University of Tennessee Athletics
Weekly Press Conference Previews Saturday's UT-Rutgers Matchup
September 24, 2002 | Football
Sept. 24, 2002
Comments from Tennessee head coach Phillip Fulmer's Sept. 24 press conference preview Saturday's game (7:05 p.m. -VidoeSeat) against Rutgers at Neyland Stadium.
* Coach Fulmer's Tuesday press conferences can be seen live each Tuesday at 12:30 p.m. (EDT) during the season on ESPN News.
FULMER PRESS CONFERENCE
FULMER Q&A | OPPONENT COACH Q&A
"We were obviously disappointed with our loss last week. If you're not careful, you let it stick in your gut too long. It needs to stick there from a remembering-how-it-felt standpoint, but not hold you back from going and working to get better. The best thing we can do is get it behind us, go to the practice field, get busy and work like heck on our mistakes, get better and go play again.
"Yesterday, I was pleased with the approach and the attitude our team had to getting back to business. Obviously that five-minute span gave us almost no chance to win the football game, but our team had time to collect itself and came back out with a lot of fight. I was really proud of that. We have to take that same fight to build, correct those mistakes, not have those things happen to us and play like we're capable of playing on a more consistent basis.
"Our defensive front, which we were really concerned about coming into the season, is playing very well. Our offensive line, for what we've asked them to do thus far, has done well. Jason Witten has had a heck of a year. Our running backs are doing what they need to do. The quarterback is throwing for 71 percent and doing well. The linebackers are playing hard and well. Our secondary had played well and lost a little bit of discipline in the last ball game. We can't hang them out like we did a few times, either, by missing sacks and things like that.
"Our receiver corps hasn't done nearly as well as we want to or hope to down the road. We're still working like heck to get that done, although they haven't just been terrible and we haven't really asked to do a whole lot of things. We're going to keep working on that to get that up to speed where we want to. It was good to get Kelley Washington out there. He did a nice job in the game. We probably played him too many plays his first game back. I didn't plan on that, but, after the game got to where it was, he played more than we had intended. He did a good job.
"Our focus is turned to Rutgers. They played Pitt really tough. The score was 23-3, but it was closer than that was. Defensively, their scheme is the same one Miami used previously and very similar to some of the things they're doing now. The defensive coordinator went from Miami to Rutgers as the head coach. They do a good job with their scheme. They make it tough. They have a nice personnel fit with what they're trying to do. They try to make it really tough to run the football.
"Defensively, they have speed at end and the defensive tackle is a good, sturdy tough guy. I'm really impressed with their middle linebacker who's a good player. They're a junior-senior kind of football team.
"Offensively, it's the same thing. They're very experienced, have a veteran quarterback and a veteran group of offensive linemen and receivers. Their tight end is impressive. They give you enough two-back things to make you prepare for that stuff. Their wide receiver Baker is an impressive player. They have 300-pounders up front. They're going to use the field, the toss, the counter, the zone play and down-the-field throws. They do a good job with what they've done.
"They haven't had as much success as they want to have this year. We hope to play better than we played the last game."
