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fight it as much as I possibly can. I'm fine doing that in closed quarters, team meetings, with these guys individually. You don't want to be out there blubber- ing in front of 100,000 people in the stadium. It's not the right tone you want to set for your team that's about to play a tough, physical Big Ten football game. I'm very passionate about what I do. I'm very passionate about who I do it with. These seniors are going to be re- membered, and remembered, I think, for a long time. I think these seniors are going to hold a special place in our his- tory for a long time. The way this season is going, the way Saturday will unfold, we just have to do a great job. There will be a lot of differ- ent things going on, a lot of different moving parts on Saturday, whenever you have a senior day. Last year I remember being at Michi- gan State, they kind of handled it differ- ent than I've ever seen it before. They do their senior day ceremonies before the stadium opens. They do it with the families, with the guys out there on the field, kind of get that done way ahead of time before the game. I thought that was kind of an interesting way to do it, because you struggle with all those things. You want to pay respect, but you don't want it to become a distraction to what you're doing on Saturday once the game gets going. Have you seen anything from Trace McSorley that's been different from what you thought you were getting? He said today it's a matter of making sure the moment is never bigger than you think it is. Not really. He's pretty much been who we thought he was going to be. But I will tell you that's typically not the case, I mean, for all of us. In any industry, any relationship, you go in thinking you know somebody pretty well. Very rarely do they play out to be the person that you thought they were. We all have strengths. We all have weaknesses, shortcomings in certain areas. Trace is pretty much exactly who we thought, and probably more impor- tantly, hoped he was. More times than not, you look at the draB in the NFL, they do more research than anybody. Guys typically aren't who you thought they were. Trace has been really, really consistent with how we graded him on high school film, how we got to know him and his family through the recruiting process. I think probably the one thing that's a lit- tle bit different is I thought there would be a point where he really came out of his shell. I think he's come out a little bit, but he's a pretty quiet guy. His sister goes to school here now, is a true freshman. She's on campus. I saw her the other day. I have a deal where I go to Jamba Juice, I get this green smoothie that's made with kale and things like that. The players make fun of me. I don't think it's open this week. I was over there last week. I saw her, had not seen her since the recruiting process. It was great to see her, she's doing really well. Trace is kind of who he is. His parents have been really good. I think I told you mom does a giB for the O-line each week, pastries or donuts, usually some- thing that's local, representative of the community that we're in, whether on the road or at home. She's usually got some type of note in there, something funny. That's been pretty cool, as well. What do you remember about Derek Dowrey's switch from defen- sive line to offensive line, his willing- ness to switch positions for you? When I first got here, it was evident right away that we had a problem that needed to get solved. I think obviously, like most things in life, you have a choice: You can complain about the problem or you can look for solutions. Right away, there were two solutions in my mind, guys who weren't necessarily starting on defense and who had back- grounds that [indicated] they could make the transition. Brian Gaia was one of them. We had recruited him actually as an offensive lineman. A lot of programs recruited him as someone who could be a defensive lineman or offensive lineman. There were some conversations already with both of them of the possibility of moving to offensive line at some point. When I brought them in, neither one of them was completely surprised about the conversation, and they embraced it. Dowrey's brother plays O-line at Mar- shall. His dad has been a successful high school football coach for a long time. Both of them kind of embraced it. A lot of times, guys want to play the position that they've always dreamed of playing. But there comes a point where you say, I want to have more of a signifi- cant role, have an opportunity to impact the team in a positive way. Typically, when their first plan hasn't necessarily worked out, you have the ability to ap- proach them with a different plan. Guys embrace it because they see it as an op- portunity. N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 6 B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . 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