Post-Game Quotes: Oklahoma 35, TCU 10

Head Coach Bob Stoops

Opening Statement:
“It was a good win. Anytime you're playing ranked teams, you have to play at your best. Heck, the way things are going, you have to be at your best every week. They're a good football team and we made some good plays as well. I compliment Coach Patterson and his staff. They played a hard well-fought game. We made some really good plays. Offensively, I thought Manny Johnson had such a huge game. We're really excited about how those guys are playing. Defensively, to hold them to one touchdown says a lot. They really execute well and the one field goal was given up with poor kick coverage. It was a good win.”

On the turnovers:
“It is big. Our guys are doing a good job, being responsible and taking care of the football. Fortunately, we got some good turnovers and that always makes a difference in a big game.”

On the defensive play:
“We played really well, really disciplined. Our front four were very active and played very well. Brian Jackson had another big game, defended well out there. Travis Lewis had a huge game and Nic Harris was really strong again, did an excellent job. They were really active against the run and pass. I'm really excited with how they played.”

On the kickoff coverage:
“It's one of those things that our guys have to keep learning how to do, keep executing and keep seeing it. We have put a lot of time into it and we will keep working it. It is encouraging to see the number of them that we did cover well, just need to fix that one.”

On moving into conference play:
“It's always a process. I feel good, we overall played pretty well. Going into conference play we just have to keep getting sharper. As we practice and as we play, we just hope we can clean some things up and continue to play better as we are challenged more.”

On concerns with the run game:
“Regardless of how someone is playing, you still should be able to move the football and create some scenes. It's o-line, it's tight ends, it's backs, it's everybody. It's everybody doing it together. We have to be better at moving the football together.”

On Manny Johnson:
“I told him that's one of the best performances of a wide receiver we have had in 10 years. It ranks up there with anybody we've had -- 5 catches, 206 yards and three touchdowns. That's a pretty special night.”

Offensive Coordinator Kevin Wilson

On the game:
“They have a tremendous defense. We scored 35 points against a good team.TCU publicly said you could not run on them, so there is no need in square pegging it, but we do need to run the ball better.When you live by the sword, die by the sword and put those guys up there one-on-one, we have some guys that can make plays. If the protection holds up and our quarterback plays well, we have a chance to make plays.”

On Oklahoma's depth:
“We are very fortunate. We have some maturity and a lot of options. There was no plan tonight that Manuel Johnson was going to have those plays - it just happened. We are not trying to get it to a particular guy but it happened and we just have to make sure they stay humble.”

On Sam Bradford:
“As he has played, he is more mature, stronger and confident. We are trying real hard to compete and give him protection, keep guys off of him."

Defensive Coordinator Brent Venables

On the defense:
“I thought collectively as a unit they played really well and played within themselves and within the system. They were physical and I really liked how hard they played.”

On TCU:
“TCU is a good football team. They won a lot of games, and I think they were 8-5 last year and I believe all five losses were a touchdown or less. They have a really great team and a great defense.”

On stopping the TCU running game:
“We told our guys going into the game they were averaging 250 yards a game. They were a team that wins by running the football and mythotically moving the football up the field, addressing the ball and keeping the opponents offense off the field. Our goal going into the game was keeping them under 125 yards and we felt like if we did the game would not be close.”

On getting preasure on TCU:
"Our pressure was really good. Most of it was out of four man pressure. We pressured very little and against option teams you have to be very sound in the run game and blitzing is not the answer. They welcome the blitz. We knew that going in and we thought our guys really stayed in the pass rush lanes really well."

Sophomore QB Sam Bradford

On getting sacked four times:
“I really can't complain about getting sacked when we won like we did. It is part of the job and comes with the position. It is always worth getting a little beat up when the outcome is a win.”

On running and passing game:
“We know that we obviously need to work on running the ball better. If we come out and run it like that in conference, we are going to get beat. Our pass game was great, and we knew they were going to load the box and try to stop the run. As many good receivers as we have, we like our chances when teams want to play us man-on-man across the board.”

On screen pass to Manuel Johnson:
“We called the play to beat the blitz and it worked about as well as you could hope for.”

On BCS rankings:
“At this point, it doesn't mean anything to me. We need to take it one game at a time, enjoy the win, and get ready to go play Baylor next week.”

Junior DB Brian Jackson

On current BCS standing:
“The number one thing is to not concentrate on rankings and go into every game playing hard to win. Number one is just a number. Coach Stoops never discusses rankings, so it is never on our mind going into a game. Our main focus is one team each week.”

On playing the first ranked team of the season:
“A team is a team. I will give TCU credit. They are a good team, but we prepare the same for each team we play and come out wanting to win no matter who we are playing.”

On holding TCU's offense to one touchdown:
“One touchdown seems too many. They've scored 30-plus points on their other opponents this season. I guess that says something about us.”

On special teams:
“We have been working a lot on our special teams. We might have had one shaky kickoff, but the rest of them went really well.”

Senior WR Manuel Johnson

On taking advantage of TCU's man-to-man defense:
“Obviously, they had a lot of people in the box, so we took advantage of their defense and went outside. I enjoyed getting into the open space and being able to show off my speed a little bit.”

On being physical with defenders:
“Football is a physical sport, and if you have to be a little physical to get open and make a play, then it is going to happen. It's the name of the game.”

On being leading single-game receiver in OU history:
“It feels pretty good just being mentioned with the great receivers OU has produced, like Mark Clayton and Mark Bradley.”

On Oklahoma's offense:
“I feel like our offense played well, especially our passing game. Coach Wilson gave us a great game plan and told us their defense would be one-on-one. He left it up to us to make the plays and make it happen.”

Sophomore DT Gerald McCoy

On junior DT Cordero Moore:
“I told you all that when he came in he would be important. Cordero was under the radar and people don't really know what he can do, but tonight you all got a glimpse of him and got to see what he can do.”

On the defense:
“Our defense played well. We had a few breakdowns here and there, but we're going to fix that. I think overall we played well. We came out with some good turnovers: stripping the ball, interceptions, putting a lot of pressure on the quarterback. We emphasize that. Put pressure on the quarterback and get him out of his comfort zone to make it easier on our backs and I think we did that tonight.”

On what the win means for the season:
“Nothing yet. It doesn't say anything yet. We got the win and we're happy. We're just going to keep on pushing and see what happens.”

On stopping the run:
“We emphasize stopping the run, we work at that all week. To come out here and do that tonight gives us a little boost. We're not going to get big-headed and beat our chests, but it gives us a little boost to know that we came in and did what we had to do.”

R-Freshman LB Travis Lewis

On tonight's defensive performance:
“It all goes into our preparation and how we prepare for each game. We had two weeks to prepare for this game, so we were really well prepared. Our coaches did a great job. Coach Venables coached the heck out of us.”

On the defensive line:
“GK (Gerald McCoy) was huge tonight. He was getting double teamed and still getting into the backfield. Corey Bennett came up big on a lot of big plays. Our defensive line is why we shut down their run. They controlled the line of scrimmage all night. That's why the score was the way it was, because of that D-Line.”

On TCU:
“They're the best team we've played so far. Cincinnati was a close number two, but this is the best team we've played so far.”

Senior WR Juaquin Iglesias

On if he thinks the team's confidence is growing:
“Yeah, I do. This time last year we were in the same position and we lost to Colorado. That's still in the back of people's minds. We've just got to keep going. It's a long season and that's just game four. We've got a long way to go still.”

Head Coach Gary Patterson

Opening Statement:
“What you can say is that Oklahoma has been here before. Bottom line is that they played at a high level and we didn't. We can't give up big plays and expect to win ball games. A lot of that was my fault. We were trying to blitz and get into some fourth downs and make them punt and they made big plays. When we quit doing that, we played
better defense. But you have got to give them the credit, they went out and did the things they needed to do and got some takeaways they needed. They got ready to play.”

On missed opportunities:
“When you play agianst good team you can't turn the ball over and you can't have penalties. You can't play at second-and-15. We have been talking about that for two weeks.”

On his team:
“This is the second time we have played the best in the Big 12 and we only played a half. I believe this is a very good football team at TCU. I believe that before it is all said and done, if they decide to play four quarters and compete when they go on the road, they will win a lot of football games.”

On OU's game:
“They are very deserving. In this day and age if you win all your football games you deserve the right. They have a good football team. They had a off week and they got themselves fresh and did a great job. You have got to give Bob Stoops and his staff some credit. They were prepared for some stuff that we did and they played great in the red zone.”

On OU offense:
“They came out to play and we didn't match it and when we did stop them on the first drive we jumped offsides. They are very athletic. I think what they are doing on offense with the hurry-up, is going to cause a lot of teams some problems. Just the tempo of their offense bothered us.”

Senior LB Jason Phillips

On what he thought about the game early on:
“I don't think that we came out with as much passion as we have in the last couple of weeks. I believe we let them get up 21 or 28 points pretty early, and you can't do that against a team like Oklahoma. They are too good”

On if they shot themselves in the foot at all:
“Yeah, there were some thing that we could have done early. You have to give it to Bradford, he made some great throws, but I think we could have helped ourselves out a little by paying a little more attention to detail early.”

On what made Bradford so tough:
“His throwing ... he made some really good deep throws. I think they caught us on two or three of those, when we were putting pressure on him early. He just sat in there and threw them perfectly.”

On what the difference between the first and second half was:
“I think it was just the fact that we were down pretty badly. I don't know if we had to wake up or what, but we came out in the second half and played better. When you allow Oklahoma 28 points in the first half, it's going to be tough to catch up.”

Sophomore QB Andy Dalton

On the first half:
“We came out slow, and that didn't help us out any. Usually we pride ourself on starting strong, especially this year. I think a lot of us were over anxious to play this game because this was a big game for us. Starting slow in the first half hurt.

On seeing Okalhoma in person:
“OU is a great team and they have proved it the way they have won games this season. They deserve all the credit, they are a great team.”

On Sam Bradford:
“He does a great job. He has a lot of weapons to use, and he finds a way to use them all. He makes big plays, and he does a great job in that offense.”

On what they found out about themselves:
“We never quit. In the fourth quarter, we were still driving and trying to score every time. Thats good to see.”

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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