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Head coach Pat Fitzgerald and a duo of players addressed the media after a 34-3 drubbing to the Indiana Hoosiers.
Pat Fitzgerald
Opening statement: “I want to give credit to Coach Allen’s staff...they won the turnover battle and that made the game...they did the things winners do.”
On the offense getting 36 yards in the second half: “We didn’t do a good job on the first and second downs to make third downs manageable.”
On the decision to put Hunter in: “We had talked all week about trying to get Hunter back on the field, and it was just the plan.”
On Hunter’s play: “I hope he had fun. He came here to play and has been battling through a lot.”
On the officials: “I’m not talking about officials after this game... I’m not talking about them Monday either, sorry”
On his skirmish with the officials: “I don’t know, usually you get a sideline warning. I don’t think I was warned...I should’ve been given a sideline warning and that’s protocol in the Big Ten.”
On what to tell his team after this: “We look like an undisciplined team because you have an undisciplined head coach... We’ve got to look at some thing we’re doing schematically. We’re getting schemed a little bit.”
On how to improve: “You’ve got to do things winners do. You’ve got to win the turnover ratio...We get an explosive play to start the game and turn it over, can’t have that. I’ve been on the other side of this, so we’ve got a tried and true formula to win, and we just haven’t executed that. Just gotta get back to work and fix things on Tuesday.”
On what they have done well in the past weeks: “Decent in special teams, decent. Not good enough, but we haven’t had a lead either.“
On the offense’s struggles: “It’s pretty hard when you’re not executing, when you’re not getting guys open, when you’re not seeing the hot throws.”
On the secondary’s struggles: “Until late in the second half, I thought we were giving ourselves a chance.. we have got to continue to create turnovers and until we do that we aren’t going to win games”
“It seemed like we had guys in good spots to make key plays...they won the 50-50 balls, you’ve gotta credit IU, they’re a good offense.”
Jared Thomas
On the moral in the locker room following six straight losses: “I think there’s a saying, when it rains, it pours...every game plan we have works in practice, we get good looks at it, and we go out and try to execute it...this season things just haven’t gone our way. Everybody’s in high spirits because we want to win. We lost. Nobody likes losing. We’re a first class program and we still have to conduct ourselves in that way.”
On how to get the offense going: “It is just a matter of execution. Things have just not been going our way. Like I said, when it rains it pours. I just go out there and block... no matter who is out there.”
On the play that Hunter got hurt: “I was busy blocking, just focused on doing my job. I didn’t really see anything until the replay because I was blocking my guy. All I can do is control what I can control.”
On the penalty disparity: “We were out there trying to give everything we had to get a W.”
Travis Whillock
On the secondary’s struggles: “We just gotta read the quarterback...trying to get there so we can either break it up or make a play on the ball...mostly it just came to little things like that.”
On morale in the locker room: “We’ve got a lot of fight in this group...we want to do it for the seniors. This brotherhood has been something so special, and we’ve got to get this sour taste out of our mouth.”
On the lack of offense during losing streak: “We gave up 34 points tonight so I don’t consider that playing well...we didn’t take the ball away and give our offense any short fields...I think that’s on us.”