	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

CAPITAL ONE ORANGE BOWL: FLORIDA VS VIRGINIA

December 28, 2019

Bryce Perkins

Miami Gardens, Florida

Q. We talked with your dad recently, and I think one of the things that struck me is he never heard you mentioned the letters NFL. Your dad and your brother played in the NFL. Is that something you think about much?
BRYCE PERKINS: Yeah, I mean, I think about it, but I also know that the things I do now, it's going to influence that more. In thinking about the NFL, I'm focused on now in order to get to. I'm never really too concerned about saying or thinking about the next step until this step is complete.

Q. Is that pretty easy to do?
BRYCE PERKINS: Yeah, because I mean, there's still things and goals I want to accomplish in college. I don't overlook anything, especially nothing that goes on in college. When thinking about the NFL, I can't think about it until after my college career is done, so that's why I do a pretty good job and kind of want to focus on college and all the goals that I have in college before I even think about worrying about the NFL.

Q. Do you see yourself as an NFL style quarterback? It seems there are more of those now, more quarterbacks like you than there were maybe 10 years ago in the NFL.
BRYCE PERKINS: Yeah, definitely. And I'm getting better. I feel like I get better every year as far as whatever it is, something little. So I feel like my ceiling is high. I haven't reached my potential yet. And how the NFL is shifting, there's room and there's a place for my style of play. And I think it can be very effective, and Lamar Jackson, amongst others, he's just a more recent, has been very influential on the type of player, the type of system that teams run.

It's going to give a lot of guys chances, and I feel like I fit right into that.

Q. Adding on to that, when Lamar came to the NFL (indiscernible) how does that motivate you, and at the same time what does that put into your game plan and motivation?
BRYCE PERKINS: Yeah, I mean, I think you have to -- you look at it, and even without them, you have to make sure that you're better because there's always going to be doubts, and there are always going to be like, well, you should play this, and just being as a black man and not being a traditional image of what a quarterback has looked like, there's going to be people saying this and that saying you shouldn't play this because that's not what they're used to. So by them doing what they're doing, and this isn't the way, and they're kind of making an open door for people coming behind them that have aspirations of playing quarterback, but maybe were told that you should play this or you should play that because you can run a little bit, and the NFL is for guys 6'4", 6'3", 6'5", guys that don't look like us that can stay still and kind of move.

By them doing what they're doing, it makes younger kids, way younger than me, starting in middle school, decide to play football. Maybe they'll have the opportunity to play quarterback because they see it's possible through the eyes of the many people that are playing.

Q. You guys are in the Orange Bowl, but is this season what you thought it would be?
BRYCE PERKINS: I haven't really heard any doubters. You hear doubters, but it's nothing new than what we have been hearing. I mean, for us, we know that this is not the ceiling for us, so I think as a team, we know that our team and organization is built on unbroken growth, and you look at Coach Mendenhall's years here, from two wins, to six wins, to eight wins, to nine wins and looking forward to being ten, we think and we know how we run and how our culture is operated and set up, that it's built to keep increasing and keep moving forward.

I mean, next year most of the guys are coming back. We're losing great guys on both sides of the ball, but this team is stacked with talent, and we're in the Orange Bowl for the first time, and I expect that we'll do even better next year.

That's the way Coach Mendenhall's programs are built and the way that I see us going for the years to come.

Q. What would a win mean to you?
BRYCE PERKINS: A lot, because nobody has ever done it before. Well, one other team has done it before. So for us to get it right aligns with all our goals. It sets us up to be one of the best teams in UVA history, just being mentioned with the other great 10-win team. It's a testament to our hard work throughout the summer, our hard work and transition from last year to this year, and the culture and the players who built and kind of set the platform when they first got here. A lot of these guys were on the two-win team and kind of see the transition from the program and how it came from not a bowl game to three bowl games in a row.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297