QUOTES FROM NICK SABAN’S MONDAY PRESS CONFERENCE
“We finished five practices in three days this past Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. The players certainly worked hard. We got back much closer to where we were before we shut it down after the season. I was pleased at the progress that we were able to make.”
“Most players were able to make it through the practices, except for Daniel Leon, who sprained his ankle. He is out for a few practices, but he will be ready in a couple of days. Other than that, most of the players were able to practice and work hard.”
“The players were really getting into the practices, and we are trying to approach this like we are getting ready to play one game. We don’t have any SEC standings to worry about, we don’t have a race in the west to distract us, and this is not really a big rivalry game for us in our league. We’re not going to be playing in Tiger Stadium, so we just have the challenge of playing on a national scene, a major bowl game, and prove that we belong.”
“The fans had a tremendous challenge in terms of what we asked them to do by supporting our team, and they responded with a bang. They did a fantasting job of buying all of the tickets in a short time. We certainly appreciate that. Our players appreciate that, and our fans have been tremendous throughout the entire season. Now it’s time for our players to take the challenge to prove that we belong on the national scene at this time of the year, which we haven’t done in a couple of years.”
“This bowl game is going to set the stage for the future, in terms of having a great football team. The great football teams, like the Florida State’s and the Nebraska’s and people like that, they always end up in these kinds of games every year. That’s why we want this game to be a building block for our players. We want this game to better prepare them for playing in an SEC Championship game in the future, or a New Year’s Day bowl game, or possibly a BCS game.”
“We want our team to have the same mindset of let’s not just to go to the game to have fun. We want them believe that they can overcome the challenge of playing in a bowl game, because of the focus that they have and what they want to accomplish and how it is something that they have to prove as a team if they are mature enough to handle these things and still play well.”
“Unlike most games, the distractions only increase as you get closer to the game. Most of the time, the distractions decrease as you get closer to the game.”
“Georgia Tech is a fine football team. They are probably as well coached of a team that I have seen all year long, relative to the players that they have, the production that they get, and the way that they perform with consistency.”
“On offense, they have very talented skill guys on the outside who make a lot of big plays. The quarterback does an outstanding job of executing their offense, and they have a pretty good runner, so they have a good balance on offense.”
“They are also very challenging on defense. They play a lot of zone. They move around a lot to try and confuse the opposing offense. They have a couple of defensive ends that are pretty good playmakers. They always seem to make the big plays when they need to in order to get off the field. They are also very sound and solid on special teams.”
“They are a good all-around team that doesn’t do a lot of stuff to beat themselves, and that does a very good job of executing what is asked of them. They’ve had a lot of success doing it, and they are a very confident team right now. This is going to be a very challenging game for our team.”
SABAN ON WHETHER OR NOT HE HAS ADDED ANYTHING NEW TO THE PLAYBOOK DUE TO THE EXTRA PREPARATION TIME BEFORE THE GAME:
“I think that we have a little bit of time to do some things that are different in the game. We have plenty of time to do a pretty good analysis of the quality control of what we have done throughout the season, and the tendencies that we have. Right now, we have to see how we can break those tendencies, because our opponent also has a lot of time to go through film and pick up on them as well. If we have any tendencies that we have developed over the course of the year, then we want to make sure that we have some key-breakers in there that could be changes that they will not be able to zero in on.”
SABAN ON WHETHER HE THINKS THAT HIS TEAM IS AT A DISADVANTAGE DUE TO GEORGIA TECH’S RECENT BOWL EXPERIENCE:
“We don’t have very many guys in those meeting rooms over there watching film right now that have ever been to a bowl football game before. We have a few, and I think that knowledge, experience, and how to handle these types of situations is obviously something that can be helpful to a team, and their team has a little more of it than our team does.”
SABAN ON WHEN HE REALIZED THAT THIS TEAM WAS GOOD ENOUGH TO GO TO A BOWL GAME:
“I’d say I knew it when we beat three SEC teams in a row. After beating Tennessee, Kentucky, and Mississippi State, I felt like we were good enough to beat just about anybody that we would play. I also knew that we didn’t quite have the maturity as competitors to always play with the type of consistency that we needed to play with in order to be a dominating team.”
“I think that the key for us is to execute on offense and do the things that we need to do without making a lot of mistakes and committing turnovers. On defense we need to stop the big plays, and not allow them to run the ball on us. In the last couple of games we did a good job of not giving up a lot of points, and hopefully we’ll be able to continue to do that. Even against a team that is averaging nearly 34 points a game.”
SABAN ON HOW GEORGIA TECH IS THE NUMBER ONE TEAM IN THE NATION IN TURNOVER RATIO:
“We have not gotten enough turnovers this season, and the turnover ratio on a team is one of the best indicators of success. Very few teams that turn the ball over more times than they take it away are going to have a reasonable amount of success, and that is true in any league. I think that has been a key to their success. If we are going to be able to play a good football game, then we are going to have to not allow the turnovers to play a big role in the outcome of the game.”