Video: Tulane awaits important conference matchup against Houston

NEW ORLEANS – Listed below is the complete transcript from Green Wave head coach Willie Fritz’s weekly press conference leading up to Tulane’s matchup vs. Houston on Thursday.

TULANE HEAD COACH Willie Fritz
Opening Statement:
“On recap for last week, I thought our guys did a really good job coming out of the box playing fast, furious and hard. We had a chance to play 87 guys. That might be a record. Eighty-seven different guys got in the ball game for the offense, defense, and kicking game. Lots of guys got the opportunity to play and play substantial minutes. They’ve earned some more playing time this week. Thursday evening, they have a big ball game for us here, I hope we can get out as many people as we can here to Yulman Stadium. I have bragged about it, but every seat is a great seat in the house. We’ve done a good job of putting the ticket prices we they need to be at, concession prices, all those things. Hopefully, we have a big crowd. I know Houston is going to bring a lot of people over, not too far of a drive for them. It works out, we will have a great opportunity to play on national TV.”

On preparation for Houston compared to last season…
“I thought we were prepared last year too. We just went out and didn’t execute. They had a good game plan. They jumped out on us early, we had a hard time with what we were doing to really come back on them. In all three phases, we did not play very well. They had a big kick return. We did not play great on defense. Out of our last six ball games of year, that is the one game we did not play very well. A lot of that was because of Houston.”

On moving forward after the Houston game…
“It is a great conference. Our conference schedule is very challenging. We just talked about how every one of these conference games counts as one. There is not one of them that you win that is going to count as two and there is not one of them if you do not get the good outcome will count as two. You have to be on point and ready to go for each and every one of these conference opportunities. That is definitely one of our goals, we want to compete for the conference championship.”

On Tulane being favored this week…
“I really did not know that until you said it. I have been involved in this a long time and that really does not have much to do with the game. We just want to go out and get better every single week and be better than we were last week. In order to win this game, we are going to have to do that.”

On whether he has seen the progress he has wanted to see…
“Yeah, you know I thought last week offensively we showed really some flashes of brilliance in our run game and also in throwing the football as well. To get going in a fast tempo, you have to stay away from mistakes. It does allow you to sometimes get some plays where you might not normally get them in the defense set up. So yes, we are seeing some progress. We just want to keep getting better. That is a big thing for us. Preparation is very consistent. We want to show that consistent improvement every week too. It is really battling yourself more than the opponent.”

On secondary’s catching ball more than last season…
“Oh, it is big. Big pick-six by P.J. Hall last week and a couple of interceptions by Larry Brooks. It is such a huge advantage when you are plus one, plus two, plus three in the takeaway department. We had the big onside kick that we recovered too. When they do not get to play offense, it makes it a lot easier game.”

On importance of secondary’s throwing…
“He can do both. He is an excellent quarterback. You are right though; our plan has always been to limit their effectiveness in running the football. We play a lot of tight lane coverage and we mix it up with some zone and some zone blitz. We go against them in offense and it has a lot of similar characteristics in using the whole field horizontally and vertically. I think that will help our guys.”

On scouting D’Eriq King in practice…
“It is tough. We had Dha’Quan Jackson out there from Huntsville, who played quarterback in high school. He’s quick as a cat. We had him do it, go against Justin [McMillan]. Justin is a great running quarterback too. Our guys see that and they have seen it a bunch.”

On the excitement for the coverage of Thursday night game…
“I think it is a big deal for Tulane. It is the first time we have had a Thursday night ESPN game here at Yulman Stadium. It is a big opportunity for us. Our guys understand that and they love it. When you are a little kid growing up, you think about playing on TV and we are going to be one of the highlighted games Thursday evening. It is a big deal. We want to be on this stage.”

On changing the schedule for a Thursday night game…
“We did not do too much on Sunday. Number one, it is fortunate, I know Justin [McMillan] is going to visit with you in a second, but he did not play second half on Saturday. We held out a bunch of guys who did not play the second half Saturday. You only get to do that if you take care of business and our guys did. Sunday we just really worked the kinks out, we did a little bit of lifting, a little bit of stretching and a little bit of movement. We practiced pretty good on Monday. We went an hour and fifty minutes today and we will cut way, way back tomorrow. I am still not in that mindset of having a fast day, the day before the game. I think our guys like the fact they are able to refresh and get ready to go the day before the game. We are going to cut way, way back tomorrow. Then they are going to get a whole lot of sleep on Thursday. It is a different day, normally they are going to class and they get to sleep in a little bit. We meet and do some things and then they get a couple hour nap in the afternoon. They tell me that feels good. I used to take them before I had my first kid.”

On matchup for defense…
“We have to play a lot better than we did last year. I think we have a really good front. We are deep up there. We can roll a bunch of guys. We need to do that against a team like Houston. Our second and third level we are able to roll some guys there as well. They have excellent receivers, two really good backs, and their quarterback is excellent. We will have to play a really good game defensively.”