um you know North Folk was given us some unbalance they were they were they were moving the line around on us we we call it an ox front uh and uh when you do that people can get out of gaps and that that first long run you know they put us an ox then then they they counted with this with the guard in the center and we didn't have enough you know and uh then the running back made a made a great move you know to get the spring and it went about 82 yards so you know for us I thought I thought we might have been moving a little bit too much you know we normally line up and just you know and we just take gaps and that uh you know I think we were moving around a little bit too much especially with the ox and gun balance stuff that they were doing you not have to slide de you got to change your gaps and we were recognizing that so you know things things to grow things to work on um you know we I'm I'm not going to tell you that we worked on the ox the heck of a lot because that's not what they did right and then obviously you know looking at a guy that was at another program before so hats off to them but they thought they did a really really good job and ultimately what happens when you do things when you do things poorly now I well you wonder what South Carolina States going to to us next weekend you already know they're going to they're going to they're going to see if we have that fixed or not so but I thought we moved around too well too much at the on the defensive line where normally we we play gaps right and and obviously they did a good job great planet and uh but we got some things we got to work on we know that and uh and you're right if we're going to continue to give up 200 yards game rushing I don't think we we're going to be lucky enough to be winning the game that we like we did tonight and a code question right here exam coach Jake McDonald 360 Sports uh usually in the last quarter you start gaming out scenarios what would happened here your scenario for a point after try and then the two two-point conversion did you welcome that two-point conversion no nothing just going through your mind when you saw that well I mean we we knew that since we were off sides that the likely of them going for two what's going to happen I me know Co call timeout you know I thought that was a good move you know we we we called the defense that we thought they were going to run a QB something with the QB and we got lucky on that one you know we we got a chance to get we our guy won the one-on-one battle with an amazing Jackle uh you know but you know we don't want to be offside to an extra point know but but I mean again the scenario was what it was defensively we did a good job and and then we didn't we didn't give up the two points uh and you know I guess obviously that's that was the uh difference of the game coach thank you good luck the rest of the season thank you everyone the safe Trav was back please everyone