Northwestern University Athletics
#17 Iowa 40, #20 Northwestern 10 • Postgame Quotes
No. 20 Northwestern vs. No. 17 Iowa
Ryan Field
October 17, 2015
Postgame Quotes
Northwestern Head Coach Pat Fitzgerald
Opening Statement...
"Disappointed in the outcome of the game. I thought we'd come back and compete better than we did. First of all, to start the game offensively, we put ourselves behind with some turnovers, obviously self-inflicted wounds. But we responded pretty well. Then we came out in the second half and start to put a good drive together, and then defensively, we just ran out of gas. We couldn't get off the field. You have to credit our opponent. I thought Iowa, at the point of attack, blocked well. We missed as many tackles as we have all year, which came out of nowhere. We've been tackling pretty well. A lot of work to do. We'll get right back to work and the team's got to make a decision between the team that came out and won five games and was making plays all over the place or a team that, the last two weeks, quite frankly, is devoid of making plays. We have to do a better job as a staff, we have to get their confidence back, we have to get our guys to tackle better, to block better, to get off blocks better, catch the ball better. A lot of work to do but a lot of ball in front of us and a tough road test next week."
On the team's performance over the course of the season...
"We've played as competitive a schedule as anybody in the country and we've been in some battles and played well and then we've played two teams in a row that are playing at a high level and we didn't execute. And when you play teams that play at a high level and don't execute, it compounds the problem. So it's going to be those continual challenges as we go forward. As you're taking steps up the mountain, it gets harder and harder as the air gets thinner and that's Big Ten football as you move through October and November and we've just got to get back on the horse and get back to playing the way that we were. And that starts with us as a staff. We've got to get things fixed and really, to me, it just looked like fundamental things today."
On the team's history with Iowa...
"If you don't stop the run against a team that wants to be a run-first team, that's going to be a recipe for success for them. And obviously we're not able to get our run game going and have balance, which ends up being a recipe for success for them again. So, you can't play the way we did against a very well-coached, a very disciplined, a very fundamentally sound football team and expect to be successful. And that's what we haven't done in the last couple years. They make it tough on you when you get behind. They do a good job. So, credit Iowa. Congratulations to Iowa. We'll move on and find a way to get better next week."
Northwestern Student-Athletes
DB Nick Van Hoose
On getting caught outside in the run game…
“We knew their receivers were going to crash, and when you’re in man coverage and somebody goes to crack, you’ve got to have really good eyes. It’s a pretty tough job to do, and its something that I didn’t execute that well today, so we’ll definitely start working on more prep for plays this week.”
On homecoming and the loss…
“We didn’t come out and execute. Homecoming is always a big game, but we play in the Big Ten, so each and every week is a big game. We just need to execute.”
DL Dean Lowry
On the stuggle stopping the run…
“I don’t think it was a matter of overpowering, I think it was a matter of poor execution. I think of guys just not getting right, and too many one man breakdowns, and against a team like Iowa, that can’t happen, and if you want to beat Iowa, you have to stop the run, and that didn’t happen today.”
On the last two weeks…
“We try to focus on what we control, and we think that it has been very disappointing - our performances the last two weeks. We know we can do better, and we have to look at ourselves in the mirror tonight and ask are we the team that beat Stanford and Minnesota, or the team that came out today. I think this game will bring a lot of reflection these next few days, and we’ll come out and work hard on Monday.”
On what Coach Fitzgerald will bring this week…
“I think just his passion and energy. He knows, and we know, that great teams respond to adversity, and it’s about coming back Monday and working. And as seniors and leaders of this team, we’ve got to set the tone, and have that work ethic, that positive attitude to go out there and get a “W” and get back on track.”
WR Christian Jones
On dropped passes...
"It starts as soon as we step out of the room. We all go back and watch what we did wrong, we go back and we let ourselves. Week in week out, we’ve got to find a way to fix that, and that’s catching the ball every week, even when we’re off. And its personal, it’s a pride thing. Nobody wants to drop any passes so you’ve got to take each one like you just dropped five, and we didn’t do very well, I didn’t do very well, honestly. And we have to change our mindset. I have to change my mindset.”
On today’s lack of success…
“Execution. We had a good game plan, and we knew what they were going to do. It was the simple thing of we know how they run their offense and how they run their defense, and they know how we do things, and it came down to who wanted it more and who was going to focus up and execute, and we just didn’t do it.”
Iowa Head Coach Kirk Ferentz
Opening statement...
“Certainly we’re very pleased and very proud of our football team. It’s a tremendous team victory. Our guys in every essence played great team football out there today… Needless to say this is a really resilient group of guys that we’re coaching right now. Seems like whatever we throw at them, whatever comes their way good, bad or different they just seem to respond in a really positive way. I’m proud of the guys for that, proud of their effort today. How good we are I have no idea right now, but I do know that this team plays extremely hard and with a lot of guts. So, it’s just great to be with them today.“
On Akrum Wadley (RB) and Derrick Mitchell Jr. (RB)...
“They were both on my scrimmage list for next week during the bye week, so we’ll count those snaps today as a part of that. Biggest concern about those guys is ball security, and they stepped up big. I think they just got caught in the wave with the rest of team and we needed them badly with Jordan (Canzeri) coming out of the ball game. It was a tough circumstance, so Akrum stepped up and he’s been doing a better job the last four or five weeks in practice. Derrick has been the same way, so we’re just really proud of their efforts and it’s scary to think what would have happened if those guys hadn’t played as well as they did.”
On the resilience of his team…
“It seems that whatever has come our way, we’ve handled it pretty well… the players have. I’d like to say you can teach that, but it’s just something that grows a little bit in a team. We’re getting great leadership, and once that gets going it can be a really good thing. Today we lost momentum before the half, and I was a little concerned about that. But again, that didn’t seem to affect the players. They just came out and played in the second half and did a great job.“
On C.J. Beathard...
“Two words I’ve used are poise and toughness. I think he exhibited both of those things, and continues to do so. He’s just a tough-minded guy who wants to compete, but he’s very poised out there. He really has a good awareness of what’s going on. When he gets knocked around, which he has been this year, you know right now he’s fighting some injuries and what have you. But, he keeps his focus where it has to be and he’s done a great job leading us.”
On injuries…
“If I said the bye week couldn’t come at a better time I’d be wrong, because it could’ve come last week. That would’ve been a better time, I was really concerned about that coming in. But, that’s football. You play through those things, you hope other guys pick it up and they did today, that was very evident. You go from there, and then the turnover takeaway ratio thing is something that we really believe in, and I think it’s something that’s synonymous with being a good football team. If you have a bad turnover takeaway ratio you better be really talented, and much better than the other teams and that’s hard to do. We’re starting to build on that, that’s a positive and the takeaways in the second half have been the biggest difference thus far. We’re doing a good job taking the ball away and then usually come out with some points so that’s a positive… We’ve got a lot more faith and confidence in a lot of guys… Guys have to go out there and experience, they’ve got to get banged around a little bit and play in tough circumstances.”
Iowa Student-Athletes
QB C.J. Beathard
On limiting his throws because of injury…
“Yeah, it was tough. I couldn’t do many bootlegs or nudes and stuff like that. I was a little bit limited in what I could do running-wise.”
On the two running backs Akrum Wadley and Derrick Mitchell Jr. …
“They did a great job. Canzeri unfortunately got hurt earlier in the game, and Derrick and Akrum stepped up and did a great job. We know the talent they have. They do it all the time against our own defense and they did a great job stepping up today.”
On what it means to be the first quarterback ever at Iowa to win his first 8 starts…
“No, all that I’m worried about is that we’re 7-0 (this year), and this team. We’re excited about that.”
On moving the ball well…
“Yeah I thought we could do what we wanted to do offensively. We were inches off on certain plays. That’s just how football is sometimes, but we got with it in the second half and did a good job.”
On the vibe in the huddle after Jordan Canzeri got hurt…
“Obviously he’s a big back for us, our guy right now. But it wasn’t a big blow for us because we expect the next man in to do a great job, and Akrum and Derrick did a great job stepping up. That’s just the way the season’s gone so far. We’ve had guys hurt, Drew [Ott) got hurt; our right and left tackles were going out. We’ve taken that upon ourselves and the next guy in has done a great job.”
RB Akrum Wadley
On getting some big carries…
“I knew running behind our offensive line was going to open up the holes for me. All I had to do was run behind them. They lightened the load for me. I just had to make a cut off their blocks.”
On knowing he would get carries going into the game…
“The main thing I wanted to do was hold onto the ball. I struggled with that in the beginning of the season. That’s the only thing. They told me I was going to get some carries, and I just wanted to pick up where Jordan Canzeri left off at.”
On the team’s response when Canzeri went down injured…
“Next man in. We got four great backs. There’s just a big play waiting to happen. Hopefully Canzeri can get healthy before we play not next week, but the week after that. Any one of us is capable of making big runs, and I just stepped up to the plate.”
On running for 300 yards collectively against a defense allowing 270 total yards…
“It’s definitely a statement. C.J. Beathard was shaken up from the last game and he couldn’t throw as much as he would like to. Big backs, we just needed to step up. It could have been Derrick Mitchell, or anyone. I just stepped up to the plate.”
OL Jordan Walsh
On seeing Jordan Canzeri get hurt and how it affected the line…
“It’s definitely sad, seeing another senior go down like that. We just got to keep working, keep the next running back clean, and let him run. Hopefully he does well.”
On how that game felt as an offensive line…
“Definitely great. We put up the scoring. We went 7-0. It felt great.”
On recovering so well from injuries to the offensive line…
“There’s no magic sauce. We all practice, we all practice each position, right and left, guard, tackle. It’s just next man in, and next man came in, and we try to execute.”
Ryan Field
October 17, 2015
Postgame Quotes
Northwestern Head Coach Pat Fitzgerald
Opening Statement...
"Disappointed in the outcome of the game. I thought we'd come back and compete better than we did. First of all, to start the game offensively, we put ourselves behind with some turnovers, obviously self-inflicted wounds. But we responded pretty well. Then we came out in the second half and start to put a good drive together, and then defensively, we just ran out of gas. We couldn't get off the field. You have to credit our opponent. I thought Iowa, at the point of attack, blocked well. We missed as many tackles as we have all year, which came out of nowhere. We've been tackling pretty well. A lot of work to do. We'll get right back to work and the team's got to make a decision between the team that came out and won five games and was making plays all over the place or a team that, the last two weeks, quite frankly, is devoid of making plays. We have to do a better job as a staff, we have to get their confidence back, we have to get our guys to tackle better, to block better, to get off blocks better, catch the ball better. A lot of work to do but a lot of ball in front of us and a tough road test next week."
On the team's performance over the course of the season...
"We've played as competitive a schedule as anybody in the country and we've been in some battles and played well and then we've played two teams in a row that are playing at a high level and we didn't execute. And when you play teams that play at a high level and don't execute, it compounds the problem. So it's going to be those continual challenges as we go forward. As you're taking steps up the mountain, it gets harder and harder as the air gets thinner and that's Big Ten football as you move through October and November and we've just got to get back on the horse and get back to playing the way that we were. And that starts with us as a staff. We've got to get things fixed and really, to me, it just looked like fundamental things today."
On the team's history with Iowa...
"If you don't stop the run against a team that wants to be a run-first team, that's going to be a recipe for success for them. And obviously we're not able to get our run game going and have balance, which ends up being a recipe for success for them again. So, you can't play the way we did against a very well-coached, a very disciplined, a very fundamentally sound football team and expect to be successful. And that's what we haven't done in the last couple years. They make it tough on you when you get behind. They do a good job. So, credit Iowa. Congratulations to Iowa. We'll move on and find a way to get better next week."
Northwestern Student-Athletes
DB Nick Van Hoose
On getting caught outside in the run game…
“We knew their receivers were going to crash, and when you’re in man coverage and somebody goes to crack, you’ve got to have really good eyes. It’s a pretty tough job to do, and its something that I didn’t execute that well today, so we’ll definitely start working on more prep for plays this week.”
On homecoming and the loss…
“We didn’t come out and execute. Homecoming is always a big game, but we play in the Big Ten, so each and every week is a big game. We just need to execute.”
DL Dean Lowry
On the stuggle stopping the run…
“I don’t think it was a matter of overpowering, I think it was a matter of poor execution. I think of guys just not getting right, and too many one man breakdowns, and against a team like Iowa, that can’t happen, and if you want to beat Iowa, you have to stop the run, and that didn’t happen today.”
On the last two weeks…
“We try to focus on what we control, and we think that it has been very disappointing - our performances the last two weeks. We know we can do better, and we have to look at ourselves in the mirror tonight and ask are we the team that beat Stanford and Minnesota, or the team that came out today. I think this game will bring a lot of reflection these next few days, and we’ll come out and work hard on Monday.”
On what Coach Fitzgerald will bring this week…
“I think just his passion and energy. He knows, and we know, that great teams respond to adversity, and it’s about coming back Monday and working. And as seniors and leaders of this team, we’ve got to set the tone, and have that work ethic, that positive attitude to go out there and get a “W” and get back on track.”
WR Christian Jones
On dropped passes...
"It starts as soon as we step out of the room. We all go back and watch what we did wrong, we go back and we let ourselves. Week in week out, we’ve got to find a way to fix that, and that’s catching the ball every week, even when we’re off. And its personal, it’s a pride thing. Nobody wants to drop any passes so you’ve got to take each one like you just dropped five, and we didn’t do very well, I didn’t do very well, honestly. And we have to change our mindset. I have to change my mindset.”
On today’s lack of success…
“Execution. We had a good game plan, and we knew what they were going to do. It was the simple thing of we know how they run their offense and how they run their defense, and they know how we do things, and it came down to who wanted it more and who was going to focus up and execute, and we just didn’t do it.”
Iowa Head Coach Kirk Ferentz
Opening statement...
“Certainly we’re very pleased and very proud of our football team. It’s a tremendous team victory. Our guys in every essence played great team football out there today… Needless to say this is a really resilient group of guys that we’re coaching right now. Seems like whatever we throw at them, whatever comes their way good, bad or different they just seem to respond in a really positive way. I’m proud of the guys for that, proud of their effort today. How good we are I have no idea right now, but I do know that this team plays extremely hard and with a lot of guts. So, it’s just great to be with them today.“
On Akrum Wadley (RB) and Derrick Mitchell Jr. (RB)...
“They were both on my scrimmage list for next week during the bye week, so we’ll count those snaps today as a part of that. Biggest concern about those guys is ball security, and they stepped up big. I think they just got caught in the wave with the rest of team and we needed them badly with Jordan (Canzeri) coming out of the ball game. It was a tough circumstance, so Akrum stepped up and he’s been doing a better job the last four or five weeks in practice. Derrick has been the same way, so we’re just really proud of their efforts and it’s scary to think what would have happened if those guys hadn’t played as well as they did.”
On the resilience of his team…
“It seems that whatever has come our way, we’ve handled it pretty well… the players have. I’d like to say you can teach that, but it’s just something that grows a little bit in a team. We’re getting great leadership, and once that gets going it can be a really good thing. Today we lost momentum before the half, and I was a little concerned about that. But again, that didn’t seem to affect the players. They just came out and played in the second half and did a great job.“
On C.J. Beathard...
“Two words I’ve used are poise and toughness. I think he exhibited both of those things, and continues to do so. He’s just a tough-minded guy who wants to compete, but he’s very poised out there. He really has a good awareness of what’s going on. When he gets knocked around, which he has been this year, you know right now he’s fighting some injuries and what have you. But, he keeps his focus where it has to be and he’s done a great job leading us.”
On injuries…
“If I said the bye week couldn’t come at a better time I’d be wrong, because it could’ve come last week. That would’ve been a better time, I was really concerned about that coming in. But, that’s football. You play through those things, you hope other guys pick it up and they did today, that was very evident. You go from there, and then the turnover takeaway ratio thing is something that we really believe in, and I think it’s something that’s synonymous with being a good football team. If you have a bad turnover takeaway ratio you better be really talented, and much better than the other teams and that’s hard to do. We’re starting to build on that, that’s a positive and the takeaways in the second half have been the biggest difference thus far. We’re doing a good job taking the ball away and then usually come out with some points so that’s a positive… We’ve got a lot more faith and confidence in a lot of guys… Guys have to go out there and experience, they’ve got to get banged around a little bit and play in tough circumstances.”
Iowa Student-Athletes
QB C.J. Beathard
On limiting his throws because of injury…
“Yeah, it was tough. I couldn’t do many bootlegs or nudes and stuff like that. I was a little bit limited in what I could do running-wise.”
On the two running backs Akrum Wadley and Derrick Mitchell Jr. …
“They did a great job. Canzeri unfortunately got hurt earlier in the game, and Derrick and Akrum stepped up and did a great job. We know the talent they have. They do it all the time against our own defense and they did a great job stepping up today.”
On what it means to be the first quarterback ever at Iowa to win his first 8 starts…
“No, all that I’m worried about is that we’re 7-0 (this year), and this team. We’re excited about that.”
On moving the ball well…
“Yeah I thought we could do what we wanted to do offensively. We were inches off on certain plays. That’s just how football is sometimes, but we got with it in the second half and did a good job.”
On the vibe in the huddle after Jordan Canzeri got hurt…
“Obviously he’s a big back for us, our guy right now. But it wasn’t a big blow for us because we expect the next man in to do a great job, and Akrum and Derrick did a great job stepping up. That’s just the way the season’s gone so far. We’ve had guys hurt, Drew [Ott) got hurt; our right and left tackles were going out. We’ve taken that upon ourselves and the next guy in has done a great job.”
RB Akrum Wadley
On getting some big carries…
“I knew running behind our offensive line was going to open up the holes for me. All I had to do was run behind them. They lightened the load for me. I just had to make a cut off their blocks.”
On knowing he would get carries going into the game…
“The main thing I wanted to do was hold onto the ball. I struggled with that in the beginning of the season. That’s the only thing. They told me I was going to get some carries, and I just wanted to pick up where Jordan Canzeri left off at.”
On the team’s response when Canzeri went down injured…
“Next man in. We got four great backs. There’s just a big play waiting to happen. Hopefully Canzeri can get healthy before we play not next week, but the week after that. Any one of us is capable of making big runs, and I just stepped up to the plate.”
On running for 300 yards collectively against a defense allowing 270 total yards…
“It’s definitely a statement. C.J. Beathard was shaken up from the last game and he couldn’t throw as much as he would like to. Big backs, we just needed to step up. It could have been Derrick Mitchell, or anyone. I just stepped up to the plate.”
OL Jordan Walsh
On seeing Jordan Canzeri get hurt and how it affected the line…
“It’s definitely sad, seeing another senior go down like that. We just got to keep working, keep the next running back clean, and let him run. Hopefully he does well.”
On how that game felt as an offensive line…
“Definitely great. We put up the scoring. We went 7-0. It felt great.”
On recovering so well from injuries to the offensive line…
“There’s no magic sauce. We all practice, we all practice each position, right and left, guard, tackle. It’s just next man in, and next man came in, and we try to execute.”
