Transcript: Everything head coach Deion Sanders said after loss to Arizona

Opening Statement: “Thank the lord for allowing us to go out there and play to the best of our ability. Fought hard, played tough, just had a wonderful conversation with the team as well as the seniors who will never get to play here again. I apologized on behalf of, just myself, the staff, the support staff that we didn’t send them out right in which we wanted to, because they deserve it. I’m apologizing to the fanbase, they’ve been supporting the heck out of us and they’ve been showing up and showing out, another sellout crowd that ended in disappointment. We’re so close, is what I told the team, but yet so far. We just simply, truly don’t know how to win yet. And it’s not for lack of effort, not for lack of coaching with the staff, the support staff, the trainers, the strength and conditioning and everybody around that’s doing a phenomenal job. We just can’t get over that hump. Another game, we’re right there. I don’t know from your vantage point, your viewpoint, but it seemed like we were the better team. And we just couldn’t get it done. The best thing about it is that in our first year, we haven’t even been here a year, but we’re right there. I mean we’re right there in all these darn games, except for one where we got our butts sloggered in Oregon, that we’ve had an opportunity to win. Defensively, we surrendered a lot of yards rushing, 207. Thank God I think we ran for 77 yards, I don’t think we’ve eclipsed that in a minute. Shedeur was efficient and effective. Receivers did some pretty good things, we had a couple drops out there. But the defense, we weren’t as consistent as we were the last two games. Our punter was phenomenal. Mark is unbelievable, he’s a pro. And Mata finally missed. I love him though. I love him though, I love him to life, and he’s been knocking them down for us all year, so he’s certainly not to blame because he’s one of the weapons we’re in the game consistently every week. But I really hate it for our fanbase because they deserve so much better, and we’re gonna give them better. We’re gonna give them better. But we’re close. We’re really close, and I hope they can see it, I hope you can see it, I hope the country can see that we have no quit in us. Our guys came ready to play, they really did. We came up short. Let’s go.”

On possibly letting them score at the end of the game: “They’re not stupid enough to do that. They downed the ball. The quarterback ran up the middle and took a knee.” (On the pass play before that) “We’re still fighting. We’re still fighting at that point. At that point, we’re still fighting, we’re not thinking about letting them score a touchdown at that point. Because now, you’re thinking hold them to a field goal because you go down there and get a field goal and you’re back in the game, you tie the game. So you’re not thinking that at that point.”

On throwing on 3rd-and-1 with just under 10 minutes to play: “You’ve been watching us play all year right? Thank you.”

On the penalties today: “That’s discipline. That’s discipline on the field, discipline off the field. If you’re undisciplined off the field you’re gonna be undisciplined on the field. Those little moments and those little penalties are costly, because at the end of the day they add up. They had more yards in penalties than we did but we had 11 penalties, they had 8 for 87 yards. We had 11 for 83 yards. We won the time of possession by seven minutes, so we controlled the clock, we controlled the ball. We just came up short, but those costly penalties, those little knucklehead plays are gonna cost you every time.”

On the pass protection: “I think he was only sacked three times. I think three times last week. Just do the math, I feel like it’s improvement. So I praised the line all game long, I was challenging them to go to another level during the game, but I praised them all game long on the field for the protection. They gave us a clean pocket at times, at times he had to scramble. You’re gonna do that because the opposing team is gonna blitz sometimes, but overall, I really think they’ve improved tremendously.”

On if they were out of sync on 3rd-and-1 with under 10 minutes left: “No, no, not really. I didn’t see it that way. I mean, I’m in the headset and I see what they’re hearing and they’re calling and I know what they wanna do. I didn’t see it that way at all.”

On Taylor Upshaw’s Instagram post earlier in the week: “That’s a young man taking advantage of his moment. It is what it is.”

On if he thinks he’s reached success this season: “In many aspects, certainly. Certainly. I’m trying to watch my words. Certainly. I feel as though every time these fans come in this stadium, there’s an expectation of us to win. I think that’s progress. I wasn’t here last year, but I’m pretty sure, I’ve talked to some people that I know pretty well, I think that’s tremendous progress. We have consistency in several positions that’s phenomenal, and I truly feel that’s progress. We have inconsistency at some positions that we can fix. We know the problem, we identified it, and we’re gonna fix it. That’s progress, because we know what the problem is and we have the aptitude to fix it. So I really feel like we’re underachieving for my standards, but when you really look at it I’m pretty sure you see a better football team on the field each and every Saturday. Just ask some fans, you been here for a while? What do you think? Is the team better? Good. Let’s rest it right there with an exclamation mark.”

On the fans expecting them to win: “I like that. I like that. They should. They should, and I feel like one thing about it, we’re gonna give you a good game. We’re gonna stretch your OC, your DC, we’re gonna stretch them out and stress them out trying to stop what we’re capable of doing. You can see what we need, it’s easy for you to look out there and watch us on television and say ‘okay, I see what they need. They can go get that.’ That’s why I’m excited about tomorrow, but I gotta take care of today.”

On his game management: “Everything needs tightening. I mean I’m not perfect, we’re not perfect by any means. You can always second guess everything but if you’re on the headset and you’re hearing things and you’re seeing what’s happening and you know your shortcomings and you know the positive that you had, you might have a whole different perspective if you can hear and see what’s transpiring. Shoot, 11 penalties played a tremendous role. They’re not coached to do that. So please take that into consideration. They’re not coached to hit a quarterback late, they’re not coached to jump offside, they’re not coached to hold, nobody does that. That just happens, it’s part of the game. We just gotta be a little more disciplined in those moments.”

On Cormani McClain starting and his performance: “He’s been a lot more focused, a lot more understanding of the expectation and what we want from him. We challenged him tremendously all year long and he stood up to the task over the last, probably week and a half. I’m really, really proud of Cormani. He’s come a long way just to get on the field and stay on the field consistently. I haven’t watched the film as of yet, but what I saw with the naked eye, he played a viable game. With his play, we could’ve won.”

On needing two wins to become bowl eligible: “It’s not about the next two games, it’s about one game at a time. It’s about doing the little things to win one game at a time. It’s about winning the personal battles one play at a time. It’s about dominating the guy in front of you and whooping the guy in front of you and being successful vs. the guy in front of you. And when you get 11 persons on the same page to do that, then that play is successful. So you gotta win the down, we gotta win the series, we gotta win the quarter, we gotta win the half, then we win the game. After we win the game, we do it all over again. So we’re not thinking about bowls, we’re thinking about just doing what we need to do to improve. And each week I see improvement in certain areas and each week I see that we gotta improve in certain areas. But we sit up here, week in and week out, and it’s a situation where we could’ve won. We could’ve won the darn game. And I like that we should’ve won. I’m tired of we could’ve won. I’m tired of that part. But we should’ve won.”

On if that’s frustrating: “Very. It ain’t no lose in me. That don’t sit well with me, it don’t rock well with me, it don’t lay down with me. I have no lose in me. And we have some phenomenal men in that locker room that feel the same way. We just gotta be a lot more disciplined and understand what’s at hand and stand up to the task on every darn play. And we’re gonna get there. I promise you we’re gonna get there. I don’t know when we’re gonna get there, but baby, we’re gonna get there.”

On punting on two 4th-and-1s in the second half: “What if you don’t get those? What happens? The other team gets momentum, they go down and score, now you’re saying ‘Oh my God, he should’ve…’ Guys, you guys are gonna second guess every darn thing. I’m at practice every day. I know these young men. I’m on the headsets. I hear the call. I know what’s transpiring right there. I know the feeling and the mood of the team. Just so happens I think we punted the ball to the two, and then we held them and they had to punt. What happened after that? We score? Why you ain’t say nothing about that? I think that was a pretty good decision wasn’t it? Can we start off with that, about the great decisions you made coach? I don’t need you to slap me on my back because I’m good, cause my arms can reach back there. But I really just want you to understand these decisions are based on knowledge. We’re not guessing. They’re based on what we do in practice and the situations we have in practice. I have situations in practice where I say 4th-and-1 on this yard line. If we don’t get it consecutively, what do you think I’m gonna do in the game? That’s what I did.”

On if another week with Shurmur calling plays helped: “Yeah. Tremendously. I think you saw it. I mean, we’re not doing tempo. We’re not as tempo as we once were because instead of going fast I want them to get it right. They did a phenomenal job. They did a good enough job for us to win, we’ve just gotta support them defensively. That’s it, I think he called a phenomenal game, they had a phenomenal game because it’s a collaborative effort when you hear it on the set. They’re really working together as one, and they’re unified. So it was a great effort. If you know it or not, we’re not at odds around here. I don’t play that. I gotta do what’s best for this fanbase, for this school, for our AD, for our team. The decisions I make, I feel like it’s best for us going forward, and that’s why I make them. It’s okay for you to second guess, I don’t mind that at all, because I’ve been second guessed my whole life. I don’t give a darn really. I’m not gonna lose a wink of sleep because you second guessed what I did and what I do. But I make decisions not based on emotions. I make decisions based on facts and based of feelings and based on knowledge and understanding and tremendous wisdom. That’s why I make decisions. Thank you my man.”

On the progress in playing complementary football: “I mean, we still haven’t shown up together in one game yet. What I mean by that is the offense plays their butts off, the defense plays their butts off, special teams plays their butts off. We still haven’t don’t that as of yet. But it was close. Special teams did its part, and shoot what’d we score, 31 points? That should’ve been enough to win the football game. That was the challenge that I gave them at the beginning of the week. I said guys, we need to score at least 31 points. Because based on what they surrender and what they score on the road, you come up with all these calculations and you kind of narrow it down and you say this is what they normally do. And they’ve been a consistent team. So that was the number, 31. I felt like we would win if we scored 31 points, and we came up short. Thank you. God bless you all. Have a wonderful evening.”