Everything Jamey Chadwell had to say following Liberty’s win over New Mexico State

Liberty picked up a win on Saturday, defeating New Mexico State, 33-17, to open the Conference USA play at 1-0. Following the win, head coach Jamey Chadwell met with the media. Here is everything he had to say following the game, beginning with his opening statement:

“It was a good (celebration). I’m sure it will be on social media, hopefully we didn’t ruffle any feathers with it. Anytime that you’re the first ever to do something, no matter what happens with this group, hopefully we will continue to get better, but they will always be remembered as the first one. That’s something great to get accomplished and we talked a lot about that.”

“1-0 is the most important but we had a chance to make history. Our quote to end our video today was ‘Victors get to write history.’ We wanted to make sure we were. I thought our guys played extremely hard for four quarters.”

17-PLAY, 9 MINUTE DRIVE, HOW MUCH DID THAT SET THE TONE?

“We challenged our guys there at halftime that it was important. Defensively, I didn’t think we played overly well in the first half. Offensively, we thought we moved the ball pretty good but we had to finish there. To be able to do that out of the gate, to go up 30-17 there right out of the gate, it was big to give us a two score lead. It shortened the game. I think they managed a little bit from that stand point. We have to learn how to finish. We had some penalties. You look back and you look at the statistics and you feel like you dominated and there was a chance to make that a one score game the whole time. We’ve got to learn to continue to finish offensively and not shoot ourselves in the foot.”

“I thought our defense stepped up in the second half, I didn’t think they played overly well in the first half. That drive, really I think, one for offensively, it was awesome, but two I think it gave our defense a lot of confidence to hey if we just go out and do what we’re capable of, they can’t come back.”

HOW MUCH DID THE BRYLAN GREEN INTERCEPTION HELP TURN THE MOMENTUM?

“It was a 10-point swing, if you think about it. We were up 20-17 at that time frame, I think, and they are driving. We hadn’t stopped them at all. We get points out of that and then we come out and get points out of halftime. That middle-8, that’s what everyone calls it, for us to close the half with a field goal, I wish we would have had a touchdown there, and then to score again to give you that separation, maybe take some of their confidence away. I thought that was a huge turning point in the game.”

HOW PLEASED WERE YOU WITH KAIDON’S PERFORMANCE?

“I thought he played extremely well. He stood in the pocket, made some nice throws. We had the one turnover but never felt like he put the ball in danger and threw it up for certain things. He made some nice runs when we needed him to, on some third down situations.”

“This is the most, in my short time with him, the most confidence I have seen him play with. Which is good, you want your quarterback to have some confidence, feel like he can make some plays. I think he seemed mature. At the end of the game, he scrambled out of there, oh I should have fell down and he falls out of bounds. He knew it immediately. So that shows me he’s maturing, he’s understanding the game. He knows what he needs to do. I think he’s making some good strides.”

“Guys made some good plays around him. I thought he made some nice throws and some pretty good balls. It continues to get tougher because people will continue to give him different looks but I was pleased with him.”

HOW DO YOU THINK HE HANDLED THE SUCCESS FROM LAST WEEK?

“Well, I didn’t think he overly practiced too well the first two days, Tuesday and Wednesday, to be truthful. I thought there were some mistakes, as far as practice, some basic things that he shouldn’t be making at this point. I was a little anxious to see how he was responding. Thursday was nice. He did a good job on Thursday, Friday, and he obviously came out here. Just continued to tell him about just making sure the preparation is what got hi to this point and don’t go backwards from where you’re at. He came out and played extremely well.”

“We have a lot of confidence in him. I don’t know that we saw him do what he did today and the way he did it, it was good to see.:

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO YOUR GUYS TO HAVE WON THIS GAME AFTER BEING EMBARRASSED BY THEM LAST YEAR?

“Well, some of the guys talked about it. I didn’t bring it up. We got beat, we got beat pretty bad. There was obviously a lot of things going on. A lot of the guys wasn’t even part of it. Yes, there were some guys that wanted to redeem themselves, but the majority of our guys that are playing and contributing, they had nothing to do with it. So, our more focus was on we have an opportunity at home to be 1-0 in our conference, that’s what we’re shooting for. I know there are a lot of people happy and they can look back because of what the game was last year, and I’m excited for those guys. I didn’t want to make it about revenge because when it’s about revenge you are fueled with hatred, that’s opposite of what we talk about with this program. I told them it’s not about revenge, it’s about us playing for something bigger.”

“Now a couple of our guys were, ‘I want to get them.’ Hopefully they learned a lesson because you can’t let emotion get a hold of you. For everybody that was upset last year, well there you go.”

COOLEY AND LUCAS AVERAGED OVER 5 YARDS A CARRY, WHAT HAVE YOU SEEN IN TERMS OF THEIR ABILITY?

“They are getting more comfortable. Taking care of the ball, last week we didn’t do a good job with that, that was the big emphasis. Those guys play off each other, they run hard, they run through some tackles, and they’ve given us some good combination of being able to run between the tackles and still get enough outside. This team decided they didn’t want us to get the ball outside at all. They weren’t going to let us do that. They didn’t want Kaidon to get out there, they didn’t want to get the pitch. So, we didn’t change the game plan, we had it built in, but we said alright, we’re going to go at ’em. For those guys to have that number of carries and produce that number of yards says a lot about them and the physical toll they were able to take on. They got stronger as the game wore on.”

NMSU HAD 60 RUSHING YARDS IN THE FIRST DRIVE, WHAT ADJUSTMENTS DID YOU MAKE ON DEFENSE?

“We missed a lot of tackles. When you missed tackles that creates a play that could be 3 yards that goes to 6, goes to 10. Then, I think secondly too, and hopefully our team will learn this, you get so excited about playing you forget to follow your fundamentals. We didn’t make that many adjustments to change what we were doing, I think we just started executing a little bit better. We have to. We didn’t play overly well there at the first half, but it’s not a scheme thing. It’s our guys locking in on doing their job and doing it consistently and not letting emotion get the most of them. They did, they came out and ran it well. They ended up with 172. They were scoring a lot of points. I thought we did a nice job there of handling some things. We’ve got to tackle better. I think our lack of missing some tackles allow some drives to keep going. I think third down defensively, they were 6 of 10 on third down. You’re not going to win a lot of games being 6 of 10. Thankfully we were 9 of 14. We have to be better there.”

THE INTERCEPTION THAT GOT OVERTURNED, DID YOU SEE IT?

“Having the video replay board in the stadium is unbelievable. We thought he caught it, but that’s me I’m going to tell him it’s a catch anyway, but then you look up there you see it looks like he dragged his feet. That’s what I saw. He’s going to tell you he caught it regardless, that’s what they do because he wants an interception, he wants to put the Joker mask on. It looked like he had his foot in. So, I was going to review it if they didn’t. I was going to do that.”

HOW HAPPY ARE YOU OF CJ DANIELS AND DOES HE PROVIDE YOU SOMETHING YOU NEED AT RECEIVER?

“He had a huge game. I thought Kaidon spread the ball around a little bit too. If CJ can be the way he was consistent, be that threat, make the plays that he did. We’ve all been talking about who can we go to on 3rd down when it matters. He obviously had a really nice game. I think Sibley is doing a nice job with it as well. We need to continue to have some guys continue to rise to the occasion.”

COULD YOU TALK ABOUT BRYLAN GREEN’S EMERGENCE?

“He is playing well. He didn’t do a lot with us in spring. He had a back issue. He was also playing baseball. We didn’t have a lot from the spring. He played some last year. The guys that were still here were high on him. We hadn’t seen much. This summer he really started coming on. We think he has NFL potential if he completely commits himself to football. He’s a natural at catching the ball, that’s why he’s our punt returner. He does a great job and he plays with a lot of confidence. That’s the thing that he does and his baseball background is showing off, he can track a ball. I’m very pleased with how he’s played and how he’s handled himself and the decisions from a punt return stand point that he made, as well. That’s the number one thing, you want somebody back there you can trust. He’s done a nice job with that. He’s got a great Louisiana drawl, it’s awesome.”

STARTING OFF 1-0 IN CONFERENCE PLAY, HOW IMPORTANT IS THAT FOR THE TEAM’S CONFIDENCE?

“That’s huge. Obviously you can’t get to that championship game without taking that first step. We talk about we’re climbing a ladder. There are rungs on that ladder and you can’t get to that one without taking the first one. To be able to start out 1-0 is a big deal. More importantly than that to continue to build confidence in our team and the team in us because they’re still learning how we respond to different things because it’s brand new to a lot of people. If we can continue to face some adversity and continue to figure out how to fight through that that continues to connect us together. Hopefully our talent will gel with the bond and the things that we’re trying to get accomplished and we can continue to rise. Anytime you are 1-0 is better than 0-1, for sure.”

“Also, to be able to do it at home. The 4th quarter and them doing all that stuff was pretty cool. I’ll be honest, I got caught up in it. That was awesome to see and be a part of that. Our fans were fantastic. They were loud in that Flames Quarter. It was awesome. The student body, I can’t give them enough credit. We want Williams Stadium to be the hardest place to play in this conference. If they continue to do that, our community continues to do that, and we continue to win it’s going to be a heck of a place.”