Tommy Bowden on
J.J. McKelvey
He has the body he just doesn't have the experience. He doesn't have the
speed that Rod's [Gardner] speed or Kevin's [Youngblood] speed or
Roscoe's [Crosby] speed but he's a big target. He doesn't say very much.
You have to check his pulse to see if he's breathing. But to have him
step up like that in a critical position for us, we're really searching.
J.J.'s been a pleasant surprise. He's worked hard to prepare himself for
this situation and we always tell those guys you're one injury or one
play away from being a starter. He's approached two a days and practice
like that.
New UVA coaching staff
I haven't even looked at last year's film. It's been difficult to
prepare for. Virginia will have a lot more tendencies and a lot more
film on us than we will on them. Not only the fact that he's new but the
fact that they've only played one game that can help us has kind of been
a double whammy. The Richmond game didn't really help us because
Richmond runs the same offense as Wofford. They're going to take away
the run which is the philosophy of most of the pros and the philosophy
of most people. They do a little bit different than most college teams
do right now as far as their defensive alignment.
Feeling on season
We're 2-0, we're 19th in the nation, the kicking game has been pretty
good like we thought it might be. Defensively we've given up 13 and 14
points. Offensively we've looked fairly good. We've had a lot of
injuries. I don't know why I felt so bad after two wins. We beat a good
Wofford team by four scores (38-14) and I'm sitting here like it's the
end of the world. We beat Central Florida, who I think will be good team
I think they are a good team. I need to learn to appreciate the wins
more. I think that's one of the things the extra time has helped me
with. We haven't played our best football yet but it's still early in
the year. You have to be realistic and I don't think I was after the
first two games.
Dantzler's play
Everybody could play better and he's one of them. Some of the
interceptions have bounced off of receivers or deflected. I don't look
so much at the quarterback on those as I do the receiver. But we've had
some backs cough it up and those are the things you would like to get
corrected. We haven't gotten any turnovers on defense. Woody's played
well but he's like the rest of the team. I think he could play better.
We've only played two games and with the scenario we have with who we've
lost and the work to be done, as long as we realize that as a coaching
staff we'll be ok. There's some calls we worked on in the spring and he
missed the whole spring. There's some throws there with pressure and
there's a built in answer to that problem and he didn't go to it.
BONUS
Comments from UVA's Al Groh
On Tuesday's tragedy and the postponement of football games across the
nation, including the Penn State game:
"This has created nationwide what many people have to deal with on an ongoing basis. I think you
continue to function and you function at the tasks and the
responsibilities that you normally have. But the event that has drawn
the greatest concentration continues to be on your mind, but you go on
functioning with what you have to do. I think that's how it is with
teams right now or with the President's call to go back to normalcy. He
didn't mean on Friday let's do everything the way we were doing it last
Monday. He said, 'Let's get back to the American way of life.' The way
I interpret it, part of normalcy and part of the American way of life is
at appropriate times there is a period for grieving and for mourning. I
do think that the weekend period was the right period of grieving and
mourning. Its not just getting on with it for all of us, but I think
there is a respect that 's due for people who lost loved ones."
Commenting on the practices during the three idle weeks:
"My team might
be a little confused as to what we're playing against. We have a very
unusual situation; I am sure its rare that you find a team that doesn't
play for three weeks during the course of a season, usually that happens
preliminary to the first game or preliminary to a bowl game. And during
those three weeks, the players have actually practiced against three
different systems. The first couple of practices following the Richmond
game we worked just against ourselves. Then we got into the Penn State
preparation and we worked against the Penn State systems. And now we
are working against ClemsonÉNow we are having to clarify, 'in this
coverage, this week, this is the check we want to make against that
formation, where as in this coverage, last week, that was the check we
wanted to make in it.' "
On UVa's development as a team and his expectations:
"I
see [improvement] in practice. I think this is a
developing team; I think this is a developing program. I
think that I am going to see things in weeks 8 and 9 that
perhaps I don't see early. I think in some cases, maybe my
expectations aren't realistic, maybe they're just based on
what I want. But sometimes I think my expectations might
be higher in terms of performance than what the players'
expectations are, not 'want-to', but expectations. Maybe
those expectations on my part are based on what I see this
eventually looking like, maybe its not going to immediately
look like that."
On the Clemson football team and its talents:
"Quarterback [Woodrow
Dantzler] is a very dynamic player, [they] have a very dynamic running
back. I see two defensive tackles that most everybody for the last two
years has a hard time keeping out of their backfield, and I see the
linebacker that seems to make all the tackles after those two [defensive
tackles] mess up the playsÉ [Clemson] is a very talented team. They
have a lot of speed, and the style that they play is well chosen. It's
one that utilizes speed. Maybe you recruit for the style or you maybe
you play the style after you've got the speed, but it takes advantage of
the speed that they have."
Commenting on the Clemson offense from his own defensive background:
"There are a lot of 'run-and-shoot' plays in this. There's a lot of
Wing-T/ Single Wing based plays in it. It's a combination of those.
And then there's the series where it's more conventional stuff. They'll
have regular personnel in the game, be in the I-formation. Substitution
pattern is a major factor in the game. All no huddle-they run different
guys on the field every play. Sometimes they'll have 11 in the huddle,
and when the huddle breaks 3 of them will run off and 3 more will run
on. They try to prevent defenses from matching personnelÉThis team
causes a lot of problems before the snap of the ball. This team does
very little shift
Tommy Bowden Press Conference
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