Mike Locksley on Rutgers loss, B1G failures, Maryland football's bye week

23 hours ago

7 min read

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-U3QWGFbd0

Opening statement

“As usual, got to give Greg [Schiano] and Rutgers credit. They executed their gameplay to a tee. Time of possession, they had 34 minutes of time of possession, did a really good job of controlling the tempo of the game in the second half, executed better on third down. The things they did well were the things we didn’t [do well] in the second half – didn't have enough sustained drives till the end. Which [I’m] proud of the fight that our guys show, fighting until the end of the play but disappointed in the result. Words like disappointing, frustrated, all come to play. But also convicted, still convicted because every day these kids come and give me their best, and they're going to get their best from me. They deserve my best every single day, and I'm gonna continue to do that.”

“We’ve a bye week coming up. We're gonna use that time to evaluate every aspect of it. Everything's on the board from personnel to preparation, execution, decisions, all those things. But my focus will be on finding answers and solutions, getting better, and continuing to fight for the players once we get back here against Illinois.”

Locksley’s legacy if Saturday is last game (it isn’t expected to be)

“I won't get into that. As I said, I'm here for these players, super convicted. The only thing that I'm concerned about is doing my very best for them until they tell me I can't. And those players continue to do their best. I'll continue to give them my best.’

On offense’s tempo through the game

“A week ago we played a team like Ohio State and we wanted to shrink the game. We wanted to play how Rutgers played today. They executed, they limited explosive plays, and they used the clock. And for us, we knew we had to play with tempo because of how they would affect the game, minimizing the opportunities we have. When we got in sync, as you saw near the end of the game, the no huddle with the mayday tempo, but we [were] just too late. We had drive opportunities in the third and fourth quarter that when they shrink the game on offense, you can't afford the three and outs. We had two three and outs, I think, that really cost us. But then we were able to fight back to the end, at the end. Football is a game of inches and the inches didn’t fall our way.”

Whether it’s tougher to avoid the noise

“Not at all, man. I've been at Maryland for 18 years. I've been through some four games, five games. I came in 1997, and I get asked, "How do you deal with it? Well, I've coached at Maryland long enough to know how you just withstand it. You stay convicted on doing whatever it takes to get out of that and give your best. That’s what I’m going to continue to do.”

On being outscored 92-13 in second half in Big Ten play

“Even today, I would venture to say – I don’t know because I haven’t looked at it but I think we may have won the fourth quarter so it’s not necessarily fourth quarter, it’s a matter of the third and the fourth. The gameplan behind knowing if they’re going to shrink it, that our efficiency has to be really good. We weren’t efficient in the third quarter on offense. We didn’t get off the field on defense, allowed a couple of scores there. The field position battle flipped with the wind obviously in the third quarter to where they had short fields and we didn’t sustain drives. To me, that’s not about the fourth quarter. That’s about the third quarter, that’s about the adjustments we’ve got to make and playing more efficient and giving us the best chance with how we call it.”

On the TE production

“Well, we were healthy at tight end. Preston [Howard] is back. He was, a week ago, he was back but limited. Dorian [Fleming] [has] gotten a lot healthier. I thought this week he had a really good week of practice. And then I saw glimpses out of the young freshman tight end, [Damon Hall] last week at the end of that game that he was starting to come on. And for us to be the offense we need to be, our tight ends have to become more involved. Our tight ends have to make plays, and we saw [that] today. We were able to see Preston make a play early in the first half. Down at the end, Dorian’s play comes down to get his foot in bounds. But we need our tight ends to play because they're usually the equalizer with the matchups that they face.”

Why Locksley thinks he can fix the issues once and for all

“I don't know if you ever can, as a parent or as a coach or as a teacher, fix everything once and for all. All you can do is continue to give it the attention that it needs to fix. And me, that's where my conviction lies. Because again, I've been a part of working through these type of tough times. I've been a part of them here at Maryland. And the key to it isn't just a one-time thing of getting it fixed. It's consistently doing the necessary work to get all those things fixed. And, the point of emphasis today was special teams. We scored on special teams. A couple weeks ago, the point of emphasis was tackling, we got better at tackling. We're going to continue to look at every aspect of our program and continue to be teachers, coaches, and work through getting it fixed, and not lose the energy to fix it.”

Whether anything surfaced on Saturday that can help Maryland in the future

“I think the big message for me was that talking about what we need to do isn't the answer. It goes back to what we started the year on – the work. We had opportunities in the third quarter to do the work that we needed to do to win a ball game and we didn't get it done. Coaches, players, all of us, and so the message is how convicted I am to continuing to do the necessary work. I'm not bored with it. I'm not tired of it. I have the energy for it. They are the reason I have this energy. You can see those guys fought, even when it looked like we had no chance. And next thing you know, we find ourselves with an opportunity. And so, that's the thing that I see every day in practice that motivates me to continue to give them the energy I have to, and I'll continue to do so.”

Whether Locksley still agrees this game wasn’t a higher priority than the rest

“Of course. Every game, we've treated each opponent with the respect of being an opponent. And as I've said here many times, that it's very rarely what the opponent does, it’s usually what we do. And so the opponent typically doesn't matter. The way I was raised as a coach, the opponent doesn't matter. They’re faceless, nameless. The thing you can do is focus on what you can control. We got to do a better job of controlling the things we can. That's my job to get us there.”

On Malik Washington’s completing under 53% of passes for fourth straight game

“Yeah, good question. Didn't know that he was 53% today, but I can tell you, I know we had a few drops. Sometimes you look at – we call it an accuracy percentage. He has a bunch of throwaways when there's pressure, he has drops. So I would venture to say I thought he maybe had two or three missed throws. I think the percentage was kind of skewed when you have drops or when you have throwaways. Throwaways are using their byproduct of protection, giving them enough time. And he's done a tremendous job of not taking sacks, which may affect the completion percentage. And then the drops, we got to make sure our players do their job of catching balls and are capable of being caught.”

On defense in first vs. second half

“Yeah, I thought the first half, and I said this at halftime. The first half of this game is probably the most complimentary half where all three phases complemented each other. Special teams had the attention that they needed to have, blocked extra points, scoop, take it up, get the points from that. Defense, couple [of] turnovers giving us advantageous field position, offense taking advantage of it. That series of events in the first half is what – it says to me as a coach, man, let's do that again in the second half. We reset, go to 0-0, and we didn't do it the second half. We didn't execute drives. We didn't get the turnovers. We didn't get stops. Lost the field position battle with special teams. And so to me, that's the tale of two halves. My job is to figure out the best decisions that we have to make to get the second half fixed and that's what I'll do this next couple of weeks.”

On taking care of the players in a difficult season

“That’s an easy one for me because a lot of these kids are a lot like me, man. This isn't the hardest thing they've ever been through in their lives, if you go look at our roster up and down. A lot of these kids, and we talk about it, face adversity. And unfortunately, football mimics life for a lot of us. You'll have some tough seasons. You'll have some tough games. No one here [has] written off this season just yet. We got 1-0 every week. We’ll get a couple of weeks to get healthy and get things looked at, evaluated for the first time to have a chance to really sit back and quality control every part of our program. And I look forward to getting that done.”

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