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UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 11, 2010

Joker Phillips

UK Â– 63
WKU - 28

COACH PHILLIPS: Injuries, Derrick Locke had a forearm, Randall Burden had a lower back, Donald Russell had an ankle sprain. We came out of it pretty good.
Thought we started fast. One of the things we talked about was showing the maturity of this football team. We wanted to come out, play fast, play smart, play physical, and play inspired football in the first half. I thought we did that.
Second half we talked about the same thing: being mature, smothering people. We got to be great finishers. Don't think we started off as fast, but we finished strong in the fourth quarter.
On defense, two 80-yard drives cannot happen. Those are things that cannot happen. We return a kick, they trump it by returning a kick on us. That's another thing that can't had, three plays, two 80-yard drives, the other one was a 73-yard drive. Can't happen, especially if you want to be a great defense.
I thought Mark Hartline played outstanding. What the stats say? You guys had him at four incompletes. He said he only had two, okay? You better check it. I don't know. Is that right? He says he only had two incompletions. Go back, watch the film, give you an update tomorrow (laughter).
Any questions?

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: I saw the picture in the paper today. He does all those things. We didn't get him a rushing touchdown, right? He got the three hardest, not the rushing touchdown.

Q. (Question regarding Randall Cobb.)
COACH PHILLIPS: No, I wasn't tempted. Not into empty stats. We're interested in having Randall for the rest of the season.
No, there's not much that he can't do. I'm worried about him because we had our coach's show, he said he wanted to be a head coach. I'm worried he'll take my job (laughter).

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: That's what we want to be. We feel like we now can throw the ball down the field. As well as we have been running the ball the last couple years, last three years, including this year, we wanted to come into this season being able to throw the ball - not only throw the ball efficient, but throw the ball down the field to get people off us. As well as we run the ball, we knew we would get some people packing the box on us. We knew that would free some guys up on the outside to be one-on-one.
We're making plays out there now. We got a chance to read the numbers. If the numbers say throw it, we throw it. If the numbers say run it, we run it, because of the way we throwing the ball right now.

Q. Some of the big-name programs lost to teams they shouldn't have the first couple weeks. Did you address that?
COACH PHILLIPS: No question we addressed it. There's some big eye-openers today. There were some things we were able to point out. Our guys laid in the hotel all day watching the games, watching the scores. There were some big upsets today.
We talked about that. We actually talked about it on Sunday of last week. Also got a chance to bring it up this week because there were some big ones this week.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: Well, there's a couple things we had to get cleaned up from last week. One of them was penalties. We talked about that, playing clean, playing fast. If you look at the game last year against Auburn, okay, that's what we were talking about. We were able to point out that game. We played clean, no penalties, didn't give up a sack that game.
I think we gave up one sack today maybe. We were able to use that from the past to try to eliminate that 90 yards we had last week. Didn't have any in the first half. Had six yards in the second half. One was on special teams, the other one was a so-called horse collar. How do you horse collar somebody around the waist? I thought you were going to give me a Jordan Aumiller question (laughter).

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: He caught some big balls for us. He played a little bit better on the perimeter as far as capturing the corners for us on the edge.
Every game he's able to get experience is a plus for us. We'll hopefully get Melillo back next week and he'll hopefully be in the rotation. Every snap that Aumiller gets for us is a plus for us down the road.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: Neloms was growing. We were really thin in the back end today. We had Randall Burden went down with the back, had a couple guys cramping. We were thin in the back end.
Neloms is big for us on defense. Plays a lot of snaps because he plays our nickel. We were actually going to use him in some safety tonight also because we were down a couple of safeties. But we couldn't use him. We went in this game with only three safeties. We had to play Cartier a lot of snaps at the nickel and corner some.
But Neloms is big for us because he's so smart, physical. He's a guy that's kind of an in-between corner/safety guy, which gives him a chance to be inside on the nickel and he also can play on the edge at corner. Like I say, tonight we were going to try to play him some at safety, but he was injured.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: The thing that I'm excited about is Raymond Sanders' ability to play special teams, see him run down and make plays on special teams. Now we've got to give him a little bit more, a bigger role on special teams.
All that does is continue to help his confidence and his feel for the game because the game is fast and it gives him a chance to see how fast it is as he continues to make plays on the special teams.

Q. Kickoff return, what would you address with that?
COACH PHILLIPS: On the kickoff? Running down the field, chasing the ball. I mean, I'm not sure if he was at the point of attack. We don't want anybody standing watching the play. He was standing there, he and another guy, I can't remember who it was. You never know what happens.
That comes with him maturing in this game. We don't lay on the ground, we don't watch the play. We get up and chase the ball. He didn't do it on that play.
I'm not sure if the ball -- if he was at the point of attack or not. I expect him to get up, run and chase the ball.

Q. Do you think you took a little or big step up tonight?
COACH PHILLIPS: We made some improvements, some improvements. Especially the thing I like, we played cleaner. We didn't have any penalties in the first half and only had six yards for the whole day. I don't like that we gave up a sack, but we only gave up one. I think we threw the ball, what, 22 times. Our goal is one sack in every 22 passes. We reached that goal.
But we cannot give up sacks either.

Q. Have you ever a single player that does as much for a team as Randall?
COACH PHILLIPS: No. He scored three different ways tonight. He actually is our holder also. He does a lot for us. Game like this, we were able to get some guys, some backups in, to see if they can handle some of the roles in case something happens to Randall. We were able to get Raymond in as a punt returner. We were able to put Tyler Sargent as a holder. Locke was begging to go into some of the wildcat stuff. Didn't get that. He named our quarterback, so I probably should have put him in some of that wildcat.
There's a lot of things that Randall Cobb does for this football team. And he does a lot of things that you guys don't see also, things in the locker room that mean the most to this football team.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: Yes, it was to get them all in the game, as many snaps as they can get also. We're going to need all three of them before the season is over. I mean, we got a tough schedule. It's hard to hold up at any position. So we got to get those guys some snaps as often as we can.

Q. When you talk about the things that Randall does that we don't see, what are they?
COACH PHILLIPS: He's one of the best leaders I've ever been around. He's the guy that gets up. He's a different person on game day. He doesn't say much during the week. But on game day, I mean, he's the guy that's vocal in the locker room, getting the guys inspired to play.

Q. First home game of the season. What was it like being on the sidelines?
COACH PHILLIPS: Hadn't been there in about five years. Glad we changed the turf over there. That felt good. It was a little softer than last time I was over there (laughter).
It was good. Anytime you can get around, be able to get down on the field, look your football team in their eyes, see how they're responding to different situations, I think it's good. Similar to last week. It was the first time I'd been on the field. You could really look into people's eyes and see where they're at, if they're with you or if they're not.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: I had Coach (indiscernible) running up and down when I saw those guys announced in there. We had them in the locker room. They were the guys we gave the game balls to. Those are the true pioneers. Those are the guys who paved the way for me to have this opportunity, and I appreciate those guys.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: I think they are. I think they're a really good football team, especially offensively. They did a really good job. You know, Willie has been in a lot of different systems. He's been in the triple option, he's been in the west coast. Last year they were a power football team with the big runningback they had at Stanford, understands how to run the ball.
If you look at them on film, everything they do is a plan to win. They run the ball. They take care of the ball. Play really good special teams. They're sound in what they do.
They're really close. I think that they will win a lot of games this year.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: Definitely. Yeah, we want him to throw the block. He's on scholarship, too. Yeah, we expect Mike to throw a block, you know. Unless he doesn't expect those other guys to block for him, yeah, we expect him to throw a block.
You should see him on the wildcat. He blocks on the wildcat package. I know you're usually watching the ball, but Mike is down there hustling, trying to get after people in the wildcat package also.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: Well, we got to tackle better. We got to tackle better. We tackle a guy, he's continuing to move for five, six, seven yards. We got to get guys on the ground. The guy is a really good back. But no back rushes for 180 something yards against us. For us to be the type of team we want to be, have the type of season we want to have, you can't allow anybody to run for that many yards on you.

Q. Anything happen on the missed field goal?
COACH PHILLIPS: Just missed it, botched it. Our kicker's got to kick better, there's no question about it. We can't leave points out there. We also got to kick the ball where our coverage is designated to cover.
We want to try to cut the field into a third, and we're having to cover the whole field. That becomes hard when you guys are thinking the ball is going to be in a certain area and the ball is kicked outside that area. We've got to kick the ball better.

Q. (No microphone.)
COACH PHILLIPS: Luke. Didn't practice a down this week, not a down. He was injured. We were wondering whether or not we needed to go with someone else because he hadn't practiced.
But the guy's earned the right to be the starter. He just continued to make the play. I didn't see who it was that made the interception. I asked. Somebody said, Luke. I mean, he's just all over the place. Maybe he's becoming the Randall Cobb of defense.
All right. Appreciate it. Thank you.

End of FastScripts

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