AZTECS FOOTBALL PRESS CONFERENCE 11/14: BACK IN ACTION

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Story by Liz Alper

Videos courtesy goaztecs.com

For videos of David Wells’ and Parker Baldwin’s portions of the press conference, click “read more” and scroll down.

November 14, 2017 (San Diego) - San Diego State football is back in action this week after a bye week, taking on Nevada this Saturday.  Head coach Rocky Long, senior tight end David Wells and junior safety Parker Baldwin sat down with the media at this week's press conference.

"...I think our team looked refreshed yesterday in practice," Long opened. "We had a little more quickness out there and a little more speed, so hopefully that will carry us through the last two games of the season. This week we play a very explosive offensive team. If you look at their statistics, they throw for a bunch of yards and they score a bunch of points. They score a lot of points on some pretty good football teams and that’s not our style. I hope it doesn’t turn into a scoring contest because that’s not our style. We’ll see how we come off the bye week, there’s a concern about how sharp we’ll be especially at the beginning of the game but we’ll see how that works out.”

Long said junior quarterback Christian Chapman "looked okay" yesterday in practice.  He also said he doesn't pay attention to losing two games putting SDSU out of the national conversation.

An update on the health of the defensive and offensive lines:  “All the guys that were hurt I think are going to be able to play. Some of them won’t be able to play well, we’re still waiting on Antonio Rosales to get completely healthy. He moves around better and he’s feeling better than he did but he’s still not at 100 percent so I’m not sure that one has been cleared up. Our defensive linemen all are expected to play, how well they can play I don’t know. They were okay yesterday but we didn’t have pads on yesterday, we have pads on today. Everybody looks pretty good in shorts.”

Long talked about the play of the linebackers. “Obviously we can be better than we have been but some of that is due to inexperience and some of that is due to injuries. I think going into the season we said we were young in the offensive line – I think that proved true and I think they have gotten better as the season goes but I think that it’s proof that they are not as good as having an experienced offensive line. We were very inexperienced at the linebacker position and at safety and I think that has proven true too. Last year when we had all those veterans back there we had 26 interceptions. This year we have 10. But last year we had 22, that’s not because they are better athletes, it’s because they are more experienced and are in the right place more often."

Wells talked about how important it is to finish the last two games of the season strong. “It’s really important, nothing is set in stone yet. We still have a chance to win a championship and we still have a chance to accomplish what we set out to do at the beginning of the season. Only thing that we can control is going out and playing hard each and every week. It’s not over until it’s over, that’s really it.”

Baldwin echoed: “Finishing strong is really what we’re all about. Last year we finished strong and this year we plan to do the same.”

Wells said preparing for a game after a bye week makes no difference in the preparation methods. “We approach it the same every single week. We get our game plans, usually on Tuesday, but going through the bye week we already prepared for them a little bit we realized what sort of defense they are running and special teams and all that sort of stuff like that. We starting installing small things at first and then usually when we see what they do in their most recent week, that’s when the game plan gets changed mostly. And then we go out there today, which is really our first hard practice of the week and we go out there and go through what we’ve got to do and run our plays that we’ve got to do. That’s really it.”

Baldwin was grateful for the time off, saying he feels refreshed. “Not having to play a game and go through all those plays, especially if you are a player who plays every snap, sometimes after a game you feel fine. You feel like you are not banged up, but the toll it takes on your body and having that break is huge being refreshed for these last two games.”

SDSU takes on Nevada at SDCCU Stadium at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday.

 

 


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