Post Game Quotes

Per iuhoosiers.com:

Indiana head coach Bill Lynch
Opening Statement:
“It was a great football game. Our kids really battled, and I thought they played very well in all phases, and then we got beat by what I think is a great football team in Iowa. We just came up a play short there at the end.”

How tough is it emotionally to have it end like that?
“Very difficult because they care, and that’s what this is all about. The investment that these kids put into this football program…I can’t say enough for them because they never gave up on themselves, and they just kept battling.”

On the IU defense today:
“That’s the mark of a maturing defense because when you play a team like Iowa, they’re going to gain yards, but if you can hold them out of the end zone and force field goals, you have a great chance of winning the game. That’s kind of how the game played out. It’s the mark of a defense that believes in itself and doesn’t give up. A team drives that ball on them, and they kind of give up, but [our defense] didn’t. They kept battling each and every drive, and it took a big play for them to get a touchdown.”

On the last play in the end zone:
“What did I see in their defense? I saw a wide open receiver, that’s what I saw. Unfortunately we didn’t make the play. They’re a great defensive team, and every yard was so difficult against Iowa’s defense. It always has been. I think that’s the mark of Kirk’s teams through the years–they play great defense, and they’re always in the game. (Offensive Coordinator Matt Canada) made a great call but we just didn’t finish it off.”

On his passion on the sideline during the game:
“Yeah, I wanted to win. The kid’s deserve for me to be fighting for them, and that’s what we did. We just came up a little short.”

On how the team responds to his passion:
“I think they played really hard, don’t you? I thought they played hard and very well. We’re going to come back. I thought they played hard and well last week, and they came back. Everybody writes them off, and they keep battling. They’re going to come back and battle, and we’re going to go up to Madison and battle there.”

On the Indiana defense inside the red zone:
“Good play. Good, tough, hard-nose play. Stopping the run, defending the pass, putting a little pressure on the quarterback. There wasn’t any magic out there, it was just kids playing hard and playing well.”

On the long touchdown by Iowa:
“From my standpoint, they just had a very good quarterback and a very good receiver who I think kind of ran a double move and just beat our guy, and they made the throw over the top.”

On the offensive line and how it held up against a tough defensive front from Iowa:
“(Andrew) McDonald didn’t play the second half. We keep moving them around in there, but they were against a really good defensive front. I don’t think we had a sack though did we? They did pretty well today.”

On punter Adam Pines:
“Yeah, he did a good job. He got a couple off. He’s been practicing well, and we felt like he deserved an opportunity.”

On Ben Chappell and his play on the final drive today:
“Well, I mean that’s Ben, and that’s why I think he’s such a great player and a great leader. To be able to take a team down the field like that and on that particular route to get him open was going to take some time. It wasn’t one of our quick throws. He knew he was going to have to hang in there until the route was open, and he did.”

On what he tells the team to keep their confidence up:
“When you know our kids, the message never changes. They’re going to battle no matter what happens. They’ll come back, go to work on Monday, and get ready for the next one. That’s the kind of group of kids we have.”

Mitchell Evans
On today’s game: “We came out and we prepared well. We had a great game going. It’s tough that it turned out that way, especially for my last home game. It meant a lot, but there are some things you can’t control. ”

On watching the last play:
“That was definitely rough. I just saw everyone jumping up and down and I stopped looking when it hit his hands. I guess that’s the way it goes, that’s football. There are a lot of other plays that people could’ve made in the game that we didn’t and I am disappointed that it had to end that way.”

On Damarlo Belcher:
“I’m sure that he is pretty beat up, but he needs to forget about it. He had so many other great plays in the game. He is a heck of a ball player and he had a great game. You can’t just narrow it down to one play.”

On holding Iowa’s offense:
“I think it was basically just us bearing down and getting into the bend don’t break mentality. I like how our defense played again, that’s three weeks in a row. I love how we came out and competed and I think that it’s bearing down that got it done.”

On Coach Lynch’s passion:
“I love that he is like that. He is out there fighting for us on every down, even the small calls. He is out there fighting for us. I wouldn’t want it any other way from a coach. We all like coach Lynch. We are out there playing for him so to see him fired up makes us fired up. We love it.”

On going into halftime with a great defensive first half:
“We knew we had to put in a full game. That’s all we were talking about. We still have 30 minutes to play. We knew we were going to come out and compete; they always come out and play the whole game. We knew that they were going to catch fire and we were ready to go. ”

Trea Burgess:
On today’s game:
“You know, that’s a game you want to win. It’s hard for us and it’s hard for the coaches to lose. It’s a game day and you want to come out with a win. Coach Lynch is an emotional guy and he always gets into games. To me he is always like that, very emotional. He just wants to win.”

On the last play:
“I was just trying to block. I saw the ball go up and from behind my back I thought he caught it, unfortunately he didn’t. ”

On what was working in his performance:
“Just running it. Taking what I see and not second guessing it. Just playing. When we just play we do a lot better.”

Ben Chappell:
On the last play:
“It was a great call by Coach Matt [Canada], the safeties were getting wide and we tried to squeeze in a Paco earlier and that forced it on a second down. We got back with a different route concept. It was close. I didn’t really see it. I’m not really sure what happened, it was close obviously, but that’s part of the game.”

On Indiana’s offensive line:
“Oh these guys battled. They battled, battled, battled. It was awesome. I can’t wait to watch the film and see how much they battled, but they played great. We did some stuff scheme wise to help them out, but I think they played great.”

On the feeling of watching today’s film:
“It will probably be difficult, but I thought offensively, we executed our plan. We kind of knew what we were getting into, playing against a great defense like that. We had some good drives and obviously it didn’t come out the way we wanted it to, but we were close.”

On not having Tandon Doss:
“Tandon is a great player, so not having did hurt, but Kofi [Hughes] did a great job. He caught a couple huge passes. He did a good job stepping in. We want Tandon in there, but the other guys will step up and play. ”

On finding out the last pass was incomplete:
“I didn’t see it. I guess I saw the referee call it incomplete so that’s how I saw it. I didn’t really see the play. I threw it right as I got hit. I thought it had a shot. The safety was wide and I got it over the backer.”

Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz
Opening Statement:
“Needless to say we are just thrilled to get the victory. Indiana played a tremendous football game, as we expected they would, and they have been playing well. It was a hard fought game. A lot of things we will look back at and have to correct tomorrow, but we just feel good about our players showing the grit necessary in that fourth quarter and making some plays to get in the end zone finally and also keeping them out. It didn’t come easy in any phase. We are just thrilled to get the victory.”

On the last play:
“I saw the official said it was incomplete, you know it was just a great relief.”

On the play of Marcus Coker
“I think he did a great job, he stepped up for us. A week ago James Morris jumped in there and did a great job. I thought he played well again today. Certainly Marcus was called upon today and carried more than his share of the load, really for the first extensive time that he has had and it was impressive. While we are talking about freshmen, I will throw Mike Meyer in there too. That last field goal was not a routine chip shot. He really came up big there too. I know he missed one earlier in the game, but he showed some resilience there coming back and getting a critical field goal for us.”

On the last Iowa drive to get the touchdown:
“We moved the ball the better part of the first half, but really struggled inside the 20. I thought the story line today was their ability to shut us down inside the 20. They rendered us inside pretty much ineffective and that was really the story of the game up until that last series. Then Ricky (Stanzi) threw three nice passes and we finally came up with a big play, something we hadn’t been able to do all day long. So those points were big to get a touchdown instead of just a field goal and I think we were all thrilled about that.”