Transcript: Florida Gators Brian Johnson on Pitts Return, Clinching the East and Playing In the Cold
Florida Gators Offensive Coordinator Brian Johnson met with local media on Monday night to discuss the changes with Kyle Pitts return, the possibility to clinch the East this weekend versus Tennessee and what sort of difference it makes playing in the cold.
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What characterizes offense?
“One of the nice things that we do a nice job of is making people defend everyone, putting our players in a position to be successful, creating matchups and creating opportunities to get our players explosive-play opportunities. I think we do a good job of distributing it and making defenses have to defend the entire field.”
Kyle Pitts return elevate offense?
“I mean, he can just make so many explosive plays. He makes very difficult plays look routine. He’s a fantastic player; he’s one of the best players in America. It’s obviously great to have him back. But we found him and we found a chance to get him matched up a couple of times. More often than not he’s going to win his matchup.”
How much of summer scouting on Tennessee do you still use?
“You use a little bit of it and you have a general idea of overall scheme and what they try to accomplish. The difficult part about that it’s so early in the season you go back and look at some games because there’s just not enough film to make a really, really solid plan. Like we always talk about, teams are different every single year. So the defense they have this year takes on a little different personality than they had the previous year. Playing them towards the end of the season, now we have quite a bit of film on them and can put together a pretty solid plan.”
Being able to clinch the East this week, easier to get guys attention and get them focused this week?
“Yeah I think that obviously, we did not play well as an offense last week. You can’t turn the ball over twice, put our defense in a terrible situation. Those guys did a great job only giving up 10 points with us giving them the ball twice on their side of the field. We have to play much cleaner. We have to execute at a much higher level and not waste opportunities. it’s always fun to play Tennessee. Our players will be fired up to hit the road and go and put on a good show.”
Fumbles becoming an issue?
“Ball security is a premium. You have to take care of the football and not put it on the turf. I think that the ball the issue, you can’t make plays if you don’t have the ball. It has to be a priority to take care of the football and keep getting first downs, put yourself in a position to go score.”
Not making guys run a mile with the football like in Remember the Titans
“No, we don’t go to those extremes. I think the biggest thing is you have to have a really high standard for ball security and each individual coach coaches ball security. Every coach coaches ball security for the entire offense and we have to obviously do a much better job of taking the ball and not coughing it up.”
Are we looking at Kyle Trask too harshly/nitpicking him?
“He’s playing really well. He’s playing like one of the best players in America. To this day I don’t think anyone’s played a perfect game. There’s always teachable moments. I’m sure there’s plays that he would love to have back as well. That comes with the territory if you’re going to be the quarterback at Florida. You gotta be ready for that.”
Vandy using Sarah Fuller, is the game evolving to that being more normal?
“Um, I’m not sure. Obviously, it was a wonderful story, a bunch of good headlines. I was watching SportsCenter on Saturday night and I saw that was the lead story on SportsCenter on Saturday night. I saw she won co-SEC Player of the Week this week. Great honor. It was a great moment. I’m not sure how common it will be moving forward, but it’s always nice when someone can break a barrier, for sure.”
Kyle Pitts loves trash talk?
“I don’t buy much into that personally. Kyle Pitts is extremely self-motivated. I don’t think he reached his status without being extremely self-motivated. He wants to be a great player and he practices really, really hard up until the games. Trash talking is part of the game..."
Coldest game you've played in?
“There’s been a couple. I would say we played at Wyoming, had to be the third or fourth week in November of 2004. It was an ABC game. We were playing Wyoming. I think we were 11-0. We had BYU the next week. (another part I can’t decipher). The stadium lights went out, so we had like a two-hour break where we had to go back and just kind of hand out. So we get to the game and I mean it's really, really cold. And I will never forget, coach Mullen had this huge jacket on and gloves and at the time, he was the play signaler. I was just a freshman so I was sitting on the bench. And Alex couldn't see the signals through Dan's fingers because he had these huge gloves on. So he asked him to take the gloves off and coach Mullen was like, 'Absolutely not taking the gloves off.' So that was a cold game. I remember I got to go in at the end of the victory, like my mouthpiece was frozen stuck to my helmet. So that's probably the coldest one I've been in, back in 2004."
ANY ADVICE FOR KYLE OR NO REAL IMPACT?
"I mean I don't exxpect it to be like a frozen tundra, so no, just go out there and play."
AP SAID GAME WAS PLAYED IN BITING WIND THAT MADE IT FEEL LIKE 15 DEGREES
"In 2004? Yeah, it was cold. It was really cold. No doubt. (When you're not playing) it makes it even colder."
YOU GUYS ARE TASKMASTERS, HOW DO Y'ALL IMPACT THAT WITHOUT COMING DOWN ON THE GUYS? HOW MUCH DO THEY DO THAT THEMSELVES? DESCRIBE MENTALITY TOWARD 34 POINTS ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH?
"Yeah, I think each game kind of takes on its own personality. Sometimes you can have a game where 34 points and you played really, really well. It's whatever the circumstance is based on the number of possessions, the flow of the game you're playing. But that was a game where we scored 34 but we did not play well and we didn't play clean. We left eight points in red zone possessions. Fourteen points by turning the ball over. So it just was not a complete effort. We obviously didn't play to the best of our abilities. I think the key is obviously coaching it. It's much easier to coach that type of stuff when you win. But the key is just understanding what the standard is and playing to your standard, playing to the best of your ability each and every play and we didn't do that this past Saturday."
HOW DOES MULLEN DRILL THAT INTO PLAYERS AND STAFF, TRICKLEDOWN?
"Yeah, he has an unbelievably high standard for himself, but you surround yourself with highly motivated people that want to be great at what they do. That's the beauty of the game is you get a bunch of guys pulling in the same direction toward a common goal. Obviously at Starkville he did a great job of leading the program and setting the standard, and all the players and the coaches want to be great as well, so it makes it easy."
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