|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
ROSE BOWL GAME PRESENTED BY VIZIO: STANFORD v WISCONSINDecember 27, 2012Travis FrederickPASADENA, CALIFORNIA Q. Is it safe to say that the defense you guys faced (Indiscernible) anything that Stanford is going to be a tougher test based on what their defense has done all year? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think it's going to be a much different test. I can't say it's going to be tougher. Because you have a lot of respect for the Stanford defense and what they've done. But their defense has done tremendous things and they deserve to be ranked where they are. And watching them on film, it's going to be a hard‑fought game the entire time. They play a little differently. They're an up‑the‑field team, and they're going to shed, and play more three down than Nebraska did. So like I said, it's going to be a little bit different, but I think it's going to be a comparable challenge, and potentially a greater challenge. Q. Have you guys looked for the success of UCLA in the Pac‑12 Championship? It was pretty good. TRAVIS FREDERICK: Uh‑huh. Q.  Does that‑‑ is there anything you can look at what they did and see things that you can do better? TRAVIS FREDERICK: There are a few things that we do similarly to UCLA. They're a little bit different from here and there. But as players, we've been through most of the games to find those kind of things. You look at a defensive player, and you find his tendencies. The way he uses his hands, all of the Stanford defensive linemen use their hands very, very well. They put them inside, and that's going to be a challenge for us. But knowing that that's coming, you try to focus a little bit more on that, and maybe think about that during a play instead of thinking about something else that really to have success, we're going to have to attack the first level first, and move up to the second level. Q. (Indiscernible)? TRAVIS FREDERICK: Yeah, you definitely can tell a difference. I don't think that there's anything wrong with either type of coaching style, because we certainly did have our legs back by the game, for the most part. But the way it's been now, I think our practices have been a little more crisp. When you have longer practices all the time, you get the toughness, you get the grind it out. But your practices aren't as crisp and smooth, because you're not playing at full speed. You're not playing at that tempo. So we've had some shorter practices. We've had practices that have been half pad or normally would be in full pads or things like that. But all but one of our practices during this bowl prep have been really, really solid practices that we've got completely everything that we wanted to get done, we got everything in. So I think there is, with one exception, a really, really good goal prep. Even that exception was a good practice, it was just not to the level of all the rest of them. It was a very standard practice that we've had. So I think that we're practicing better, and hopefully that leads us to be able to play better. Q. Montee said in his opinion guys have been able to spend more time prepping. I don't know if that will translate to a victory? TRAVIS FREDERICK: That certainly helps. When you spend more time on the field, you spend less time at the complex as a requirement. Less time in meetings and all of that, and that gives you more time to do other things. We talk as student‑athletes about the amount of balance that you have to have. Bowl prep is an interesting time because maybe you don't have school the entire time, but you have finals that week. You have to study. You have projects the last week. So there is a little more stress on your time during bowl prep. So we've spent actually, with Coach Alvarez, we've spent a lot less time at the stadium than we have in previous times. I think that's allowed guys to get their school done, but it's given guys that extra time that they want to go and study film and things like that. Before, I would have had to go straight from practice to the lab to do my projects, and maybe I have a little more time that I can go spend an hour watching film that day or something like that. Q. Is there a different mindset with you guys? Do you think you've seen a difference? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think it is a little different. I think the first time you come out here you're ‑‑ I don't want to say nervous‑‑ but it's the first time. It's something new, and something shiny. Last year when we came out here we thought about winning the game. But after you go through something the one time, it's new and shiny, and maybe you skip over a few things. The second time you say, okay, this was really cool looking back at it. I really want to experience everything. So you go home and you really do focus on the experience and going through it. Obviously it didn't work out the way you wanted it to last year. But the third time now for most of the players that have been here two years, we've been through everything. We've been to Disney, we've been to the Beef Bowl, we've been to the Improv. But there is a tremendous amount of focus this year on the game. I think that's come down from the head guy. Coach Alvarez has done a good job of putting focus on the game. But I think they're even more focused this year than previous years in the game and coming out here to practice and to win a game. Not necessarily as a vacation or your normal bowl trip. Q. What is the take away lessons? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think the lesson is you have to go out and continue to play the entire game. Both of them were close games. We were the underdog for both of them. You have to be able to play your game and go out and do that and not deviate from the plan and things like that. I don't think that we deviated last year or anything like that. But you have to take advantage of every opportunity, every play. You don't know if that's going to be the play. You have a holding penalty on a play that was maybe only two yards, but it got you the first down on the next play, and you went to score. You never know what's going to be the outcome of a certain play. I think that's something that we've learned throughout this year and from other Rose Bowls. Q. How would you describe Barry? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think the amount of confidence that he has is tremendous. I don't think it has anything to do with false confidence. I think everything is completely justified. I was saying in there that somebody asked me what could I say about Barry Alvarez? The best thing that I can describe him as is absolutely everything that you've ever heard about him is true. The amount of swagger that he has, the confidence, the tremendous coaching ability, everything like that. So I think that he's kind of brought that to the team. I think the team has accepted that and has a little bit more confidence about them as well. Q. He's been pretty impressive this year. Are you guys aware of that? TRAVIS FREDERICK: We're going to go out and play for us. We're going to go out and play for our team and the struggles that we've been through this year and the last two years. If we can cap that and it kind of justifies everything moving forward. But I think that the opportunity that we've been given to play under a Rose Bowl Hall of Fame coach in the Rose Bowl is something special. I think it's a tremendous storyline for you guys, and if we can go out and win one for him, I think that would just boost his career to the next level as well. Q. Anything you would change about coach Canada going into a Big Ten title game? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think it was just a matter of knowing that was the end of the season. We had planned to be in that game all year. That's the goal. That's what you want to do. We put ourselves in a position that we knew we needed to be in. Obviously we wish some things would have worked out a little differently. But we knew we needed to get to the championship game. From there, to win that game and move forward, I think to win the championship game, Coach Canada let it all out. He opened up everything, and I think the coaches put together a tremendous game plan. But I think it was a matter of just open it up, and show everything that we had so we could go out and win that game. Q. Is there a bag of tricks still? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think there might be a couple things left in there. Every team presents different opportunities. You watch film and there is a little thing here, a little thing there. So it's going to be a tough, grind them out game. It's not going to be a trick play game or anything like that. We're going to try to run the ball, they're going to try to run the ball. I don't think there are any secrets about that. I think it's going to be two heavyweights going out. Q. (Indiscernible)? TRAVIS FREDERICK: Every team is a little different. But it also makes it something like that where you don't know what they're going to, do you don't have film on it, it makes it difficult for us to run too. But it's a challenge for both teams. It's kind of a give‑and‑take. They're going to have to focus on more things, but they've had a whole month as well to prepare for that. So they've had more time to prepare for our looks as well. Q. This is like a heavyweight battle. It's kind of strange to me that you're two teams that are really throwbacks to an earlier era in a BCS game. But I don't imagine this is going to start a trend in college football, right? Everybody's still going to be spreading it out and all that stuff, right? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think everybody's going to do what they do. At Wisconsin, this is what we do. We run the ball. At Stanford, that's what they do. They're going to be a tough team that's going to go out and fight for four quarters. I think that those programs are built that way. With athletic directors in place, and Coach Alvarez is going to make sure the way he hired Coach Andersen to help us move forward in that way. We're going to be a tough team and continue to move forward. He thought that he could handle it. It's a matter of program history. It's something that Coach Alvarez has done a good job with. But both teams are going to do well moving forward. It's just the way we do things. Q. You had an offensive line coach switch early in the season. How did that work? TRAVIS FREDERICK: It was a difficult time, a difficult transition for us. Obviously, the transition in the off‑season from last year to this year. Then, obviously we weren't playing the way we wanted to play, and Coach B. made a decision that he wanted to transition at the offensive line position. So we got a new coach. Q. Was he the offense? TRAVIS FREDERICK: He was a GA at that point, yep. Q. Is that Coach Miller? TRAVIS FREDERICK: Yes, that's Coach Miller. Coach Miller has done a tremendous job this year in bringing us together and taking some of the things that we learned at the beginning of the year and transforming those into what we needed to go out and play well and go out and win. Coach Miller did a tremendous job of bridging the gap. He was around for both of the two previous coaches, so he kind of knew everything that we had been through and all of the strategies or techniques that we had used. So it made it a little easier that he could come in and say we're going to take this from the previous guy. We're going to take this from Coach Marx, and then we're going to meld them together to make the best that we have here. I think he's done a really good job, like I said. We've put up some of the top rushing performances in UW history, and that is partially a credit him to. Q. You probably aren't surprised by Russell Wilson's success. TRAVIS FREDERICK: No, Russell's success is something that doesn't surprise me, just because of the person that he is. From the first time that I met him, I knew he was a special person and special player. He's a guy that's going to continue to lead and play his heart out. He gives his all in every game, and does a tremendous job throughout the week of getting himself prepped and getting the team prepped. Q. When will you decide whether you're going to go to the NFL? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I haven't really thought about it a whole lot. I think that the focus for this game or for this month has been on the game. I think the team has done a good job of focusing on the game. That's something that's different this year than it has in previous years when we weren't or we didn't have the success that we wanted to have. There was a tremendous amount of focus on the game, and that's what I've been focused on. Q. Have you been cultivating this for a while? TRAVIS FREDERICK: Yes, the beard has been around for a while. It probably started around June is my best guess. Q. So best beard on the team, I would assume? TRAVIS FREDERICK: It's the longest beard on the team. I don't know. It gets to be a little gross sometimes after practice. So I don't know if I can call it the best all the time. Q. Talk about the challenges you've had (Indiscernible)? TRAVIS FREDERICK: He has. We've known going in that this is going to be a tremendous challenge for us and a heavyweight fight. They're a little bit different in the way that they play with the three‑four, and they're going to get down on the four front every once in a while. But it's going to be a good challenge for us, and we're excited about that opportunity. We know that for our team to have success, we have to have success up front. Q. How much three‑four have you seen over the last few years? TRAVIS FREDERICK: A good share. We saw quite a bit early on this year. Utah State ran a three‑four, and some of the smaller schools we played in the non‑conference. Ohio State has run kind of a hybrid three‑four back and forth. Sometimes it's four, sometimes it's three. And sometimes you treat it as three even if it's four. So we've seen a decent amount. It's not something that we're not familiar with. It's something we've been able to focus o because that's what they've been able to do. We've had more time to prepare than a normal game week, so that should help us out. Q. Talking to James and Coach Canada, what element do you think your wildcat and trick plays have brought you in energizing you guys in the second half of the season? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think it just gives us an opportunity to do something different. I think that teams are going to expect us to come out and run the ball. I think there is no secret about that. The passing game and the play‑action and everything that goes into it. But when you line up in a formation that somebody's never seen before, it gives you an advantage because they've never seen it. They're going to be a little confused or have base rules and get into that base look. Then can you hopefully take advantage of that. Now after you've run it once, they can adjust to it, and it will be a different play and different success rate at that point. But I think doing different things like that gives you an opportunity to throw the defense off guard. Q. You've run it a little different than most. Sometimes you don't have a quarterback out there. Coach Canada was saying one of the reasons he went with James over Montee was he's able to handle it better? TRAVIS FREDERICK: He's just really shaky back there. He can go back there and do anything he wants. Really shifty is the word I'm looking for. But when he gets the ball, he's a little short, and no one can see him once all the big guys get up and earn their block. You put that many guys on the ball, and it gives us an opportunity to go out there and get those holes, hopefully. He's done a good job all year finding those holes. Q. (Indiscernible)? TRAVIS FREDERICK: Absolutely. Right, the really cool thing about that package is that it can open up anywhere. That's really the design of it. We could bounce out to the outside. We can go up in the middle. Wherever there is a crease, James White will find it, and that's what he does. He's a tremendous running back with really great vision. Sometimes he sees a crease outside, and it suddenly closes and it gives you an opportunity to go man for man. When you put that many guys on the ball, they have to cover the gaps, and it gives you that opportunity to get up and get guys on guys. Q. The Big Ten Championship game, it seems like you could have thrown any play out there and it would have worked that day. Have you ever had a game like that before where just everything works? TRAVIS FREDERICK: I think there have been parts of games where we've been able to do things like that. I remember Michigan‑‑ it would have been two years ago, I guess‑‑ where we ran the ball, and every play in the second half. That's one of those things. I don't know exactly how that comes to be, but once it happens, it is a really good feeling. And you're able to just go out there and execute and continue to do what you've prepared to do. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|