bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the BYU game?
DeWayne Walker: Well I tell you what, for about two and a half quarters, almost three quarters we were in there swinging and fighting with them. Obviously when you can't match them, whether you need a defensive stop or you need to score a touchdown to stay with them, when you can't do that consistently the game usually gets away from you and that's pretty much what happened to us.

bc.net: What were some things that you saw from your team in those first two and a half quarters that you were really pleased about?
DW: We probably put more of the pressure on our defense to keep us in it. They were playing with their backup quarterback and he turned out to be a pretty good player. I kind of wanted our defense to keep us in it until we could try to get something going offensively because going against their defense, it's one of the top defenses in the country and Bronco [Mendenhall] does a great job and I figured they would stymie us from their defensive standpoint. I thought the one touchdown before halftime really kind of put a damper on us a little bit but at the same time you're not going to hold a BYU offense down for very long if you can't keep up with them.

bc.net: Defensively from your perspective what did your team do well for those first two and a half quarters, the game was only 23-14 about halfway through that third quarter.
DW: Just trying to keep them out of the endzone. Any time, despite how many yards or how many big plays, if you can keep teams out of the endzone, that's always going to give yourself a chance to win. Even though they had only scored 23 points we were able to stay within that seven to nine point range to try to get something going to try to really steal one. I just think the ceiling kind of fell in on us after a while because we just were able to continue to match what they were doing offensively and defensively.

bc.net: Since the San Jose State game, your team has kind of bounced back from the standpoint of their energy level and have continued to play hard. Would you agree with that?
DW: Yeah. That's something we talk about, I've challenged them all along. Every meeting I'm challenging them to compete and let's not worry about our record, let's go out there and try to win a game and that's the same thing we're going to try to do this week.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: What was your bye week schedule like for the team?
DeWayne Walker: We played Saturday, gave everybody Sunday off, brought them back on Monday. We just had meetings on Monday, watched some tape, made some corrections. Practiced Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and gave them Friday and Saturday off and had them come back on Sunday for meetings and film work and then we had meetings yesterday and a good 30 minute walk-through and conditioning and we'll go back to normal practice today.

bc.net: You mentioned corrections, where were some of those things you saw on film that you talked to the kids about?
DW: It probably was the first time, especially on defense, that we just didn't look like we had the energy. There was no one in the stands, it was our first home day game and there was just no energy and no excitement and that's how we played. It was discouraging. We don't want to let the empty stands dictate our energy and our enthusiasm to play a football game. I'm a little disappointed that we didn't bring that energy level that we normally do.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the Auburn game? I'm sure if someone had told you before the season started that you'd only be down 7-0 at halftime that you would have taken that.
DeWayne Walker: There's no doubt about that. It was fun to see these guys battle in the first half. Even getting into the third quarter. I say it every week, if you can't score at some point the roof is going to fall in on you and that's what happened. Defensively I thought we hung in there as long as we could and then they made a couple plays. I think the fumble that went for six points, that kind of put us in a position and I think once adversity hit, we couldn't stop the bleeding. I just continue to enjoy their fight and we just want to continue to get these guys fighting for us until we're done.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: DeWayne Walker: No question. Being a defensive coach you want to play ass kicking defense. When you look at what Gary Anderson at Utah State has done, it's taken him a while to get his defense the way that he views himself as a defensive head coach. I think guys like myself kind of envy it because that's what you're trying to work toward. It was great to see our guys play at a decent level. It was fun to finally see it. Hopefully we can built on it throughout the rest of the year.

bc.net: Over the course of the last month the defense has really made some pretty big strides. You go from games against good offenses like Ohio and UTEP where you had given up a lot of points and then you come into the game against Louisiana Tech, a team that's averaging 56 points per game and you hold them to 28. What has been the difference in the growth over the last month?
DW: I think you've gotta give Coach Elson and Coach Rutenberg, Coach Martin, Coach Bandison, all the defensive coaches, you've gotta give them a lot of credit. These guys work hard. For me, I'm in the room with them most of the time and really there more for support and ideas and really shaking things up scheme-wise and making sure they're crossing their t's and dotting their i's and just helping them more so from that standpoint. It's good to see all of their hard work paying off to a certain degree.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the game. Even though you lost the game, I saw improvements on both sides of the ball and had me feeling more optimistic about the rest of the season.
DeWayne Walker: Yeah. I agree. I have to complement these coaches and these players. Any time you're going through something like this it's hard. It's hard for all of us, me included. Just to see these coaches continuing to work late hours and our kids coming in and continuing to work hard in the weight room and in practice. Even myself, just rolling out of bed when it's tough to come in and put my best foot forward to really keep this team competing. To me, it's not about the wins anymore. I know that's the objective of lining up and playing people but it's about improving and if nothing else at the end of the day that people can say what you said, this team is still fighting, this team is still trying to improve and at the end of the season we'll just have to look at what's next.

bc.net: Offensively you only scored seven points and you left some points on the field but as far as the entire game, I thought it was the best played game since the Sacramento State game.
DW: I thought our offense did a great job. I thought we had a great scheme offensively, we moved the ball. Gary Anderson gave our offense a complement and said, "You guys did a good job of moving the ball." Unfortunately we couldn't score points to keep us in it but when you're looking for positives, that's a positive and hopefully we can build on it this week.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: How was bye week for you and the team?
DeWayne Walker: We [coaches] worked on Sunday and Monday, gave them [players] Monday off and then practiced Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and then gave them the weekend off. We brought them back Sunday afternoon and had meetings on Sunday, had a little light practice yesterday [Monday] to get them back into it and we're back full tilt today.

bc.net: Did you notice any difference in your team, maybe a little more energy after having a few days off?
DW: We did. We noticed yesterday they had a little more bounce. I've been just preaching to these guys, we're going to keep fighting and we're obviously going to play a lot of very good teams in this last half of the season and let's see if we can knock a couple of these teams off and kind of be the spoiler so to speak with some of these games we have left.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedcrimson.net: Obviously the loss to UTSA this past Saturday was another tough game. What were your takeaways from the game?
DeWayne Walker: Well you know we turned the ball over four times, I just hate to keep beating up the offense, again it's not like the defense is top ten in the country but any time you turn the ball over four times and score seven points, that's not a great formula for success. Defensively I thought we did some things early to keep us in it but it's just like anything else, we can't sustain anything after adversity hits. When [Austin] Franklin muffed the punt, it's just seemed like the wheels came off. Before that we were looking like a football team. It's discouraging and it's hard to watch when you can't play a consistent game against an opponent that I really felt like we had a chance to beat.

bc.net: When we talked last week you said that in the first ten minutes of the game you wanted to see a lot of energy and aggressiveness from the team and I thought you did that. You came out and put together the longest sustained first drive of the year and then you put together two good defensive stops and your second offensive drive was everything we've been hoping to see.
DW: Well I think we've got to look at what we're doing offensively a little bit. I know it's easy to beat up your quarterback but we've got to help him. We've got to get rid of the ball faster, help him scheme-wise. Plus I think that's going to help our offensive line. I just don't think we're stout enough to run the power run game. We haven't really been all that successful. Schematically we're going to have to change some things. We're probably going to use Tra Colwell a little bit more in the wildcat package to try to bring a little more juice to the offense.

Defensively it's just the explosive plays. They're still showing up. We'll show some spurts of playing pretty consistent ball but then the adversity hits and we go. We just don't play well off each other. When the oftense is struggling, the defense will hold up for a minute but they're not able to sustain it. When the offense starts getting starts getting drives together the defense gives up a long drive. We still don't have a formula yet for playing team football. That's why we're 1-4.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: What are some things that you took away from the UNM game on Saturday?
DeWayne Walker: The one thing is, you hate to point fingers and I'm never going to do that because I think we've all got a hand in it, I just think our offense really sparks this football team. It does. I think when we struggle on offense, I think we're stagnant. I really do and it's something that I've addressed with Coach Mac [McManus]. I was a little shocked about our offensive performance. Not that we were the '85 Bears on defense because we're not but I just think for them to have held us to seven points for as long as they did, I was a little surprised by that. Even when you look at our game from last year, we had to score points. We scored 42? That had a lot to do, it was 42-28. I just think in college football unless you have a great defense, and we don't have a great defense, I just think you're going to have to score some points. You're just going to have to match them. I just think there were too many series in that game where we just didn't have any production and then obviously we couldn't get off the field either. I'm not going to eliminate that. I thought the defense when we did get off the field we needed to make some things happen because that style of offense, that's what they do. If you're not better than them, they're going to have opportunities to hold that football and they did. I think again and it's frustrating, we still haven't put together that team victory yet since Sac State and I think that's probably the most frustrating thing right now. We've gotta be able to work a little better together and we haven't done that the last three games.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: The UTEP game wasn't the result that you wanted, what were you able to take away from the game?
DeWayne Walker: When you look at the last two games, the last eight quarters, I think we probably stunk it up in two out of eight quarters this season against two very good teams. And these are bowl teams. When you look at it from that perspective you can take some positives out of that. I think the most disappointing thing was the first quarter. I was just very disappointed with all of us, anybody involved in that game. I was very disappointed to come in a rival game… it's embarrassing to the alumni, everybody involved. But then when you look at once we settled down, I thought we kind of made our mind up that hey we can play with these guys, despite other mistakes. But it was a better football game outside of that first quarter.

If you play against bowl teams like this and I think both of these teams will play in bowl games this year, you've gotta play four quarters. In our last two games we've stunk it up in a quarter in each game to keep us from putting it in a position where the fourth quarter would decide how the game was going to go.

That was probably the most disappointing thing.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the Ohio game?
DeWayne Walker: I thought we looked like a pretty good team for a half and even some of that third quarter. We were in striking distance but you just can't make mistakes down the stretch with six minutes left to go in the third quarter against a good Ohio team. We're just still trying to find ourselves to a certain degree. I still feel good about being 1-1 but we've still got a ways to go to accomplish our goals this year.

bc.net: The first the team looked good, the offense had a good balance to it and the defense was playing well. What were some things you saw in the first half that pleased you?
DW: We played as a team. I've been saying this ever since I got the job here. When we start playing consistently as a team we're going to have a good football team at some point. I thought it had a chance to show everybody a glimpse of what that looks like. We've just gotta figure out a way to do that for four quarters.  Continue Reading This Post >>