Oct. 9, 2010
Vanderbilt 52
Eastern Michigan 6
Vanderbilt Head Coach Robbie Caldwell
Opening statement
“Great team effort. I’m very proud of all three phases. Defense did a great job. It took us a little while to figure them out but we finally slammed the door on them. Offensively, it took us a little while. We worked to improve our punt return team and we got a good return and got an easy score. We might have let our guard down a little bit and it took us another quarter to wake us up and I think we got going. We scored in the first quarter and that was good. We moved the ball.
“I want to stop right there and apologize to Eastern Michigan. That was not an onside kick. I’m embarrassed. It was supposed to be a sky kick and we missed the ball and it happened to fall right into our hands. We didn’t know what to do with it. Jordan Matthews recovered it and didn’t know what to do with it because it was such a surprise to him so I apologize to the coach and everybody. He was great about it but it was embarrassing.”
“Otherwise, we made some improvement. Did we do everything exactly like we wanted to? No. We were inconsistent and fumbled the ball. We had a bad snap. Quarterback drops the snap. Whether it’s a lack of concentration, we’ll continue to go to the drawing board and work on that. I’m very proud of the team stepping up and we did what we were supposed to do. We put all phases of the game together.”
On getting his players focused after some early game faults
“Nothing other than normal. We are always after them to try and press forward. It’s just human nature for young kids. They think `we ran it down and got an easy score,’ then let the game go. Typical of young people sometimes. Then we step up.”
On Larry Smith’s game
“I thought he did a great job other than those two throws. Of course those two throws would have only been one bad one if we hit the first one. He got hit as he threw it and sometimes you have to make those throws while getting hit. He did a great job of running the team and getting the right play. A lot of those were setups. He just did what he was supposed to do: check the play, read the play, put us in the right position. The thing that the public doesn’t see about Larry [Smith] is his leadership and what he means to this team.”
On the receivers
“We used a lot of people and want to get a lot of people work because down the stretch we are going to have injuries. It’s part of the game. Sometimes it’s difficult for a quarterback because no two guys run the same route. I’m very proud of Larry [Smith]. He just keeps playing and never criticizes. As you can see, Larry is the man.”
Vanderbilt Player Quotes
Larry Smith, Quarterback
On coming out strong after last week’s disappointing second half.
“It was huge for us, as far as a big confidence boost. We came out here and executed pretty well. It’s going to be huge for us next week.”
On How it felt to complete 7 straight passes before the half.
” It was huge for us, I think going into halftime, putting more points on the board. A big confidence booster, especially when we knew we were going to get the ball to begin the second half. “
On what he learned today playing against this team.
“That if we execute we can put up as many points as possible. Hopefully we can just continue that next week against Georgia.”
John Cole, Wide Receiver
On getting his burst back for this game
“I’ve had it. It’s nice to be able to show it and to get some room to run, so that was good. I’ve always felt like I’ve had that. My production in the previous weeks has not been where I wanted it to be. It was good to be able to step up.”
On the punt return that got them kick started at the beginning of the game
“That was big for us because we haven’t been able to capitalize in the first quarter all year. So that was big for the offense to get it started.”
On getting Jared Funk his first career touchdown.
“He has been here for 5 years. He works extremely hard, so it was nice to be on the receiving end of that.”
Nate Campbell, Linebacker
General Thoughts
“I thought the defensive line played a tremendous game. They were getting about it, and doing a great job of keeping (blockers) off the linebackers. We were able to attack the ball because of how the defensive line played.”
“Overall, I thought we have a great plan and really carried it out. Everyone on the defense really played fast tonight, and was able to get to the ball.”
Eastern Michigan Quotes
Head Coach Ron English
General Thoughts on the Game
“I’ve never seen a game get away from you that fast. I think at this level, when you don’t take advantage of opportunities, or you don’t put pressure on the other team, particularly when you’re not really talented yourself, you’re going to struggle. I think that’s what happened here.”
“We have a chance to make that a 17-7 game, and we miss two passes that are wide open. If we hit that it’s 10-7, and there was another one there with a guy that was wide open, which would have made it 17-7. And there were a couple of third downs in there where we had one guy making multiple mistakes.”
“We have to find a way to finish. We have six games left and we have to turn this thing around because, we played some opponents that were better, but I would like to have a better showing than this.”
