Virginia Head Coach and Student-Athlete Post-Game Quotes
2005 Syracuse Football
Syracuse vs. Virginia – Sept. 17, 2005
Carrier Dome, Syracuse, N.Y.
Coach Al Groh:
“This was a good place to play at this stage of the season – it presented us with a challenging environment. We’ve seen others that are tough, too, but this definitely is. Syracuse presented us with a physical challenge, too. We’re proud of our kids who hadn’t been in a pressure situation like this before and came up for us. Now we can say they’ve done it.”
“With the pressure on at the end, we had no penalties and no negative plays. Marques (Haggans) was pretty spectacular out there today. He can just pick up the team and carry us. That scramble at the end was just a tremendous play.”
On the Haggans interceptions: “They weren’t a matter of bad reads. It was an accuracy situation. We just told everyone at halftime that you have to trust yourself and trust the system.”
On the last drive strategy: “We have one of the best field goal kickers in the country, so we were going to trust him.
On going for the first down on the fourth and short situation at the end: “Are you familiar with the movie ‘Risky Business?’ What the heck?”
On the third down stop by LB Mark Miller on Damien Rhodes on SU’s last drive:
“Damien would have scored on that play without a terrific play by Mark. There’s another example of a kid who hadn’t been in that situation stepping up. We would have needed a TD then.”
On the controversy over whether illegal substitution should have been called:
“I was worried about it, especially after the earlier call, but there was no intent to deceive. We wanted to get a bigger back into the game in that situation.”
On the Syracuse passes to the tight ends:“Those big plays to the tight ends really let them get back in the game. Perry (Patterson) really executed the touchdown play well.”
RB Jason Snelling:
On the 4th down conversion: “They put me in to get the first down – so what I had to do was get it.”
On his late entry: “That’s football, people in and out. Coach told me to go in, so I ran in and I wasn’t trying to deceive anybody.”
OT D’Brickshaw Ferguson:
“When the coaches call a play my way, I’m happy. I just want to do my job. At crunch time, when the coaches show the confidence, like on the fourth down play, you just want to show them that their confidence is warranted.”
Punter Chris Gould:
On his snares of two high snaps and getting off one of those punts under pressure:
“I saw the Syracuse guy coming in from the right and felt that if I had stepped forward normally, the punt would have been blocked, so I kicked it back toward the left. It’s really unusual for him, (for our long snapper to have high ones) but we kickers are all good athletes, too. We played other sports in high school.”
Quarterback Marques Hagans:
“I’m disappointed by the three interceptions. My team fought hard and that’s all that matters. They kept us in the game and we won a tough one on the road.”
Place kicker Connor Hughes on his game-winning field goal:
“I just tried to keep the mentality that coach always talks about – a warrior mentality. I just wanted to keep my head down and let it ride. That’s what I tried to do. After the ball hit the net, I knew it was through.”
“It was a great call by Coach Groh. When you’re on the team and the coach makes a decision like that, you’ve got to be for it. It was a great decision. It got us down to the last couple seconds and made it even easier on me.”
Linebacker Mark Miller on his third-down stop of Damien Rhodes that led to Syracuse’s game-tying field goal instead of a touchdown:
“I thank the Lord I was able to make a quick reaction and it opened up beautifully and I was able to get the TFL.”
“There was something I wanted to prove this game because Syracuse is a running team and I wanted to prove to myself that I could get in there and stop the run with the rest of this defense.”
