Nov. 25, 2008
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| Head Coach Steve Spurrier met with the media for his weekly press conference Tuesday afternoon in the Crews Building team room. Below are some excerpts from his press conference:
Opening Statement
OK I guess the first thing I have to do is thank Carolina football fans for their strong purchasing of season tickets next year. The turnout to our YES program, which is the Yearly Equitable Seating program, has gone tremendously well. We appreciate the support of the Gamecocks. They love their football as well as their athletic teams here. Hopefully they believe our football program is headed in the right direction.
We’re getting ready for a big game with Clemson at 12 noon Saturday over at Death Valley. I know they’re excited to play. They’ve won (two) in a row. We’ve won two o the last three. We didn’t have much of a chance last time out the way we played and coached, but we’re looking forward to the game. It should be a typical (Carolina-Clemson) game. All three of our games have gone down to the wire; gone down to the fourth quarter. They’ve won two of the three since I’ve been here so we’re going to try to even it up.
On quarterbacks
We’re going to let Chris Smelley play the game. We decided to give him the ball, tell him he’s our man and to go play. We’re hoping he can finish the game. Stephen Garcia has struggled a bit lately. It’s time to say, “Chris we think you’re the best guy for the job (so) go play and we’ll see what happens.”
On playing at Florida two weeks ago
None of us handled that environment very well. – coaches, players, the whole offense. Our defense gave up some big plays but we got two turnovers and forced six punts against one of the best offenses in the country. Our defense did have a lot of good stops in that game. That one’s history as we say and we’re moving on to the one Saturday. We’re in position to have a good season this year.
On the possibility of swapping quarterbacks
I hope not. We’re trying to get our wristbands and get our signals straight and let Chris Smelley go play. Stephen actually has a little bit of the flu bug. He didn’t’ practice yesterday and I doubt he’ll practice today.
On “hate” in rivalries
I haven’t used that word in my coaching career. Strongly dislike each other might be something. That’s more for the fans. Really to win the game you have to play well and coach well. I’m not a believer that the one side that hates the most has the best chance to win the game.
On the Carolina-Clemson rivalry
It’s unique because it’s been going on so long, over 100 years. I think it’s the third-longest running rivalry in the country. It’s an important game in our state. Somebody’s going to have bragging rights for a year.
On Clemson after the coaching change
They may be doing a few things differently, but I’ve been watching their defense mostly They’ve got good hitters. They’re safety’s tackle well and cause a bunch of turnovers. That’s what I’ve been watching.
On if it will be a low-scoring game
We’ll have to see. You never know what’s going to happen. We hope to take care of the ball a lot better than we did last game, but we’ve taken care of the ball (pretty well) most of the year. It could possibly be a game where both teams struggle to drive 80 yards for a score, but we’ll have to see how it plays out.
Your in-state rival game is the biggest game of the year unless you’re playing for the conference championship.
On Clemson’s running backs
C.J. Spiller is a fast guy that if he gets loose nobody’s going to catch him. He got loose two years ago a couple of times in the game we won. They key is don’t let him get behind us or in the open field. James Davis is a very good inside runner also. We have to go play the best we can.
On team speed
We have excellent team speed on defense. Offensively we could use a bit more. (With) Kenny McKinley, Jason Barnes and Moe Brown, we can run well. Our running backs haven’t made a lot of long runs this year. Of course we haven’t had a lot of yards rushing this year.
On playing with the atmosphere at Clemson
When I coached at Duke obviously coming to Clemson in Death Valley was like going to an SEC ballpark. Back in the 80’s there weren’t a lot of big stadiums in the ACC. They’ve gotten a lot bigger, but Clemson had by far the biggest ballpark in the ACC…That was the only place we’d have to ask for crowd noise to stop.
On the importance of the season finale
It’s always helpful to win your last game. For whatever reason people remember the last game you play a whole lot more than how you played five weeks earlier. I was sitting in here with you guys prior to the Tennessee game. You weren’t exactly right but you (reporters) said we’d be favored in three of the last four. We’re (almost) in that position. We’re not favored for this game because we played so poorly in our last game. The fact is we’re in the same position we talked about that we could be going into the Clemson game at 7-4 with an opportunity to have a big year.
On winning with defense
I don’t want to get used to it because we need to get better on the offensive side. Defensively hopefully we can maintain and continue to improve there also, but we need to improve our offensive team. We are what we are right now. We’re 7-4 and have a toss-up game. We’ll have to play our best and see what happens.
Jasper Brinkley
On the potential to knock Clemson out of bowl contention
We’re not thinking about that. We’re thinking about trying to get ourselves in better position to get a better bowl game and to make our record look better. It will be great to go out (8-4), possibly (9-4).
On what the Clemson rivalry means to him and the team
The Clemson game…it always seems to have a little more spark to it than any other game. The whole rivalry of the game is just so big, and it’s what the fans look forward to. We can have a bad year but then beat Clemson, and it’s like we’ve had a winning year.
Every year we play Clemson, we get their best game. They come out with everything. We don’t get to see that bad part throughout the year.
On the students’ anticipation of Saturday’s game
It’s crazy right now. I’ve got a couple of classmates, they’re talking about it, “Go beat the Tigers.” It will mean so much to them. I guess it’s because their friends are Tiger fans or whatnot, and I guess they want to have the bragging rights for a year. Their friends had it last year, so they want it this year.
On the lack of recent success against Clemson
We really haven’t (had much success lately). It’s something that we want to change around here, try to change it for the good. That’s a goal we’re going to keep shooting for. Every year since 2006 it’s come down to a field goal. I think that’s good because it shows they’re playing great football, and we’re trying to play good football.
On the defense’s reaction to the loss at Florida
It didn’t take anything away (from what we’ve accomplished this year). We just know you can’t take anything for granted. You’ve got to go out and perform each and every weekend.
On this being the last time the seniors will face Clemson
It means a whole lot. One of my goals is that I want to leave school with a win at Clemson. I want to be able to go out and say I beat Clemson my last year.
