Notre Dame head football coach Marcus Freeman met with the media shortly after his 21st-ranked Irish thwarted arch-rival and No. 10 USC, on Saturday night at Notre Dame Stadium. Here's everything he had to say. Answers are largely verbatim. Questions are edited for brevity and clarity.
OPENING STATEMENT
“You know, not every week you get an opportunity to get a victory like this. Really so happy for your players, happy for your program, happy for this university.
“We're going to enjoy this one. Our guys competed. You know, that was my message all week, is that competitors don't pick and choose when they compete for a game. Like you don't — because of what happened last week, if you're an elite competitor, the inner motivation and the inner adversity sometimes that you have to face, doesn't matter as you prepare for the next opponent.
“So, I'm so proud of the way they executed. They performed on both sides of the ball. So we're going to enjoy it. We're going to enjoy it for the next couple hours, and we'll go back and study it and get back to work.
“I don't have a whole bunch of words. I'm just going to enjoy this one, and I'm so happy to be a part of this place with this team and this university. You realize the support through adversity sometimes, and the amount of people around this university and our players, they understand how special it is to be a part of this football program.
“We had a lot of support, and I'm proud that our players were able to go out there and be able to enjoy the feeling that you get after a victory like this together. So with that, open up for questions.”
Q. You talked a lot in preseason about establishing an edge, physicality, and a demeanor within this team. Obviously, this was a really trying week for you. How did you go about recapturing that, and when did you sense that it had been recaptured?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Same thing I just said in my opening. I challenged those guys and said, ‘Are we going to let a defeat that happened in the past dictate how we prepare for this?’ This wasn't about the outcome. It was about preparing the way we needed to prepare to give us a chance to have this kind of performance.
“And that was my challenge to the group: Are we elite competitors? Coaches that really can hold your chin up throughout tough times and do the things — there is a process to making sure your team is ready. That doesn't guarantee you to have success, because everybody is going to say, ‘Why don't you do that process every week?’
“There is a process to guarantee you have a chance to have success. That's what we couldn't cheat. I'm proud of the way the coaches and the players really attacked it.”
Q. What about the job that Al Golden has done for, and how much does his experience as a past head coach and high-level defensive coordinator shine in a moment like this?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Yeah, I couldn't speak more highly of the performance of our defense and the way coach Golden prepares. Got a lot of respect for him. He's been through a lot of ups and downs in his time of being a football coach. He's unwavering. The way he prepares is unwavering.
“I mean, obviously, [we] had a great plan for what our guys performed today, but our guys perform as they are taught. That's why I kept saying to the coaches, ‘It's on us.’ We don't have insubordinate kids. We have to teach them exactly what we want them to do to give them a chance to have success.
“I'm really proud of the way they performed and the way we prepared on both sides of the ball.”
Q. Just what did you learn last year from playing against Caleb Williams? Looked like you guys did a great job staying in your lanes and just the application of what you learned tonight.
MARCUS FREEMAN: Yeah, I don't know if there is a perfect answer to stopping Caleb Williams. He is one of the best college football players that I've ever seen. All I kept telling the guys is, ‘We have a plan, and on this play you have to attack. You cannot play passive. You cannot play a three-man rush and let him go out there and be the Heisman Trophy winner he is.’
“You have to attack. And no matter what happened — there were plenty of plays that he continued to extend plays with his legs, but on that play I think our guys continued to battle.
“And then in the secondary, we are able to capitalize off of — I'm sure he would call them mistakes. He doesn't want to throw the ball to our defenders. We were able to capitalize off them, instead of just having PBUs or almost [interceptions], our guys turned those into takeaways, which were huge for our entire team.”
Q. Could you speak to those turnovers, and your secondary and the way they played?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “They battled their tails off, man. I know Xavier Watts had some crazy stats. I don't know if it was the last takeaway that Cam Hart had. I kind of saw it on the video board, and it's something that we practice, the ability to stab the ball out. We talk about if we have awareness, you can stab the ball out, stab it out, and it was a teach tape, and Xavier returned it, which is another coaching point. You sprint through the end zone. Don't start jogging, celebrating. That could have been a play that's on SportsCenter in a bad way.
“We’ve always got to learn. I kind of think about the teaching plays and Jaylen Sneed. We can't rough a punter. We know that. He played great. He played phenomenal. We can't rough the punter in the first half and we can't celebrate as they're getting ready to snap the ball. Same thing with Xavier, make sure you finish the ball through the end.”
Q. Is that why you called a timeout, because you had guys celebrating?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Yeah, because we were going to get a penalty. I stood there by the ref, and we were either going to get 12 men on the field and [USC would] still have a free play, or call timeout. It really didn't matter.”
Q. Can you talk about Xavier Watts? What did you say to him on the sideline after his second interception? You patted him on the helmet. What did you say to him?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Was that the one where he scored?”
Q. The one before, the interception.
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Oh, I can't remember. I really don't remember. Probably said something like, ‘So proud of you. Way to go. One play, one life.’ That's what I always say to them. I say the same thing to Sam [Hartman]: ‘One play, one life. Whatever happened on the last play, I'm proud of you. I love you. Move on. One play, one life.’
“We have to move forward. That's the process we talk about, is continuing to win the interval on this play is all that matters. One thing I want you thinking when you leave this locker room: win the interval on this play. We can't be fearful to make mistakes. They're going to happen.
“There is no perfect football player. On this play we have to win the interval with relentless effort and attitude, and that's what they did. I saw these guys, man, at critical moments in the game just playing relentlessly, and it was good to see.”
Q. Your defensive line put a lot of pressure on Caleb Williams. Speak to that, and the game plan going in?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Be aggressive. Be aggressive. Roll guys. We want to roll guys. I told [defensive line coach Al Washington], when you see them sub, we need to roll our guys, get some fresh guys in there, roll them. We have to have relentless rushers against Caleb Williams, and we were able to do that. And it was a whole group of guys that was able to really get pressure on him.”
Q. What was the difference between the way they came out last week at the start of the game and this week?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “I wish I had the answer, you know. You always go back and look at your preparation and say, ‘OK, how can we enhance the way we prepare?’ It's always the coach's fault. We have to own that and always coach better. We have to take pride in that the production you see on the field is a result of how we coach.
“So it was a tough week to make sure that we take a deep dive in how we're coaching and what they know. They went out and executed right away, from the start. And that's how you have to do it.”
Q. At the end of the game, what does it say about your guys that they're still battling, Xavier is still stripping out the ball, even though it's a 28-point game at the end?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “Win the interval on this play. That's all that matters. Whatever happened before doesn't matter. Win the interval on this play.
“That's what it's like in the team meeting. Win the interval on this play. That's about all you're going to get.”
Q. You talked about the adversity a little bit. Interested how you challenged your coaching staff in the past week to come back from last Saturday? When do you do that deep dive, what did you find out?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “It's easy to say what happened, right? Coaches are good at saying — man, these guys are crazy out there, man. Keep it down, Sam.
“Listen, it's easy to say what happened. We can sit and watch film. This is what happened. This is what should have happened. I challenged the coaches to figure out why. It's not always going to happen in a team meeting. It doesn't happen in a team meeting setting. It happens in your position meeting that we have to figure out why the mistake occurred.
“That's the challenge. It takes difficult conversations to figure out why the player didn't do exactly what you wanted. Sometimes it's because he didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't have that look. We looked at practice reps. We looked at everything we could to say, ‘OK, are we teaching them exactly what we want?’
“If it's something we didn't prepare for, let's simplify so they have rules, [so] that there is no confusion. If we do that, we’ve got a chance to be really successful, as you saw today. We have to make sure we're giving our kids a chance to be successful.”
Q. Last year it was different. How is this week maybe unique to some of the bouncebacks you had last year, where you had to learn something new as a head coach?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “You know, weeks that you lose are really long, especially around here. The expectation is that you win every game you play. I know the hours are the same, but the weeks that you win seem to go by really fast and the next opportunity is here.
“But it is what it is. You have to pick your head up and go back to work. Adversity is a part of life. I told our guys — here is the word I used — I said I want to be an ‘anti-fragile’ program. We have to be an anti-fragile program. What does that mean? We just didn't get through it, through adversity. We are better because of the adversity we faced. That's easy to say.
“The challenge is to do the things that it takes to make sure we're better, and that's what these coaches and players did.”
Q. It looked like on kick returns you guys had three guys back deep for the game. What informed that decision, and do you think that impacted the opportunity that Jadarian Price had?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “The weather was a reason why. We knew there was going to be — we prepared for a little bit, probably more strenuous conditions than we got. We knew the wind, rain, we were preparing, so we didn't know where that ball was going to go.
“Had three returners, and I think they took a lot of pride — I remember being in the huddle and saying, ‘Every one of you have to win the interval. If we do that, this ball can be returned.’
“We had a couple good returns, and that one obviously went the entire way. JD got a little tired at the end, but it's a credit to [special teams] coach [Marty] Biagi with what he has done with that group and credit to those guys for doing their job.”
Q. What does it mean to see the offensive line rebound after last week?
MARCUS FREEMAN: “They take a lot of pride. They take a lot of pride in what they do. They want the challenge. They embrace the challenge. As I told them, ‘I said perception is we can't run the ball because of our offensive line. That doesn't mean it's reality, but take that as a challenge.’ I love the way they attacked in practice and performed today.”
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