Post-Game Quotes at (RV/RV) Kentucky, Oct. 11, 2014
ULM Head Coach Todd Berry
Opening Statement …
“Congratulations to Coach (Mark) Stoops and obviously the Kentucky team. I am proud of our effort. I thought we had a good gameplan, I thought we were playing well. Second half got away from us a little bit. Some of it was just we do not have a lot of warm bodies right now. A lot of shuffling. We lost five more guys here today. Last two weeks we have 10 guys down now. We are kind of falling apart here a little bit. We had to make some adjustments. Was not pleased with our special teams, obviously. Some of that was having to adjust some guys around and switching some people in coverage areas. (I) did not think that we kicked the ball well either today. Defensively we played decent in the first half and not quite as good in the second half. (I) thought that came down to a little bit of everybody pressing again instead of playing their job. Some of that had to do with the rotations though also. Offense played pretty well in the first half. Again, we did not play well in the second half and obviously the second half we when we came back out, we had to move Ben Risenhoover, Colby Mitchell was not able to go today as you probably noticed. Ben banged up his hand a little bit and it made it tough for him snapping so we brought Trey Martin in and that created some other snapping issues for us. Anyway we have an open date, hopefully we can get a little healthier and grow some of these other players up and move forward.”
On being able to evaluate the new players to replace all of the injuries…
“Well I think anytime that you get actual game snaps on anybody, it is a great evaluation. Practice snaps are just OK evaluations, game snaps are real ones so that does give us an opportunity to do that.”
On the three losses being close at halftime and what happens in the second half…
“I do not know if it is so much adjustments. I think this team desperately wants to win. I do agree with you in a relation to when something bad happens in the second half, everybody starts pressing. And you do not press, you play. And I get it, I do, I have been there before as a player. And have seen it multiple times as a coach. Everybody wants so badly to win, that pretty soon in the first half you are doing your job and then in the second half you are trying to win. And we need to do our job all the time and that allows us to win.”
Brayle Brown, QB
On some things he told Pete (Thomas) early on in the first quarter …
“We played pretty good in the first quarter. We had everything going, and we were communicating back and forth. But give credit to Kentucky. They adjusted to everything we were doing, and they played a good game.”
On how much optimism does it gives him on how he played in the first quarter …
“We came out good, but we have to keep it going. We do not settle for moral victories like the program did in the past, so this game hurts a little bit. We had the potential to move the ball, like we did in the first quarter, but we have to go for four quarters, especially against a team like Kentucky.”
On if today is a moral win …
“We are a mature team with a lot of juniors and seniors. It is obviously fun coming into an SEC atmosphere with a good crowd, but we are expecting to win every game, so if we come short of that, we feel like we failed.”
Hunter Kissinger, LB
On the interception to set up the touchdown …
“Yes, going into this game I thought we were going to win, just like every other game. I thought we would come out and play sound defense and take advantages of mistakes Kentucky would make. Early on we made a great stop to force them into a field goal after a long kick return, which gave us some momentum. After that, the interception was exactly what we needed to help us score. At that time, we thought those plays were the turning point and that we had a clear shot at winning, but it did not turn out that way. We made too many mistakes, and you pay for it when you play good football teams.
On if the team started pressing too much in the second half …
“Yes, I think it is something that comes naturally in big games like this, and we need to really focus on doing our individual jobs, instead of everyone trying to make the big play. If we try to press too much, we will pay, because our offense and defense is designed for everyone to do their individual job on each play. If you do your job, plays will come to you.”
On if this helps them for conference play …
“They are a good team, but if you give up 48 points in a game, there is not much to be optimistic about. The best thing to be optimistic about is that we have a bye week. This will give us time to get healthy and try to make a run in conference. I think that is the most important thing, and we have to learn from our mistakes in this game. We have to play a full game.”
