K-State Coordinators Meet with Media Prior to Texas Tech Game
Oct 01, 2020 | Football
MANHATTAN, Kan. – Kansas State offensive coordinator Courtney Messingham and defensive coordinator Joe Klanderman met with members of the media via Zoom on Thursday as the Wildcats prepare for their Big 12 home opener this Saturday against Texas Tech. The game against the Red Raiders slated for a 2:30 p.m. kick inside Bill Snyder Family Stadium and will be televised by FS1.
COURTNEY MESSINGHAM, OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR
On the absence of Harry Trotter at Oklahoma changing the play calling...
"Thankfully our ability to pass pro (protect) and stuff, we did a pretty good job early, so I maybe didn't feel as concerned as I maybe would have because I feel Harry really understands what we're doing protection wise and does a great job with that. Early in the game, obviously, it took a while to get things rolling at all. I think we had six plays in the first quarter, so I don't know if I had a good feel of where and how it was going to go. They were doing a good job of keeping the ball. Thankfully, we got some turnovers and kept them from scoring each time, but not having Harry was a concern early. Then, once I felt like we were kind of picking things up and weren't getting the quarterback hit much, I felt like we'd be alright."
On getting the wide receivers going...
"I think we just have to keep taking what people give us and understanding that it doesn't matter how we move the ball. We just need to move the ball. When you get opportunities to make a big play, you have to make that big play. I felt like we made a number of plays this week that we hadn't the week before. We still left some out on the field. We had opportunities to make two or three more plays that could've made our lives a little easier for sure."
On the team's quick-strike capability...
"I just felt like we made some plays and didn't get tackled one-on-one because, again, I kind of go back to Arkansas State a little bit on that and say there were probably five post plays where if we complete two or three of them, you feel like this team can move the ball in chunks by throwing it down the field. Unfortunately we didn't make those plays."
On the offensive line's progress during the OU game...
"Two fold, from the first quarter to the fourth quarter, our ability to at least start plugging away from a run-game standpoint to give ourselves a chance. The last touchdown, it was a nice run, but it was also blocked well. Probably the bigger difference from one game to the next was taking hits away from the quarterback. We only gave up one sack, and to be honest with you, I felt like he probably got hit more in game one, when he still got the throw off than he did against OU. That's going to be a huge deal for us, not just progressing from a run-game standpoint, but those five guys also have to do a good job with pass pro and do a good job of passing things off and giving us an opportunity to throw it if we're not running the ball as well as we want to."
On opening up the playbook with the offensive line clicking...
"It changes a bunch with our ability to use the play action pass. If you're running the ball and getting some four, six, eight and 12-yard run plays, then we can start running some play action and be able to throw it off of that. I felt like our ability to run the ball did help us. Did we run it that well? No, we didn't, but it still allowed us to use some different protections and kept the quarterback clean."
On more explosive plays this season...
"I think Deuce (Vaughn) is obviously something that's been great for us. He's done a phenomenal job to this point, but I also think it's Skylar (Thompson) delivering a ball where you can catch it and run with it. I think it's guys downfield making blocks. It's the whole offense understanding that one guy has to make sure he doesn't get tackled one-on-one, but everybody else has to play to the end. On one of Deuce's long receptions, Briley Moore does a phenomenal job of blocking downfield, cleaning a guy up that probably tackles him if we don't put the extra effort in to block downfield and allowing him to get 20 more yards. All of us need to keep understanding that you never know when your extra effort is going to be the difference."
On the difference in play calling this year with the variety of playmakers...
"I don't know that I feel much different, honestly. I felt like last year we still had guys to make plays. Were we as consistent as we needed to be? We've not proven yet this year that we'll be consistent. We need to be, and hope we can build on what we were able to do last week. We need to build on it. I think there's still a lot of room to get better. Our mindset needs to be that every day I can improve and need to improve."
On Texas Tech's defense...
"In the back end, they're going to really try to knife down, tackle and be physical. They're not a, 'box you in and mash you' kind of team. They're going to try to tackle everything low. They try to use their team speed and play fast, and their interior three guys are bigger, thicker guys. Their back end all are long, rangy guys who can really run. I'm not saying they have a mindset of trying to get off the field one way or another, but their mindset is fly around fast and make things happen fast. I'm sure that, from a program standpoint, they want the ball back in their offense's hands so they can get 90-100 snaps in if they can. We have to do a good job of forcing their defense to say out on the field, play eight, nine or 10-play drives and make them defend us and not just be where we're sitting on the sideline while their offense is doing things."
On working more people in this season...
"100 percent I feel that. The biggest examples I would use is our game last week and when you watch the Texas vs. Texas Tech game last week. I felt like we were as fresh and ready to go as you could be in the fourth quarter, even though it was in the fourth quarter. I felt like when you watched the game, we were in better shape. And it wasn't that each individual was in better shape. We used as many people as we can. When you watch the Texas/Texas Tech game, by the fourth quarter and overtime, you could see they were two teams that were gassed and were spent. We want to make sure we have as much left in the tank when we get to the fourth quarter as we can."
On not getting into the shootout kind of game against Texas Tech...
"We obviously want big plays, and we want to score. If we score in one, two or three-play drives, I'm excited and happy about that. We, as a program and team, need to understand that the ability to stay on the field and have eight, 10 and 12-play drives and start grinding on people is a huge positive. As an example, only getting six plays in the first quarter was hard on our offense because in terms of what we could run, I had four plays at normal down and distance and two third down plays, and I couldn't have told you what I thought we could run. That's what we need to be able to do against a Texas Tech-style of offense is keep them on the bench. If we get a three and out as a defense and we can go out and hold the ball for five minutes, that's a huge bonus for our program."
On the youth of the offensive line making it difficult to sustain drives...
"Obviously their ability to communicate and work together is a huge part of our ability to move the chains. But if it's a wide receiver making a 10-yard gain to move the chains and maybe picking up the o-line maybe when we don't do it as well as we need to, that's what we have to do. That's all 11 of us figuring out how to move the chains."
JOE KLANDERMAN, DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR
On the boldest secondary change K-State made for the OU game...
"There's a lot of contenders there, I don't know. It's just taking the leap that guys that haven't played are going to step up when they're asked, and that's going to happen. That's inevitable every year. You're going to have some of that. You hope you kind of prepare for that in the offseason and it doesn't happen during the season, but it did and it will. It probably will again at some point this year. So, you just have to believe in your guys and we did."
On the play of Ekow Boye-Doe and Ross Elder...
"I just thought their confidence grew as the game went on. I believe that in the beginning of the game they were pretty timid about whether or not they belong. Something inside of them as competitors felt that way to a degree, but I think until you really get on the grass and prove it, there's always that shadow of doubt in your mind. I think as it went on, particularly toward the end of the game, those guys were playing much faster and you could see it in their attitude and how they carried themselves on the sideline, how they carried themselves on the field. On tape, I was just impressed with how they grew as those 60 minutes ticked down."
On the game plan against OU quarterback Spencer Rattler...
"Well, we had a plan. The plan was we were going to show him certain pictures and we knew that we might have to take our lumps with some of those pictures – and we did – and then we were going to change pictures. That's what we did. We stuck to it. It was hard at times, but I think as a young guy, I felt like I wasn't sure how he was going to react to getting hit. We have some guys up front that can really get after it, and they did toward the end of the game. I thought if we gave him pictures that he was familiar with, I thought he probably would be pretty successful. If we were able to change those pictures a little bit, then he was going to hold onto that ball. That's when those hits would come, and that's what happened."
On the pass rush in the second half...
"Outstanding. Something we probably didn't have the ability to do last year as much. I think the emergence of Khalid Duke has been big. Of course Wyatt (Hubert) is always steady. Bronson Massie, I thought, played huge. I could name a number of guys that we tried to rotate. I'm screaming on the headset, I just wanted to keep fresh rushers in there and just continue to keep throwing bodies at him. When you can do things with four, you can do a lot more things in the back end to be sure."
On the play of safety Jahron McPherson...
"Well, we were talking earlier, Jahron played a lot of ball here, but he's been out of position. He was out of position last year. We all knew it, but we were just trying to get our 11 best guys out on the field, and that's how it felt. I think we got him in a position now where he can be his best. We just have to do a job of getting him around the action, but his leadership, his steadiness, his communication skills really calms people down back there."
On playing A.J. Parker at the nickelback position...
"That's part of the plan. He did a really good job in there. A.J. has tremendous speed, tremendous man-ability. He's not a big guy, and a lot of times you get those smaller matchups in the slot. It goes deeper than man, A.J. has tremendous skill for the game. A.J. is a really natural football player, very intelligent, and he just really just is a natural fit in there at nickel, not only in the man stuff but in the zone stuff too. He was just doing a great job in curl windows and doing a good job of reacting to things back down in the flat. We tried it a little bit there in the off-week, and it was an experiment we decided to roll with. I think you're going to see more of him in there."
On when they knew Khalid Duke was a different player...
"He's an entirely different football player. I would have never saw this coming. I would have never saw this coming in the winter time, when we headed in for quarantine, I guess. When we got back, and I know that we did a lot of Zoom things and stuff over the quarantine, Coach (Buddy) Wyatt and he met on several occasions over Zoom – dozens of occasions probably – we knew that Khalid was taking things very seriously. When I saw him coming back for quarantine, his body had changed. There's a guy that did not waste his time over the winter. We were excited to see what he could do, and I would say to answer your question bluntly, after practice one we probably knew we had a different kind of guy there, and it showed up."
On using more of the speed-rush package against Texas Tech…
"Potentially. One of the things that makes it difficult with a team like Texas Tech is they go so fast. They make it hard to get your substitutions in, and that's part of the design. They go quickly. They go quickly on third down so that if you have big guys out there, you have to play third down with the big guys. If you have little guys out there on third down, you have to play first down, potentially, with little guys. It makes it a little bit more challenging to do that to be sure but you might see it a little bit."
On defensive end Wyatt Hubert taking his game to the next level...
"We just have to continue to put Wyatt in a position to be successful. He's going to win his one-on-one matchups, by and large. The issue that we were having a little bit with him toward the end of the game is they were chipping him with tight ends, they were chipping him with backs. They weren't allowing him to rush and have the clean one-on-ones. So, we have to do a job of moving him around as coaches and getting him in positions where he can get those one-on-ones. He's proven a year ago that he can rush inside if need be. He can rush from any of the four spots. We just have to get him in spots where he can get those singles and go win."
On the nerves after the lack of practice time in the secondary last week...
"I don't know if I have a word to describe that. But listen, that's why you have to teach concepts and that's what we try to do. The guys in my room, they're hearing as much about nickel play as they are about safety, as they are about free safety play. I am big believer in game reps or pictures, even if it's practice reps. I think you have to see it to be able to do it, but if you have somewhat of a background knowledge through what you're doing with meetings and what not, you should be able to move those parts in and out pretty easily. It's going to be painful, but it shouldn't be impossible."
On changing the secondary lineup based on performances in the OU game....
"Well, there's people moving in and out, right, so it's the people that weren't part of the lineup when they do get back I hope that they're able to be part of the lineup again. They were starters for a reason, or they were high up on the depth chart. So we're going to continue to play the best people. They have to earn it, nothing is given. I think that competition is something that maybe we didn't have heading into last week. I think that this maybe opened our eyes to giving some other people some opportunities. When they took and ran with those opportunities, it's going to make things a lot more interesting moving forward."
COURTNEY MESSINGHAM, OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR
On the absence of Harry Trotter at Oklahoma changing the play calling...
"Thankfully our ability to pass pro (protect) and stuff, we did a pretty good job early, so I maybe didn't feel as concerned as I maybe would have because I feel Harry really understands what we're doing protection wise and does a great job with that. Early in the game, obviously, it took a while to get things rolling at all. I think we had six plays in the first quarter, so I don't know if I had a good feel of where and how it was going to go. They were doing a good job of keeping the ball. Thankfully, we got some turnovers and kept them from scoring each time, but not having Harry was a concern early. Then, once I felt like we were kind of picking things up and weren't getting the quarterback hit much, I felt like we'd be alright."
On getting the wide receivers going...
"I think we just have to keep taking what people give us and understanding that it doesn't matter how we move the ball. We just need to move the ball. When you get opportunities to make a big play, you have to make that big play. I felt like we made a number of plays this week that we hadn't the week before. We still left some out on the field. We had opportunities to make two or three more plays that could've made our lives a little easier for sure."
On the team's quick-strike capability...
"I just felt like we made some plays and didn't get tackled one-on-one because, again, I kind of go back to Arkansas State a little bit on that and say there were probably five post plays where if we complete two or three of them, you feel like this team can move the ball in chunks by throwing it down the field. Unfortunately we didn't make those plays."
On the offensive line's progress during the OU game...
"Two fold, from the first quarter to the fourth quarter, our ability to at least start plugging away from a run-game standpoint to give ourselves a chance. The last touchdown, it was a nice run, but it was also blocked well. Probably the bigger difference from one game to the next was taking hits away from the quarterback. We only gave up one sack, and to be honest with you, I felt like he probably got hit more in game one, when he still got the throw off than he did against OU. That's going to be a huge deal for us, not just progressing from a run-game standpoint, but those five guys also have to do a good job with pass pro and do a good job of passing things off and giving us an opportunity to throw it if we're not running the ball as well as we want to."
On opening up the playbook with the offensive line clicking...
"It changes a bunch with our ability to use the play action pass. If you're running the ball and getting some four, six, eight and 12-yard run plays, then we can start running some play action and be able to throw it off of that. I felt like our ability to run the ball did help us. Did we run it that well? No, we didn't, but it still allowed us to use some different protections and kept the quarterback clean."
On more explosive plays this season...
"I think Deuce (Vaughn) is obviously something that's been great for us. He's done a phenomenal job to this point, but I also think it's Skylar (Thompson) delivering a ball where you can catch it and run with it. I think it's guys downfield making blocks. It's the whole offense understanding that one guy has to make sure he doesn't get tackled one-on-one, but everybody else has to play to the end. On one of Deuce's long receptions, Briley Moore does a phenomenal job of blocking downfield, cleaning a guy up that probably tackles him if we don't put the extra effort in to block downfield and allowing him to get 20 more yards. All of us need to keep understanding that you never know when your extra effort is going to be the difference."
On the difference in play calling this year with the variety of playmakers...
"I don't know that I feel much different, honestly. I felt like last year we still had guys to make plays. Were we as consistent as we needed to be? We've not proven yet this year that we'll be consistent. We need to be, and hope we can build on what we were able to do last week. We need to build on it. I think there's still a lot of room to get better. Our mindset needs to be that every day I can improve and need to improve."
On Texas Tech's defense...
"In the back end, they're going to really try to knife down, tackle and be physical. They're not a, 'box you in and mash you' kind of team. They're going to try to tackle everything low. They try to use their team speed and play fast, and their interior three guys are bigger, thicker guys. Their back end all are long, rangy guys who can really run. I'm not saying they have a mindset of trying to get off the field one way or another, but their mindset is fly around fast and make things happen fast. I'm sure that, from a program standpoint, they want the ball back in their offense's hands so they can get 90-100 snaps in if they can. We have to do a good job of forcing their defense to say out on the field, play eight, nine or 10-play drives and make them defend us and not just be where we're sitting on the sideline while their offense is doing things."
On working more people in this season...
"100 percent I feel that. The biggest examples I would use is our game last week and when you watch the Texas vs. Texas Tech game last week. I felt like we were as fresh and ready to go as you could be in the fourth quarter, even though it was in the fourth quarter. I felt like when you watched the game, we were in better shape. And it wasn't that each individual was in better shape. We used as many people as we can. When you watch the Texas/Texas Tech game, by the fourth quarter and overtime, you could see they were two teams that were gassed and were spent. We want to make sure we have as much left in the tank when we get to the fourth quarter as we can."
On not getting into the shootout kind of game against Texas Tech...
"We obviously want big plays, and we want to score. If we score in one, two or three-play drives, I'm excited and happy about that. We, as a program and team, need to understand that the ability to stay on the field and have eight, 10 and 12-play drives and start grinding on people is a huge positive. As an example, only getting six plays in the first quarter was hard on our offense because in terms of what we could run, I had four plays at normal down and distance and two third down plays, and I couldn't have told you what I thought we could run. That's what we need to be able to do against a Texas Tech-style of offense is keep them on the bench. If we get a three and out as a defense and we can go out and hold the ball for five minutes, that's a huge bonus for our program."
On the youth of the offensive line making it difficult to sustain drives...
"Obviously their ability to communicate and work together is a huge part of our ability to move the chains. But if it's a wide receiver making a 10-yard gain to move the chains and maybe picking up the o-line maybe when we don't do it as well as we need to, that's what we have to do. That's all 11 of us figuring out how to move the chains."
JOE KLANDERMAN, DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR
On the boldest secondary change K-State made for the OU game...
"There's a lot of contenders there, I don't know. It's just taking the leap that guys that haven't played are going to step up when they're asked, and that's going to happen. That's inevitable every year. You're going to have some of that. You hope you kind of prepare for that in the offseason and it doesn't happen during the season, but it did and it will. It probably will again at some point this year. So, you just have to believe in your guys and we did."
On the play of Ekow Boye-Doe and Ross Elder...
"I just thought their confidence grew as the game went on. I believe that in the beginning of the game they were pretty timid about whether or not they belong. Something inside of them as competitors felt that way to a degree, but I think until you really get on the grass and prove it, there's always that shadow of doubt in your mind. I think as it went on, particularly toward the end of the game, those guys were playing much faster and you could see it in their attitude and how they carried themselves on the sideline, how they carried themselves on the field. On tape, I was just impressed with how they grew as those 60 minutes ticked down."
On the game plan against OU quarterback Spencer Rattler...
"Well, we had a plan. The plan was we were going to show him certain pictures and we knew that we might have to take our lumps with some of those pictures – and we did – and then we were going to change pictures. That's what we did. We stuck to it. It was hard at times, but I think as a young guy, I felt like I wasn't sure how he was going to react to getting hit. We have some guys up front that can really get after it, and they did toward the end of the game. I thought if we gave him pictures that he was familiar with, I thought he probably would be pretty successful. If we were able to change those pictures a little bit, then he was going to hold onto that ball. That's when those hits would come, and that's what happened."
On the pass rush in the second half...
"Outstanding. Something we probably didn't have the ability to do last year as much. I think the emergence of Khalid Duke has been big. Of course Wyatt (Hubert) is always steady. Bronson Massie, I thought, played huge. I could name a number of guys that we tried to rotate. I'm screaming on the headset, I just wanted to keep fresh rushers in there and just continue to keep throwing bodies at him. When you can do things with four, you can do a lot more things in the back end to be sure."
On the play of safety Jahron McPherson...
"Well, we were talking earlier, Jahron played a lot of ball here, but he's been out of position. He was out of position last year. We all knew it, but we were just trying to get our 11 best guys out on the field, and that's how it felt. I think we got him in a position now where he can be his best. We just have to do a job of getting him around the action, but his leadership, his steadiness, his communication skills really calms people down back there."
On playing A.J. Parker at the nickelback position...
"That's part of the plan. He did a really good job in there. A.J. has tremendous speed, tremendous man-ability. He's not a big guy, and a lot of times you get those smaller matchups in the slot. It goes deeper than man, A.J. has tremendous skill for the game. A.J. is a really natural football player, very intelligent, and he just really just is a natural fit in there at nickel, not only in the man stuff but in the zone stuff too. He was just doing a great job in curl windows and doing a good job of reacting to things back down in the flat. We tried it a little bit there in the off-week, and it was an experiment we decided to roll with. I think you're going to see more of him in there."
On when they knew Khalid Duke was a different player...
"He's an entirely different football player. I would have never saw this coming. I would have never saw this coming in the winter time, when we headed in for quarantine, I guess. When we got back, and I know that we did a lot of Zoom things and stuff over the quarantine, Coach (Buddy) Wyatt and he met on several occasions over Zoom – dozens of occasions probably – we knew that Khalid was taking things very seriously. When I saw him coming back for quarantine, his body had changed. There's a guy that did not waste his time over the winter. We were excited to see what he could do, and I would say to answer your question bluntly, after practice one we probably knew we had a different kind of guy there, and it showed up."
On using more of the speed-rush package against Texas Tech…
"Potentially. One of the things that makes it difficult with a team like Texas Tech is they go so fast. They make it hard to get your substitutions in, and that's part of the design. They go quickly. They go quickly on third down so that if you have big guys out there, you have to play third down with the big guys. If you have little guys out there on third down, you have to play first down, potentially, with little guys. It makes it a little bit more challenging to do that to be sure but you might see it a little bit."
On defensive end Wyatt Hubert taking his game to the next level...
"We just have to continue to put Wyatt in a position to be successful. He's going to win his one-on-one matchups, by and large. The issue that we were having a little bit with him toward the end of the game is they were chipping him with tight ends, they were chipping him with backs. They weren't allowing him to rush and have the clean one-on-ones. So, we have to do a job of moving him around as coaches and getting him in positions where he can get those one-on-ones. He's proven a year ago that he can rush inside if need be. He can rush from any of the four spots. We just have to get him in spots where he can get those singles and go win."
On the nerves after the lack of practice time in the secondary last week...
"I don't know if I have a word to describe that. But listen, that's why you have to teach concepts and that's what we try to do. The guys in my room, they're hearing as much about nickel play as they are about safety, as they are about free safety play. I am big believer in game reps or pictures, even if it's practice reps. I think you have to see it to be able to do it, but if you have somewhat of a background knowledge through what you're doing with meetings and what not, you should be able to move those parts in and out pretty easily. It's going to be painful, but it shouldn't be impossible."
On changing the secondary lineup based on performances in the OU game....
"Well, there's people moving in and out, right, so it's the people that weren't part of the lineup when they do get back I hope that they're able to be part of the lineup again. They were starters for a reason, or they were high up on the depth chart. So we're going to continue to play the best people. They have to earn it, nothing is given. I think that competition is something that maybe we didn't have heading into last week. I think that this maybe opened our eyes to giving some other people some opportunities. When they took and ran with those opportunities, it's going to make things a lot more interesting moving forward."
Players Mentioned
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