WATCH: Chip Kelly Recaps UCLA’s Performance vs. Bowling Green
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UCLA football coach Chip Kelly spoke to reporters ahead of Monday morning’s practice session. Kelly touched on several takeaways from Saturday’s win over Bowling Green, including what he got out of his initial film breakdown, Jake Bobo’s status as punt returner, Kam Brown and Logan Loya’s health, the defensive players of the game, Josiah Norwood’s first career touchdown and the issues the team needs to shore up in practice this week.
Film review, especially offensive line?
Yeah, I thought our offensive line did a really nice job. There was a couple of blitzes that Bowling Green presented where guys were coming free—those are hot throws for us and not protection issues from that standpoint. Actually, the last touchdown pass that Garbers threw was a hot throw, he read the hot correctly and got the ball out to Josiah and he made a nice play on the perimeter, so I thought our guys did a really nice job.
Punt block, not picking a guy up?
A communication issue in how we’re going to block that look.
Attendance an all-time low, some mitigating factors but it's been an issue for a few years – concerned that's a reflection of interest in the program?
Nah, I just want to thank our fans for going to that game because it was the hottest game I’ve ever had an opportunity to coach in and the fact that they were there was a tribute to them and hats off to them, but that’s the hottest football game I’ve ever coached in in my life, so. We can’t control the weather, but I want to thank the ones that did show up because that was not a fun place to be, to be honest with you.
Attendance down even before that, concerned that...
Our job is to play football, so we’ve won our last four, on the Ben Bolch momentum meter, I think everything is going in the right direction—we’ve won all four by more than 25 points, so our players are doing what they’re supposed to do and prepare to do all those things, so we can’t control the weather, so I’m not concerned about it.
As a head coach, anything you can do to help with interest besides winning?
I don’t even understand the question.
Like booster events or social media?
We don’t have any booster events that have been recommended. We always struggle early in the year no matter where you are because we don’t have the students on campus, so we don’t start classes until the end of the month so that’s always been an issue when you’re playing the early season games.
Kam Brown and Logan Loya available in practice?
We’ll see. They’ve been in parts of practice for the last couple of days and we’ll see what they can get through today.
Ezeike and Habermehl?
We’ll see. I don’t anticipate anything but we’ll see.
Bobo jersey situation, somebody forgot he needed to switch?
Yeah, it was a misstep by us, as I said after the game, we’ve got to make sure when we have guys in duplicate uniforms—you know, Martell Irby was a guy who was in a duplicate uniform all of last year, so it’s something we worked on on Friday but we’ve got to do a better job of it, so.
Keep changing jerseys?
It depends on who’s in, you can’t just have duplicate numbers in the game, so him and Choe Bryant-Strother both have the same number—they’re both No. 9—so you can’t play both at the same time, so.
Bobo's a big target at 6-foot-5, got leveled a few times – concerned about...
One was a penalty. No. I mean, you can’t go back there and say, ‘I’m worried about my punt returner that gets—he fair caught it, it was a great decision by Bobo and it was a penalty on their part, so I don’t know if you can do anything else to prevent a penalty on the other side. That’s really what happened there.
Putting him in harm's way as a punt returner?
Kyle Philips was our punt returner last year and has been our top receiver.
But Philips wasn't as big of a target?
I don’t think the target means, I’m confused on that. 6-5? Oh, so they jump higher to tackle him than they jumped to tackle Kyle? They’re football players. You know, it’s part of the game. If you’re concerned with a guy getting a productive player the ball in their hands, that’s how it is and we’ve had a ton of success. You know, Kyle—I mean, he had 97 targets last year and led the nation in punt returns, so when you have a dynamic player, I don’t think the difference between being 5-11 and 6-5 is the reason that Bobo got hit, it was a penalty on their part, so.
What makes Bobo a good punt returner for someone who's not a traditional punt returner size?
Um, he’s got really good instincts for the ball in the open field and does a good job of fielding the ball and has proven to us over time that he’s our best punt returner.
Mafi got a carry after recovering a fumble – ever use a Refrigerator Perry play as a coach?
No, we haven’t. They’re ineligible number-wise in college football, so it’s number issue in college football. In the pros, you can declare a guy eligible, so you can’t hand the ball off to a No. 56 in college, that’s illegal in college football. So in the NFL, when they did it, they declared ‘No. 72 is now eligible’—they do it in every NFL game when you watch them on Sundays if they have to use a lineman as a tight end or a running back, they tell the defense. In college football, anybody numbered 50 to 79 cannot be handed or thrown a football, it’s illegal.
Josiah Norwood touchdown?
I mean, just – that's what he's done, he's made a lot of big plays for us the last couple years in certain situations for us. He's obviously contributing more now, earned a scholarship, really proud of him in terms of what he does. Plays with great effort, great energy every single day. He's worked himself up from – he came in here as a quarterback coming out of high school, and then worked himself into playing receiver, getting on the field, initially, as special teams. And to see a fifth-year kid like that, for that to pay off is really just a tribute to him. So really happy for him, and hopefully we get more of those from him.
Carson Schwesinger got playing time?
He did, he's done a really nice job. I know Ken and Billy are really high on him. He's smart, he's intuitive. Charlie Collins told us when we were recruiting him, he said "I think this kid's really gonna play for you." I think he's got that special trait in him and really respect Charlie and what he has to say about players and Charlie's coached at all levels himself, so he had really big praise on him. When we got a chance to see him play and our coaches watched him practice, we could tell that he was a really good football player. So we were excited when we got the opportunity to get him. All he's ever wanted was an opportunity, and he's gotten that and he's capitalized on it. So I think he'll continue to grow, he is a young player but he's got the requisite size and speed, he's smart, he's a physical player, he's playing on all four special teams for us right now. So hopefully as we continue to develop and get him more snaps and more playing time, he's more comfortable out there. But for his first time in a college football game, I thought he did a really nice job.
Ale Kaho status?
He's unavailable.
Any feeling he could play this year?
He's unavailable.
What kind of tone do you want to have in practice this week?
We just want to improve, you know, and we try to come out of every day – and that's what we talked about in our team meeting earlier is that we gotta get better. The biggest improvement most teams make is from game one to game two, you know, so we have a lot of things we have to tune up from last Saturday. But we had an opportunity to get them on film, go over them in our meeting sessions and now get back out on the practice field and make the necessary corrections and then obviously put our installs in for our next opponent. But it's really the same schedule we have every week, but our Mondays are always about improvement. Can we be a little bit better today than we were on Saturday and continue to grow as a group. So as I told the guys after the game, I hope Saturday is the worst game we play all year. And that means both progressing every game and we continue to roll. You don't want to be the same team at the end of the year that you were at the beginning of the year, you want to hope that there's improvement over time.
Biggest standouts after watching film?
I thought Gary Smith played a really good game for us, was really disruptive and added some things to us up front. Darius played a really good game for us at inside linebacker, I thought his tackling in the open field was really good. And I thought Blay may have played one of his better games he's played since he's been here. Had a big sack for us, was really productive for us, really led for us and did a really nice job. So those were the few players that really stood out over the course of the game for us. We talked about it in our meeting today, Gary, Darius and Blay, I thought, were the real standout players on Saturday.
Kenny Churchwell too?
Kenny played a good game, but our top three players of the game were Gary, Darius and Blay.
Postgame thoughts on the defense reinforced after the game?
Yeah, I mean, we can get better at everything. There were some missed assignments, there were some effort deals – offensively, defensively and special teams – but to go out and do what they did, especially the amount of snaps they played in that heat, give our strength and conditioning staff credit for our conditioning. You didn't see any of our guys go down cramp-wise, our guys fought through it. Again, it was a difficult situation to play in from a weather standpoint, but that can't be an excuse. But I thought, overall, our defense played intact. Really, that one drive, I think they had 162 but they had 79 yards on that one drive. We can clean up some tackling things and that's kind of a goal for what we've gotta get better at this week, is cleaning up some of the tackling things, but I thought as a unit, they played pretty well today.
Kaz Allen's development?
Yeah, he's starting to learn the nuances of the game playing wideout. He's always been a running back and as he transitioned last year, the subtleties and the differences – he's very dynamic with the ball in his hands, but understanding leverages of the defenses and how they're trying to play you, where they're trying to force you, how you can get across, how you can beat somebody across, some of the little subtle things that I think you have to be to be a really, really good receiver. But I was really happy with his production on Saturday. And I know he'll tell you there's one or two he wanted back that I think he could have been even more productive for us. But like all of our players, it's about growing and improving from day one to day two, so hopefully that's just the start for Kaz.
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