* Courtesy Penn State Sports Information
James Franklin Postgame Quotes
Penn State vs. Buffalo, 9/12
Opening Statement:
First thing I’d like to do is thank the fans. Especially the students, it was one of the more beautiful days in Happy Valley. The fact that our students were still out there going crazy under those types of conditions, I’m very appreciative of that. We’ve said from day one the entire community and campus coming together we are going to do great things this year, so I wanted to take a minute to thank everybody for that. I’ll give you guys some high points we have from the game. Carl Nassib who I’ve been bragging about all summer first career interception, career-high three sacks, and two forced fumbles. We have a freshman DeAndre Thompkins with a 58-yard punt return, longest one since Derrick Williams in 2008. Christian Hackenberg moved into second place on Penn State’s career completions list. First time since 2007 that we had a kick return and a punt return for 58 yards or more in a game. DaeSean Hamilton with his third career touchdown. Austin Johnson with nine tackles. Evan Schwan with career-high four tackles. Saquon Barkley, who I thought gave us a spark, came in as a freshman and did some exciting things. Had 15 yards, most for a true freshman since Silas Redd [in 2011]. Before Saquon got here he used to hurdle people all the time in high school and he said I’m not going to do that in college. I said that doesn’t make sense because in high school it’s illegal to hurdle people and it’s legal in college. I’m glad that he brought that back out of his bag of tricks. First time two true freshmen scored a touchdown in a single game since 2005. One of the other important stats is that we protected our quarterback, we moved the pocket, ran the ball. I thought our defense had some momentum with changing plays and sacks and interceptions and with turnovers today. I thought at times we started to create an identity for this football team on offense and defense. I thought on special teams the last two weeks we played pretty well, but we need to clean up our punting and be much more consistent. I think that will be helpful especially with the style of football we are trying to play.
Q: You were carrying a play card, did you take a more active role in the play calling? How did you think the offense ran today?
A: I was more active all week long. We lost Andrew Nelson for the game, and you could make the argument that he is one of our better offensive linemen. So I thought considering everything we did some nice things on offense today. We were able to run the ball, I don’t think we had a turnover in the game, in pretty significant wet weather. I thought all the coaches did a nice job having a plan and to have our guys be prepared. There’s still a lot of things we need to get cleaned up and a lot of things we need to get better.
Q: Why did you feel the need to take a more active role in play calling?
A: We needed to be more effective. We needed to be more effective on offense and defense and special teams. There are a lot of challenges that I think a lot of people aren’t aware of, but no body wants to hear it. We have to find a way to get better every single day and that’s through fundamentals and technique. I do think Saquon Barkley being able to make people miss tackles is helpful for us. Polk has brought that, I think Godwin’s consistency has really brought something. I think Mike Gesicki is a special player. He had some opportunities today, but he’ll make those next week. I saw him right after the game and the first thing he says to me is “I’ll bounce back.” I told him to enjoy the win and I know you’re going to bounce back. Enjoy the win and we’ll get back to work tomorrow. I’m proud of the guys for preserving, for sticking together, having each other’s backs and finding a way to get a dub.
Q: Can you talk about how the offensive line did after losing Andrew Nelson, and can you tell us anything about Andrew’s situation?
A: Andrew’s been dealing with a situation since he got here. It flares up at times and from what I’ve been told from the trainers it’s the same thing. I think the fact that we had moving parts and we put Wendy Laurent in there. He wasn’t available in Week 1, but we were able to bring him in this week. I think that was helpful. Paris Palmer got the Week 1 jitters out and I think played pretty well. I think we managed the O-line situation much better. Being able to run the ball and move the pocket and throw quick gains, allows those guys to have success. I thought the O-line stepped up when they needed to.
Q: Overall, how did you think the defense played?
A: I think we all know that our D-line can be really disruptive on the pass game. I think they can still be even more disruptive. I thought the defense played well. That offense has a good plan, we talked about Coach Leipold’s background. I thought our defense played. I still think we can play to another level defensively, offensively and special teams, but I thought at times our D-line really took over the game. I’d like to see them do that more consistently. Troy Reeder had seven tackles, I find that hard to believe, he seemed like he was all over the field and he did really well for a red-shirt freshman.
Q: When and how did Saquon [Barkley] demonstrate to you that he could, 1. Handle running the ball at this level and 2. Make plays like he did?
A: It was very early on. We played him in week one. Its not like he hasn’t played. Were only in the second week of the season. He played some in week one, showed some flashes, allowed his roll to continue to grow as he gets more comfortable and confident. He needs to improve in pass perception in terms of responsibilities. We managed that today. He was in for passes then for third down we took him out and put Akeel [Lynch] back in. He just has to keep working, I feel really good. I feel Akeel has a chance to be a special back. We look at Mark Allen, and Saquon and Nick Scott. Nick Scott showed some things as a kick returner today, and he’s got a chance to do some great things. We have four backs we feel good about. And the O-line will continue to grow and our tight ends, like Brent Wilkerson, played a good game as blockers. We need to get our tight ends more involved in our passing game.
Q: Could you evaluate what you saw when you had three linebackers on the field and what you thought of the packages when you went to two linebackers and five defensive backs?
A: I thought our linebackers continued to play well. There is still a lot of communication in our defense and I thought overall they handled that well. Sometimes with the tempo that they were doing, we needed to water down our calls and make a base call to let our guys get their cleats in the ground and play fast. I think we could of done a better job of doing that. [Jason] Cabinda played well, [Troy] Reeder played well, Von Walker did really well. We didn’t really call the game any different with our star package, and that’s how it’s going to be. And that’s going to be valuable for the guys moving forward. Hopefully we will get a few more guys back this week.
James Franklin Postgame Quotes
Penn State vs. Buffalo, 9/12
Opening Statement:
First thing I’d like to do is thank the fans. Especially the students, it was one of the more beautiful days in Happy Valley. The fact that our students were still out there going crazy under those types of conditions, I’m very appreciative of that. We’ve said from day one the entire community and campus coming together we are going to do great things this year, so I wanted to take a minute to thank everybody for that. I’ll give you guys some high points we have from the game. Carl Nassib who I’ve been bragging about all summer first career interception, career-high three sacks, and two forced fumbles. We have a freshman DeAndre Thompkins with a 58-yard punt return, longest one since Derrick Williams in 2008. Christian Hackenberg moved into second place on Penn State’s career completions list. First time since 2007 that we had a kick return and a punt return for 58 yards or more in a game. DaeSean Hamilton with his third career touchdown. Austin Johnson with nine tackles. Evan Schwan with career-high four tackles. Saquon Barkley, who I thought gave us a spark, came in as a freshman and did some exciting things. Had 15 yards, most for a true freshman since Silas Redd [in 2011]. Before Saquon got here he used to hurdle people all the time in high school and he said I’m not going to do that in college. I said that doesn’t make sense because in high school it’s illegal to hurdle people and it’s legal in college. I’m glad that he brought that back out of his bag of tricks. First time two true freshmen scored a touchdown in a single game since 2005. One of the other important stats is that we protected our quarterback, we moved the pocket, ran the ball. I thought our defense had some momentum with changing plays and sacks and interceptions and with turnovers today. I thought at times we started to create an identity for this football team on offense and defense. I thought on special teams the last two weeks we played pretty well, but we need to clean up our punting and be much more consistent. I think that will be helpful especially with the style of football we are trying to play.
Q: You were carrying a play card, did you take a more active role in the play calling? How did you think the offense ran today?
A: I was more active all week long. We lost Andrew Nelson for the game, and you could make the argument that he is one of our better offensive linemen. So I thought considering everything we did some nice things on offense today. We were able to run the ball, I don’t think we had a turnover in the game, in pretty significant wet weather. I thought all the coaches did a nice job having a plan and to have our guys be prepared. There’s still a lot of things we need to get cleaned up and a lot of things we need to get better.
Q: Why did you feel the need to take a more active role in play calling?
A: We needed to be more effective. We needed to be more effective on offense and defense and special teams. There are a lot of challenges that I think a lot of people aren’t aware of, but no body wants to hear it. We have to find a way to get better every single day and that’s through fundamentals and technique. I do think Saquon Barkley being able to make people miss tackles is helpful for us. Polk has brought that, I think Godwin’s consistency has really brought something. I think Mike Gesicki is a special player. He had some opportunities today, but he’ll make those next week. I saw him right after the game and the first thing he says to me is “I’ll bounce back.” I told him to enjoy the win and I know you’re going to bounce back. Enjoy the win and we’ll get back to work tomorrow. I’m proud of the guys for preserving, for sticking together, having each other’s backs and finding a way to get a dub.
Q: Can you talk about how the offensive line did after losing Andrew Nelson, and can you tell us anything about Andrew’s situation?
A: Andrew’s been dealing with a situation since he got here. It flares up at times and from what I’ve been told from the trainers it’s the same thing. I think the fact that we had moving parts and we put Wendy Laurent in there. He wasn’t available in Week 1, but we were able to bring him in this week. I think that was helpful. Paris Palmer got the Week 1 jitters out and I think played pretty well. I think we managed the O-line situation much better. Being able to run the ball and move the pocket and throw quick gains, allows those guys to have success. I thought the O-line stepped up when they needed to.
Q: Overall, how did you think the defense played?
A: I think we all know that our D-line can be really disruptive on the pass game. I think they can still be even more disruptive. I thought the defense played well. That offense has a good plan, we talked about Coach Leipold’s background. I thought our defense played. I still think we can play to another level defensively, offensively and special teams, but I thought at times our D-line really took over the game. I’d like to see them do that more consistently. Troy Reeder had seven tackles, I find that hard to believe, he seemed like he was all over the field and he did really well for a red-shirt freshman.
Q: When and how did Saquon [Barkley] demonstrate to you that he could, 1. Handle running the ball at this level and 2. Make plays like he did?
A: It was very early on. We played him in week one. Its not like he hasn’t played. Were only in the second week of the season. He played some in week one, showed some flashes, allowed his roll to continue to grow as he gets more comfortable and confident. He needs to improve in pass perception in terms of responsibilities. We managed that today. He was in for passes then for third down we took him out and put Akeel [Lynch] back in. He just has to keep working, I feel really good. I feel Akeel has a chance to be a special back. We look at Mark Allen, and Saquon and Nick Scott. Nick Scott showed some things as a kick returner today, and he’s got a chance to do some great things. We have four backs we feel good about. And the O-line will continue to grow and our tight ends, like Brent Wilkerson, played a good game as blockers. We need to get our tight ends more involved in our passing game.
Q: Could you evaluate what you saw when you had three linebackers on the field and what you thought of the packages when you went to two linebackers and five defensive backs?
A: I thought our linebackers continued to play well. There is still a lot of communication in our defense and I thought overall they handled that well. Sometimes with the tempo that they were doing, we needed to water down our calls and make a base call to let our guys get their cleats in the ground and play fast. I think we could of done a better job of doing that. [Jason] Cabinda played well, [Troy] Reeder played well, Von Walker did really well. We didn’t really call the game any different with our star package, and that’s how it’s going to be. And that’s going to be valuable for the guys moving forward. Hopefully we will get a few more guys back this week.
