University of Massachusets Athletics
Head Coach Don Brown's Thoughts From Weekly Teleconference
September 17, 2007 | Football
Sept. 17, 2007
UMass football is off to a 3-0 start, 1-0 in CAA play, after a 36-13 win over Towson on Saturday. Read what Head Coach Don Brown had to say in his weekly teleconference.
On the first half of the game:
The game opened where Towson took the ball and we made a coverage mistake in terms of a coverage check. They took advantage of it and got the ball down inside our red zone. We had a pass interference call. It was a difficult call for us, but a correct call. They capitalized to make it 7-0. Our offense responded really well by going down and finishing the drive with a 40-yard field goal from Chris Koepplin that made it 7-3. Towson came right back down and hit a play-action pass over the middle. We were able to stem the tide there and force them to kick a field goal, which was good; we're down 10-3. Then Liam Coen took us right back down the field with 1:56 left in the first quarter. Mike Omar catches a touchdown pass and it's 10-10 at that point. It's really anybody's game. Our defense came up with a big stop on a big sack by Burris. There was a special teams mishap which resulted in the ball getting snapped into the endzone, which we got the safety on. Just before the half, Rasheed Rancher made a great catch against a blitz. One of the best catches I've ever seen, for a 35-yard touchdown, to put us up 19-10 at the half.
On the three turnovers in the second half:
That's when things got strange for us, as we turned the ball over on three consecutive series. One on the 27, one on the 12, and one on the minus 47. It was nice to see our defense step up and minimize the damage to a three-point field goal off the one scenario. Courtney Robinson had a big interception in the endzone, which was real key for us. We minimized the damage when we gave them the ball on the 12 to a field goal. Then on the minus 47, we turned that back as well. That was a big confidence booster, something we needed on defense.
On the second half:
We did a really good job of trying to keep Sean Schaefer throwing the short game and pressuring him. We had five sacks; our defensive front seven and eight tried to mix a bunch of different thoughts there and did a good job with it. The third quarter was a good one for Towson in terms of their defense. We had to survive that stretch. Early in the fourth quarter, they're driving again and Sean Smalls [comes up with] a 90-yard interception return, which was a huge play for us. We capped it off at the end of the day with Mike Omar on a bubble pass for a touchdown.
General thoughts on the game:
A very hard fought game, a very close game. The score was not indicative of the type of game it was. I have a lot of respect for Sean Schaefer, he's an extremely good quarterback and a very tough individual. Their defense played real hard all day long and we were just fortunate enough to get the win. Once again, we were plagued by penalties. A lot of them are effort and energy penalties. Not one phase of the game or another, they were spread out. Again Liam was very efficient. He was able to get off the track late in the third when he got decked. He came back in the game and finished the game off for us. We're a work in progress, no question about it. We took a small step defensively, that's for sure.
On the status of Liam Coen:
He was bouncing around yesterday, walking around. He was pretty sore, but he was on his feet bouncing around, so we're hoping to have him for the weekend. Any time a guy goes down, you're not real excited. Hopefully we have dodged a bullet. We'll know a little bit more today and tomorrow.
On Coen's play this season:
Any time he's under center, we certainly have a chance to be successful. He has great skill with what we're trying to do offensively, he has a better feel of what people are trying to do to him defensively, and he's starting to take advantage of that. Is his menu grown this year? Probably yes. He's taken on more of a responsibility for our offense and we're happy with his progress, that's for sure.
On getting prepared for Maine:
Very similar attack to a year ago. They've gone to the spread offense. I remember when Maine was a knock it down your throat football team, to see coach go to the spread has been surprising, but they've done a nice job of adjusting. They're excellent on defense with McCrossan, John Wormuth, and others. They've got a number of guys who play hard and play well together. We have a lot of respect for what they have done defensively. I thought Farkes gave them something at quarterback this weekend. I'm very impressed with Jhamal Fluellen; he had an exciting run on the option play and also popped some known runs. They've started to get their legs underneath them. I thought their best half of football was the second half against Villanova, so we certainly know we have our hands full. We have to drive up to Orono, and play a very very good Maine team that's hungry for a win.
On Sean Smalls:
The thing that he does is he's very good at defending people and taking his assignment personally. He has not been big on the turnover piece. To see him respond with a big turnover on Saturday was exciting for all of us. It was at a spot in the game when it was really needed as Schaefer had them driving. Our whole secondary stepped up; we had three interceptions on Saturday. Any time you can get three on Sean Schaefer, you feel pretty good about what you did. Some of that has to be attributed to the way our front is playing as well. We're playing about 17-18 guys. I like the way we're going in that respect and defending that Towson throw offense is no easy task. We need a guy like Smalls to take a leadership role and he did that on Saturday.
On the strength of the Colonial Athletic Association:
Congratulations to coach McDonald, quarterback Ricky Santos, and all those guys. Second week in a row you've got to go on a plane and play in somebody's home in a tough environment. Congratulations to the New Hampshire program on a tremendous win [over Marshall on Saturday]. Each conference in our country has two to three premier teams that year in and year out you point to and you know are going to be there. In our conference, that's a revolving door. Everybody's got a chance to win because everybody is good. The reality is if you don't take care of your business and you show up in somebody else's home or they come to your home and you're not ready to play, you're going to get beat. It shows the strength of our programs from top to bottom throughout the league. That's what makes our conference great.
