Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/85914
COACHSPEAK |EXCERPTS FROM BILL O'BRIEN'S WEEKLY PRESSER Can you evaluate the offense as a whole and how much progress it's made since the start of camp? I would go all the way back to spring practice on that to really eval- uate it. When you bring in a new sys- tem it's a lot like learning a new language. So in the spring, it was up‑and‑down, and I felt like in the Blue-White Game, it was OK. I was concerned about it going into the summertime and I knew that because of the rules that we were not allowed to meet with these guys in the sum- mertime, that the guys were going to have to do a lot on their own. So we came into training camp and obviously many, many of the guys on offense did a lot of work on their own and got together and either threw routes or worked on blocking schemes on their own, or did some things that really helped them com- ing into training camp. So I believe we've made progress, but there's such a long way to go. You know, we show them every week a good and bad tape from the previ- ous game. So it was about 50/50 on offense, good and bad. So there's so many things to improve upon and some things to build upon, but I do believe that progress has been made. How big of a priority is it for you to identify future place-kickers and punters? How big of a challenge is it with your recruiting sanctions and numbers being limited? It'll always be a big priority to iden- tify all the positions of need, and ob- viously that includes place-kicker and punter. Ideally you'd like a guy who can do both so it's one person. But at the end of the day, you just have to do a really good job of identi- fying, and you're right. You're on the money there, because you know, with the scholarship reductions, if you have a great punter/place-kicker out there that you would like to com- pete in recruiting with, you have to offer him a scholarship and that's going to affect your overall numbers. So that's a strategy that we are talking about every day, and it's an ever‑evolving strategy. Tim Owen Moving [Adrian] Amos back to safety [on third down] – how much of a difference has that made? Obviously we have concentrated a lot on third down in practice. We work on third down every single day in practice, so we make sure our players are very aware of the sticks and the yardage on both sides of the ball. I think our team has improved in that respect. Amos is a guy who is an excellent young player who can move around a lot. He's a big guy. He's a physical guy. He's got good ball skills. He's in- stinctive. You know, he's just done a nice job overall for us this year. Zach Zwinak, a lot of people have been calling him a really good downhill runner. What does he do that makes him a good downhill runner? How does one become a good downhill runner, or is it more of an innate thing with your body type? I think it's part of your skill set: bigger back, 230‑pound back who is a thick guy who has good speed. He is one of our faster backs. He's got good speed, but he's not a scat back. He's a physical, downhill guy that likes to press the line of scrimmage. There are certain runs that he's good at. You know, there are other runs that maybe he's not as good at and that he's got to improve at. But what makes you a downhill O C T O B E R 3 , 2 0 1 2 13 runner is just you understand the intent of the blocking scheme that they are running. Those are your fa- vorite runs and you understand how to press the line of scrimmage, make your alignment right and get the ball into the teeth of the defense as fast as you can. He's done a nice job of that. He takes care of the ball. He's not a big bounce guy. He's going to run inside the tight ends and the tackles, and that's what he's good at doing. There's a student White Out being organized for the game. Has [the team] been talking about that, and how fired up do you think that gets them for the game? I don't know about the student White Out, but I do know this for the students: This is a noon kickoff, and it is by far the biggest game for us this year. We are playing a 5‑0 Northwestern team. We feel like we are doing some good things. We need all those students in the stands at noon for that kickoff. These guys, they feed off of that. You know, the crowd noise, the stu- dent section, these guys feed off of that. So whether it's a White Out, this-out, that-out, I don't know; I just need them in the stands at noon going nuts for this football team, be- cause you know, we have got to have a great home‑field advantage. These guys really feed off of that. B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M GIVE 'EM A HAND O'Brien is asking the fans, specifically the students, to be at Beaver Stadium Saturday by noon "going nuts for this football team because we have got to have great homefield advan- tage."