OU QUOTES HEAD COACH BOB STOOPS Opening Statement: I ll first start off by complimenting TCU, Coach Patterson, the team and the staff for another hard fought, tough football game. Their team really hung in there and made plays there down at the end to give them a chance to win, and fortunately, we came up with enough plays to win the football game. I m really proud that Steven Parker came up with a huge play there at the end. I guess to recap the game just overall, offensively, I really thought going into half time, compliment TCU forced us on some red zone areas to come up with some field goals instead of touchdowns. I knew it would be difficult moving the ball overall, but I felt like we had a chance to catch a rhythm Of course, Baker, just to be sure that everyone understands, our trainers and doctors were constantly with each series, every time Baker was off, checking him, asking him questions, making sure he was okay. Everything was checking out fine, and then at halftime they approached him again, wanting to go over some things, and Baker admitted to having a headache, and that s when our doctors said we re not going to have him play any more. I m sure there was more to it than that, I m not part of the whole testing situation and everything that they do. I know our doctors are incredibly thorough and always err on the safe side, and once we did find a symptom, that s when they made sure he was pulled. Of course, that threw us off in the second half when we weren t very consistent at all. Defensively, I thought in the first half, it basically got to two plays, two pass plays on one drive were really all that we gave up the whole first half Then, the same thing happens in the second half we re playing great defense and one guy gets beat in coverage and they get a big play and a touchdown, and all of a sudden they re juiced up, and again, when the defense isn t able to do anything, they re constantly kicking it back to them in three-downs or turning it over and giving it to them with field position, it s tough to hang on, and that s how the game got tight by the end. Again, fortunately we were able to come up with a big play there at the end on the two-point play to win it. It puts it in a position now with one game remaining in the regular season to go to Oklahoma State and hopefully have a chance to win the championship. On Samaje Perine s injury followed by a 72-yard run: He had a slight ankle sprain, and it hurt him initially. Once he gets on the sideline, they tape it again, he gets to moving on it again, then he trusts that it s okay. It s an ankle sprain; it s not a high one, which is good. Hopefully he ll heal up well. On tonight s performance despite having better finishes in the past: If you look around the country every week, for everyone, is it ever perfect? It s tough. Gary s sitting over there with a team that hasn t lost but three times in two years. Regardless of who s playing for them, they re a good football team, and I knew they would be. Rarely is it perfect. We ve had a lot of excellent games, and we re due for one that maybe isn t. You can win when you re still not at your best. On Zack Sanchez s performance coming back from an ankle injury: Zack was great again. The interceptions were huge, and the onside kick. Fortunately he didn t re-hurt it at all, but he s still favoring that ankle, but he s still fighting through it. On going into next week s game and their chances of securing a playoff spot: A lot happened this week, a lot will happen next week. When you can not be at your best and win, it s always a positive against a ranked team We ve been in four National Championship games where they pick two, and in three of them, we had a loss. A lot s going to continue to happen. On Steven Parker s play during the two-point conversion attempt in the fourth quarter: That was a huge play. On the sideline, it looked like he was up there, like he could have dunked it on a 12-foot rim. He was way up there. It was a great play by him.
OU QUOTES COORDINATORS OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR LINCOLN RILEY On changing quarterbacks and how it changed the offense: We didn t have to change much. We just didn t play as good in the second half. I felt like in the first half we were close to blowing it wide open. We started to get into a little bit of a rhythm, but any time you change quarterbacks it s going to take time to get in a rhythm. I didn t call a very good second half at all. We just had some small breakdowns here and there. I don t think any position group played super well in the second half; we were just okay. We were just one step away. We played a lot of nine and 10-man football the second half, and when you do that against a really good team and a defense like the one run by Gary Patterson, you re not going to play as well. At the end of the year this is our eighth-straight [win]. It s gutty. You look across the country we got a chance to watch the Ohio State vs. Michigan State game. It s a lot of ugly games. That s what the end of the year is about. You re going to have some adversity and both teams did today. Give our team credit because we found a way to win it. On mistakes he made calling plays: We weren t aggressive enough. We got away from who we are offensively. That s my fault. That can t happen. We were playing so well defensively. I felt like we had the game under control for a while. We got away from that, and me doing that took away from our kids playing football. It s unfair of me to ask them to play one way and me not bring that same approach. I brought them down by doing that. I can t do that. That s why we ve gotten to where we ve gotten and had whatever success that we ve had offensively is because of that mentality, and I got away from that and it showed in our kids. On Trevor Knight s ability: I don t worry about anything before, I go off what I see in practice. There s not anything in this offense he can t do. This is a guy that came as close as it could be to starting the season as a starter and a guy that s won a lot of games, a lot of major games. I had full confidence in him. I let the game situation, the fact that we had some different combinations of guys throughout get banged up, I let that get to me and took away from who we are. On if he s ever been worried that Baker Mayfield could get hurt: It s a dangerous game. I don t know that I ve ever worried they re going to get hurt. You don t ever want it to happen, but you can t approach it like that. That s part of that game. That s why we have three good [quarterbacks]. You never want it to happen, but you have to turn loose and play. DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR MIKE STOOPS On the last play: We played a quarter concept across and just were able to cover them. We were in kind of the same defense as when they threw the touchdown. We were in a pretty good call for what they were trying to do. I thought we had it covered, and we did. The initial coverage was pretty good, then we lost contain. It was all kind of a blur to me. On when TCU changed quarterbacks in the third quarter: They ran a concept there for the deep post that s a beater against that coverage. We weren t far enough inside and didn t have the right leverage. That gave them hope with eight-and-a-half minutes to go. We were pretty much doing what we needed to do to secure the game, regardless of what was going on. We were in a good rhythm. We were stopping the run. We were good on third down. We just gave up that play. You could just feel that things were starting to change. On the defense s overall effort: We had four turnovers again. We re doing a lot of good things. It took a little bit away, but give TCU credit. To knock the champ out, you have to fight. It s going to be a fist fight. We were just hanging on. We couldn t make a play. We overran the football. We made good calls. We just lost momentum. We had to make a play. We just felt like we were going to make one to win the game. It got to that point, and we were able to do it. On if he was surprised by the two-point conversion call: I was (surprised). The way their defense was playing in the second half, both teams had backup quarterbacks, so I was surprised just because they were in such good rhythm defensively. On the road, they say go for the win and we made a play when we needed to. For our guys, I thought, for 52 minutes we controlled the game and just lost it there down the stretch. I wish we would ve finished better, but winning championships is never easy. Beating a team like Baylor, you have to earn it. That s what our players have to realize. We can finish better and we need to learn from this experience, but we came out on top, but we need to play better. I didn t think our rush game was great. We didn t pressure enough. There s some things we have to get better at before we go up to Stillwater next week. On if they win at OSU, do they deserve a playoff spot: I got no idea. We ve played some awfully good football. Losing Baker [Mayfield] hurt us. He s our team. He s our leader. He inspires us in a lot of ways. We re going to need to play better as a team. That situation doesn t present itself if we don t start playing better. It s not going to be easy under any circumstances.
OU QUOTES PLAYERS SENIOR CENTER TY DARLINGTON On Perine s run and performance: It s definitely a good feeling when we work something like that all week in practice and it happens exactly like it s supposed to. We need him big time. Down the stretch, we ve been rushing the ball well, playing decently. He played a big part. Samaje has been a huge key to our success and he s going to continue to need to be if we re going to continue to win games. On Sterling Shepard: He always makes plays. He finds a way to make plays in whatever capacity that he can. He made some plays tonight and we ve got to be able to protect them, whoever is back there, so he can have more time to find Shep down the field. On the effort tonight: I feel pretty confident in the group. We were playing good football and this probably wasn t our best performance today, but still we found a way to win. That gives you a certain level of confidence in our ability to gut it out. Sometimes you need that. REDSHIRT JUNIOR QUARTERBACK TREVOR KNIGHT On how it felt getting into the game: It felt good. Obviously we didn t play as well as we wanted to there in the second half, but end all be all, we get a W, and that s what matters. We re going into the last game of the year with everything we want still right in front of us, and that s all that matters at the end of the day. On going into Bedlam: That s how you want to draw it up. You dream about going into the last game with everything right there in front of you. And it s going to be an electric atmosphere next Saturday, and I can t wait for it. On sending the seniors out with a win: It s huge. Just the way the defense stepped up to make that happen, you ll remember this one forever. Those guys will remember this one forever. You know you d like it to be a little more at ease, maybe their hearts were pumping a little bit too much, but they left with a win, they went undefeated at home as seniors and that s pretty special. On Steven Parker s play: Big time players make big time plays in big time games. And this was a big time game, a big time moment, and he got it done. And that s why he s out there on the field, to get it done. It was an awesome moment. SOPHOMORE SAFETY STEVEN PARKER On the two-point conversion: Basically just had a hard decision on whether to stay with my receiver or go after the quarter back. I knew that the route was going to be double-draft seven and come and get the quarterback. I just played in between and kind of play dummy to it. Then from there just time my jump right. On if they predicted the route: On the two-point conversion you usually know just on how they align. I basically just know that it was going to be double-draft seven with three receivers and to back away. That was my first thought and knew that I already had help inside. On if he was surprised that they went for two: No, I wasn t surprised at all. They are a team that wants to win just like we do. They felt like they were on the verge of punching it in and our defense just stayed strong. On if he has ever felt better about a play: I can t really say I have. That was probably my favorite memory of my football career. On what made him go after the quarterback: I just knew that if I stayed on the guy, the quarterback was going to run it in with ease. If I attacked him, I knew he was going to throw it because he was behind the line. My thing was to kind of slow play it and basically make the decision for me. I used to play basketball, so to me it was almost like a jump-trap type of move. As soon as you know he is going you just have to time your jump. He has to go through your hands if your hands are up.
REDSHIRT JUNIOR CORNER ZACK SANCHEZ On his interceptions: They re plays the defense puts me in a position to make. The only play I can think about is the last touchdown I gave up on. I ve got to do better. On TCU in the second half: I don t think anything went wrong, I think they just had a lot of momentum. Obviously we needed to stop them. We needed a big play. It s not always going to be as pretty as we like. It s something we ll get back to work with on Monday. SENIOR WIDE RECEIVER STERLING SHEPARD On not having Baker (Mayfield) out on the field in the second half: Trevor (Knight) gets as many reps as Baker does, maybe a little bit less than he does, but we had to just put our trust in him and come out with that win. On how big Samaje Perine was tonight: Samaje is a great running back, as everyone knows. We just have to do our jobs as wide-outs down the field and get those blocks and get those secondary blocks for him and he s going to spring them. On his attitude going into to the Bedlam game: We set goals at the beginning of the season, we re one step away from achieving those goals. I feel like guys will be locked in and ready to roll for next weekend. On the offensive struggles in the second half: It was what it was, we didn t execute and that is what it comes down to. We will get in the film room and we ll fix those deals. On winning a game that big: It s been a while since the defense has had to make a play for us. We haven t had to make up for the defense. It s been kind of even and we have all been doing well, so they (defense) definitely had our backs tonight. On what was going through his mind during the two-point conversion: Just get a stop. I had trust in my defense though, I go against them every day and I know how tough they are. I had faith in them. On Frank Shannon getting the start on senior night It meant a lot. Every senior wants to go out with a bang and being able to start for his last game in front of his parents and all of his family, I am sure it meant a lot to him. On whether or not he was unhappy to see Oklahoma State lose (to Baylor) tonight I am not too focused on what they are doing, but it would have probably helped us a little bit if they were undefeated. But we can only control what we can control, so we have to go out next game and get a W. On what Brian Bosworth gave him tonight: He gave me a magazine, it was a Sooners Illustrated magazine with dad on the front cover and the whole 85 team signed it for me. He just told me that he was proud of me and that he loved me, so that was a great deal. On whether or not he saw anything different with Baker (Mayfield) after the hit: He didn t see anything different. I guess it is just a precautionary deal where they have to sit him out if he has any symptoms, and I guess he had some. But I didn t notice anything different. SENIOR LINEBACKER ERIC STRIKER On Steven Parker stopping the two-point conversion: That was clutch. That was really big and as a senior, I really appreciate it. On the memorable finale for him: Yes, really memorable. I came in thinking I m just going to give it my all and try to do my best for my team. I just tried to get a good jump on the ball, have the best blitzes of my life tonight. Senior year, it s a big game, and we ve got something good going. On how this year was different when it comes to winning close games: Minimizing those turnovers late in the game, defense being on their P s and Q s in tight games like that. It s important not giving up big plays at the end like that. That s been really helpful this year. On Samaje Perine s performance: That was big. He fought through the pain. There s a lot of guys that are
like that. Zach (Sanchez) is like that. He s out there a little nicked up, out there making plays. There are a lot of guys out there that are fighting through for the greater good of the team. You see that as a warrior, and you ve got to take your hat off to them. SENIOR DEFENSIVE END CHARLES TAPPER On the defensive performance: We went out there and we started off really good. The first three quarters were pretty good, the fourth quarter had a little fall-off. But it s like we knew adversity was going to happen at some point in time. It happens every game, it s part of the game. So we knew we had to keep fighting and then Steven went and made the biggest play probably in his life right now. were in different meeting rooms and things weren t working out with miscommunications and things like that. Now we are together and more of a family now, too. We aren t just playing for a win, we are playing for each other. On the up and down night for the secondary: Yeah we played good, but there is always something that we have to be better at; open field tackling or whatever it may be. They got some yards that they didn t deserve on missed tackles. We just have to keep working. On it coming down to the defense at the end of the game: Because we re competitive guys, we always want the last play of the game. We want to be the side of the ball that makes that big play at the end of the game. Last week it was the offense that made the big play, this week the defense made the big play. If we keep playing like that, we can go a long way and the Sooner Magic is going to keep rolling. On going out with a win as a senior: With it being Senior Night, the last game on this field, for me and (Eric) Striker, this game meant a lot to both of us and the whole defense. The whole defense and the whole team, they love the seniors and they wanted to send us out with a bang. And we surely went out with a bang. JUNIOR SAFETY AHMAD THOMAS On what was the key to stopping them late in the second half: Just to keep executing. Just keep executing as a team. We just had to be ready for whatever that they had for us. We all had to do our jobs and no one else s. On what was going through his mind on the two-point conversion stop: I was just happy for the team. I was happy for him [Steven Parker]. It was a huge play in the game. On how much coach Kerry Cooks has helped this defense: We had to come together first to be how we are first. At first we
TCU QUOTES HEAD COACH GARY PATTERSON Opening Statement: First off, you ve got to give Oklahoma credit. They found a way to stop us at the end. People always ask, why do you go for two? Our rule has always been to go get the win on the road. To be honest, if he (OU Safety Steven Parker) doesn t knock it down, there s a guy open in the back of the end zone to catch it. If there was a mistake, it was us going for two early on in the first half. So you have to give Coach Stoops and his staff and kids a lot of credit, and you have to give our team credit too, it was a great ballgame. Now, we have to get ready for Baylor. On TCU s turnovers (three interceptions, one fumble): You can t turn the ball over. But our kids fought back and played the way they needed to. They played without their All-American quarterback (Trevone Boykin) and All-American wide receiver (Josh Doctson) and a lot of other guys who were already down, so I give credit to my kids and my staff. On what he and Bob (Stoops) talked about after the game and the game overall: Every ballgame we ve had against each other in the last five years has been close. We talked about it being a great battle. He told me it was a gutsy decision to go for two. He s a good man and I like him and his team a lot. You know so many of these kids on the other team through recruiting, and one of the things I ve noticed is that there s never any bad blood between Oklahoma and TCU. There s been heavy competition, but never bad blood, which is exactly what I think college football is supposed to be about. On going for two: I didn t go for the tie at West Virginia last season and wouldn t do it again tonight on the road. They had no timeouts left, and if we make it, they only have 50 seconds and a long way to go. We have a ballgame next Friday, so if you go to three overtimes, you ve got no chance to win that game next week. I m the hero at West Virginia, and I m the goat in Norman. There s not anybody on our sideline that wanted to go for one. We didn t come here to hang around, we came here to win. On third-string QB Bram Kohlhausen s performance: I was very excited about it. Here s something nobody knows two weeks ago, Bram s dad passed away. I said, stay home as long as you want, and guess what, he s back on Tuesday. I have a coach going through cancer treatment that nobody knows about. I told him to take a leave an absence and he said, nope, I m here for the long haul. The bottom line is, this team and this staff have fought their tails off all year. On the amount of injuries his team has suffered: You saw me tweet out today that I ve gotten tired of people making excuses. TCU doesn t make excuses. We came here to win, and I said, let the chips fall as they may, and that s exactly how it all went down. Our kids battled and did what they needed to do, and I was proud of them.
TCU QUOTES PLAYERS JUNIOR DEFENSIVE END JOSH CARRAWAY On the defense s energy in the second half: I think we found our confidence. I think sometimes it takes a while to build our confidence, and you can t do that with great teams. You have to come out and have confidence right away. On what gave them their confidence: We just started working together and getting stops and making big plays. [That] just really starts to build your confidence and the offense started playing better. On his pride in his team: I ll remember this forever. These are my brothers and it was an emotional game It was awesome that we were able to fight back like that being down so many guys and nobody giving us a chance. SENIOR TAILBACK AARON GREEN On having a chance to win the game: It s what we do -- we fight. We fight back no matter who s on the field. We just gave it our all. That s what we ve been taught to do. That s what we ve been trained to do, coached to do, and that s what we did. We just laid it all out there, and unfortunately we came up short. On his pride in his team: I wouldn t rather be on any other team. These guys, my teammates, my brothers, they make this experience, my last year, that much sweeter for me. I m just happy and fortunate to be here. On injuries and their team as a whole: We just came together, even closer. We have each other s back no matter what good play, bad play. We just fight. On adversity making him stronger as a player/person: I feel like you have to go through something to actually grow. It s made me appreciate the game much more. It s made me appreciate my team much more.