Oct. 11, 1997
California-Washington Postgame Quotes
Cal Coach Tom Holmoe
On the Game: "I was very proud of the way we came
out. We played valiantly and hard. I couldn't have asked for
anything better. On Tuesday and Wednesday, practice was great.
The team was ready to play."
"We are not that far away. Take away some of the mistakes,
and we are close. Close to where we need to be to compete with
the big guys in the league."
On the First Half: "We are not yet at the point
where we can be champions. At times we play like champions. Are
guys are courageous and they play valiantly, but we still are
not at the point where we can get the respect by winning games
because we are missing big plays. There comes a point in time
when players have to be accountable for the mistakes that they
make."
On Washington: "Our team knows that they had just
played a top ten team and, one that is possibly the best in our
league, pretty even for a half. And then, we withstood a couple
of tough situations in the second half. I would be remiss if I
didn't say that Washington is a good team. That is the sign of
a champion, that they come out in the second half and make the
plays. That is a good team. That is where we want to be. You
have to make the plays.
On the Way Tarik Smith Came Out: "I was very happy
with Tarik. He ran hard. He played with passion. I don't care
how many yards he had. I just care that he came out and ran
hard. He did a good job for the team and he had a great
attitude on the sideline."
On the First Fake Punt: "The instructions to the
kicker were to make a play to make something happen. The
intentions were to kick the ball. We just wanted to make them a
little weary, show them a surprise. The communication was not
there. The one silver lining, is that our defense held them on
that. It was a great thing to be able to get off the field,
considering that was a huge part in the game. In hindsight, I
have to take responsibility for the communication because it
falls on me."
"On the second, we were going to punt the ball, but we were
running out of time. If we just punted it, I wouldn't have
given my guys a chance to win. We had a shot and could have
been in the game. I'll take some heat on that, but I'll stand
by that decision. I want to give my guys a chance to win."
On the Opening Drive: "If we could have gotten two
touchdowns on our opening drives, it would have been huge. But
to come away empty handed, we still drove the ball on them. The
bottom line is at half time our guys were not concerned that we
came away without points. We were moving the ball on them.
On the Upcoming Washington State Game: "I love to
win. I am desperate for a win. I want to win. I'll do what it
takes to win. This game versus Washington State takes on new
meaning. We'll fight and prepare for this game to win it."
Cal Players
Justin Vedder
On Cal's first two drives: "I don't think it (not
scoring) affected us in any way. I think we took it as a
positive, not a negative. We drove down and did a good job
moving the ball, we just didn't get field goals out of it. We
should have scored touchdowns. It was a confidence builder,
but it was also frustrating that we didn't move the ball and
get a touchdown."
On the Cal team: "We were able to move the ball on
them because we are a good team. We are starting to realize
that more as players. We became a good team today. If a
couple calls hadn't been called and we hadn't made a couple of
mental mistakes, the score would not have been 30-3."
Albert Dorsey
On the second half: "We were good defensively in the
first half, so I didn't think it (defense) would be a problem
for us in the second half. We didn't expect their first score
(in the second half); we didn't expect Deltha (O'Neal) to
fumble. We should have picked it up a notch, but we didn't."
On Washington: "They're good. Their line is big and
mean. (Rashann) Shehee is a great back, and (Brock) Huard is
really good. I thought we had a chance of beating them, but
things didn't go our way; we didn't execute in the second half
the way we should have"
Tarik Smith
On being back: "I feel good. I try not to think
about it too much, but it felt good to be out there most of the
game, to run hard and get back into the groove of things. I
feel healthy. I just need to get my stamina back to where it
should be."
Peter Destefano
On his missed tackle: "I was right there and went
for the knockdown, and missed. I have to give him some credit;
he's a good player. I thought I had position on him and that I
was going to bring him down, and he ran right through."
Deltha O'Neal
On the second half kickoff fumble: "I was cutting
across the field and saw an opening, but when I switched the
ball from my left hand to my right hand, it hit my shoulderpad
and came out."
Washington Coach Jim Lambright
On stopping Cal's fake punts and trick plays: "We'd
seen it one time before, the fumblerooski. The good thing about
that was we were in questionable territory and had our regular
defense on the field. We'd seen it before. BYU did it, so we'd
prepared for it before."
"The emotional swings you get, especially on fourth down
plays, are tremendous."
On the fumbled second half kickoff by Cal: "That's
exactly what you'd like to do coming out of halftime. The
critical thing is momentum. To get that momentum coming out of
the locker room is like a shot."
On improvements made in the second half: "We just
went about correcting things that we were doing wrong in the
first half. We were unhappy with the running game in the first
half. You'd like a balanced attack, especially after watching
Cal the week coming into this game."
"If you can take a good team like Cal and give them minimal
gains, you'll take that and go away happy."
On the Washington defense: "We're definitely trying
to improve our scoring defense. The kids take a lot of pride in
keeping the score down below 10. The defense will be very proud
of that - we'll put that up on the board."
"The fact that the defense held them to three points is a
real accomplishment. That was a big part of the game."
"We were really pleased overall with our defensive schemes.
We knew we needed to take away the big plays from Bobby Shaw.
We mixed it up enough with zones and man-to-man to keep him
from breaking big plays."
On Cal QB Justin Vedder: "What we could see on film
is that he improvises so well. I can't compliment him enough on
how he can improvise. We got good enough tight coverage that he
couldn't dump the ball off."
Washington Players
Derrel Daniels
On fumble recovery: "I came down the field and got
blocked from the back. At first I was going to run toward the
ball, but then I saw someone about to make the tackle. O'Niel
tried to stretch it out, and I guess he was switching hands,
and the ball just popped out. After that I just jumped on it."
"It's one of our goals to get the ball out every time, so
when then happened one of our goals was accomplished. "
Rashaan Shehee
On first quarter v. third quarter: "We really talk
the truth on this team, and the truth is what gets people going
after the first quarter. That's the way we should have opened
up in the first quarter, we should have came out ready to
play."
"We came out ready to play, but Cal had a good game plan
and jumped on us early. They were fired up and ready to go."
On tradition: "We always think about the tradition.
They haven't beat us in a while and we've had their number. We
don't want to be the team that lets it down. We're trying to
keep the tradition going."
Jason Chorak On Shaw: "We all have real
good confidence in our corners. We new that if we got to the
quarterback they were going to have to throw the ball to Shaw
to get yards. But they kind of surprised us with some of their
formations they came out with early in the game with the
I-backs running to the wide-slot. That is something Arizona
State does. The former coaches that came here took some of
their game plans from before and used it against us here. We
weren't prepared for it until the second or third quarter when
we figured things out."
Cameron Cleeland
On 30-3 score: "You've got to give Cal a lot of
respect for coming out and playing as hard as they did, and
making big plays. But there were a lot of mistakes out there
for our team. You have to look and learn from this game. It's
nice to get another road win. We've got three big road games,
and now one's over and next we've got Arizona."
"The fumble I had was a huge critical era. You don't
usually get those kind of things back. It was hard for me to
handle. I get the ball very rarely, and when I do I want to
make the best effort. Thankfully there was a penalty, and I got
a second chance at it and made a play."
On touchdown: "It was a rout over the middle called
an option route. I saw the safety drop down and I saw no one
ahead of me."
On slow start: "We're not starting very fast at all.
We've got to get moving because against a good team they're not
going to give us a second chance. You have to learn how to
dominate right away."
Nick Lentz On timing: "As a unit we have
to work on our timing. It was off sometimes today really bad.
It takes time to get that stuff down, and we've only been
working on things for a few weeks. "
