Mike Locksley on Indiana, RB DeJuan Williams, OL progress, 'shock the world' mentality

Ahmed Ghafir
11 hours ago
9 min read

Everything that Maryland head coach Mike Locksley said following the bye week and ahead of Saturday’s matchup vs. second-ranked Indiana:

Opening statement

“Appreciate you guys being here, coming off our second bye which really came at a good time or a great time for us in terms of both health and mindset. Had quite a few injuries we dealt with going into UCLA and also during the game and during the week and very hopeful that we're able to get some of those guys back this week. It's also allowed us to kind of hit the reset button. The last bye week we worked on the individual prescriptions. This bye week, we worked on our unit prescriptions as to things we as a unit need to improve upon and get corrected. It allowed us to really turn our focus on to those individual things as a unit, but also allowed us to focus and see what we're doing well and what we need to improve upon which bye weeks tend to allow you to do. I feel really confident coming out of the bye week that the things that showed up for us, as I've said before, when this young team, when we emphasize something, we usually see the fruits of it. The one area that we continue to want to work towards is being able to win in the fourth quarter. And I think I know that we've continued to do the necessary things that will give us a chance.”

On Indiana

“Indiana, obviously, a lot of respect for their program. Coach Cignetti, I've known a long time. It comes from the pedigree, his dad, a Hall of Fame college football coach who I had the chance to compete against as a student athlete at Towson State when he was the head coach at IUP and always had great teams. And brother, [Frank], that's also a coach. So you know, he's part of the family business, and has really done a good job of not just at Indiana, but if you look at his track record everywhere he's been, he's won. And you got to give credit to a guy that does it and he's built it the right way. Got a lot of respect for him, extremely good in all three phases. When you look at Indiana's roster, I think they got 22 juniors or redshirts seniors or higher in their program in their two-deep. And so a veteran, veteran group with a lot of those guys are guys that have been with him throughout his time at James Madison that traveled with him to Indiana, which has allowed him to really get a jump start with a veteran team that knows his system and he has taken full advantage of that opportunity.”

On Indiana QB Fernando Mendoza, offense

“The quarterback is as advertised. He's one of those guys that throws it very accurately. He's efficient. As he goes, they go. Obviously the rushing attack, they got a guy we're very familiar with, Roman Hemby, I think is leading them in rushing. They got two 500-yard rushers. They got a 300-yard rusher behind them, you look at the receiving core veteran receivers, [Elijah] Sarrett, a guy from right down the road, went to St Frances, transferred up to JMU and then goes with his coach to Indiana, and is having a big year along with [Omar] Cooper. So really done a good job on the offensive side. But I think defensively is where they really jump out, because they've got another veteran group there. And it seems like number four is all over the tape. You know, the [Aiden] Fisher kid, the linebacker, really talented player, on the back end number five [D’Angelo Ponds] is a really talented player. And then, you know, obviously they have the [Mikail] Kamara kid as a pass rusher that has been, I think all three of those guys were first team all Big Ten a year ago. So really talented across the board, will be a well-coached team, but what a great opportunity it is for us to host a top two team here in The Shell for homecoming. Ideal situation for us and I know our players are looking forward to it, especially knowing that we probably will have a pretty good crowd in terms of people that are coming back to campus for homecoming.”

On game captains

“Our game captains into this game will be Octavian Smith, Jalen Huskey and Daniel Owens.”

On injury status with Zahir Mathis, Daniel Wingate

“They’re giving the effort to get back. They both were active and participated in practice yesterday. We're evaluating them this week to see and hopefully they will be available.”

On 'shock the world' mentality

“No. As we said earlier, and this is no disrespect to Indiana, but our opponent, much like what they do, is the biggest opponent we're going to face is ourselves. And I think when you look at the way the last three games have gone, it's been a lot more us than it has been the opponent. And those are the things that - that's why I feel pretty good about going into it because these are things that can be corrected, that we need to get corrected, and we'll get corrected this week.”

On what Locksley has to do better during November slate

“Well, one is the chess match of health. I mean, our biggest concern going into the season has been depth. And if you look at where our issues have lie, they typically lie in our lack of depth and when we need it most. Because when you lose six starters in that last drive against UCLA and replace them with freshmen, a lot of the meat of guys that have played plays around here aren't in our program. It is what it is. So not complaining, but what I have to do as a head coach is find a way to make sure that those guys are available to finish games and are as strong as we possibly can. So for me, it's adjusting practice. It's what are the things we're not good at right now. Right now, red zone offense and third down defense. So how do I put practice plans together that allow a young team to rehearse these situations? As much as I would love to see us pop these freshmen in the microwave and pop up redshirt seniors and redshirt juniors, it just doesn't happen that way. And so what we've got to do, and what I have to do, is make sure I put the best practice plans I can to expedite the growth, to expedite the learning curve for the young players that have been thrust into roles and have done a really good job at it.”

On what Locksley wants to see during the final stretch of the regular season

“I'm going one at a time. Michael, I'm not going down the road of prognosticating what makes it successful. I'm one game at a time.”

On CB Jamare Glasker

“A year ago, we had to reset the DB room, the corner room. if you watch us on tape, we had a lot of young players. We gave up a lot of passing yards and so we sat out to fix that issue, and we fixed it with getting a guy like Jamare Glasker to come back home. He's a guy from Potomac High School, Coach Crump down there in Oxon Hill area, has done a tremendous job and has given a ton of players and have sent a ton of players here to Maryland that have had great success. And Jamare has kind of settled down that corner room for us. He's a veteran presence. If you look at statistically what we've been able to do in the passing game, a lot of it can be attributed to our ability to play man-to-man coverage and that's what he excels at. Thing I've been a little more pleasantly surprised is the physicality that he'll play with. He's one of those corners typically you say, let's block safeties and let the corner make tackles. And he's been really a high-end tackler for us and brings a physicality to the position, as well as some size and length.”

On Indiana’s pass rush

“They're really slippery, meaning they've got some guys that do a great job of shedding and getting off of blocks. The movement that they create. They also create some issues with you in that they show all-out pressure but typically they're bringing four, which we call it change coverage. So it gives the illusion of here comes a bunch of people and then they drop a bunch of people out and then they bring an illusion of a bunch of people and they bring a bunch of people. So they create confusion and the protections, the points, who's coming, who's not, and that's what's created some of the disruptiveness that they've created in the passing game. Now, individually, the Kamara kids is by far one of the best pass rushers. He kind of reminds me of Yannick Ngakoue type guy, first step, quickness, speed, the power pass rusher that we've done a good job thus far of keeping our quarterback, a freshman quarterback from getting the yips of looking at the rush, because we've kind of made sure we blocked people up. Best thing we can do to help with those type of guys, and that type of thing is be able to run the ball and control the line of scrimmage in the run game.”

On Indiana’s rushing attack

“They're different. Roman is - you can tell [is] their every down back. They throw it to him. He's hit a few home runs. He and the kid, [Kaelon] Black, both are complimentary of each other. If you look at most people on offense, they have two guys, three guys that they rotate in, much like us. Both those guys are red shirt seniors that have had a lot of football in front of them, big tool boxes in protection and experience. And it shows up because in critical situations, you see those guys being very familiar with being able to make plays when they need them. And there's no doubt both those two backs are a little different. One's a little more heavy handed as a runner. Roman is, as we know, is a home run hitter that if you give him a crease, he will and can go and so we got to do a great job of gap, soundness, contain and tackling.”

On Maryland’s offensive line, success and area of growth

“I'll say one, I think we've been very intentional because one of the things I've learned over the 37 years I've been doing this is that if you got a really talented freshman quarterback, the worst thing you can do is have them get beat up as a freshman. They tend to not lose those and so what Pep, Hal and Wrobo have been able to do in terms of giving confidence to the young quarterback to where he knows that he's been protected and he has the ability to get through some progressions and has given us a chance. The area that's been the toughest has been obviously, being able to be efficient at running the ball, especially when we need to run the football. The thing that jumped out to me when I study us on offense is our P-and-10, our first and 10 efficiency. You want to get four or more and we haven't. We've been in 2^nd-and-10 quite a bit and when that happens, those downs are advantageous to the defense and those are the ones that, as you have veteran players, they learn to overcome those 2^nd-and-10s and that's kind of what we've worked on.”

On RB DeJuan Williams

“It's just time with DeJuan. I mean, he's a guy that came off an ACL, really talented player out of high school. Usually takes about a year and a half to get through the ACL. He is what we thought he would be, both he and he and Nolan [Ray], both he and Nolan compliment each other really well. DeJuan is a little more heavy handed, every down guy. Both do a great job in protection on third down and both are very capable as receivers. We've tried to focus [DeJuan] as one of those guys that has a really good receiving skill set, create some matchups - tight ends and running backs against linebackers. He's a guy we think can win. And so we've emphasized trying to get the ball to guys like Juan in space to take advantage of some opportunities.”

On the key to getting DeJuan Williams going

“Balance. Being able to efficiently see, read it through, cover people up, be better on the C-area blocks where a lot of the penetration has happened, get that cleaned up, which we worked on.”

On Jalen Huskey’s first half ejection for IU, how he’ll adjust for second half

“He won't be available in the first half per rules of being ejected in the second half of a game. Jalen is a veteran player. He's a senior, maybe even a redshirt senior, I don't know which one, but he's played a lot of football at Bowling Green before he came here. Acclimating a veteran player is a little easier than acclimating a true freshman or a guy that hasn’t had a lot of game experience. I think for him, it's a matter of keeping him warmed up on the sideline, him staying really mentally active with helping coach some of the younger guys, like the Messiah Delhommes that will be out there in place of him. And then once we're able to get him on the field, get him going pretty quickly, he's one of our leaders. He's a guy that we count upon to kind of be the guy in the locker room. And he's been doing just that for us, so we expect him to continue to do that.”

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