(He) was running around like he did last year (before the injury). He couldn't run like that in practice last season. |
[18: |
[A case of first-time nerves playing among his new peers?] No, ... Just bad play. No excuses. |
[Asked who the best running quarterback he ever coached was:] It may be Antonio Heffner, ... We haven't had many real runners. |
[But after embarrassing himself with the Redskins in a way that Lou Holtz once embarrassed himself with the Jets, Spurrier decided he couldn't play bogey golf for the rest of his adult life.] I told my wife, 'I need to go coach somewhere,' ... Then this opportunity popped up and she said, 'Why there?' I said, 'Well, first of all, it's in the South. It's in the SEC. I get to play against the same guys I've been playing for 12 years. Everything is there to be successful and yet they have never quite done it.' |
[By next year, Spurrier calculates that about half his team will be his players, and he believes he can bring in the talent necessary to be successful in the SEC. His recruiting coordinator is former Florida State quarterback Rick Stockstill.] And he's wonderful, ... The best I've been around. |
[Mitchell] can walk around and he told me he can drop and put his foot in the ground and throw it, ... We're still about five days away. I've got a feeling he should be ready, but again, well just have to wait and see how that plays out. |
[Richt] was a little different than a lot of the Seminoles, ... He was a little different type guy. |
[So late in the contest, backup Eric Kresser threw a quick screen to backup Travis McGriff for the landmark score.] They didn't seem too mad about it, ... They only had about 10,000 in the stadium with about five minutes left. |
[Steve Spurrier wasted no time, naming sophomore Blake Mitchell his starting QB just days into fall camp. According to Spurrier, the LaGrange native has proven that he's better prepared than redshirt freshman Antonio Heffner and true freshman Cade Thompson. Mitchell responded with an up-and-down camp, garnering praise from Spurrier one day and criticism the next.] If we can't throw, we'll run up the middle and punt, ... And if our defense plays this well, if we can win 13-10, that's what we'll try to do to win. |
[To] the national media guys, we're a 4-7 team, supposedly, ... We don't need to be sitting here bragging about anything on our team right now. We've got to go play and try to earn our way. |
[While Spurrier said the choice of Mitchell was obvious, he wasn't sure of his rotation after that.] Backups — we don't know yet, ... We're trying a lot of guys right there. |
A guy said, 'Coach, you know (the letters) USC is in Citrus now also, |
After being here, I can really appreciate how the Carolina people love football and love their team, ... They've paid their dues. I'm hoping they get a return real soon. |
After being with a team that didn't score many points, I sort of realized why teams didn't like us (at Florida), ... We kept trying to score the whole game and for some reason, in football, you're not supposed to do that. If we lose by a big number, that's fine with me. |