Rhett Lashlee talks SMU's win over Nevada, looks back on Preston Stone's showing, QB situation

hardfought win give Jeff and his his crew a ton of credit man they they came out ready to play they they kicked our tail for a good half or more of the game and um I think he's going to do a really good job here I mean he's he's got a tough toughness to him you could feel it in their team and um I think the future's bright with with him here leading those guys um not not the kind of football we want to play that probably is the most undisciplined game we played since I've been the head coach here uh not proud of that I think we had 11 penalties for over 100 yards there were accepted um you know so just some some really self-inflicted wounds it made it really hard on our offense for about really the first half to get any kind of momentum or anything going because as soon as we get a first down it felt like we were in second and 15 or second and 20 and first and 20 because of penalties we had um but we found a way to win in the fourth quarter I think down down two scores ball on two yard line with round two minutes to go um guys dug deep so it's not always how you win it's that we win and would want to know so so early in that game Preston throws a pick on his first pass struggles a little bit early on you put Kevin in you choose to go with Preston after that even after Kev goes four for five can you talk a little bit about the decision to trust him and then with the off from him from well like I said Preston won the starting job he's our starter but both guys are going to play they deserve to play and our plan all along I know we didn't share with y'all was was was Kevin was going to play the third and four series like that's fair to him you know let Preston start the game and then Kevin can see it those two drives and get a feel for what the defense is doing and then Preston gets to come off and see the defense a little and and Kevin gets to come in and not have one drive he's got two because sometimes as a quarterback if I got one drive you press and you try to do more than you need to do and and then we were going to put Preston back in the fifth series and go from there and see how the game went um definitely if you'd asked me I have thought we' have played Kevin Moore I mean he had our only touchdown Drive in the first half did a great job and he's going to continue to play um but you know the way the game went we weren't getting a lot of time and possession we weren't getting a lot of possessions obviously we were down um I think it really hurt us when we opened the second half you know we gave up the touchdown right before half we do go get a field goal um and then we get a stop and and then we have a penalty give them the ball and it ended up taking like eight minutes seven six seven eight minutes I don't know what and now we're down two scores and um you know you just you don't want to go back and forth so you got to you got to go with someone and like I said he earned a starting job he's got the experience so stuck with him and and it worked out but it had nothing to do with us not fully believing in Kevin you're going to see more of Kevin coach who's who's doing to communicate you tell you're talking you're telling Kevin you're telling Preston this is what we're going to do as the game is going on is that you yeah well like I said we we told them what to expect going in hey Preston's going to start go the first two drives Kevin you're going to come in third and fourth we'll go back to Preston and go and we told it doesn't matter how your drives go that way they're not feeling like the outcome hangs on everything and then Coach King and I just talk between drives and and he kind of lets them know and and like I said the game the game obviously went a direction that made it hard when you're having limited options if you start going back and forth you don't let either guy get in the Rhythm that could be a challenge and um like I said Preston went down to start the second half I start I think we started to look likeu football a little bit we got points and we we started moving the football and we just didn't want to go back and forth when when time was running out on us but yeah we communicate as as a coach you've got to be proud of both of those guys you're a quarterback you quarterback collegiately you know to accept it deal with it run with it I I am I'm proud of both of them uh I don't know if you saw Kevin's drive we score and come off and him and Preston do some sort of handshake I I don't know you know it's cool for them but just the way they celebrate each other and I know I'm sure Kevin is is disappointed he didn't play more but he's going to keep playing because they're both really good and and look not a lot of people play two guys we got two guys that are that leted us on touchdown drives today that are capable of playing and you know hopefully we get in a rhythm more offensively where we get more drives and more opportunities and we can we can do that but yeah credit both those guys for how they handle it because how those guys handle it permeates through our team and uh they're Team guys and they're for each other can you talk about RJ I think it was the 10 minutes ago was that deep pass to him to get the drive going and then obviously the final D to win the game I think honestly and RJ would I tell this I'm going to tell this to him tomorrow uh he played as bad a first half as I've ever seen him play just like we kind of did and he played about as good a second half as they' ever seen him play right and so that's that's what's weird about football um we didn't we tried to get him in involved early in the game I think we threw him a quick screen and got a holding penalty you know we just never got going and um I think you saw even on the first drive of the second half we got him a couple touches which we ended up kicking a field goal and it just kind of got him in the flow and then um it all kind of hit we had the ball in the two we had our first scrimmage of fall Camp the last thing we did was put the ball back up what it's called on the two yard line and the offense went 98 yards for a touchdown and had a really big just a really good drive executed some third Downs you know I think we actually threw a seam throw to Matt hibner and he caught it on that drive then so right before that drive it was a TV timeout and just told him hey you guys remember that 98 yard Drive first scrimmage thought yeah I was like well we need it now so we're going to go down the score we're going to go for two defense are going to stop you know Etc and credit credit them with believing it and doing it we get RJ on third down matched up on a linebacker and in the rest of history for us the last eight minutes or so obviously you got a defensive stop you got the winning touchdown but the body language of your team seemed to change like there's a different urgency was there something said on the sideline or what changed there toward in those last minutes I felt like we were ready to play clearly we weren't and that's my job I mean the penalties the sometimes you're over ready to play like it's been a long a long good off season and we had a lot of guys like ready to play and we feel like we have a good football team we didn't show it most of the game today but we do and we just we were really really flat and again I think Nevada had a lot to do with that in the first half um at halftime we we just talked about hey it's time to dig deep playu football I thought I think we started to do that in the third quarter again the penalty that allowed them to have an extended Drive really kind of thed our momentum a little bit but we always call it up to start the fourth quarter because finishing is a big part of what we want our program to be known for and we called it up it was 24 to 13 I think then and I don't remember what I said I don't know if it mattered what I said but they got it done so to go off of that a little bit in the offseason you talked about how much experience and Leadership this team has how much does that help you and the team as a whole in moments like early in that fourth quarter when you're down to scores to know you're still in the game it helps a lot uh helps a lot having you know experienced quarterbacks having experienced guys on offense and obviously on defense when we needed stops and you know I think I think we started pressing a little bit in the first half weren't playing well it wasn't going the script wasn't going how we wanted it to go I I didn't call a game very good game at all specifically the first half like we can throw that one away you know but we settled down we just started trusting each other calling plays to make plays guys making plays on both sides of the ball The Experience we're going to need it um and like I said I've been on part of teams that that we've lost games like that but we we find a way to win games like that early in the year and it it ends up really helping us later in the season so hopefully uh we'll learn a lot of lessons from from it but we'll be able to draw on that cuz there's going to be another time this year in the fourth quarter we're down two scores and we know we can do it folks what about what about the composure and un Sportsman like issues that that were permeating throughout the game can you can that yeah I I don't love it at all it's not who we are and it's not who we want to be so I will look at the film you know I know early in the game um Jordan Hudson got spit on so then he he pushed the guy in the helmet back which he can't do so they they call a flag on him and the other side too um it's hard guys it's really hard for guys to control their emotions when they get spit on but they got to and um and then same thing later again I'll have to see the clip officials make calls and we we got to live with it and and they do a good job running the game so um we'll look at the film where we can be more disciplined where we can do a better job um that's not who we want to be so anything we did out of character will be addressed and guys will go on the field that are going to represent the right way so was that just something the referees must have missed because they called crossly for the same thing correct which again I don't know the call was made and we respect it um Brandon feels like it happened the other way but he's out of the game because whatever we did to put oursel in a position to where that could be thought of that's on us and it it cost us him and it cost our team and so we got to be better than that we got to have composure there's a difference between between playing with passion and emotion we were emotional a lot tonight we got to be passionate big difference you got the safety late um are there cir is that defensive set designed specifically to go get a safety or simply plug gaps and if you get the safety that's a nice byproduct yeah no I think it was just a matter of we had them backed up they obviously been running the ball a lot I think we probably felt good about it and our guys just got to push and um you know look ball sitting on the one yard line our defense gets a little more motivated to get a push and um same thing happened on the other when we were on the two we were able to run it out they weren't and if you look at it those two two moments probably were the difference in the game brard Smith had a pretty strong outing tonight what' you see from him we what we thought we'd see from him super explosive uh he's got to get in better shape but um I think he had 11 carries for over 60 yards maybe caught some passes obviously the kickoff return past M Midfield got us going uh he's explosive you can tell when the ball is in his hands he's got a different different gear in a good way and he's a just a really good allaround player so you know we had him in the past as a receiver and he's played predominantly receiver but our familiarity with him when he came here we said you're going to play running back and he's embraced it and um you know I think between him LJ and rooster they all did some some really good things tonight to help us win the defensive line has a lot of new faces on it it seems like they really started to play well together in the second half with the safety getting some of the sacks and the pressures on that last Drive is that something where you expect them to improve as they just get to play with each other more and more often I think so I think again I think we were frustrated I think Nevada did a great job of frustrating us because they run the ball a lot with the quarterback and motions and it's you know a lot of unbalanced and and there's it's just it's not normal our guys want people to drop back pass and get after it right and that's it's not the game that was being played you know you look what Georgia Tech did today to win that's that's the formula they used and so credit them with doing it and uh fortunately late in the game we got them in must-pass situations and we were able to kind of play to our strengths but we're going to have to stop the run and run the ball better to win moving forward there's a lot of journalists who going want me to ask you this question what how do you know Jeff Cho what's your familiarity with him since his first game yeah yeah we're not incredibly familiar I mean I know he spent the last three years at Texas uh he told me pregame I didn't know his parents I think were from Dallas Fort Worth went to Irving High School I didn't know that because I know he's been on the west coast a lot um but you know I know he was at Boise and I know he was at um Washington maybe and some other places out west a lot and mon you know when he was a head coach at Montana State I believe um you know teams take on the identity of their head coach you hope and I think in one game you can see they're going to have the identity because he's hardned tough culture type guy and I think his team played with the edge he's going to want them to play with moving forward so we know of each other we've never worked together or spent a lot of time other than the last couple years in Texas you'd see each other a little bit you know throughout the state but got a lot of respect for him think he's going to do a great job here we heard RJ broke The Rock was it an easy decision to give it to him or C candidates up for that honor especially after games like that as I'm walk I usually let Grizz tell me like I don't Grizz tell me he told me he had I don't know what he had he told me he had something for 160 or whatever and I was like man you make the call I'm I'm good I'm I'm out I'm done for now and uh but it was it was definitely welld deserved um you know he he hit it but he didn't hit it head on so he's a little bit better at catching seam balls and and breaking the rock but I'm glad he got to do it thanks a lot thank you