Photo by: All Pro Photography/Dale Sparks
Coach Dana Holgorsen Press Conference
August 21, 2018 04:43 PM | Football
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia University football coach Dana Holgorsen addressed members of the media on Tuesday, Aug. 21, 2018, at the Milan Puskar Center Team Room.
Opening Statement
It's freezing in here. That is 100 percent (associate head coach – defensive coordinator/linebackers) Tony Gibson's problem. It's his fault, his problem. I think our first day that we had our team meeting three weeks ago, it was like 74 degrees in here, and guys came in and there was like 140 people in here and the body heat got this thing cranked up to about 82 really quick, and he started sweating, which when he starts sweating, he gets really grumpy and all that. So, he threw a fit, and they got that fixed, so now it's like 40 in here. He's the one that meets in here; once we break, the defense stays, and then the linebackers stay. He likes having it pretty cold in here.
We're in mock week. Obviously, we've been in school, this is the fourth day. I'll get this out of the way – I'm not happy about the fact that we get less time to prepare than Tennessee does. They start school five or six days later. I think this is a flaw with how the NCAA does their preseason practices. They did move it to 25 practices as opposed to 29 practices. We did get some morning walk-throughs with balls, which that was good. With that said, they still get about five more days of unlimited time, which if you add that up, that's probably around an extra week of work. Once we got into the 20-hour rule, they got an extra week of work. Nonetheless, we started school when we started school. I don't understand why we start on a Wednesday, that has always baffled me. But guys are in a routine from school.
We had a good scrimmage on Saturday; I was very happy with that. We had a really good weekend around here, and we got a lot of work done. I was very pleased with the scrimmage in general. Today and tomorrow, monitoring weather – there are cells everywhere, that's another annoying part of my job – but we have to get out there. We have to practice today, we have to practice tomorrow, and we'll start introducing some of our opponent with Tennessee. I'm not going to talk too much about it until next week with you guys or our team. We still have battles going on, we still have a lot of assignment and technique issues and concerns that we have to continue to address. We're figuring out who is on the starting lineups, figuring out special teams lineups. We still have to figure some of that stuff out, so we'll practice hard today and tomorrow to, hopefully, get a step closer to that. Then, we get into our mock week.
We've talked a lot about a mock week situation since we've been here. We'll teach them how we do things on Thursday, and we'll travel on Friday. We have a lot of new guys that haven't experienced how we do things on a travel Friday and a game day situation on Saturday. So, we'll get a lot of work done when it comes to the logistics when it comes to those three days. Then, we'll get into the actual game week, and we'll talk and watch a whole lot of Tennessee stuff starting on Sunday. So, that's where we're at currently.
(Redshirt sophomore cornerback) Jake Long broke his hand, he'll be out a few months. Hopefully, we'll get him back at some point, probably similar to what we have with (redshirt sophomore linebacker Brendan) Ferns and (senior linebacker Quondarius) Qualls with the timetable. You never know how these guys are going to heal, so from a timetable perspective, he's another one that's on the shelf, but we will get him back at some point this year. Other than that, we're healthy, we're happy, we're good. We're in a pretty good place; I'm looking forward to just continuing to move forward to get ourselves ready to play.
On what he liked about last Saturday's scrimmage
The overall energy, I thought, was really good. Sometimes after you get two-and-a-half weeks into beating on each other, you get tired of it, and you really don't want to do it again. We've had less tackle reps due to how we're supposed to practice. I think that probably had something to do with it – less scrimmage reps, less live reps. I was happy with that, the energy. Offense made some plays, defense made some plays, a lot of special teams work. We're getting after each other on special teams a little bit as well, so that looked pretty clean. We had referees here; we had an hour meeting prior to that scrimmage on rule changes, which there are quite a bit of rule changes this year. So, I feel like we understand those rule changes a lot better. They were free to throw flags, and there weren't a whole lot of flags being thrown. That's always encouraging. The young kids, which the young kid scrimmages, the 'thirds' or 'scout team guys' or however you want to refer to them, I refer to them as developmental guys, they got a bunch of snaps as well. Our team was excited about watching those guys play. The energy was where I wanted it to be, and we got a lot of work done as well.
On if he expects more veteran players to be involved on special teams this season
It should happen that way. I monitor how many are on what units. We don't have a lot of guys that are on three and four units, so we're able to spread that around a little bit. Our guys are buying into that, and they feel good about it.
On if the team's hand, foot and mouth disease situation has been cleared up
I think so. There was some overreaction to it a little bit. It's poison ivy with a fever; your hands and feet aren't going to fall off. It is contagious, so our medical staff did a great job of identifying it. We clean this place as well as we can possibly clean it, regardless of if there's any kind of outbreak or not. Guys were educated on it; I think it probably spooked them more than anything. It's an unknown situation more than anything. It's contained; it's more of a nuisance than anything – you have to keep those guys away. We treated it like those guys were hurt and couldn't come here. Once the doctors cleared them, they were back to normal. It was a nuisance, but it's all good.
On if any position battles have been decided
I'm not prepared to say any of that yet. There have been decisions that have been made, obviously, but we want these guys to keep competing. I'm not prepared to put a depth chart out yet. I've made decisions, and position coaches have made decisions, but I'm not going to tell you guys, and we're probably not going to tell them in fairness to wanting to continue to create as much competition as we possibly can. I think that's the best approach with our football team, and my job is to get the best players out there and to get them as good as we can possibly get them. I'm just not prepared to talk about that at this point.
On if the coaching staff has a deadline to determine lineups
Most of the time it's, 'OK, you get the starting nod, but that doesn't mean that you're going to play 100 percent of the time.' There aren't many of them that are going to play 100 percent of the time. And then you have to look into if it's a situation where it's going to be 50-50, then I make the decision on how many special teams snaps those guys play as well. That's an ongoing conversation, and our guys understand that. I think we're comfortable with (redshirt senior quarterback) Will Grier being the starter, (redshirt sophomore quarterback) Jack Allison is doing a good job as the backup, but he has to continue to fight off (freshman quarterback) Trey Lowe (III), who is going to get better and better and better. That's just the way that position is. Just because you start, it doesn't mean you're playing 100 percent of the time, and I want our guys to know that and continue to fight hard to try to gain as much playing time as they can. That's their job.
On how he looks at penalties during practices
I addressed this with our team on Saturday. I was getting a little uncomfortable with our aggressiveness with some holding calls, because I'm not going to call all that. If we're in the course of a practice, it irritates other coaches and other players if a guy is holding and the running back squirts by him right there. I'm not going to get into the habit of flagging our team throughout the course of practice. It's our assistant coaches' job to chalk it up to technique situations. There's some aggressiveness like fighting for a ball that can get you a pass interference call; it's up to the assistant coach to determine whether it was reckless, more technique, that sort of thing. Penalties are never going to be 100 percent avoidable. With that said, I did remind our team that we were ninth in the Big 12 in penalties last year. We've been pretty good with penalties around here over the course of my tenure. Last year, I felt like we were a little reckless, and our technique was not quite what it needed to be. So, that's been a point of emphasis. And again, I gave the green light to that crew that was here, and I didn't see a whole lot of bad stuff.
On if one rule change concerns him more than others
The chop block, I think, is a big one. In my eight years here, I think six of the years we've talked about blocking below the waist in our head coach meetings, and every year I leave more confused on what is legal and what is not legal. I do know that they're trying to get it out of our game. We showed them a lot of examples, and the tricky part is that we don't practice it. We don't practice cut blocking against our own people. It's hard to practice it, but we have to educate them. Once again, it's up to each one of the position coaches to communicate to the players that this is an acceptable cut block, this is not an acceptable cut block. It can go on defense, too; defense can chop down offensive guys, and we do at times. They have to understand what is acceptable and what is not because they're going to look very, very closely on cut blocks, and you're going to see more flags on chop blocks this year.
On the comparisons between this team and the 2012 team
I respect the reference, and it's not the first time it's been referenced. We sure don't talk about it; this is a totally different situation. (Associate head coach – defensive coordinator/linebackers Tony) Gibby (Gibson) has been our defensive coordinator going on five years now, we have a lot of continuity with our coaching staff, we have a lot of older players that are experienced, Big 12 football players. You can't compare this football team to that football team. You can compare a fifth-year senior quarterback or a couple of wideouts that have good numbers, but other than that, the comparisons stop there.
On if a medical redshirt applying for a sixth year of eligibility can play the final four games of a current season
It's a good question, and it actually has been brought up in our conversations. I don't know if we have a rule to it yet. They are granting sixth years, but from what my understanding is, it's going to get rid of the medical hardship, like the guys that play in three games and you say he's hurt, which every coach says they were hurt, but whether they were truly hurt or whether they could come back or whatever it is, that's neither here nor there, it gets rid of that aspect of it. But that's a different conversation than the sixth year. So, I don't know, I don't have an answer for you. I know it's been brought up, and we're looking into it.
On why more transfers are being granted immediate eligibility
It's going to continue to trend that way. Every indication is that it's going to continue to trend that way, and no head coach across the country wants to talk about it. There are a couple I'd like to give some immediate eligibility with right now. It's not working for us. I don't know what the rule is.
Closing Statement
You guys are kind of quiet today. We did add a player today: Isaiah Esdale. It's an interesting story, really. He's an Eastern Christian (Academy) kid, which I think if you look back at our success rate with Eastern Christian kids, it's been high. So, he's a part of all of those guys. He knows (senior wide receiver) David (Sills V), he's played with David. He was a little younger than like Daikiel (Shorts Jr.), Wendell (Smallwood), (redshirt senior defensive lineman) Kenny (Bigelow Jr.). But he's older than like (freshman running back) Leddie (Brown) and (freshman wide receiver) Randy (Fields Jr.). So, he was in that area where things shut down. He got lost in the shuffle a little bit. He was at Eastern Arizona (Community College) with the (Joe and Michael) Brown brothers last year. The Brown brothers are doing well, the Eastern Christian kids are going well. This guy is a pretty thick three-for-three guy. So, he's on board, he's in school today. We're excited to have him here. Other than that, that's about all the news I have.
On the team's roster number following the new addition
I don't even know. We put a couple guys on scholarship, we all know about (redshirt sophomore kicker) Evan (Staley). A couple guys are still fighting for a few. I don't really know what it is, it's doesn't matter. There are different rules that we can work around. Recruiting is going good; I would imagine if we sign our 25 here in December, we'll be up to the full 85. I know it's close to that.
On if Isaiah Esdale is eligible this season
Yes.
On where Isaiah Esdale will play
He's a receiver.
Opening Statement
It's freezing in here. That is 100 percent (associate head coach – defensive coordinator/linebackers) Tony Gibson's problem. It's his fault, his problem. I think our first day that we had our team meeting three weeks ago, it was like 74 degrees in here, and guys came in and there was like 140 people in here and the body heat got this thing cranked up to about 82 really quick, and he started sweating, which when he starts sweating, he gets really grumpy and all that. So, he threw a fit, and they got that fixed, so now it's like 40 in here. He's the one that meets in here; once we break, the defense stays, and then the linebackers stay. He likes having it pretty cold in here.
We're in mock week. Obviously, we've been in school, this is the fourth day. I'll get this out of the way – I'm not happy about the fact that we get less time to prepare than Tennessee does. They start school five or six days later. I think this is a flaw with how the NCAA does their preseason practices. They did move it to 25 practices as opposed to 29 practices. We did get some morning walk-throughs with balls, which that was good. With that said, they still get about five more days of unlimited time, which if you add that up, that's probably around an extra week of work. Once we got into the 20-hour rule, they got an extra week of work. Nonetheless, we started school when we started school. I don't understand why we start on a Wednesday, that has always baffled me. But guys are in a routine from school.
We had a good scrimmage on Saturday; I was very happy with that. We had a really good weekend around here, and we got a lot of work done. I was very pleased with the scrimmage in general. Today and tomorrow, monitoring weather – there are cells everywhere, that's another annoying part of my job – but we have to get out there. We have to practice today, we have to practice tomorrow, and we'll start introducing some of our opponent with Tennessee. I'm not going to talk too much about it until next week with you guys or our team. We still have battles going on, we still have a lot of assignment and technique issues and concerns that we have to continue to address. We're figuring out who is on the starting lineups, figuring out special teams lineups. We still have to figure some of that stuff out, so we'll practice hard today and tomorrow to, hopefully, get a step closer to that. Then, we get into our mock week.
We've talked a lot about a mock week situation since we've been here. We'll teach them how we do things on Thursday, and we'll travel on Friday. We have a lot of new guys that haven't experienced how we do things on a travel Friday and a game day situation on Saturday. So, we'll get a lot of work done when it comes to the logistics when it comes to those three days. Then, we'll get into the actual game week, and we'll talk and watch a whole lot of Tennessee stuff starting on Sunday. So, that's where we're at currently.
(Redshirt sophomore cornerback) Jake Long broke his hand, he'll be out a few months. Hopefully, we'll get him back at some point, probably similar to what we have with (redshirt sophomore linebacker Brendan) Ferns and (senior linebacker Quondarius) Qualls with the timetable. You never know how these guys are going to heal, so from a timetable perspective, he's another one that's on the shelf, but we will get him back at some point this year. Other than that, we're healthy, we're happy, we're good. We're in a pretty good place; I'm looking forward to just continuing to move forward to get ourselves ready to play.
On what he liked about last Saturday's scrimmage
The overall energy, I thought, was really good. Sometimes after you get two-and-a-half weeks into beating on each other, you get tired of it, and you really don't want to do it again. We've had less tackle reps due to how we're supposed to practice. I think that probably had something to do with it – less scrimmage reps, less live reps. I was happy with that, the energy. Offense made some plays, defense made some plays, a lot of special teams work. We're getting after each other on special teams a little bit as well, so that looked pretty clean. We had referees here; we had an hour meeting prior to that scrimmage on rule changes, which there are quite a bit of rule changes this year. So, I feel like we understand those rule changes a lot better. They were free to throw flags, and there weren't a whole lot of flags being thrown. That's always encouraging. The young kids, which the young kid scrimmages, the 'thirds' or 'scout team guys' or however you want to refer to them, I refer to them as developmental guys, they got a bunch of snaps as well. Our team was excited about watching those guys play. The energy was where I wanted it to be, and we got a lot of work done as well.
On if he expects more veteran players to be involved on special teams this season
It should happen that way. I monitor how many are on what units. We don't have a lot of guys that are on three and four units, so we're able to spread that around a little bit. Our guys are buying into that, and they feel good about it.
On if the team's hand, foot and mouth disease situation has been cleared up
I think so. There was some overreaction to it a little bit. It's poison ivy with a fever; your hands and feet aren't going to fall off. It is contagious, so our medical staff did a great job of identifying it. We clean this place as well as we can possibly clean it, regardless of if there's any kind of outbreak or not. Guys were educated on it; I think it probably spooked them more than anything. It's an unknown situation more than anything. It's contained; it's more of a nuisance than anything – you have to keep those guys away. We treated it like those guys were hurt and couldn't come here. Once the doctors cleared them, they were back to normal. It was a nuisance, but it's all good.
On if any position battles have been decided
I'm not prepared to say any of that yet. There have been decisions that have been made, obviously, but we want these guys to keep competing. I'm not prepared to put a depth chart out yet. I've made decisions, and position coaches have made decisions, but I'm not going to tell you guys, and we're probably not going to tell them in fairness to wanting to continue to create as much competition as we possibly can. I think that's the best approach with our football team, and my job is to get the best players out there and to get them as good as we can possibly get them. I'm just not prepared to talk about that at this point.
On if the coaching staff has a deadline to determine lineups
Most of the time it's, 'OK, you get the starting nod, but that doesn't mean that you're going to play 100 percent of the time.' There aren't many of them that are going to play 100 percent of the time. And then you have to look into if it's a situation where it's going to be 50-50, then I make the decision on how many special teams snaps those guys play as well. That's an ongoing conversation, and our guys understand that. I think we're comfortable with (redshirt senior quarterback) Will Grier being the starter, (redshirt sophomore quarterback) Jack Allison is doing a good job as the backup, but he has to continue to fight off (freshman quarterback) Trey Lowe (III), who is going to get better and better and better. That's just the way that position is. Just because you start, it doesn't mean you're playing 100 percent of the time, and I want our guys to know that and continue to fight hard to try to gain as much playing time as they can. That's their job.
On how he looks at penalties during practices
I addressed this with our team on Saturday. I was getting a little uncomfortable with our aggressiveness with some holding calls, because I'm not going to call all that. If we're in the course of a practice, it irritates other coaches and other players if a guy is holding and the running back squirts by him right there. I'm not going to get into the habit of flagging our team throughout the course of practice. It's our assistant coaches' job to chalk it up to technique situations. There's some aggressiveness like fighting for a ball that can get you a pass interference call; it's up to the assistant coach to determine whether it was reckless, more technique, that sort of thing. Penalties are never going to be 100 percent avoidable. With that said, I did remind our team that we were ninth in the Big 12 in penalties last year. We've been pretty good with penalties around here over the course of my tenure. Last year, I felt like we were a little reckless, and our technique was not quite what it needed to be. So, that's been a point of emphasis. And again, I gave the green light to that crew that was here, and I didn't see a whole lot of bad stuff.
On if one rule change concerns him more than others
The chop block, I think, is a big one. In my eight years here, I think six of the years we've talked about blocking below the waist in our head coach meetings, and every year I leave more confused on what is legal and what is not legal. I do know that they're trying to get it out of our game. We showed them a lot of examples, and the tricky part is that we don't practice it. We don't practice cut blocking against our own people. It's hard to practice it, but we have to educate them. Once again, it's up to each one of the position coaches to communicate to the players that this is an acceptable cut block, this is not an acceptable cut block. It can go on defense, too; defense can chop down offensive guys, and we do at times. They have to understand what is acceptable and what is not because they're going to look very, very closely on cut blocks, and you're going to see more flags on chop blocks this year.
On the comparisons between this team and the 2012 team
I respect the reference, and it's not the first time it's been referenced. We sure don't talk about it; this is a totally different situation. (Associate head coach – defensive coordinator/linebackers Tony) Gibby (Gibson) has been our defensive coordinator going on five years now, we have a lot of continuity with our coaching staff, we have a lot of older players that are experienced, Big 12 football players. You can't compare this football team to that football team. You can compare a fifth-year senior quarterback or a couple of wideouts that have good numbers, but other than that, the comparisons stop there.
On if a medical redshirt applying for a sixth year of eligibility can play the final four games of a current season
It's a good question, and it actually has been brought up in our conversations. I don't know if we have a rule to it yet. They are granting sixth years, but from what my understanding is, it's going to get rid of the medical hardship, like the guys that play in three games and you say he's hurt, which every coach says they were hurt, but whether they were truly hurt or whether they could come back or whatever it is, that's neither here nor there, it gets rid of that aspect of it. But that's a different conversation than the sixth year. So, I don't know, I don't have an answer for you. I know it's been brought up, and we're looking into it.
On why more transfers are being granted immediate eligibility
It's going to continue to trend that way. Every indication is that it's going to continue to trend that way, and no head coach across the country wants to talk about it. There are a couple I'd like to give some immediate eligibility with right now. It's not working for us. I don't know what the rule is.
Closing Statement
You guys are kind of quiet today. We did add a player today: Isaiah Esdale. It's an interesting story, really. He's an Eastern Christian (Academy) kid, which I think if you look back at our success rate with Eastern Christian kids, it's been high. So, he's a part of all of those guys. He knows (senior wide receiver) David (Sills V), he's played with David. He was a little younger than like Daikiel (Shorts Jr.), Wendell (Smallwood), (redshirt senior defensive lineman) Kenny (Bigelow Jr.). But he's older than like (freshman running back) Leddie (Brown) and (freshman wide receiver) Randy (Fields Jr.). So, he was in that area where things shut down. He got lost in the shuffle a little bit. He was at Eastern Arizona (Community College) with the (Joe and Michael) Brown brothers last year. The Brown brothers are doing well, the Eastern Christian kids are going well. This guy is a pretty thick three-for-three guy. So, he's on board, he's in school today. We're excited to have him here. Other than that, that's about all the news I have.
On the team's roster number following the new addition
I don't even know. We put a couple guys on scholarship, we all know about (redshirt sophomore kicker) Evan (Staley). A couple guys are still fighting for a few. I don't really know what it is, it's doesn't matter. There are different rules that we can work around. Recruiting is going good; I would imagine if we sign our 25 here in December, we'll be up to the full 85. I know it's close to that.
On if Isaiah Esdale is eligible this season
Yes.
On where Isaiah Esdale will play
He's a receiver.
Players Mentioned
Gold-Blue Spring Festival Fan Recap
Sunday, April 19
John Neider | April 18
Saturday, April 18
Coach Zac Alley | April 18
Saturday, April 18
Coach Rich Rodriguez | April 18
Saturday, April 18
