Baylor Coach and QB Not Talking Harbaugh as they Have Their Focus on Michigan State

Baylor Coach and QB Not Talking Harbaugh as they Have Their Focus on Michigan State COACH BRILES: Extremely excited. Of course, been to the Cotton Bowl, great

Baylor Coach and QB Not Talking Harbaugh as they Have Their Focus on Michigan State

COACH BRILES: Extremely excited. Of course, been to the Cotton Bowl, great bowl. If you are from Texas, been around Texas, you know what the history of the bowl is. And throughout my life, it has always been the bowl in the state of Texas. So we're proud to be able to represent Baylor University in the Cotton Bowl this year.

Excited about our football team and the journey they've had in the last couple years and what they have been able to accomplish on the field. And, hopefully, we can take care of business Thursday and add one more win to our team and our program.

Q. Nick Saban has lost two bowl games at Alabama where his team thought they were good enough to be playing a national title; and they talked about the disappointment in the players.

Have you done anything special because obviously your guys are right on that cusp because of the great season to maybe be careful of not there being a let off?

COACH BRILES: I mean, we didn't I didn't see any let down from our guys, quite honestly.

It is what it is. We knew it was going to happen to somebody. We just didn't know it was going to be us, and that's the way it goes. You play a little better and do a little better and next year might be better.

With our guys, I haven't noticed any drop off. Their mentality is honest because of what how we performed last year in the BCS bowl. First time we had been to one and been conference champs.

Now we have done it back to back. We are a little more disciplined mentally than we were a year ago at this time.

Q. You are in a state where you can win back to back conference titles. In a place like Texas, you sneeze and it makes headlines. Michigan State is dealing with that about Jim Harbaugh.

Does that bother you no matter what you do, something coming out of Austin trumps the headlines? I'm from Michigan.

COACH BRILES: Maybe your perception of what's happening in Texas is not the same as what's in the state of Texas. You know, in the state of Texas, we kind of deal in reality. And the reality is the last two or three years, we have been the dominant program in the state. When we sneeze, there are people saying "gesundheit" to us and we say "thank you."

Q. Can you just reflect on Bryce's growth over the time you have coached him.

COACH BRILES: Bryce is just first of all, he is a tremendous person in his character and leadership and everything you need at that position to be great.

Most great teams have great quarterbacks. That just correlates. That's how it works. And Bryce has certainly been as great an ambassador for Baylor as possibly we've had. He's great on the field. He's great off the field. He is a great student of the game, and he's a guy that will fight for wins. He will compete his tail off.

That's really what I appreciate about him more than anything, is I know when he's on the field, I know whatever he's got we are going to get from a football standpoint. I'm really proud of his journey. And I think after this Thursday, I think he's set himself up for a great NFL career.

Q. During the off season, we were talking about the Fiesta Bowl, you guys kind of got caught a little bit but you told me it would never happen again. How much of that mentality of "never again" have you carried throughout the season and how much of that mentality goes into Thursday?

COACH BRILES: We certainly hope that never happens again. You got to be careful to never say "never."

But, like I say, we have a different mindset this year than a year ago. Last year we kind of rolled in there, kind of happy and satisfied to a certain extent. You try not to get that way but reality sinks in as you read and listen to people. The next thing you know you think everything is okay and it's not.

From that standpoint, what I have always said, if you have all the money in the world, you can't buy experience. We experience things differently than we had a year ago at this time. Hopefully that will carry over against a really good Michigan State football team.

The problem this year, as last year, we had a good UCF team, their quarterback being the first QB off the board.

Michigan State is a really, really tough football team, that's been good for a long time. They have been probably last four or five years been the dominant team in the Big Ten. And Mark [Dantonio] and his staff have done a tremendous job. We know it will be a war.

Q. Talk about the senior class and Bryce [Petty] and Antwan [Goodley] and Levi [Norwood]? What have they meant to the program?

COACH BRILES: These guys have just been top of the league. We like to deal in the facts. I can throw some facts at you. They have won more games than anybody in history in the four year span. They have won back to back conference championships, which I'm not sure has ever happened before. National rankings probably as high as they have ever been. Home attendance as high as it has ever been. National brand as high as it has ever been. So they've done a great job of putting us on the national map.

What we are obligated to do now is make sure we stay up there and even expand on that. And I think that's what we're developing as a program. We feel like we're are a young brand. We are just beginning to get noticed on the national scene, and a lot of that is due to our senior class we've had this year and some of the other guys that are top performers.

Q. A lot of people talk about your offense, Bryce [Petty], your quarterback, your wide receivers. But nobody talks much about your offensive line. You have had guys like Spencer Drango being First Team All American, 10 of 12, can you address how well your line is playing?

COACH BRILES: I mean, the thing that I know when I first started coaching in 1979, because I had always been a skill guy, I always played quarterback, receiver, DB. And, you know, I get in there and we start coaching and all of a sudden I'm thinking, you got to have good guys in front. You are not going to win both sides of the ball.

What I've always done from a coaching standpoint is really when I was in high school, put our best guys on the D line because you had a high school class that had a chance to be dominant. So we would put those guys on the D line and make offensive linemen, make it work that way.

When you get in college, you have more chances to get good on both sides of the ball. So we always start recruiting in the O line and D line. And then we find our skill guys after that. The O line has always kind of been a trademark of our football team. One misnomer about us is that we are a throwing football team. You can look at the stats and facts. We run the football as well as well as anybody in America. That's a little bit of a two based style of offense where you run and throw, for about the last ten year period going back to the University of Houston.

We will be really good up front. Our guys will be really physical. We had two or three guys play in the League (NFL), Sebastien Vollmer with New England. He got recruited and didn't speak English when he we got him from Germany.

We have had students at Baylor and continue to have great students. That's something we will continue to pay a lot of attention to. With strength and conditioning with Kaz [Kazadi], our guys have a great chance to develop into great players.

Q. Has this season for Andrew Billings been what you expected or gone beyond your expectations?

COACH BRILES: In general, our D line I was actually saying in the spring, I thought we had a chance to have the most dominant D line in America. Michigan State certainly has a great defensive line. That's where they hang their hat also.

Those guys have been tremendous on that side of the ball. Andrew billings in particular since you asked about him hasn't surprised me. What's kind of surprised me is he hasn't had more plays like he had against Kansas when he ran down the guy on the sideline.

That really shows what separates him from other people because he is different. He is a different guy. When you possess that kind of speed, strength, and really the mental toughness that he brings to the table, it's hard to equal. He'll continue to make dynamic plays at that defensive tackle position. And I think he's a bona fide first round draft pick in two years.

Q. What have you thought about Corey Coleman's evolution, especially overcoming his injury at the beginning of the year?

COACH BRILES: First of all, we knew Corey was going to be an outstanding player when we got him coming out of high school because of his athletic giftedness.

We certainly had this point with the redshirt year which was really good for him. It gave him a chance to mature. Corey is a young guy, turned 18 after his senior year in high school. It gave him an opportunity to mature a little bit and understand how to prepare and how to work and how to perform on a daily basis, which a lot of great high school players don't have a chance to do. So it gave him a chance to do that and had a great year last year.

This year, pulled his ham (hamstring) in late July, early August. Missed the first three games, I think. And comes to be an All Big 12 player, and I think he leads in receptions and yards.

So, yeah, he has done a great job. He's a dynamic, explosive player that is I called him pretty tough. He's kind of a pretty guy, but don't let that smile fool you because he will rip your heart out and throw it on the ground in front of you and step on it. He is a tough, tough guy. That's really what separates him.

Q. The Big 12 had a tough day yesterday in competition. What's your response to the criticism that's reflective of the competitive level of the conference?

COACH BRILES: I haven't even turned on the TV or looked at a game. To my knowledge, it doesn't affect how we will play on Thursday.

Q. Your athletic director talked about when doing your schedule six, seven years ago, the goal was to get to a bowl game. Has this happened for you faster than you thought it would be at Baylor in terms of the rise and the building?

COACH BRILES: Not really.

The thing we always felt at Baylor, everybody told we us we had really good student athletes. It was mentioned earlier about the Michigan/Michigan State thing that was happening today with the coach and different changes there. We deal in the state I don't know how many D1s there are in the state, 13, 14. Plus you got Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Arkansas, LSU. You got all those people in there competing for the student athletes that are in the state of Texas. It is a competitive, competitive natured game on a day in, day out basis.

QUESTIONS FOR QB BRYCE PETTY

Q. Bryce, what makes your offense so difficult to defend? Is it simply the speed or the tempo, or what are the challenges that Michigan State will face?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah, I think those are both a big factor, the speed and tempo which we go. You know, I think also something is that you can tell we're having fun. When you've got guys that have fun doing what they're doing, it makes it execute a lot easier. So, taking defense, I think one of the best things that we have going for us is that we can adapt and change. And so that West Virginia game you know, people are going to play us different. So for us to do that, we have to adapt to change.

Q. A team will play you different during a game. Can you perhaps get a feeling like now we're clicking, now we're kind of getting it? What's an indicator?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah, you know, a lot of it just kind of happens. At a certain point in the game that I feel like we're going to just it just happens. And then we roll with it from there. So for us it's all about knowing that moment is going to come. Sometimes you know one or two or three series sometimes.

And, if it doesn't work out the TCU game the first four series we didn't score. So you just got to keep plugging and keep your head up. Always the next play mentality for us.

Q. And watching some film on Michigan State, the defense, is there anything you see that's maybe a little unique that they do differently than some other teams you've faced or something that that might be especially challenging for them?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah, I don't know if there's anything specifically unique about them. I just think they're very well coached. I mean, they know what they're doing. They execute just like we do. They don't let a lot of things happen to the offensive side of the ball. They don't let big plays happen. So, when you do get those opportunities, you got to cash them in so they don't let them happen.

They're just very savvy defensively. They've got guys running the ball. They've got athletes all over the field. So it's going to be a challenge for us, definitely, one that we're looking forward to. But, at the same time, you know, we've got to execute to the best of our ability each and every play.

Q. What's the biggest motivation for you guys going into this game?

QB BRYCE PETTY: For me personally it's just to finish. Last year we didn't finish. That's a long time, six months of a bad taste in your mouth. So kind of hard to be told that we would be champions last year and a loss and everything. So my whole thought process and drive on this game is just to finish and be the best team that's ever gone through Baylor.

Q. Can you see a difference in the approach to this bowl game this year?

QB BRYCE PETTY: I really can. I think that has everything to do with we've got experience in it now. Last year was our first big bowl we've ever played in. I think we kind of let that get the best of us and listened to how good people were telling us we were, you know? And we kind of lost that chip on our shoulder, really that motivation that got us to that game. So this is a much different, I guess, drive to this game that we're focused on. So I'm excited to see how we play.

Q. Despite the one loss to West Virginia, how much do you think it made the team better?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Tremendously. What I was saying earlier is we came in there happy. So you can't come in happy, mentality wise. That helped us understand people play us different. They hit harder and that kind of thing. There's not a team that wants to beat us more than we want to win, which I know sounds weird. So for us, the game is huge. I think that was really what helped us get to where we are.

Q. How would you sum up your own experience at Baylor?

QB BRYCE PETTY: How much time you got? You got a while? It's kind of hard to put that in a few words. The coolest part about what Baylor has done for me is as much off the field as on the field. I've been through several challenges. And, obviously, you know, I've gotten through every one of them. So it's a unique and very appreciative feeling that I have towards Baylor. And, when you kind of get through the whole process, everything was kind of weird. So for it to work out the way it has, you know, if I did it all again, I'd do it the same way. It's been a blessing to be here and couldn't think of a better way to finish it out.

Q. Hey Bryce, how much have you thought about the journey you had to get to the starting job over the last couple three weeks? Towards the end?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah, haven't really thought about it too much. I probably will more towards the end of the game. My focus right now is let all the emotions come at the very, very end, not right now. You know?

So it's been a great ride. Again, like I said, I wouldn't change anything for the world. So for us it's been an awesome transition for just the whole team's mentality and how we approach things to where four years ago we were hoping that we would just be able to win and now we're upset if we don't. So it's been an awesome ride. And, like I said, a blessing.

Q. Was it 1240 between your starting day and coming to Baylor? Was it 1240 days?

QB BRYCE PETTY: 1346.

Q. 1346?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah.

Q. What was the lowest point during all that time?

QB BRYCE PETTY: I think the lowest point was when I thought that I guess with Nick Florence, as great a guy as he is, greatest competitor as he is, you know, I really thought that I would get an opportunity or a chance to compete. I thought that was great. And so, when I was getting two reps in practice and not really have a chance, that was my low point, I guess, throughout the whole deal.

Q. Contrast that to where you are right now.

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah. No doubt. That's the greatest part about it. That's really what life is all about, is looking back. And you can't tell yourself where you're at if you don't know where you've been. So for me it's been an outstanding journey, one that I will cherish and, hopefully, tell my kids and my grandkids about.

And it really sets you up with things that have to come in life, the future. And when you've been down before, you know you got out of it. And for me, especially my faith and the fact that you know God's plan is 10 times better well, probably a lot more than 10 times but a lot better than what we have. So, just the fact that it's a unique perspective on that now.

Q. You have a game to prepare for. But have you had a chance is it at times something in your head that this is it, kind of surreal?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Like I said, that part hasn't hit me yet. And I think it probably won't until about two minutes left in the game or something like that.

It's just there's been so much in these last five years that have meant a lot to me. And so it's one of those deals that the feeling of being surreal and looking back on all that doesn't surpass that I want to finish being 12 1, because that's going to make that whole feeling a lot better.

Q. What's your legacy?

QB BRYCE PETTY: I don't know. I get that question a lot. When I came in here, I said I was going to be the best quarterback. So I think that, as long as I'm in that conversation, that I've achieved that goal, regardless of who it is as long as it's talked about. You know, that's what I set out to do. My legacy is that.

Q. Connor Cook yesterday said that you're more athletic than him because he can't hurdle anybody, he's never leaped over a defender.

QB BRYCE PETTY: He's also never tripped before. So that's kind of interesting. Yeah, I've got moments. Somehow I've got moments. I can hurdle people, and the next moment I trip. He's great, though.

Q. Bryce, you're part of the winningest class in school history. What's that mean to you?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah. I'm looking across at Coach Briles now. I mean, I owe everything to him. You know, he gave me the opportunity and the chance to be part of it. You know?

Again, when it gets to this point and, like I said, I'll be probably looking back more as the game winds to a close. But there's been a lot of people in my life that contributed to where I am. So just an overwhelming sense of graciousness and respect for a lot of people that have been in my life and stuck through it. I haven't had the easiest journey. So it means a lot. That's why I want to close out for myself and the seniors.

Q. Obviously, you've been here a long time. Do you remember guys in your class talking about how good you all could be even early when you got here?

QB BRYCE PETTY: Yeah every time a class comes in you kind of bond together. And a lot of the time that's what it is. It's, okay, let's go get this thing.

But the cool part about it for me is this is the I guess the last class, really, being in that transition of knowing what it was to where it is now. I think that's a unique perspective on the whole program itself. And it gives you a lot of appreciation for things knowing that it was a lot worse.

I think that's what means the most is just where we came as a group, as a team, as a locker room. And, you know, we're sitting right here talking to you guys for the Cotton Bowl. So it's huge.