Below is the transcript for the Bobby Wilder press conference.
Coming off a historic win for our team and for Old Dominion University saturday 49-35 over Virginia Tech our first ever win over Virginia Tech which is significant. Our first power five win and our first win over a ranked opponent which are all major accomplishments for our football program. A key to this game was a belief in the plan and the players ability to go out and execute that plan. We had a lot of energy early in the game, we had some positive things happen early and that continued throughout the game. It was really critical that we were able to stay in this football game. There were four different times that we trailed by a touchdown in the game we were down 7-0, then it was 14-7 then it was 21-14 then it was 28-21 going into the fourth. Our ability to stay within a touchdown because there were a number of times where this almost became a two score game and we just managed to hang in there and then when we got to the fourth quarter we had that belief; the I can and I will attitude. We also outscored Virginia Tech 28-7 in the fourth quarter of this football game. The fact that our players stuck to the plan was the key to winning this.
The anatomy of an upset calls for number one you have to have belief in what you’re doing and I felt like the coaches and players worked hard putting together a game plan. This was the first time we played a complete game this year, the first three games we didn’t, we played well in spurts, this game we played well throughout so we stuck with a plan. Offensively we needed to hit vertical passes versus a man coverage that was the one thing in our plan. Defensively we needed to confuse them with some looks in their RPO game. I feel like defensively we hung in there throughout the game and we did a good job mixing in some coverage. Special teams we needed to play even with Virginia Tech which we did, we did not allow any explosive plays from Virginia Tech on special teams in this game.
Blake LaRussa just had a sensational football game, this was the most impactful game since Taylor Heinicke played against New Hampshire in 2012 in terms of he just got hot and he stayed hot throughout. We brought him in in the second series, his first pass was from our one yard line, he throws a 30 yard strike to Travis Fulgham that he perfectly drops in. He just put the ball right on the money. Throughout the game it felt like a lot of his deep passes were extended hand offs. Fulgham and Duhart both played the best games of their career. We had a number of other guys that had explosive plays. Harper had an explosive catch, Isaiah Spencer, freshman tight end had an explosive play that led to a touchdown, Hasaan Patterson had an explosive 37 yard catch that led to a touchdown so a lot of the focus was on Blake, Travis and Jonathan and rightfully so but there were other explosive plays in the game. We finally got some run game going, Jeremy Cox was the healthiest he has been this year in this game. That’s the best his ankle has felt and you can see from his performance; 20 carries, 130 yards, 2 touchdowns that he was healthier, that’s the Jeremy Cox we all know, the guy breaking tackles extending runs, bringing a lot of excitement to our sideline. Then the offensive line I felt like we did a very good job of holding up and then the third and fourth quarter starting to play really good football. That was a very difficult game to block, Virginia Tech has an outstanding front seven and our guys hung in there and gained some momentum as we went along.
Defensively, against a very good offense we played well enough to win. If you look at the drives in this game, Virginia Tech had the ball 16 times and they scored five times that means we had 11 stops on defense. I think the most impactful stop we had in this game was Geronda Hall’s interception with 1:30 left in the half and we were down 14-7, Virginia Tech just got a first down on their own 45, it looks like they’re going to drive and potentially be up 21-7 at the half; Geronda Hall intercepts the ball and we go 79 yards and score with 4 seconds left to make it a tie game at halftime. We really needed to be in that position at halftime. The belief of our football team that we could win this football game, and that was a critical play by a freshman starting his first college football game. That was an impactful play. Defensively we also had Oshane Ximines play as big as any defensive player we have ever had play at Old Dominion. In the biggest game in the history of our school he played just an incredible game. He was a force the entire game, he had a couple sacks, but he was disruptive the entire football game. Marcus Haynes also with two sacks in this football game, that’s somebody you’re going to be seeing a lot more of as we move forward. Sean Carter with 12 tackles and moves to number six all-time in the history of our program. There were just a number of those type of plays and players that we needed in this game, quite frankly we hadn’t had the number of players that played at a high level previously that did in this football game and we needed to have that to win the football game.
This weeks opponent East Carolina is 1-2 right now, I think they easily should be, could be 3-0 at this point. They were upset their first game of the season at home and I just got done watching their South Florida game which was a dominant performance by East Caroline. South Florida is 4-0 right now and East Carolina dominated in every phase of the football game other than the scoreboard; they lost 20-13. This is a good football team, their quarterback Reid Herring is throwing for 284 yards a game, he throws a good football, he can make all the throws, he’s got good mobility, he moves well. They are averaging 435 yards a game and 26 points. They’ve got excellent receivers, they spread the ball around, the running backs can go the distance at any time. Defensively they are only allowing 320 yards a game and 22 points through 3 games and that’s impressive and what they did saturday night defensively their fast, their physical, they can get to the football, they’ve got excellent D-linemen. I don’t see a big difference between Virginia Tech’s defense and this defense of East Carolina in terms of the explosive players that they have particularly in the front seven. This is a very good football team and this is going to take a tremendous effort for Old Dominion to go down to East Carolina; we’ll go as under-dogs again and were going to need to have a major effort to compete in this football game and have an opportunity to win.
Q: At one point Appouh was on the sideline and Oshane kind of hobbled over, are they both okay?
A: They both are, it was such a physical game. There were alot of plays in this game, a normal game has around 180 plays, this game there were 210 plays. We ran 84 on offense and Tech ran 83, so just the volume of plays and the energy they expended. Not only the game but the mosh pit after the game, by me as well.
Q: How hard is it going to be to get everyone focused on East Carolina?
A: Not at all, when you go through an experience like that you gain tremendous confidence. We were a team that wasn’t feeling very good about ourselves going into this football game so the confidence, the way we practiced this morning; we had an excellent practice this morning. You could feel the energy, you could feel the relief, you could feel the excitement. Confidence and momentum are a really big thing in college sports and in college football particularly for a program like us that’s had a good amount of success and we weren’t going into this game. So we talked about taking 24 hours after the game and enjoying everything that happened so 25 years from now when you come back with your family you could tell them this is exactly what happened and where it happened. So we needed that 24 hours and I felt that this morning they were ready to go, they wanted to get ready to go to East Carolina, East Carolina is a program that it’s easy to get excited about. East Carolina traditionally is a really good football program, they’re the closest FBS program to us. When we initially joined the league, we thought that was going to be our partner. We thought it was going to be East Carolina, we’ve been able to get a two game series with them, I’m hoping we can get more. So the players all know East Carolina, they are all excited to go and play there, it’s a beautiful stadium. I feel really confident that we’ll use this momentum and energy from beating Virginia Tech to help us continue to get better this week in practice.
Q: There’s a lot more people who are now fans because of that one game, what does that mean to you as a coach?
A: It’s a great moment of pride, all the phone calls, all the text messages, all the situations like you just talked about. How proud people are of Old Dominion, to be able to say they were a part of history. There we’re 20,000 something in that stadium, I’m sure five years from now there will be 100,000 that were in that stadium. Everybody wanted to be a part of that and what’s even more impactful, that’s the best football program in Virginia clearly, there’s not even a close second. We don’t have pro-sports in Virginia so Virginia Tech is up here in every way shape or form and they still are even though we beat them. So now for people to say we beat Virginia Tech, thats impactful; That’s why you sell 5,000 dollars more worth of merchandise from the book store because people have that Old Dominion pride, they want to wear something that says Old Dominion Football and that’s a proud moment for all of us involved in this program.