OU Quotes from January 6, 2009

Head Coach Bob Stoops

On today's practice ...
We'll come out tomorrow and do some walkthrough stuff, but for the most part it's the last day we'll have pads on. The guys were great. They've really done a good job

On the repetition of practices here in Miami ...
Most of its repetition, but we've put in a few new wrinkles.

On the health of the team heading into the game ...
Everyone's good to go. We don't have any other than Ryan Reynolds is still out and Demarco [Murray] is still on crutches that's pretty obvious, but everybody else is good. Austin's [Box] practiced and has done well so he'll play.

On the team being ready to play ...
There all anxious. Everybody is at this point, but you have to be smart about it and pace yourself too. You can get too wound up too early as well.

On controversy and more interest in this championship game than previous ...
I don't know how to gage that. All I know is that it's exciting and these are special games. I'm a little oblivious to the community and what the rest of the country's doing. We're at practice and we're in meetings. It's not easy to keep up with the rest of that. I don't even try to. Heck, they're always exciting so I don't know how to determine if it's more or not.

On the case for who should be No. 1 ...
You guys debate that. I'm not in that. Remember, I don't even vote.

On Big 12 teams not scoring as many points in bowl games as they did in the regular season ...
That's up to you guys [the media] to decide why. To answer your question, what about other teams? I don't know whether they've score more or not. I'm just wondering what the averages are for other conferences and if they're up or down. My guess is they are probably too. That would be for you guys to research.

On the reason for the lower scoring being that defenses that haven't seen this this type of offense having more time to prepare ...
There's something to that for anybody. That can be the case to some degree. That team's get familiar and have three weeks to get familiar. Getting ready for Florida's difficult, because all the different ways they run the ball and pull people. If you had to do it one week it's hard. You get more time to get familiar with it.

WR Manuel Johnson

On being in Miami ...
It's my first time being in Florida. It's nice, great weather, it's fun.

On activities outside of game preparation ...
We don't do anything too much. We go out to the malls and things like that, walk on the beach. Not many of us have seen the beach before, just been enjoying South Beach, Miami. Seen a couple celebrities here and there, it's just been fun.

OL Trent Williams

On his health ...
I had a little cough and sneeze, I got bad allergies. (Miami) contributed to them. All these palm trees, I am not used to this, it's my first time down here.

On the anticipation for the big game ...
It's starting to bear down on me. It been like a month, it seems like a year though. It's finally here man, we're just ready. National Championship, if you can't get high for this game, you better check your pulse.

On Florida's speed ...
They're fast, and a great team. We just got to step up to the challenge.

On activities outside of game preparation ...
It's been fun. Miami has been treating us real good. We had a nice little comedy show last night with Mike Epps, so yeah, it's been fun.

LB Austin Box

On splitting time with Mike Balogun ...
It's going to be a joint effort. We're both going to get our reps, we've been each taking reps in practice this week and it's going to be a joint effort. We kind of see it like that's how it's been all year. Guys have had to step up and we've had to use everybody and be together as a unit so I'm just excited and I'm ready to get out there.

On Oklahoma's defense ...
If you've watched us all year our defense has shown that we can do a lot of great things, especially causing turnovers, and that's something a lot of people don't talk about, and that's something we've done really well this year. We're among one of the top teams in the nation in causing turnovers. Turnovers win games. You know our offense has been putting up tremendous numbers all year, but also what a lot of people don't see is the defense is setting up a lot of those scores. We can leave the talking to the media and the rest of the people, but come Thursday night that's when it all matters, and we're going to show up to play.

On Tim Tebow ...
The guy can run, he can pass, he's a tremendous competitor and athlete and we're just going to try to keep him locked up as much as possible. That's the only thing you can hope to do. Being a quarterback, he likes to take hits, he likes to take contact, he likes to run over people, and he's just an impressive all around player, obviously winning the Heisman last year, that speaks for itself. They're not a lot of guys running around here with a Heisman Trophy. So we know he's a great player and we've been preparing hard this week and we're ready for the matchup.

On Oklahoma fans at the game ...
I'm sure they'll have the edge but you'll be surprised. I know that our fans travel well, and they're devoted and love their Sooner team. I know that quite a few are going to make it out.

On his being in the BCS National Championship ...
We're very thankful to be in this game. Something like this doesn't come around very often. It's a once in a lifetime deal. I'm just very thankful that I get to contribute and be a part of the national championship.

DE Jeremy Beal

On Florida's speed ...
We see that their a fast team and all but we got speed too. We just got to prepare for this and hope we're prepared. You can tell on film their a fast and quick team, but hopefully we can prepare for that, I mean we have to prepare for that. We'll just go in there and see how it is.

On Oklahoma's defense being overlooked ...
We can create turnovers on defense and also our offense can take care of the ball very well too, so I mean it's not just defense, it's offense too taking care of the ball.

On other teams claiming to be # 1 ...
I mean, I don't know, they're, Utah is undefeated and Texas beat us in our stuff, but I mean we're in the championship. We look at it like that and we're going for the championship. We really try not to pay attention to those other teams, we try to pay attention to us getting in the national championship. There's no doubt this is the championship game and we're in it and Florida's in it too, so that's how we look at it.

On rooting for Texas in the Fiesta Bowl ...
I watched some of the game. I was rooting for Texas and I'm glad they pulled it out. I root for all Big 12 teams. They're a part of our conference and anytime a Big 12 team is in a game I root for them. I think of it as if you're in our conference I root for you to show how strong our conference is.

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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