Alabama / Southern Miss postgame interviews with Mike Shula, Joe Kines, Dave Ungerer, Brandon Avalos, Justin Smiley,DeMeco Ryans, Shaud Williams and more

These comments came following the Southern Mississippi game as Coach Shula answered questions from the press pool ...

Coach Mike Shula – Great day. What a way to win on Homecoming. It was a total team effort. We talked to our players about that was what it would take. Defensively, we were shutting them down, making some plays, getting off the field with some 3-and-outs. The special teams were making some plays. Not just being even, but making plays. We did that and got some points. Offensively, we were able to run the football and move it against a team that brings 10 or 11 guys up to the line of scrimmage every time. I can’t say enough about the total team effort. The execution wasn’t always great, but it was good enough to win the game. It’s a great feeling. So with that, I’ll start with the questions.

Talk about Brandon’s performance and whether Brodie was still a possibility last night. (question partly inaudible)

It was very similar to last week. Brandon got most of the reps. Brodie actually threw the ball more this week. He didn’t take as many reps, but he’s feeling better. So we felt like we were going to go win the game with either guy. But we wanted to make sure Brandon was ready because obviously he hasn’t had the reps that even Spencer had. We were going to find a way to win it, even if we had to run it every down. Unfortunately, the couple times we did throw it there were some times that we just missed. As far as Brodie’s injury, we’re taking it day to day. The bottom line is we won this football game. Brodie got some rest and hopefully he’ll be ready next week. If not, we’ll go about it the same way we did this week.

Someone asked us earlier how much of the game plan we cut down for Brandon. I mentioned during the week that it was about 60% of what normally had in. No, we didn’t call the game that way. That probably sounds like a surprise to you because it may have looked like we had about 10% of the plan in. We had a lot of runs. But I think we wanted to sure that if we felt like we got something going on a few plays that we were going to keep running them and keep using our strengths. That is our offensive line and running the football. Shaud (Williams) and Ray Hudson did a nice job, even toward the end there where they were getting hit at the line of scrimmage but just kept running and turned those things into 8 or 9 yards and first down plays. So that was big. Again defensively, guys stepped up. We had some 3-and-outs with our offense early, which put our defense back out on the field for a lot of plays. But they did a nice job against the run and forced Southern Miss to throw it. And they made some good plays on third down to get off the field. I want to say this to … I don’t know if anyone’s is going to ask me. Bo Freeland did a great job today. He practiced hard all week and came out and punted very well. There was a little bit of a breeze, but he punted well with it and against it. That sometimes goes unnoticed. Field position is important. It’s a lot tougher, especially on the road if you have to start backed inside your own 20.

Yeah, I liked it. I think it was guys just believing that we were going to find a way to make a play. We practiced that way all week. Chris James was the guy who blocked it, but you never know who is going to block it. You never know how they are going to protect, so everyone was prepared. We kind of created a spot where Chris was going to come. He probably didn’t even know at the time that it was going to be him. But he knew he had to be in the right spot and the right time and it gave us a big play.

We went into this game a with the mindset, and we told the offensive line this, that this might be a 60 minute “middle drill”. An inside run drill is what we call it, where we might not throw the ball at all. Their eyes got real big when they heard that because they like to run the ball. They take a lot of pride in doing that. We realize that is one of our strengths, but we also realize that it’s tough to do when all of a sudden they put a couple of extra guys up there (on defense) that can’t block. So we tried to put our backs and our offense in the best position to execute. But our offensive line responds to challenges. We haven’t executed as well the last three weeks as consistently as we would like. But we did that enough today and we got stronger as the game went on.

Three and out is big. First of all, when you can get them in 3rd-and-long and get them off the field, it helps with field position. And then conversely, we would make some first downs and we had a couple of three and outs at some times when we felt like we could get some momentum if we got a first down. But the defense was good. They were not going to let that team move the ball. They did a nice job, even at the end.

When they’ve got 10 or 11 guys in the box, talk about the physical job Shaud did running the ball. (question partially inaudible)

At times, they’re going to take hits right at the line of scrimmage. We try to call plays where the extra guys are going to be on the other side of where the run is going to be. Early, they made some plays where they kind of stuffed us. Not really stuffed us, but made plays at the line of scrimmage with their extra guys up in there. But the longer we stayed on the field, I think it was evident that some of those guys that were making tackles early, weren’t able to make those tackles. That’s a credit to our offensive line first of all, but also to Shaud and Ray. They run efficiently. They run low to the ground. They’re hard to tackle as it is and they did a nice job protecting the football. And they were able to stay in bounds to run the clock.

Last week, you were saying that you hoped not to see the same mistakes made. What did you see?

Yeah, and I include myself on making mistakes. But I think we played efficiently. I wasn’t exciting, but it was efficient. We made some first downs and did some smart things. We got the lead which was big. We had the big run on 3rd and 1 where we just creased it right up inside. Then we felt like we had the advantage to play with the lead, especially at home. You get the defense going and get the crowd into it. We just wanted to build on that. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get the lead to where we felt a little more comfortable with it. But in the end, we came up with a big play special teams-wise and pushed it to a two score game.

We talked about it. We said “Let’s just find a way to win one game. Don’t worry about anything else. Don’t worry about what’s happened. Don’t worry about anything else down the road. Let’s just find a way to win one football game. No matter what the circumstances. No matter what the situation. Keep believing for 60 minutes that we’re going to do it. Make up your mind that we’re going to do it. Our guys deserve a lot of credit, so hopefully this is the start of some good things to come here.

They did a great job. They all got a lot of snaps and had big smiles on their faces afterwards. They played the run well. Mark had that one sack there, at least one. For Mark, that position is a little bit new. As we know, he was a linebacker before he moved to defensive line this Spring. He did a nice job and hopefully he’ll continue to get more playing time. We’ll utilize all those guys the best way we can.

He’s been great. I’ve said all along with DeMeco and Juwan Garth, the more they play the better they’re going to be. They’re both going to get bigger, stronger and faster. They play well. Even when they make mistakes, they’re quick learners and do a nice job understanding the corrections and being a better football player because of that.

I saw it real early, but then I kept looking for it on the field. I think it was in a divot. For a second there, I was wondering where it went. But that’s tough. It’s something where you get the momentum, then they come back and you’re like “Here we go again”. It was obviously a difficult play for them, but we were happy to see that flag.

Well, he practiced all week. He’s been very similar to Brodie. He could have played today, but we made the decision that if we would play with these other guys. Hopefully, that will give Derrick some more time to get well, get some treatment and be back ready to go next week.

It probably would have been Michael Machen, but don’t hold me 100% on that though.

Yeah, now we have to, first of all, enjoy this one. It’s been awhile since we enjoyed a victory. We’ll get the corrections made and build on the good things tomorrow and get focused on Ole Miss. Obviously, they’re a very good football team and it’s going to be tough to play over there. We’ve played 6 out of 7 games at home. Now we have to go out and get an SEC win on the road against a good football team.

Click on the name for parts of their post-game interviews ..
Coach Mike Shula (Head Coach)

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