Forged in the fire of adversity

As the days grow shorter, so too do the press conferences. Here’s what we’ve got:

Buckeye 411

• Injury Report- No significant changes; Bryant, Moeller, and others still out. The Donnie is dressed, but Tress said he wasn’t going “live”, and probably wouldn’t be back until after Michigan week.
• Tress Talk- On preparing for the Hawkeyes

They do what they do and they do it so well. They believe in it. Their players believe in it. They’re very, very physical at what they do and the schemes back that. They want to be a balanced offense and they’ve probably, over the past couple years, gotten more balanced, and so they’re not going to change. Now, they may change a little play they run because of what people are doing against them or they — in ’06 they blitzed us a lot more than they ever did. They came after us pretty good, but it was within their system. It wasn’t as if they’d never run those blitzes, they just did their blitzes rather than eight percent of the time they did it 15 percent of the time and it felt like they were blitzing every down, that’s what you admire about them, that’s what you admire about Penn State, that’s why you come out, we got behind Penn State and that wasn’t a shock to me that we were behind Penn State, Penn State plays their defense, they play their offense, they do what they do, they’re very capable as anyone else is, they have good athletes. How we were behind was a little bothersome, but scheme-wise, the good teams, they’re going to do what they do, and Iowa will do that.

• Award Winners- Of course Boom Herron was honored as the offensive player of the week, and Chimdi Chekwa was the defensive POTW. Mike Brester won the Jim Parker award for lineman performance, Drew Basil was awarded the Special Teams POTW, Cam Heyward was the Attack Force honoree, and Brandon Saine had the Jack Tatum hit of the week. Scout Teams award: Spencer Smith, Don Matheney,and Vince Petrella.

• Tweet of the Week- Jonathan Newsome, speaking truth regarding today’s bomb threat on the Ohio State campus.
• Tress Talk, The Sequel- On “spitting fire” at halftime:

REPORTER: Your players talked after the game about the, job if speech is the right word, but the talk you gave them before they went back out for the second half and just did you feel disappointed that you had to make that speech at that point or that you needed something like that and just what were your thoughts there during that? Did you think you were at kind of a junction of the season there a little bit?

COACH TRESSEL: I was disappointed that we weren’t playing like we were capable of playing. We’ve all been in games where you’ve played as well as you could and you lost and that happens, or you played as well as you could but you made those two mistakes and, therefore, you lost. I didn’t think we were playing anywhere near we were capable of playing and we were playing against a team that they knew was good. We play them every year, it’s not like we hadn’t played them in a while, and we were playing in our stadium and all the rest, and at this time of year when you’re supposed to have been improved, so, yeah, I was disappointed in our — and up until that stop, I wasn’t disappointed in that, in fact, I was energized by that, but disappointed up to that point.

REPORTER: How often do you have to go to that big halftime speech to get your guys motivated?

COACH TRESSEL: You only do what’s going on in the course of the moment, so you don’t sit there saying, okay, it’s game seven and I haven’t played that card because you can’t play a card. I mean, you have to react to what’s going on and, you know, typically what’s going on is that we’re playing near to our ability and we’re maybe not doing some little things, it’s atypical that we just weren’t ourselves.

• Posey’s Take: DeVier stated that he knew Coach Tressel had something to say, since” his heel didn’t stop moving and he was shaking his leg“. When asked what the coach said, DeVier responded,

I really can’t repeat that. He got pretty animated. He definitely, you know, spilled his heart out to us and he challenged us, he challenged us to go out there the first play, you know, the kickoff team to make an impression and defense to get a stop and once we got the ball back in the huddle, he was like, you know, we had those — we had that penalty and then we had another penalty, but his attitude didn’t change. His eyebrows didn’t go up. They were still down. And he was like, well, let’s just make the drive a little bit longer.

• Tressel’s Komedy Klassic- Again, presented without commentary or context

They’re a little bit thicker on you, a little bit stronger on you…

Elsewheres

• Thank God For Tressel- We could have Houston Nutt at weekly press conferences.
• One Take On Newtonian Economics- This is a well written article, especially if you believe that we’re only delaying the inevitable.
• This Will Not End Well- You just know Zook’s going to try to “open up a scholarship” given these parameters. Just don’t ask him about the bowl game. Seriously.
• Oh. My. God.- Texas fans, dealing with reality

No, we don't have her number

• Another Take- You know, it really is the system that’s corrupt. Don’t let the talking heads try to convince you otherwise.
• Put Another Way- From ShaggyBevo

Ah, the magic of college sports

• He Then Proceeded To Beat Him With A Ringside Chair- This is a tackle.
• Be Careful What You Ask For- Coach Pelini, wanting the fans to get more “involved” and “vocal”, may want to listen to “The Boos In The ‘Shoe” before continuing to chastise Husker Nation.  “Loud” and “Supportive” are not always the same thing.
• Just Because- this made me spit out my Diet Coke this morning:

Tags: Auburn, Bo Pelini, Brandon Saine, Cameron Heyward, Cameron Newton, Chimdi Chekwa, Daniel Herron, DeVier Posey, Don Matheney, Donnie Evege, Drew Basil, Houston Nutt, Iowa, Jim Tressel, Jonathan Newsome, Mike Brewster, Nebraska, Penn State, Ron Zook, SBP, Spencer Smith, Texas, Vince Petrella
Categories: College Football, Humor, NCAA Investigations, Ohio State Football