Sept. 1, 2008

Head Coach Gary Pinkel

Opening Statement:
   "Good afternoon, I'll give you the injury update here really quickly like I usually do. First thing, Jeremy Maclin has an ankle strain and he is probable this week. We'll find out more certainly tomorrow and the next day. His MRI and his x-rays were negative and he's in treatment as we speak. William Moore has a foot sprain and we expect him most likely to play. He won't practice Tuesday, we have a walking cast on him. That's routine now, to see him walking around. They do that quite often now. Hopefully, he'll play. He's probable, we'll find out as we go. Steve Redmond is going to have knee surgery tomorrow afternoon. It's unfortunate, he's given so much to this program. He's had a rehab, as you well know, he hurt his knee and had meniscus surgery just prior to our first game and came back from it. He's just a soldier. He told Pat Smith he wants to be back and ready to play in a bowl game. The reason I say that, it's just remarkable, this guy always wants to give for the team. So, we feel for him, but his leadership will be needed as Pig Brown's was a year ago. He's very much a part of this team, in terms of the seniors and what they've done and the chemistry we have on our team. So, we'll certainly need his experience as a leader to continue. Other than that, I think Van Alexander will get more work this week. Hopefully, he'll be able to get some playing time this week. We'll see, he's improving and getting better. For him, it's just changing direction. He's been released to play, but he needs to make sure he's running full speed and he's getting close. Danario Alexander, very possibly will be able to play next week (against Nevada). You'll see him practicing out there quite a bit this week. We're going to have to keep it under control because he's not getting any reps in this game. But, certainly, that's great news and that's his work ethic. And that's Pat Smith and Rex Sharp and everyone combined working hard to get that done. Andy Maples, he has that Jones fracture, he's been released to get some work this week with the red pullover on, and as quick as he can get back, possibly this week, maybe next week, for sure possibly the next week.
   "That's kind of where we stand as a team, we played a very physical team in Illinois. They are a very good team, we had guys banged up, and that's part of it. We expect everyone else to be 100 percent. Going back to Saturday night's game, I felt very pleased with our kicking game. I thought we made a lot of progress. We did a lot of good things in a lot of different areas. When you get a 50-yard field goal, when you get a kickoff return for a touchdown, when you get 46-yard returns on a punt, you're doing a lot of things in your kicking game that allow you to succeed. I thought our punting team was good overall, it wasn't perfect, but certainly we had some big kicks in the 4th quarter. We had a relatively few penalties, we had only three penalties for 20 yards, which I thought was good. Our opponent had eight penalties for 80 yards which I think was significant. I thought we maintained our composure. So I think our discipline there in a very high-octane environment, I thought we did a lot of good things in terms of that. On both sides of the football, we need to get better. We're going to work very hard to do that. We're excited to be back playing at Mizzou. We like playing at home, we like playing in front of our fans. I know our players are very excited about doing that. But we have a lot of work to do if we want to achieve our goals, and our players understand that. I think they're very excited about getting it done. We're playing SEMO, they're a good football team. We're going to work very hard to play our best game."

On WR Tommy Saunder's performance:
"That's just Tommy. Tommy's like that personally too. Tommy's the guy. Ever since the day he got here, it's always about everyone else. And you've heard us talking about him like that...You can move him anywhere on that field and he knows where he 's going and what he's doing. That's why he's valuable in many ways,but certainly as we saw Sat night. hje just does so many things for us, and is one of the most unselfish people I've ever been around in my life. We're going to miss Tommy Saunders. I guarantee you. A guy like that does so much more than just play football. Certainly, we saw how he can do so many different things for us. By the way, he had a great punt return. By the way, he does about anything we want. By the way, he comes to my office and wants in on every single kicking team. He's like a machine. We try to control it, he got a lot of reps. He got a lot of kicking reps. Guys do get tired. He's not Superman. But he wants to try everything he can do to help the team. What a great visual aid. He does it all, and that's great."

On the running game against Illinois:
"I think it's a combination of a bit of game planning and anticipating a little bit better what they're going to do in the game. A year ago, we hadn't played them. i thought we had a good plan. I thought we blocked well. I think that, obviously Derrick Washington did some really good things. Jimmy Jackson did some great things. I'm really proud of Jimmy. We call him the 'Grandpa' of the group. He's been around a long time and knows the position well. Anytime you call his name, he produces. I was very pleased with that, without question. As our opponents defend our offense, there's still that balance of defending whoever we give the ball to in our running game. I think we're better at offense when both (the running game and passing game) are working well. That's not profound. But certainly, when you think of Missouri's spread offense, we'd like to be able to run the ball well. I was pleased with that overall. "

On improving next week against SEMO:
"We need to become a better football team. We need to become a better offensive football team. In the 4th quarter, we had the ball four times, and we punted three times and missed a 4th-and-1. So, everybody talks about our offense. We scored 38 points on offense, not 52. We did a lot of good things. But to act like everything is all good and fine on the offense. It's not. We've got a lot of things to do. We've got to do a lot of things on defense, we had a good half.  I don't care who we play opponent-wise. It wasn't about Illinois. It was about Missouri, and our defense. This week, it's about Missouri. SEMO is our opponent, and that's one of our goals to beat SEMO. But this is still about our offense and our defense playing at a higher level. I got kids that want to be good, and they're going to work hard, and hopefully we'll get better."

On RB Derrick Washington:
"I don't think there's any question about it. Your first year of playing is probably going to be the year when you learn the most and you go through some growing pains. I think he did that. We used him sparingly a year ago. Tony was here, and all the running backs in front of him. He did a very good job, he got better. The experience of playing and being in that environment and playing in November in the Kansas game, playing in the (Big 12) championship game, playing in the (Cotton) Bowl, that lends itself to maturity. I saw the guy in spring football, I saw him in two-a-days and there was no doubt he would play at the level he played. That experience was huge for him. Now it's a huge benefit for not only him, but the football team...He's got a different running style. I will say he's got hands like a wide-receiver. He's got great hands, the other running back have good hands. So it allows us to do a lot of different things with him. He's a complete running back as far as all his skills and capabilities. The good news is, he's going to get a lot better. I was not surprised by his performance."

On the defense in the second half:
"I thought overall we played a really good first half on defense. Obviously, we look back to the Kansas game a year ago, we look back to the Illinois game a year ago, we look at this past game and we see a trend of having a significant lead and not doing very well. Last year against Illinois, we turned the ball over I think two or three times in the 3rd and 4th quarter which created a lot of problems for our defense. The bottom line is, we've got to play better. I think that's why our players were disappointed. Being respectful to Illinois, we played a good football team...From our standpoint, we have to play better. We had some coverage breakdowns, some assignments missed. We had some fundamental breakdowns. They also threw 5-6 balls absolutely on the money, with great catches. So I think you need to give them some credit. Again, the first half we played great. But you can't give up big plays in the second half, and not have a big effect on the game. I think all those things we can coach and we can get better at."