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UNIVERSITY OF CONNECTICUT MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 21, 2009

Randy Edsall

COACH EDSALL: I'm just so proud of those kids over in the locker room and those assistant coaches. We persevered today, and ended up making just a couple of plays at the end that we hadn't been able to make in some of our other games against what I think is an outstanding football team.
We're just thankful that we were able to finally put together a win, so now we can take a game ball and send it down to Joe, Angela and Henry and David, and the Howard family. Because I know one thing, that little number 6 was up there looking down on us today. He gave Blidi and Dwayne something special today, because those two kids played very, very well against some outstanding receivers.
Like I said, it's just to come out here to Notre Dame, and to play in this stadium -- which I can remember our kids really don't remember, but the history, the tradition that goes with this place and to be seven years at an FBS school, just a remarkable feat by those young men.
We're just very, very proud to win and know that we have to stay humble and stay hungry because we still have other things that we still would like to accomplish.
But there is no doubt that this is the biggest and best win that we've had so far in the short time that we've been an FBS school. Any questions?

Q. Can you describe what that locker room was like afterward when you went in there?
COACH EDSALL: Well, you know, it was happy. But we expected -- they expected to win. They did. They had the mindset that we were going to come out here ask win. It wasn't, to me, it wasn't an upset. It wasn't an upset to our kids. We knew we could come out here and win if we just went and executed and did the things that our God-given ability would allow us to do.
So it wasn't, I don't know, it wasn't off the charts. There was one where they were happy and very excited. But not surprised.

Q. Can you talk about your running game getting going late in the second half and in the overtimes what got it going for you?
COACH EDSALL: Well, we just I think our offensive line did a tremendous job. They just did a tremendous job. Then when you have Jordan and you have Andre, two outstanding running backs that want to carry the ball and want to touch it as many times as they can and follow their blockers, and they're patient, that's what happens.
We just feel like we always can get stronger as the game goes on. I think that's what happened with our offensive line. I think we got stronger as the game went on, and I think we might have wore them down a little bit in the second half.
I know this, I got to say this, too. Coach Richardson, we love you. We know you buried your mother today, and I think those kids, Jordan and Andre, ran a little bit harder today with his absence.
But those two kids have been great. Anthony Sherman and Anthony Davis did a good job of blocking you know, we're a team that's going to run the football. We run because we think you have to run the football. Especially in those situations, it proved to be true.

Q. You said it was important for Zach to stay with the game plan. Do you think that he did stay? How did you evaluate him?
COACH EDSALL: I thought he was very nervous to start. I thought he had jittery feet, which would be understandable. But as the game went on I thought he settled down.
Again, I'm so happy for him. For him to be able to come out here and lead his team to a victory and, again, there is no animosity from Zach towards Notre Dame. He got caught in a numbers game. That's all it is.
But I know it's got to be special for him to lead his team. I thought after like the first quarter he settled down and started to play a little bit more within himself.

Q. Did you have any deja vu after the two holding calls and the missed field goal that was going to end up like two of your other games?
COACH EDSALL: I said here we go again. You sit there on the sideline. You're staying positive, and you're thinking what you're going to tell them when they make the field goal. Boom. You miss that. We have those holding calls. Again, they might have been good calls. We'll see. If they're not, we'll submit them. Bottom line was this time we found a way to win, and that's what we did.

Q. Can you talk about the defensive adjustments you made in the second half?
COACH EDSALL: We really didn't make any. We didn't make any. Basically what we did, we made some adjustments after the first drive. You know, they showed some tendencies, they showed some tendencies coming into the game, so we were basing our calls on the tendencies that we saw on film when they were in the gun or under the center.
In the second half they kind of went away from that a little bit, because they figured that we were on. But what we did we just stayed with what we did. We went to more of a 3-D zone.
But the whole game plan coming in is that we wanted to when they run the gun, we wanted to just bang the crap out of those two outstanding receivers that they had. And they started running some slants, so what we did is we moved our guys inside in cover 2 to be able to break on those slants.
Like I said, I thought Dwayne and Blidi and most especially Blidi really made some big plays in the game. But we really didn't make any adjustments. We just said we're going to keep doing what we're doing, and that's what we did, and we just executed better.

Q. A couple weeks ago Dwayne and Blidi were taking pretty good for Cincinnati, much more physical, much more confident today. How did you get them to play like that?
COACH EDSALL: You know, we just told them to go out and play hard. Don't worry about anything. Just whatever happens on one play, let it go and move on. You know, we were all over them in practices, you know, just in terms of being physical and get your hands on people and doing those things. And they went and did that. They're two young kids that grew up big time today.

Q. Tuesday you told us this was just another game, but it looked like your on the field interview after the game, you looked a little emotional. Do you care to clarify this now and say this is more than just a game for you and your program?
COACH EDSALL: It's just another game, but you've got to understand the human part of this, and you've got to understand what this team has gone through. A couple of close games, and then you lose a teammate, you lose a brother, you lose a son, and you're trying so hard to honor him by winning on the field. We hadn't done that.
So that first win that we were going to get was going to be special, and what better place than here? We converted a Notre Dame priest out here to a UCONN priest, Father Sullivan. So he helped us out a little bit. But it is emotional. If it wasn't emotional, to me, you're not human.

End of FastScripts

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