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Manny Diaz Press Conference Quotes: Miami
10/28/2024 4:43:00 PM | Football
DURHAM, N.C. – Duke football head coach Manny Diaz, offensive coordinator Jonathan Brewer and defensive coordinator Jonathan Patke met with members of the media on Monday afternoon for the program's weekly press conference.
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Duke (6-2, 2-2 ACC) travels to Miami (8-0, 4-0 ACC) on Saturday, Nov. 2 for the Blue Devils' second road conference test of the season. Kickoff is scheduled for 12 p.m., ET and fans can watch live on ABC.
HEAD COACH MANNY DIAZ
Opening Statement:
"The last time we were in front of each other on Saturday night, it was an emotional time. What's important to move on is that Sunday has to be very non-emotional and our mindset yesterday was you should never rationalize away a loss, because what will happen, given the unusual set of circumstances that happened on Saturday night, you'll try to find something that's outside of your control as to why you lost. When we reviewed the film, there were certainly enough plays to be made in all three phases to give you a chance to win a football game, but there were also enough mistakes made in all three phases that would allow us to get beat. Everyone who had a role in the game on Saturday night could have played better and could have ensured our victory. That's us taking accountability, it's us taking control and that's us becoming a team. Things don't just happen to us, we get to be in control and we get a chance to correct it and to move on, which is the most important thing. I think the guys responded well to that with how they lifted and how we practiced last night and now we move on. We're into our Miami prep and excited to go play another top team in our conference."
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On Diaz's return to Miami:
"There's a great saying that 'no man crosses the same river twice before he's not the same man and it's not the same river' and that's really the way I look at it. I've grown. I'm different as a coach, as a head coach and as a man than when I was at Miami. Certainly, the program is in a different place, by every metric, from when I was there. So I'm at peace, I've moved on. We still go down there a lot. We have a place not far from there and we're down there all the time. So, there are still people in the program, on the staff and players, who I know and have a lot of respect for but no different than playing SMU last week with all the familiar faces. This is just right now. This is just trying to get our football team to play a better game than we played against a top team that we played a week ago."
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On facing Miami's Cam Ward:
"He's having one of the best seasons of any quarterback and if you just look at what they do on third down, it's remarkable. I think they have 60 percent conversions on third downs. I think the worst game they had was five out of 10. So we've got to defend two plays, the first is that he has great anticipation, very quick release, very accurate and then he's a hard guy to get on the ground. He runs around and can make plays, even scrambling on the throw and scrambling to run. So any quarterback like that puts a high amount of stress on the defense. We saw something similar last week but not to the level of this guy. I'm sure everyone has gone into the game saying, 'Hey, we've got to try to contain this guy', and they're 0-8 in trying to execute that. So how you want to do it and actually being able to pull it off are two different things."
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On the team's mental and physical toughness transitioning away from a hard loss:
"It's all from their actions. Coach Feely always gets them first on Sundays in the weight room and his reports were very positive in terms of how they went about their work. That's real and measurable, he has numbers for everything. Then we went out there last night and went after it in our prep for Miami. You can always tell from their body language if there is something lingering or if you have sad players, and we didn't sense that at all. The players came ready to work and I think they're excited about getting into a matchup with another team at the top of our conference."
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OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR JONATHAN BREWER
On the growth of Jake Taylor in the last few games:
"He had essentially almost the same play calls against Georgia Tech when they took away our man side and we went to the cross, and in the play at Georgia Tech, he dropped it, but this week he made a huge catch. That was really big to set us up for the tying score. I'm just really happy for him. To come back to a young player like that, when you had a drop in a big game a few weeks ago, you want to get that opportunity again. For him to have the ball come back to him in that moment, just speaks volumes to how hard he works and his persistence."
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On the impact of Eli Pancol this season:
"Eli is such a strong football player. He's a physical receiver. He can get off a press and then he has the speed to restack. He has such confidence in what he's doing right now. It's probably him coming back from all of the injuries and now he's starting to get his legs into playing. I think Saturday was probably the most snaps he's played in a game. He gets targeted a lot because he's just so physical at the top of the route. Anytime he's in man coverage, he can restack really well and he can get off a press, then when people started playing off, he is able to throw guys by and come back down. There's a great protection for the quarterback with a little bit of security that Eli is going to get open, especially when we're working some slot options. He's a tremendous worker. Now, he came in yesterday and we're running routes and he's a little sore, but he has played his butt off for sure."
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DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR JONATHAN PATKE
On facing two strong quarterbacks in back-to-back weeks:
"Obviously, Cam Ward is a special, special player. I've known about him for a long time, starting at Incarnate Word and having great success there, then great success at Washington State, and now he's doing it at Miami. He's an unbelievable player, a great athlete, and just hard to bring down. He's got every tool in the toolbox and he can get it done. I've got a lot of respect for him and the weapons around him. He just has complete control of the offense and they give him the freedom to get in and out of plays. When he gets out of the pocket, he's scary. He keeps his eyes downfield and really has no fear. He's going to sit in there and push a ball down the field to find one of his guys."
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On the defensive performance against SMU on Saturday:
"It was just one of those games. I thought our guys did a great job with following our message of the week, which was just getting after the ball. We knew they were an explosive offense. Coach Lashlee does a great job of pushing the ball down the field and wanting to run the ball. The most disappointing thing was a few runs that got on us that I don't think should have happened. We knew they were going to make their plays, but ultimately, our message was we were going to get the ball. That was how we were going to give our chance a team to win, so they really did that with the six takeaways. There were a few explosive plays that I wish we could have back but I was proud of our guys to hunt the ball."
#GoDuke
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Duke (6-2, 2-2 ACC) travels to Miami (8-0, 4-0 ACC) on Saturday, Nov. 2 for the Blue Devils' second road conference test of the season. Kickoff is scheduled for 12 p.m., ET and fans can watch live on ABC.
HEAD COACH MANNY DIAZ
Opening Statement:
"The last time we were in front of each other on Saturday night, it was an emotional time. What's important to move on is that Sunday has to be very non-emotional and our mindset yesterday was you should never rationalize away a loss, because what will happen, given the unusual set of circumstances that happened on Saturday night, you'll try to find something that's outside of your control as to why you lost. When we reviewed the film, there were certainly enough plays to be made in all three phases to give you a chance to win a football game, but there were also enough mistakes made in all three phases that would allow us to get beat. Everyone who had a role in the game on Saturday night could have played better and could have ensured our victory. That's us taking accountability, it's us taking control and that's us becoming a team. Things don't just happen to us, we get to be in control and we get a chance to correct it and to move on, which is the most important thing. I think the guys responded well to that with how they lifted and how we practiced last night and now we move on. We're into our Miami prep and excited to go play another top team in our conference."
Â
On Diaz's return to Miami:
"There's a great saying that 'no man crosses the same river twice before he's not the same man and it's not the same river' and that's really the way I look at it. I've grown. I'm different as a coach, as a head coach and as a man than when I was at Miami. Certainly, the program is in a different place, by every metric, from when I was there. So I'm at peace, I've moved on. We still go down there a lot. We have a place not far from there and we're down there all the time. So, there are still people in the program, on the staff and players, who I know and have a lot of respect for but no different than playing SMU last week with all the familiar faces. This is just right now. This is just trying to get our football team to play a better game than we played against a top team that we played a week ago."
Â
On facing Miami's Cam Ward:
"He's having one of the best seasons of any quarterback and if you just look at what they do on third down, it's remarkable. I think they have 60 percent conversions on third downs. I think the worst game they had was five out of 10. So we've got to defend two plays, the first is that he has great anticipation, very quick release, very accurate and then he's a hard guy to get on the ground. He runs around and can make plays, even scrambling on the throw and scrambling to run. So any quarterback like that puts a high amount of stress on the defense. We saw something similar last week but not to the level of this guy. I'm sure everyone has gone into the game saying, 'Hey, we've got to try to contain this guy', and they're 0-8 in trying to execute that. So how you want to do it and actually being able to pull it off are two different things."
Â
On the team's mental and physical toughness transitioning away from a hard loss:
"It's all from their actions. Coach Feely always gets them first on Sundays in the weight room and his reports were very positive in terms of how they went about their work. That's real and measurable, he has numbers for everything. Then we went out there last night and went after it in our prep for Miami. You can always tell from their body language if there is something lingering or if you have sad players, and we didn't sense that at all. The players came ready to work and I think they're excited about getting into a matchup with another team at the top of our conference."
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OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR JONATHAN BREWER
On the growth of Jake Taylor in the last few games:
"He had essentially almost the same play calls against Georgia Tech when they took away our man side and we went to the cross, and in the play at Georgia Tech, he dropped it, but this week he made a huge catch. That was really big to set us up for the tying score. I'm just really happy for him. To come back to a young player like that, when you had a drop in a big game a few weeks ago, you want to get that opportunity again. For him to have the ball come back to him in that moment, just speaks volumes to how hard he works and his persistence."
Â
On the impact of Eli Pancol this season:
"Eli is such a strong football player. He's a physical receiver. He can get off a press and then he has the speed to restack. He has such confidence in what he's doing right now. It's probably him coming back from all of the injuries and now he's starting to get his legs into playing. I think Saturday was probably the most snaps he's played in a game. He gets targeted a lot because he's just so physical at the top of the route. Anytime he's in man coverage, he can restack really well and he can get off a press, then when people started playing off, he is able to throw guys by and come back down. There's a great protection for the quarterback with a little bit of security that Eli is going to get open, especially when we're working some slot options. He's a tremendous worker. Now, he came in yesterday and we're running routes and he's a little sore, but he has played his butt off for sure."
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DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR JONATHAN PATKE
On facing two strong quarterbacks in back-to-back weeks:
"Obviously, Cam Ward is a special, special player. I've known about him for a long time, starting at Incarnate Word and having great success there, then great success at Washington State, and now he's doing it at Miami. He's an unbelievable player, a great athlete, and just hard to bring down. He's got every tool in the toolbox and he can get it done. I've got a lot of respect for him and the weapons around him. He just has complete control of the offense and they give him the freedom to get in and out of plays. When he gets out of the pocket, he's scary. He keeps his eyes downfield and really has no fear. He's going to sit in there and push a ball down the field to find one of his guys."
Â
On the defensive performance against SMU on Saturday:
"It was just one of those games. I thought our guys did a great job with following our message of the week, which was just getting after the ball. We knew they were an explosive offense. Coach Lashlee does a great job of pushing the ball down the field and wanting to run the ball. The most disappointing thing was a few runs that got on us that I don't think should have happened. We knew they were going to make their plays, but ultimately, our message was we were going to get the ball. That was how we were going to give our chance a team to win, so they really did that with the six takeaways. There were a few explosive plays that I wish we could have back but I was proud of our guys to hunt the ball."
#GoDuke
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Players Mentioned
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