On taking stock of what happened at the end of last season:
"Basically, you rehash the entirety of the season. And then you kind of start with explosive plays -- you kind of rip the Band Aids off real quick. So you start with the negative, and that's the appropriate thing to do. And you first look at it through the lens from a coaching staff standpoint -- OK, what can we do to affect the behavior of our guys? Can we put them in a better situation to be successful. And it takes a lot of discipline, and it takes a lot of maturity as a coaching staff to go through, because you're rehashing the most frustrating plays throughout the season and it's fresh. We're in here the day after the game. So you look at it through that lens and say, 'OK, what can we do?' What you have to do in those moments is you have to have an honest evaluation -- you've got to make sure that you look at from the standpoint of if it's a simple as, all right, there's a guy who should be in the position to make a play, he's not there, well it sounds simple enough but why? The part of the evaluation that makes it really difficult if you say X, Y, Z should happen, it didn't, is there something we can go back from a preparation standpoint that would lend ourselves to believe that maybe, just maybe it goes back to just that -- we need to prepare them in a better way.
"Other situations, a guy's at the point of attack, he's in position to make a play, how can we help him make a play next time? But what you don't do is you don't just throw your hands up and pout and play victim. And then you attack from the mindset of, OK, let's look at it through the minds of situational calls. So you kind of break it down that way -- you look at the redzone defense, you look at it through third downs, you look at it through P-and-10 (the first possession of a drive), first-and-10, so it's a comprehensive study. Ultimately, those plays show up quite a bit, right? So you watch it over and over again.
"And then you look at it, OK, what can we do from a physical standpoint? What's the most tangible thing you can do in January -- you come off, you're disappointed. We went through what a lot of basketball teams are going through right now -- they didn't get out of the first weekend. That happens. Does it dismiss, those kids won 11 games? And they deserve credit for that, so you don't dismiss that. But what's the most tangible thing that we can do in the moment is bigger, faster, stronger. So you attack in that mindset. It's all-encompassing and it's ongoing. And then what you do is you then take it on the practice field and say, OK, well if these are the things and adjustments we maybe want to make, is there a coaching point? It may not be big-picture scheme, but it may just be simply are we asking an individual guy to do the appropriate thing within that scheme. Then you look at it through lenses -- or we call it testimonial -- the drills that we're doing. Does it show up on film? And if doesn't, then we need to either change the drill, change the coaching point and at point possibly change the person. But that's final steps. What we want do is change the player, right, as opposed to looking through the lens of just simply changing the person, fire guys, next guy, next guy, next guy. No, let's change the player -- let's get them bigger, faster, stronger and put them in the best situation possible. Let's coach them up, let's put reps on it. And that's what spring is. You flip the page and you move forward. As a competitor you don't ever get over it, but as a professional you've got to move on."
What do you think led to that disconnect between what you tried to teach and what happened during games?
"I think it's ongoing. I don't think anything specific to us is unique. It's a lack of consistency, and where's that consistency come from -- you've got to go back to preparation. I think in other instances, you've got to make sure you have the strength to execute at the appropriate level. You've got to be able to get off blocks. The unblocked guy has to make tackles. And then we've got to look at it through the lens of, how do we get two unblocked guys there? Then you've got to look at it through the lens of, are you asking the guys to do the appropriate things? Are there call you want to have back? Absolutely, that always happens and you can't dumb it down to that either. The baseball example, you throw a curveball and they hit it out of the park, you can't just say, 'Well, we should have thrown a fastball.' That's not how this sport works. So it's the same thing for us -- man, zone, three-down, four-down, rushing five, rushing four, should we drop eight more, should we play with two-high more, should we ask certain guys to do other roles? So no, it's a difficult process and not one you want to go through, but it's not unique. It happens every single year. If you win 11 games, you're awfully excited about the 11 that you win, you're devastated by the ones you lost. And then that doesn't matter if you win them all, which obviously the end goal is, so the work continues."
How much do the returning guys look like returners and is anybody standing out?
"It's exciting, and what you can't do and we talk about this, we've challenged the guys this way, you can't just simply say 'Well, it's Year 2 so all things are going to be better.' Just the natural progression of we're older, we're bigger, whatever. So we describe it to the guys, 'It can't be Year 1 2.0' where we're saying the exact same thing every single day. So Practice 1 of spring football is just regurgitation of Practice 1 of last spring football -- we're starting over from square one. There's so [many] things that you dial it back and you make sure that you're starting from square one, but they've got to have responsibility on their part to act like they played 14 games last year. There's guys that were an eight-game starter, nine-game starter, whatever it is, they've got to bring those experiences with them and they should beat the coaches to some of the coaching points. An older guy that's been around, say 'Well these are the expectations of how we practice.' There's also guys that didn't have success that look at it through the lens of 'Well, maybe just maybe if I do some of these things that we're talking about, that success rate can go up because I tried it a different way and it didn't work.' So all those things, guys just come with a knowledge base that way. You're not installing everything, every technique, every drill, expectations, all those things. So no, believe me, everybody loves Year 2 compared to Year 1, but that's not the magic elixir either ... so we've got a responsibility to just stack days and work hard. But there's a bigger unit, there's a stronger unit and I think it's a very confident unit. And it's something that is ongoing because you've got to be able to do that on the field. You can do that in the offseason, but you've got to do it through spring football and all of those things."
How soon after the bowl game did you go back and watch it and how long did it linger with you?
"The next day, you watch it on the plane ride home, all that stuff. That's normal, that's part of it. Does it stick with you? Again, from a profession, you've got to move on. You just do. You don't make excuses, you don't allow yourself to into -- like we talked about, there ain't no victims here. We signed up for high expectations and when you win, we celebrate, and when we don't we circle the wagons and we come back and we work harder for it. Because Year 2 was coming whatever Year 1 was going to be. Obviously, our expectations for Year 1 were high and we reached some of those -- had the player of the year in the conference, were one of the top teams in the country in takeaways, those kids won 11 games and you can't just discredit the things they did do well. You've got to give them credit. And from a coaching staff standpoint, what you do is you expect the bullets to be aimed at you and you take those bullets as aimed at the right place and take ownership for it, and that's what we've done."
How much do you study the jump your defense took in Year 2 at Oklahoma as it relates to now?
"Yeah, I think it's different players, it's different challenges in terms of the week, different opponents and all that stuff. So you don't want to be too naive to that, just again say that the magic bullet was the calendar went from Year 1 to Year 2. But you also draw confidence in that guys have an understanding of where they need to be and what they need to do, and the expectations just through four days, are we coaching effort like we had to do in January or December? Fortunately we didn't, now you've got to go back and why did we have to coach effort in December? That's just part of the process. As we say, you can't microwave it -- you've got to go through it. And we always have to make sure as you go through it is that at USC we're not afraid of the struggle, we're not afraid of the hard part, the hard stuff. We weren't talking last year about how easy Year 1 was going to be. I don't remember that question coming up -- it was going to be hard. And again, that continues. So Year 2, my point being is, the easy part's not coming. It's a talented league, we've got talented opponents, but also yeah, absolutely you take confidence. And then it's confidence being around the guys because ultimately they've got to go make plays and then do the right things we've got to put them in position to do. So we have a lot of confidence we can get that done."
"Basically, you rehash the entirety of the season. And then you kind of start with explosive plays -- you kind of rip the Band Aids off real quick. So you start with the negative, and that's the appropriate thing to do. And you first look at it through the lens from a coaching staff standpoint -- OK, what can we do to affect the behavior of our guys? Can we put them in a better situation to be successful. And it takes a lot of discipline, and it takes a lot of maturity as a coaching staff to go through, because you're rehashing the most frustrating plays throughout the season and it's fresh. We're in here the day after the game. So you look at it through that lens and say, 'OK, what can we do?' What you have to do in those moments is you have to have an honest evaluation -- you've got to make sure that you look at from the standpoint of if it's a simple as, all right, there's a guy who should be in the position to make a play, he's not there, well it sounds simple enough but why? The part of the evaluation that makes it really difficult if you say X, Y, Z should happen, it didn't, is there something we can go back from a preparation standpoint that would lend ourselves to believe that maybe, just maybe it goes back to just that -- we need to prepare them in a better way.
"Other situations, a guy's at the point of attack, he's in position to make a play, how can we help him make a play next time? But what you don't do is you don't just throw your hands up and pout and play victim. And then you attack from the mindset of, OK, let's look at it through the minds of situational calls. So you kind of break it down that way -- you look at the redzone defense, you look at it through third downs, you look at it through P-and-10 (the first possession of a drive), first-and-10, so it's a comprehensive study. Ultimately, those plays show up quite a bit, right? So you watch it over and over again.
"And then you look at it, OK, what can we do from a physical standpoint? What's the most tangible thing you can do in January -- you come off, you're disappointed. We went through what a lot of basketball teams are going through right now -- they didn't get out of the first weekend. That happens. Does it dismiss, those kids won 11 games? And they deserve credit for that, so you don't dismiss that. But what's the most tangible thing that we can do in the moment is bigger, faster, stronger. So you attack in that mindset. It's all-encompassing and it's ongoing. And then what you do is you then take it on the practice field and say, OK, well if these are the things and adjustments we maybe want to make, is there a coaching point? It may not be big-picture scheme, but it may just be simply are we asking an individual guy to do the appropriate thing within that scheme. Then you look at it through lenses -- or we call it testimonial -- the drills that we're doing. Does it show up on film? And if doesn't, then we need to either change the drill, change the coaching point and at point possibly change the person. But that's final steps. What we want do is change the player, right, as opposed to looking through the lens of just simply changing the person, fire guys, next guy, next guy, next guy. No, let's change the player -- let's get them bigger, faster, stronger and put them in the best situation possible. Let's coach them up, let's put reps on it. And that's what spring is. You flip the page and you move forward. As a competitor you don't ever get over it, but as a professional you've got to move on."
What do you think led to that disconnect between what you tried to teach and what happened during games?
"I think it's ongoing. I don't think anything specific to us is unique. It's a lack of consistency, and where's that consistency come from -- you've got to go back to preparation. I think in other instances, you've got to make sure you have the strength to execute at the appropriate level. You've got to be able to get off blocks. The unblocked guy has to make tackles. And then we've got to look at it through the lens of, how do we get two unblocked guys there? Then you've got to look at it through the lens of, are you asking the guys to do the appropriate things? Are there call you want to have back? Absolutely, that always happens and you can't dumb it down to that either. The baseball example, you throw a curveball and they hit it out of the park, you can't just say, 'Well, we should have thrown a fastball.' That's not how this sport works. So it's the same thing for us -- man, zone, three-down, four-down, rushing five, rushing four, should we drop eight more, should we play with two-high more, should we ask certain guys to do other roles? So no, it's a difficult process and not one you want to go through, but it's not unique. It happens every single year. If you win 11 games, you're awfully excited about the 11 that you win, you're devastated by the ones you lost. And then that doesn't matter if you win them all, which obviously the end goal is, so the work continues."
How much do the returning guys look like returners and is anybody standing out?
"It's exciting, and what you can't do and we talk about this, we've challenged the guys this way, you can't just simply say 'Well, it's Year 2 so all things are going to be better.' Just the natural progression of we're older, we're bigger, whatever. So we describe it to the guys, 'It can't be Year 1 2.0' where we're saying the exact same thing every single day. So Practice 1 of spring football is just regurgitation of Practice 1 of last spring football -- we're starting over from square one. There's so [many] things that you dial it back and you make sure that you're starting from square one, but they've got to have responsibility on their part to act like they played 14 games last year. There's guys that were an eight-game starter, nine-game starter, whatever it is, they've got to bring those experiences with them and they should beat the coaches to some of the coaching points. An older guy that's been around, say 'Well these are the expectations of how we practice.' There's also guys that didn't have success that look at it through the lens of 'Well, maybe just maybe if I do some of these things that we're talking about, that success rate can go up because I tried it a different way and it didn't work.' So all those things, guys just come with a knowledge base that way. You're not installing everything, every technique, every drill, expectations, all those things. So no, believe me, everybody loves Year 2 compared to Year 1, but that's not the magic elixir either ... so we've got a responsibility to just stack days and work hard. But there's a bigger unit, there's a stronger unit and I think it's a very confident unit. And it's something that is ongoing because you've got to be able to do that on the field. You can do that in the offseason, but you've got to do it through spring football and all of those things."
How soon after the bowl game did you go back and watch it and how long did it linger with you?
"The next day, you watch it on the plane ride home, all that stuff. That's normal, that's part of it. Does it stick with you? Again, from a profession, you've got to move on. You just do. You don't make excuses, you don't allow yourself to into -- like we talked about, there ain't no victims here. We signed up for high expectations and when you win, we celebrate, and when we don't we circle the wagons and we come back and we work harder for it. Because Year 2 was coming whatever Year 1 was going to be. Obviously, our expectations for Year 1 were high and we reached some of those -- had the player of the year in the conference, were one of the top teams in the country in takeaways, those kids won 11 games and you can't just discredit the things they did do well. You've got to give them credit. And from a coaching staff standpoint, what you do is you expect the bullets to be aimed at you and you take those bullets as aimed at the right place and take ownership for it, and that's what we've done."
How much do you study the jump your defense took in Year 2 at Oklahoma as it relates to now?
"Yeah, I think it's different players, it's different challenges in terms of the week, different opponents and all that stuff. So you don't want to be too naive to that, just again say that the magic bullet was the calendar went from Year 1 to Year 2. But you also draw confidence in that guys have an understanding of where they need to be and what they need to do, and the expectations just through four days, are we coaching effort like we had to do in January or December? Fortunately we didn't, now you've got to go back and why did we have to coach effort in December? That's just part of the process. As we say, you can't microwave it -- you've got to go through it. And we always have to make sure as you go through it is that at USC we're not afraid of the struggle, we're not afraid of the hard part, the hard stuff. We weren't talking last year about how easy Year 1 was going to be. I don't remember that question coming up -- it was going to be hard. And again, that continues. So Year 2, my point being is, the easy part's not coming. It's a talented league, we've got talented opponents, but also yeah, absolutely you take confidence. And then it's confidence being around the guys because ultimately they've got to go make plays and then do the right things we've got to put them in position to do. So we have a lot of confidence we can get that done."
