Q & A: Bobby Bowden Part 2

Any thought to going to some nickel package more frequently?

Bowden: You can do that what, and that's what you could end up doing, but they are going to hammer you. They are going to run that football. If you take one of those big linemen out and put another back in there, they are going to run that ball. Still, you've got to do something.

You said Saturday you got enough from the running game but you'd still like to see more consistency, but Lorenzo Booker and Antone Smith only had 14 carries between them. Are you not being patient enough running the ball or are there still some breakdowns that are taking you away from it?

Bowden: You'd probably like to run it more, but it's more fun throwing it. It's quicker throwing. By that, I mean, Duke's philosophy on defense is the same as ours. And probably, or maybe 100 percent of college teams. No. 1, we're going to stop your run. We're going to put so many people up there you can't run the ball. When you do that you make yourself vulnerable to the pass, you know. You can go ahead and be stubborn and run the ball, run the ball and run the ball, just trying to get statistics. Or you can try to take advantage of where they are not the strongest, which is in the secondary. That was very obvious, that that's where their weakness was. So some of it is . . . (Saturday) I felt like was a time where all you did was run it enough to let them know you've got the run and y'all better defense it, so they couldn't drop everybody back. Or blitz everybody or something like that.

Fourteen is not a lot of carries, but that's one of those games where it didn't really make a lot of difference.

How satisfied were you with the way Drew Weatherford played against Duke? After not completing the first six passes, he really settled down. It was by far the best game he's had this season?

Bowden: Now let me ask you this. I'm looking at it from the sidelines and I'm mad as heck. Shouldn't we have caught about four of those passes? ... They were in their hands but he threw the ball a little too hard. But a great catcher would make those catches all day long. Even though he started off 0-for-6, I thought we should have caught about four of those.

What was the difference? Did he finally get comfortable again because there had been concerns about him holding the ball too long and not making the right reads?

Bowden: Experience. Holding the ball too long is probably what everybody goes through at one time or another. Throwing it too quick, they go through that, too. Some of that is learning and learning and learning. He's still only in his sophomore year. He probably learned something about releasing it a little quicker that he's probably better off. That's the learning process. That's what Xavier is having to go through. Xavier is just further behind because of missing spring training like he did, he's so much further behind. But he's still got the same tools, you know.

Is it possible or plausible that Drew would relax more now? It's been his job and you have made that clear, but there is still a lot of commotion about Xavier. It seems like every backup is the most popular guy, but because Xavier didn't perform well, does that quiet some of the talk? Drew has looked like he is pressing. Do you hope this settles him down?

Bowden: That could be a factor. I don't know if it is or not. He's a pretty confident boy, Drew. He's pretty confident and he's got good sense about him. It might. If I were the quarterback and I knew nobody is going to take my place if I make a bad play, I might play a little looser. But knowing him, I don't know if that goes through his mind or not. I know this. He seems to have no resentment about Xavier going in. He seems to pull for him real hard.

Since the Rice game you have appeared to have opened things up offensive a little more by doing some different things. Has something transpired? There seems to be more efficiency in the attack? It doesn't always work obviously, but it just seems like the plan is working better.

Bowden: It seems to be. It seems to be. I mentioned last week that we lose to N.C. State but we scored 20 points. You look at all the teams that played yesterday that lose and didn't get 20 points. We are doing better offensively, even though we lost (to N.C. State). We are probably more versatile in what we are doing than we've been in a while.

How well would you assess that (offensive coordinator) Jeff (Bowden) has adapted to the personnel just in terms in creating the game plan and executing it?

Bowden: My point would be that he does it as well as anybody else. Our people watch us play. They don't watch other teams, and they wonder why we don't do this and why do we do that. How come we're not any better than that? Other teams do the very same things. I bet there have been so many times when I'll be talking on the phone to Jeffery and I'll say, 'Jeffery, run so and so.' He'll say, 'No, it's not a good play.' And I'll say, run it. I know they are giving it to us. Run it.' Well, it's not a good play. I'll say, 'I don't care. Run it.' So he'll run it and the next day I'll look at film and say, 'My lord, I shouldn't have done it. He was correct.' He said don't do it, do this. I've seen so many times where he was right and I was wrong. Well, he catches all the blame no matter what happens. But now, if you'd watch Florida's play-calling or watch Miami's play-calling or watch Alabama's play-calling or watch Georgia Tech's play-calling, you'd see the same thing. You'd say, 'Who's that idiot up there calling plays?'

Do you feel like you have taken a step back or tried to take more of a step back in recent weeks?

Bowden: Yes. I've tried to take more of a step back, and more than in just recent weeks. I've done it nearly every year, trying to take a step back. Now I do get my pointers in the day before, you know. When we have our staff meeting, we'll go through ... In our last play-calling session I do get my points in then. And some of the play calls might be me saying, 'I won't you to do this no matter what.' It's not even a question. That's what we are going to call. So I'm still in it, but I'm trying not to get in it where I bother people. You can bother the guy that calls the plays and mess him up completely. I used to do it to Mark Richt that way. He came down to my office and said, 'I don't know if I can call plays any more with you butting in.' That's what he told me. I had to butt out. And usually the guy up there, he has the eyes to see things. Down there, you're guessing.

You had 11 penalties for 101 yards against Duke. Is that a concern?

Bowden: It is. I don't like it, darn it. Our penalties are funny. We'll get six one game and the next one get 12. It just makes me so mad. We talk to our coaches. We work on it. We had a great punt return and one of our guys drilled a guy in the back. But he was a freshman. That's the liability of playing with freshmen. We've got so many freshmen out there they are liable to do anything. You talk to them. 'Don't block in the back. Don't block in the back. Don't block in the back.' Then he starts to block a guy and the guy turns and he hits him in the back. I guess as long as we play with so many young guys we're going to get some of that.

We know what your goals are at the start of the season, but how have they changed with two losses?

Bowden: Let me say this, the position we are in, you really have to cut down on your goals to just win the next game. I know that sounds old but that's as far as we can go. When we started out the season our goals were to win every game, win a national championship, win an ACC championship, go to a BCS bowl. There were just so many beautiful goals out there. Now when you get to where we are, it's kind of like we are backed into corner. You're a tiger. You're wounded. You're backed in a corner. Now try not to get killed and try to fight your way out. But don't think about the prize you are going to get after you fight your way out. There's going to be a lot of meat down there to eat. You just worry about fighting your way out.

Are the new rules that have eliminated about 10 or 12 plays a game, does that factor in to play-calling, too? You have fewer at-bats. Everybody is playing under those rules, but does that make it even more difficult?

Bowden: That really throws more pressure on your defense as well because you are typically not going to have as many at-bats, which means you are not going to get as many scores as you might have had two years ago or even a year ago. So really, it puts more pressure on your defense. Defense, you can't let that other team run up and down the field on you. So on offense, you've got to put some points up there ... Really ... I don't know what it does. It makes both of them more tense.

Two or three weeks ago there was some questions about not having Greg Carr on the field at critical times. Based on his performance, dare we say those issues have been resolved?

Bowden: Well, yes. That's kind of a game to game thing. The way our offense is, and it's been this way for years ... We've always had great receivers like Peter Warrick and now Greg. And yet, you've got Chris Davis, and he ain't bad. You've got De'Cody Fagg, and he ain't bad. And you've got some pretty good young ones behind them. Our offense has always been based on call a certain pass, drop back, read and throw to the open receiver. Now one Saturday that receiver might be Chris. One Saturday it might be Greg. One time in might be De'Cody. One time it might be your tailback. So it's not like we go into a game and say, let's hit Greg five times. Or let's throw 10 passes to Greg ... . If they are double covering him, why are you throwing to him. So our offense is not built to get the ball to one guy, but sometimes that's where it's at. That's the day he catches two or three touchdowns passes. Sometimes you have to look at it ... OK, he catches three touchdown passes last week. Now last year when we played Boston College, I know he caught one touchdown pass. He might have caught two. You don't think they are going to let him run around free out there, do you. They might double. They'll probably double him most of the time. That's going to leave somebody open, either inside or outside.

Have we tried harder to get the ball to him? Yeah, we'd like to get the ball to him all the time. You could tell the other day that some of those plays were just to him, but I don't know if he'll get that kind of coverage this Saturday.

Last week you did hold some of your first-team players out early in the week so they didn't get more banged up. With Boston College being the opponent, can you do the same thing?

Bowden: I don't think we have a choice. You can get them hurt in practice. I usually try to judge that by how sore they are, how tired they are, how beat up they are. If they have any kind of minor injury and they are a starter, we simply can not risk losing them in practice. So it could be you put a blue shirt on them, and tell everyone not to hit them. I'm sure we will have to go through that the rest of the season.