Everything Sam Pittman said Monday after Auburn game
Sam Pittman sat Monday around lunchtime and took questions from the media the same way he does every Monday after a game.
The Arkansas coach was forthright.
Questions about his job security are constant in the social-media sphere, but as Pittman said Monday, social media isn’t real life. He isn’t, for his part, concerned about job security.
Pittman is worried about Florida International. If Arkansas were to lose to the Panthers, though, social media inches closer to real life. The Razorbacks are already out of bowl contention after falling to Auburn on Saturday and a loss to a lower-tier FBS team would be a stake through the heart of the program.
Here’s what all Pittman had to say in full Monday.
Looking at tape
Probably exactly like it looked. We were running some stunts, we weren’ handling the edge … Tackling wasn’t very good. But we emphasized it. We’ve got to do something different. We’re not wrapping up well. Certainly couldn’t get off the field with their rushing attack. They out-physicaled us there. Offensively, not a whole lot of good things to say as far as the blocking, breaking tackles, protecting the quarterback in all phases, getting open. Probably about what it looked like during the game. I thought Jacolby came in and gave us a spark and played extremely hard, even on the last throw, I thought it was on a dime. We just didn’t catch it. Special teams, obviously we’ve got to cover better. That’s twice we’ve given up punts for touchdowns. Kicked it out of the zone. At the same time we’ve got to get a guy on the ground. We had opportunities to. Probably about what you thought from, or what I thought, from watching the game.
Coaching for next year?
You’re always trying to win. Honestly, it doesn’t feel a whole lot different than what it does every week. We want to win and to coach for our players to be the best they possibly can be. Coaching, I think a lot of times, you get concerned when you felt like you had a really good practice week and it doesn’t go well on a Saturday. So we went back and tried to figure out if we could change something up. It was the same thing we did against Florida format-wise. But, no. We’re trying to win games and trying to do the best we can to put the kids in the best spot to have success.
Energy for Florida International
We have to be right because I would think that we would really want to play after what happened Saturday. Of course, you could go back another Saturday and say you really want to play after what happened at Florida, as well. But, we got embarrassed Saturday. I like our kids in the locker room. I would be shocked if we don’t come out ready to play. I’m sure we’ll practice well. We’ve got accountability for them, for us, for me. But the past has said that we haven’t played real well against teams like this, so there is obviously a concern there and we’ve got to try to coach our way out of that.
Message to fans
First of all, thank them for coming out and supporting us. Obviously we’re disappointed we didn’t have even a good showing for them on Saturday. We believe we can get this thing turned around and that’s what we’re going to do.
Familiarity with FIU coach
I know him because he’s on the AFCA board of trustees with me. I know him there. I know some people who worked with him at Colorado. Really energetic guy. Great guy. I think he was a GA at Georgia maybe at some point. He’s doing a really good job there. The kids plate extremely hard. He’s got a nice, athletic quarterback and some skill players. Defensively, they’ll hit you.
Does SEC coaches' firings create more noise?
I think it’s hard to block out all the noise. We’ve got a job to do. That is to get prepared each and every week. But Jamie and I, when we got here, we were planning on coaching here until whatever that date was that we were going down to Hot Springs and call it a day. I’m not close to that right now. The plan is to get this program back to where it deserves to be and stay here as long as we possibly can. So it’s hard. It’s hard to block out noise. It’s more like for the kids, for the recruits. Once it starts, negative stuff, it’s about recruiting. I know what’s going on, Hunter Yurachek knows what’s going. But nobody else. It’s opinion. But it affects our recruits. We spent a lot of time yesterday with that as well. My job is to get ready for FIU. I’m not worried about my job security at all and I think I’m the guy for the university and I want to stay here for a long time.
Struggles hurt in transfer portal?
So far it hasn’t been difficult at all. We talk to our kids on a daily basis. I know the defensive staff yesterday talked to every kid on the team yesterday. Also with the recruits because of all the noise that was going on. I don’t know why you’d leave the University of Arkansas. We treat our kids like they’re supposed to be treated. We expect them to get an education. And it’s a great place to live and a great place to get a degree. I don’t have any idea why they’d want to leave.
Conversations with recruits
Rev up the offense again
There’s a lot of things. We’ve got to play better out on the edge. We’ve got to play better, tackle better. We have to. We have to make people miss. We obviously have to protect better. We’ve got to change something up. Obviously we had a change during Florida that worked for us. .. They had a week to prepare for it which was different because Florida did not. We’re not a team that can just turn around and hand the ball off right now and just smash like Auburn did to us. We’re not there right now like we’ve been really for the most part through the other three years, especially the last two. We’ve got to continue to try to steal some yards. Once we get out in space, we’ve got to make somebody miss, too. Other people are making us miss and we’ve got to do something a little bit different so we can get some explosive plays.
A defensive bounce-back
I know they were fine in the locker room. Everybody was quiet. Everybody was listening. They’re a resilient group. I think they love their coaches. I think they respect their coaches and we’ve got a lot that we’ve got to clean up. But I think they will. I know they will because they want to win, too, and they’re a really good group of kids.
Tackling issues
It wasn’t a problem earlier. We’re just not wrapping. We’re trying to body tackle everybody. Our linebackers are free in the hole a lot of times and we’re not making the play consistently. We’ve talked about what we can do differently. I don’t want to go live at practice, but you can fix anything if you emphasize it. I don’t know if fix is the word, but you can get better at it. That’s what we’re going to try to do this week.
Polar Express video
What was the show? I haven’t seen Polar Express, so I don’t really know my thoughts on the movie. In our locker room, I want to reward our kids by letting them run through the A if they practice well. We don’t have enough lockers in our main locker (room) to house all the kids. So some of them have to go in a separate locker. It’s a separate door to the locker. Young man, I’ve already addressed it with him, made a mistake. That’s why you don’t want cameras in the locker room. … But it’s hard because the music is on it as well. That’s a team rule. But also a team rule that you don’t post anything after Friday night, after we leave on Friday. The young man made a mistake. Sent to a friend, friend sent it to his brother, brother put it out on what-have-you. I’ve already addressed it and I think we’re fine there. It was just a mistake that a young man made and I wish he wouldn’t have. But he came in, he was sorry for it. He was very remorseful for it, so we’re going to move on.
Injury update
I hope so. He’s (Kutas) going to do a little bit today (Monday). Dave said that today, he was talking about he can do a little bit in indy. He was in a boot last week. He has progressed. WE’re going to be smart with him because a beat-up him is not better than what we have. But he has an opportunity. Braxton has a shoulder sprain, we’re going to keep him out of contact all week and we’ll just see where that goes. Those are probably the only two I can think of. … (Rocket) He’ll be fine. (Grier) He’ll be fine, as well. Singletary, he had an ankle. It looked bad in practice. Stepped on a receiver’s foot. He also is going to move around a little bit today in indy. I think him and Kutas will be very, very questionable for the game, along with Braxton, but I think there is a chance.
Communicating with team
We’ve got a lot to fix, so I’m going to go today about what we did wrong and how we can fix it. Our kids probably hear and read the same thing the recruits do. I’m not going to address it because I don’t think it’s as severe as y’all do. If they ask me about it, then I’m going to explain about that. But I don’t have time really to explain about my job security. We’ve got to beat FIU. That’s an honest answer. If I was worried about me, personally, I think it would take away from what we’re trying to get done here. I’ve got a job to do. I get paid to do it. I need to do a better job so I can’t really sit around and worry about my job security or me or anything like that. I just think it’s a much bigger issue with the media than it is with myself.
Conversations with Yurachek
I talk to Hunter every week. I talk to him after every single game. I talk to him some on Sundays. Talk to him on Mondays. You’d have to ask him the conversation. But I haven’t really expressed what our conversation was in four years so I don’t think today is a good time to talk about it today, either.
What changed from Florida offensively?
As a coordinator, you can only call certain plays now. People have got to block it, execute it. We’re still evaluating Kenny. I’m not going to let one game where we didn’t have any success in reality change any of that. It’s not time to make that decision to me. I’m not disappointed in him by any stretch of the imagination. He’s worked his tail off and he’s done a really good job.
Criswell get any run going forward?
I hate it – hate’s not a good word – but to come in here on a Monday and answer questions and be truthful to you is hard because we haven’t had any conversations with anybody on the team. If we were going to do something – and we’re not, by the way – but Jacolby has earned the right to play some. But to answer a question truthfully when I haven’t had an opportunity to tell a kid before I tell the media, if we were ever to start practicing in the morning, I think these would be a lot better interviews. I think he really gave us a spark. Man, he looked fast. He’s played two games and threw two touchdowns in both games. I’m really excited about him and our future. But I think he’s earned the right to get on the field.
Nathan Bax
I think Bax is reliable. You know exactly what he’s going to give you. He’s been wonderful to have on the football team. Ran up the sideline, made a nice run on one of his catches. We only have him for two more games. We’ve got to rev him up a little bit and see what he can do. But I was proud of his effort on Saturday.
Was the video thing normal?
It was halftime, so it wasn’t during the game, but no. You probably knew the answer to that. I’m going to ask you, do you think it’s normal? I’ll be honest with you, I didn’t even know there was a TV in there. Somehow the TV got turned on. I don’t think that him being in the redshirt locker room watching a movie at halftime had anything to do with us getting our butt kicked.
Sategna as a downfield threat
We obviously have run him routes where he’s running deep over the middle of the field. He happened to get open that time and he threw it to him. We also have some other guys that are fast on the team. He made a nice catch on that one. If we can get it more often, sure would like to do that.
Hard to develop players in portal era?
Recruiting in JUCO changed, too?
What I’ve noticed in junior-college is they’re not being as highly recruited as what they used to be. Nor is high school. It’s simply because you saw a guy play against Syracuse on tape he looked really good or you saw a guy play against Ole Miss on tape and he looked really good and you’re going ‘OK, I want that guy’ because of what you see his competition is. I’m familiar with the Kansas junior colleges because I was a head coach over there so I know a little bit more about who they’re playing and the competition, but I think it’s trickled down to junior-college, as well. I just don’t think it’s as highly recruited as it had been in the past.
Auburn sting more because of Florida?
I don’t know. Momentum is a wild thing now. When you lose it, it’s hard to get back. You guys ask me a lot of questions about that on 4th-and-1s or faking kicks or whatever it may be. You’re always thinking about it. We just never had it. We kept talking about we can get back in there. Nudie gave us a chance to maybe get something, get it stopped and we go three plays, two yards and kick a field goal. You’re constantly trying to do that. I don’t know if the Florida went negative toward this one. I don’t know. You always want your team to feel good, if you’re holding them accountable. Which they did last week. If I had to answer that, that would never happen. But I don’t know.
