Gary Patterson Press Conference Quotes: West Virginia Gameweek

(This story is original content of GoFrogs.com)

TCU football coach Gary Patterson held his weekly news conference Tuesday in the Four Sevens Team Room.
The Horned Frogs host West Virginia on Saturday at 2:30 p.m.

Included below are excerpts from Patterson's meeting with the media.

Opening statement ...

"Week nine, West Virginia. They're a little bit like us. They've had opportunities. They've not been able to find a way in the end to finish ballgames. Even last week at Kansas State, they were ahead at halftime. They have a lot of good potential as far as wide receivers. Their skill set is really good. On offense, the key is that they're finally getting settled in at quarterback. Every week they've been getting better. Defensively, they've been very physical. They've played hard and some really good defense. They are very athletic and physical upfront."

On his impressions of Casey Pachall's performance in his return to action ...

"I didn't think there was that much rust. The key is being on the same page. One of the things we get out of him, which is very obvious even in practice, is the leadership part. After having to sit out, I think he took a whole different perspective. He looked at the game like a coach does compared to like a player, which is a big difference. It's where you really need to get to if you want to own the system. We still have to do a lot better. In this league, scoring seven points isn't going to win you very many ballgames."

On how West Virginia is different compared to last season ...

"Last year, they're basically what we would call 20 personnel - two backs, three wides or a 10 - one back and four wides. Now, they're a little bit of everything. They're using a tight end more in short yardage. They're also using what we call 11 personnel with a tight end and one back. It takes more to prepare for them."

On Saturday's challenge for his defense ...

"The key is understanding that you have to play run and pass. They run a lot of plays. The best way is them not having the ball to score. Keeping them off the field is the easiest way against that offense."

On what his team can do to better sustain drives ...

"The bottom line is that you have to score more points. However you do it, you have to catch passes, sustain drives, run better and block better. If you listen to everybody's conference call, the guys who are doing well have the same answers. When you're not winning ballgames, it's also the same answers that come out. I've been on both sides of the street giving the same answers to everybody. You don't make excuses, and you don't talk about it. You find ways to get it done."

On his biggest challenge as a coach ...

"I have to stay positive. You have to move forward and get the guys to move up. There are a lot of guys like Denzel Johnson who did an unbelievable job on special teams. If you look at some of our young players, there are a lot of guys doing a lot of good things. That is what you have to be able to do. You have to keep the team growing. If you don't keep growing, then it carries over to next year and you can't do the things you need to do. You need them to understand that you have to find a way to keep improving as a team so you can go win ballgames."

On the state of his team ...

"You look at the amount of guys we have gone, playing 16 true freshmen last year and only playing about seven seniors this season. Let's look in the league and find the ones who are playing well. There are guys making plays. You have to find guys in critical situations. I've always said great players make great plays, good players make good plays, average players make average plays and bad players make bad plays. Our job as coaches is to make bad better, good better, average better and great better. On both defense and offense, how do you mix it and tweak it going into a season. Over the last two weeks, I thought it made a big difference that Texas and Oklahoma State had off weeks. When you get two weeks, you go in and examine what you do and you change it up. When you get four days to change it, it's one thing. It's another thing to have two weeks to look at it and decide how you want to attack people and how you want to do things. You can go down the list. All of it doesn't matter, though, when it all comes down to it because my job is to make sure we win by one point and score one more point."