CHICK-FIL-A PEACH BOWL: OLE MISS VS PENN STATE

December 28, 2023

Anthony Poindexter

Mercedes-Benz Stadium

Penn State Nittany Lions

Quick Quotes

Q. When you got here, Keaton had already been in the program a couple of years. How has he evolved over the latter half of his college career, and what's your relationship with him?

ANTHONY POINDEXTER: It's a great relationship. I've been with Keaton the longest. When I showed up here, Keaton was a corner, and he was transferring right into the safety room, so I kind of started him out in his safety career.

Keaton has been special because you are an older player and then you have a younger player come in and take and look at your role. He has just been excellent. He's a great teammate. He's great with the younger guys. He teaches them a lot of stuff. He does business the right way. He knows how a Penn State player is supposed to be on and off the field. He's just been awesome.

Q. You talked about place over position. Is being a defensive coordinator at a Power 5 program still something that you would aspire to be in the future?

ANTHONY POINDEXTER: If things happen -- I know people think I'm half crazy, but I just like things to happen organically. My whole coaching career, everything happened organically. I don't chase jobs.

I'm not saying that somebody's wrong for doing it. I just try to be where my feet are at the moment so I can do the best job for the people I'm working for right then. I've just been like that my whole career. I'm just blessed that good things happen to me. I just try to come to work and take it day by day.

Q. Zakee seemed like a guy who was on the come up last year. He's been less prominent this year than last. Where is he at? Where does he need to get better at?

ANTHONY POINDEXTER: I think it's been a combination of things. Some other guys like kind of coming on, but I think he's in a good spot. Zakee is a very talented player. We need him on our team. We need him to perform. He's worked his way into getting himself in a good situation of being able to perform and play better.

I'm excited about Zakee. I think he's got a very high ceiling, and we'll keep working so he can reach it.

Q. Is Johnnie Dixon here? We haven't seen him at practice.

ANTHONY POINDEXTER: You'd have to ask Coach about that. You got to ask the boss man about that one.

Q. What are some of the challenges when you're trying to -- plays aren't changing with this defense, but you know who you have and who you don't have.

What are some of the challenges of this is who we're working with?

ANTHONY POINDEXTER: I think the challenge is like -- you know, Coach Manny just had his own feel of how he'd call the game, which everybody has that different feel, which I said a couple of weeks ago. You have to find your own feel. You have to feel how the game's going and how the situation's appearing in that game.

To say you're going to call it, it's going to look similar to Coach Manny, some plays will. There's certain calls at certain times, who knows? Each coordinator is different in pushing the button at what time.

Q. With the number of defensive players that have made known that they're not going to be back next year, does that affect how you approach this game with some younger players getting more depth involved? Or how do you look at that?

ANTHONY POINDEXTER: I just think we've played a lot of kids every year we've been here. We try to build on our depth. It won't affect our rotation. We try to go in there and win the game. Whoever it is that has to play, we're going to play them. I don't think who's leaving really affects the rotation.