University of Massachusets Athletics
Quotes From Coach Brown's Monday Teleconference
August 30, 2004 | Football
Aug. 30, 2004
On Monday, the Atlantic 10 began its weekly teleconference with league coaches. Here are some excerpts from UMass head coach Don Brown as the Minutemen open the season at Delaware State on Saturday. Question: When you look at the success you had at Northeastern and it started with running the football and establishing the line of scrimmage, as you go to UMass now it appears the make up of the offense is tailor made for your system, from Rob Kane and the experience on "O" line and Rich Demers, can this UMass team play power football the way you like to? Brown: We'll find out, obviously in a few very days, but I've been really excited about Rich Demers' development and we've kind of played him in two spots a fullback and a tailback. Now with Steve Baylark back in school and back practicing with us, it's a pretty formidable backfield in terms of size. I'm not sure if there is a bigger backfield tandem in I-AA with Demers over 240 pounds and Baylark at 228. Although we are also getting outstanding play from freshman Bryan Smith who's done a really nice job for us and Steve Wysocki has done a good job at fullback. As you mentioned you have to be solid up front with Stoetzel, Kane and O.J. McBride. I think Alex Miller is probably the smartest center that I've ever been around and David Thompson is manning that other guard position. We feel good about Matt Austin, so we feel like we've got six guys in the offensive line that we can play and Mike Douglas has done a great job at tight end as well, so some of those ingredients are there, now we just have to see if we can get going in the same direction. Question: Is it difficult to coach against a brand new head coach that you will be seeing for the first time and particularly someone that hasn't been a head coach before? Brown: Well, it sure is and we've been sitting here scratching our heads since last Thursday trying to figure out exactly what Coach Lavan is going to run, you get little dribs and drabs. You know obviously he was fortunate enough to get Coach Warden with him, the former offensive coordinator at Eastern Michigan. Obviously, we'll just wait and see and it is tough because you are not sure what direction you're going to go on either side of the ball. They have new coordinators and that is why we have preseason, you better stay flexible and you'd better stay adaptable. Question: Having played UMass for the past few years, you are familiar with them somewhat seeing them on film and what have you, but once you got into practices and stuff where there any areas you were more impressed than your first annalist of the team. Brown: We've got a huge chore in that we are trying to replace six or seven starters in the front defense. I was very concerned about that and obviously that's a huge rebuilding project. If you look at us as a match of goals with Delaware State, they are 300 pounds across the front and a tight end who's an excellent player and James Edmonds who they predict as a pro prospect, we're not very big, but I've been impressed with our foot speed and our ability to move and fly around and get off blocks. That's what it's all about, being able to get off blocks and I'm excited about our young front seven is responding to our challenges and we certainly give them some schematic challenges as well. Question: You talk about that front seven. Two returning players who you spoke very highly of in the off season, Jason Leonard and Keron Williams, how good can those two players be for you this year? Brown: Well, I think very good. Keron, we practiced inside and was a substitute who played some a year ago. We moved him to what we believe is his natural position 4-3 defensive end. Jason Leonard who was predominately a scout team guy as a red shirt freshman is playing nose guard and has really taken to the position and I think he can really be a sideline to sideline type nose guard and give us some movement factors maybe that we haven't had in the past. Question: Chris, again: Can you just tell us how excited you are to be back at UMass and take over a program like that? Brown: Well, I'm excited, we had two great years here, my family and I, both personally and professionally and we had 22 wins in two years. Mark Whipple is a great friend of mine and having the opportunity to come in behind him and the nice thing too. There's a lot of challenges especially on the defensive side of the ball, we are excited about our core offense and to be honest, I think the preseason camp couldn't have gone much better than it did in terms of organization and guys just flying around and the one thing, these guys have fun playing football and that makes me more excited about the challenge. Question:Was it a difficult decision to go with Day as your quarterback or did that come easy for you? Brown: It really came easy for us, to be honest, coming out of the spring I don't think anybody established themselves as the starter. Timmy, just once we got going in preseason camp here, just seemed to pick up where he left off and get better every day. I'm awfully excited that he has made that improvement and he's really taken to our offense and the guys have really taken to him, he's been really good in the huddle and I'm still excited about the way Steve Howell has preformed and freshman Liam Coen will be an excellent player for us, as well, in the future. Question: In the past two years, UMass has led the A-10 in take-aways and you return all your secondary guys like Shannon James, Steve Costello, James Ihedigbo, all with at least four interceptions last year and you get R.J. Cobbs back, will this be the strength of your defense and does the secondary with this type of talent allow you to take more chances or be more aggressive on defense. Brown: Obviously, if you have followed us in the past, we're going to take chances. So those guys that you need to have top flight corners and you need to have guys that are willing to take that one on one challenge. And I'll be honest, Steve Costello has come off surgery this summer and is not 100 percent, is practicing and we are controlling his reps as we go along, we are hoping he'll be ready for us this weekend. Tracy Belton has been playing outstanding. He played as a true freshman a year ago, I couldn't be more happy with his play. You mentioned James Ihedigbo, we moved him from free to strong safety to get him involved with the front eight, help us in the run game, some edge stuff, things we like to do with our strong safety and Shannon James has been in and out of practice as well with a bothersome foot but seems to have solidified himself for the last few days and we are happy with the way Leroy Brooks is responding. And R.J. Cobbs has really responded well to the cornerback position, is playing well. Looks like we can put a lot of pressure on those corners to do things and even hitting it on the head. With a young front seven, those guys need to step up and protect the shell, as we call it and take over a lot of the responsibility of not allowing big plays and I feel I have one of those secondary units that I can put the pressure on.
