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C OA C H S P E A K| EXCERPTS FROM JAMES FRANKLIN'S WEEKLY PRESSER How much progress do you feel the offensive line has made these last few weeks and how might that help your offense evolve going forward? I think they've made real progress. Again, first week [against Temple], don't really want to talk about it any- more. Everybody knows the details of the first week. But you think about how we've been able to run the ball and pro- tect our quarterback the last two weeks. That's the O-line playing at a much higher level. That is the threat of the running game. That's how we're calling the game and managing it a little bit. I think we need to continue to do that. It's going to be even more magnified this year if anybody's had a chance to watch San Diego State already, they play what I would call a chaos defense. Any- body ever see those defenses where they don't even line up, they just kind of walk around and do all those things? They blitz from every angle possible. So we're going to have to continue calling and managing the game the way we are right now. But I do see those guys taking a lot of pride. I do see those guys building con- fidence. I do see them playing faster and more aggressive. Just like everybody else does, we want to get back to the point where we're balanced and we're able to rush for a number of yards and have success running the ball, but we're also able to threaten the people with our wide receivers and our passing game because we've got some talented guys there. I'm really proud of Christian [Hack- enberg] and how he's handled every- thing. I think he's doing a great job. We had very specific plays on Saturday that, if [Rutgers was] running a certain blitz, we wanted to check into the cer- tain specific play versus the blitz, and those plays accounted for major runs and touchdown runs. I would say al- most every single one of those touch- down runs [resulted from] him checking into that specific look. So I thought he did a great job with that, but there is no doubt that we want to continue to grow our passing game. We have the ability to do it. We've all seen it in the past. But it all comes down to our offensive line and then continu- ing to grow and play confident. How would you assess the passing game through three games, in partic- ular the fact that the completion rate is under 50 percent? We're moving the pocket, we're doing the quick game. We're not taking a whole lot of shots down the field where we have to hold onto the ball for a long period of time. It's what I've been men- tioning the past couple weeks, it's going to evolve. We've shown that we've been able to do those things in the past. We've got the wide receivers to do it, we've got the tight ends to do it. It's going to be a gradual thing that we're going to grow over time. We've shown it in our past. We have the confidence that we can do it. You come out and watch practice in our seven-on-sevens, and we're able to do some exciting things. But the game of football is not seven-on-seven, it's 11-on-11, so it will happen. It will hap- pen. I'm actually really pleased with how we're playing as a team right now. I thought that game on Saturday was probably the most complete football game we've played since we've been here. Now, have we played better on de- fense? Yes. Have we played better on of- fense? Yes. Have we played better on special teams? Maybe not. But [taking into account] all three phases together, I thought we played great team football [against Rutgers]. Geno Lewis had an up-and-down kind of season last year. Where is he at right now? What does he need to do to become more involved for you? It's no different than at any other po- sition. We're looking for guys to be con- sistent. We love Geno. He's had a great career here. He continues to be a great teammate. I got an email the other day. A professor met him on campus and was just blown away by how he pre- sented himself and how he carried him- self, so much so that she took the time to write an email. Geno's doing great. Consistency, I think, is the [issue] with a lot of our guys at a number of posi- tions. They show flashes of doing spe- cial things. They want to be able to do it more consistently. We want them to do it more consistently. So I think Geno's in that conversation like a number of guys are. I know it was a bad day in Temple as far as third-down conversions. Through three games, you're still only converting 30 percent of your third downs. Do you see progress there, and what has to be done to get a higher figure? I think when we get more balanced and throw the ball more, that's going to help you on third down. It always does. But we are taking some approaches where we're running the ball on third down, and we've been able to be suc- cessful on some of those third downs. We've been able to add to the punt on some of those third downs, and I'm not as concerned about specific statistics at this point as a program. I'm more con- cerned about playing in a style that's going to allow us to be successful as a team. The statistics will come later. Those things are great. The statistic I'm concerned about is being 1-0 this week. It looks like Saquon Barkley is going to be a star. You may not want to use that word and he may not either. But I'm wondering how you think he's going to handle the attention? I think Saquon's going to be a great teammate here. He's going to make the commitment and sacrifices to help his team be successful. He's also going to give credit to his offensive line and spe- cial teams for providing field position and the defense for playing great team football. So this is about the team. This is about Penn State. There are conversations that I want to have with all of our guys about how to handle adversity, how to handle success, which can create adver- sity for young people. All those things. S E P T E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5 B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M 14

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