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C O A C H S P E A K • E X C E R P T S F R O M J A M E S F R A N K L I N ' S W E E K L Y P R E S S E R What was your role in scheduling Georgia State three years ago, and would you like to see your nonconfer- ence schedule continue to include one Power Five opponent? To be honest with you, the administra- tion handles the scheduling. I have con- versation and I have input. A few years ago, we did a camp at Georgia State. I had a conversation with the head coach. They were interested, we were interested. I came back and gave it to the administra- tion and then they kind of looked into the specifics and the details. I have strong feelings about scheduling. It's something that me and Sandy [Bar- bour] spend a lot of time talking about and discussing. We're looking at how the playoff system played out last year. You've got a bunch of different scenarios to factor in. I think the playoffs are one factor that you've got to look at when it comes to scheduling, but I think the most impor- tant thing you can do year-in and year- out is schedule in a way that's going to give your team the best chance to win your conference, and then everything else will take care of it from there. So you can make arguments in both di- rections. You know me; I'm going to have my feelings based on my experiences, but then I'm also going to do a lot of different studies from an analytics perspective and some other things. I'll give you a really good example when it comes to schedul- ing: You look at teams that run an option- style offense. Well, it's not just the impact that you have to make with your team in terms of time, in terms of preparing for an option-style team, but also what it takes away during camp from preparing for the other styles that you're going to play the rest of the year. There's a pretty interest- ing stat out there: Teams that play an op- tion style, what their win-loss record is the week aBer playing one of those teams. There are all these different things that I think we've just got to look at. But for me, the most important thing is, what's going to give us the best chance to prepare us to consistently be a part of our conference championship discussion? I know the numbers might suggest that Saeed Blacknall is off to a slow start. I was just curious where you feel he's at. I know you play a lot of re- ceivers. Where is he at? He's been a dangerous player for you in the past. Do you feel like you need to get him more involved? It really doesn't work like that. We look at Saeed as a starter. We look at him as a big-time player. He's played a lot of foot- ball for us over the years. We've got great competition, which is excellent. But our offense really doesn't work like that. In the old offense, we would use per- sonnel and formations to get players into certain spots. With what we do now, which I love, it depends on what the de- fense does. That truly is going to deter- mine [players' involvement]. You would love to say we're just going to hand the ball off to Saquon Barkley 35 times a game, but that's not what we do. If we get the look to hand the ball off to Saquon, we will. If we're going to pull it and throw it on the perimeter, we're going to do it, and it's all based on whether they are in man-to-man coverage, zone cover- age, whether they are playing a middle- of-the-field open Cover 2 or quarter-style defense or they are closing it up and going man coverage or Cover 0. We have checks. We have places to go with the ball. So it's not like we go into it saying we're going to get Saeed this many touches or Saquon this many touches. Obviously, we want to get the ball in our playmakers' hands, but it's all based on what the de- fense gives. We're not going to force it. So you're going to see Saeed one week maybe have one or two catches and you're going to see another week where maybe he has eight or 10 catches, and it's the same thing with [DaeSean Hamilton] and that's the same thing with DeAndre [Thompkins], the same thing with Mike Gesicki, all of our weapons on offense. The thing that's great is our guys get that and they embrace it. They realize that's how our offense goes, and the most im- portant thing is, what do we have to do to put the team in the best position to win? Has the offensive line begun to fulfill your expectations of it becoming a strength of the offense this year? I think we're playing solid. I think we can play better. One of the things that is very important to me that I've been talk- ing about since I got here and really has been a challenge my entire coaching ca- reer, is that offensive linemen are the nicest human beings on the planet. I've said this before: If my daughters choose to marry football players, I want them to marry offensive linemen. They are just big, nice, happy, jolly guys who put the team first. They are the ultimate teammates. But that's also one of the challenges. They typically have been big kids their whole life, and being able to find offensive linemen who will get on the field and play with a nasty streak and a nasty demeanor, and then be real gentle- men off the field, that's what we want. And we're getting closer to that, but we're still not where I think we can be and where I want to be. That's the next step for us. We're playing good on the O-line, but I think there's still more there for us to give, and more than anything, it comes with a mentality. We need a little bit more from a football perspective of a killer in- stinct. I think once you have that on your team and once you have that on your of- fense and specifically with your offensive line, then you can be difficult to deal with. Saquon Barkley is listed as your No. 1 kick returner. Some would say you're risking an injury by doing that. Can you talk about that situation? Yeah, a couple things: No. 1, Saquon Barkley has been our starting [kick re- turner] since camp. I didn't want that on the depth chart because I didn't want people scheming to kick it away from him. That's the reality of it. Our team and Saquon have known that he was the starting kickoff-return guy from the beginning. I just didn't want to put it on the depth chart from a public perspective because people are going to start kicking away from it. I think that's what's going to happen now. That's why having Koa Farmer as one or our up-backs is really important. He's got the ability to return the ball. You know, again, I studied this. You look at what Stanford did with their starting tailback. He had a huge impact as a tail- back, as well as a punt-return guy and as well as a kick-return guy. You know, one of the things that I don't S E P T E M B E R 1 3 , 2 0 1 7 B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M 12

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