Brent Key: "I Don't Think We Are Anywhere Close To Being Ready To Play a Football Game"

Nov 29, 2024; Athens, Georgia, USA; Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets head coach Brent Key reacts with an official during the game against the Georgia Bulldogs during the first quarter at Sanford Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Dale Zanine-Imagn Images | Dale Zanine-Imagn Images

A lot can change in a week.

After last week's fall camp scrimmage, Georgia Tech head coach Brent Key was positive about the trajectory of his team and how they performed that day. Today, Key was less than optimistic.

""All right, had a final scrimmage of preseason camp. You know, went 125 plays, I was planning to go about 100, but the first 100 looked like dog crap. So everybody got a chance to get in their place, see what they can do, how they can help this football team. We got some heat out there today. Reached about 94, but about 115 on the turf, which was what I wanted. I wanted to see how these guys could sustain and practice through some adversity. I don't think we are anywhere close to being ready to play a football game.

Way too many penalties. Way too many turnovers. Way too many ball and assignments. Way too many guys that either didn't play or tapped out for aches and pains and things you have to you know, we're not even close from the standpoint from mental toughness the grit and the fortitude that you have to have to play this play this game, you know, we got, we got a lot of young kids on the field new kids. That isn't, zero excuse, so we got a lot of damn work to do."

Dec 27, 2024; Birmingham, AL, USA; Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets head coach Brent Key tracks his team during the first half of the 2024 Birmingham Bowl at Protective Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Vasha Hunt-Imagn Images | Vasha Hunt-Imagn Images

Key Wants a Mentally Tougher Team

This team did not meet the expectations that Key had for them from a mental toughness standpoint today.

"Yeah, physical, physical health's fine. I believe I'll get the injury report later. I want to get the mental health, not mental health, I apologize, the mental toughness. And really, that's part of the mental psychology. And look, this starts with me. This starts with me. This is my job to get the football team in a position to be able to compete and play football games. The mental toughness which goes into the game, the mindset that you have to have.

These guys came out with a really good attitude and a lot of energy to start the day. And we went into this thing, we wanted to play a lot of guys today to see what they could do and who can help us, who's gonna be in the two-deep, who's not gonna be in the two-deep, who's on teams, scrimmage every special team today. And we wanna see who can go out there, and it's going to be, I mean, it doesn't matter if it's game one or the last game of the season, there's going to be challenges, adversity, different things that you can't control, right? And, the hardest thing right now with anybody, not just a young player, it's adults, it's players, is to be able to block everything else out, right? Is it not affected by things that you can't control or circumstances that you're in, right, and in the mindset and in the mental toughness part of it is it's so much of the gam, it's so much of the game."

Key mentioned that veteran leaders on the team did speak about the performance today:

"No, they did. They say things, they do things. That's the thing that we don't feel you have to be ready to go before the game. You don't have somebody behind you patting you on the butt or kicking the butt, right? When you do something good, you do something bad. And when you do something bad, you can't let it carry over to the next play. And way too much of that right now.

Good and bad, I should say. Good and bad. Making, you know, acting like we just made the greatest play in the world on a routine play. You gotta play third down and you get smoked. Like you've done it before."

What Now?

Nov 29, 2024; Athens, Georgia, USA; Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets head coach Brent Key on the sideline against the Georgia Bulldogs in the third quarter at Sanford Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-Imagn Images | Brett Davis-Imagn Images

Georgia Tech will have two practices next week that Key said will be "Camp practices" and then the Yellow Jackets will start on their prep for the first game of the season against Colorado:

"So we'll come in tomorrow as a staff, and hopefully it's being done as we speak. We'll evaluate the football team, evaluate the roster, evaluate where we're at from-- and look, I don't care if we go on the first game and we run two offensive plays and two defensive calls. We're going to play what we can execute with the best players on the field to do it. We'll meet all day tomorrow as a staff. School starts on Mondays, so the players are off then. We'll come back on Tuesday and Wednesday, and they'll be camp practices. They will be camp practices. We gotta find out who wants to play football. And then we'll go and get into the Colorado prep on Thursday and Friday."

This was a different tone from Key than what he has shown so far in fall camp and leading up to the game against Colorado. As he said, though, there is still time to figure things out and get the team back on track before the season opener.