COACH PETE CARROLL
"This was a
night for champions. It was a championship night
in all ways. Two teams went out battling the whole
time to the final second in great fashion, honorable
fashion. And Texas did a great job. They did a
wonderful job all night long. We had to keep
outscoring them and we weren't able to.
And Mack Brown and his whole staff, and
the whole program, they were great champions
tonight. And if you have to hand it over, step aside
for somebody, that's a heck of a team to do that to.
I'm very, very proud of this football
program, this team, the players that have led this
team over the last few years, and we walk out of
the Rose Bowl tonight very disappointed. We had
a real chance to win again. Make a 4th down and
we win. But on this night it's Texas' night. They
deserved it. They earned it. It was a heck of a
football game.
Vince Young was extraordinary. He was
an extraordinary talent out there tonight. It was
obviously the difference in the football game. It
was obvious why they were so affected this year.
Good players all over the board, but he's off the
charts. He's a heck of a football player.
Q. On the 4th down, late in the game,
what was the thinking instead of punting it or
going for it?
COACH PETE CARROLL: 1st down the
game is over basically, rather than we just seen
them what they had done the series before and it
didn't really matter where they were going to start
in that regard if we had a chance to make that 1st
you don't, that's where we win the football game,
that moment flashes by in the instant and that's our
moment to seal the win. It was a night we had to
do it on offense and we weren't able to and we had
our chance to stop it and couldn't do it on defense.
Q. Best performance you've seen by an
individual against you?
COACH PETE CARROLL: Yes, without
question, that was the best by one guy and a team,
I won't take away from the Texas football team, it's
an extraordinary football player.
Q. You've had the great success, 34 in
a row, and obviously it has to come to an end
eventually. Talk about your feelings right now,
the disappointment that obviously you must
have.
COACH PETE CARROLL: Of course I
have. It hasn't hit me yet, to tell you the truth. This
has been about excellence all throughout the year.
It's not about walking. It's the level you perform
week in and week out, and the stats you hold
yourself to and we did that tonight. I have no
problem with what happened tonight. Of course
our football team battled like we always do.
We didn't think -- we thought there was a
second on the clock to kick the field goal, that's
what we were thinking. We would have done it.
It's a very rare opportunity that we dealt with here.
I loved every minute of it. It was so much fun to do
something that hasn't been done before and work
at it. The challenge now is to show who we really
are, come back and get going again. It's pretty
hard to describe what the feeling is like.
One of the thoughts I had all along, who is
going to get it. They took it. I won't take anything
away from them. This was an excellent football
team we played, they had a great team and great
stats, and coaching staff and the whole thing.
They are a worthy team. It makes me feel a little
differently than if we lost to somebody we
shouldn't. It was that kind of night. If we had the
ball again we would have got back in it again.
Q. You really went with the blitz on the
last series almost every play, it looked like you
were going to try to put it in your hands and
force the action a little bit that way?
COACH PETE CARROLL: Yes, just
basically when faced with an opportunity, I have
been in these situations before, and it's how you
want to dish it out in that situation, how you want to
deal with it after. The last thing I want to do is sit
back and see what happens. I want to get it and
make opportunities. We were trying to fill up the
rest of it so that he couldn't escape. He could any
time he wanted to earlier in the night, so I thought
the best chance was to get that done.
Q. Pete, what can anybody do to stop
anybody with that kind of talent?
COACH PETE CARROLL: It's very
difficult. I'm on the record telling you guys how
hard it is to stop the quarterback. He is a difficult
quarterback to face, because he's so fast. It's not
that he's scrambling. He's a fast guy and he's big.
He probably made us miss a dozen passes tonight
and we slipped right off the guy. He threw the ball
quite well again. A great 1st half. I don't know
what his numbers were the 2nd half. A great 1st
half. He took what we gave him. He is a heck of a
football player.
Q. In all the situations you've been in,
have you ever been in a situation where you
felt you couldn't stop a guy if you had to go 80
plus yards to stop?
COACH PETE CARROLL: I played with
Dan Marino for years. I felt that way a lot of times.
Q. Why the decision to go for it on 4th
and 2 in that situation? And take me through
the play, what you saw.
COACH PETE CARROLL: For us at the
time, it was the right thing to do. We would have
won the game right there. We had a chance to win
the game and go for it. You make that 1st down
and you win the football game. You're going to
have to stop it anyway. How far you're going to
kick it right there, kick a 20-yard punt, it's not even
close. The decision, in my opinion, in our way of
thinking, you're going for it all the time.
Q. Can you talk about the frustration as
a defensive coordinator in that situation trying
to stop an offense?
COACH PETE CARROLL: Unfortunately
we've won and lost them over the years. I've been
in this situation a lot, where it's coming down to the
last drive. So it's extremely frustrating, in particular
when you know what the problem is. We tried to
get after him, even when we looked like we were
going to sack him.
If you go back, I'm not sure if -- we had a
shot to turn the ball over, and they knocked the ball
away from us. But that was our chance to win the
football game right there. We were just looking for
one more, we couldn't find it. He was too good.
Q. What kind of adjustments did you
make at halftime that you were able to get the
ball in the end zone and put up some more
points?
COACH PETE CARROLL: That's just the
way we play really. It's the stuff that we do always.
We did some things differently in the 2nd half, it
worked out okay for the most part, but when they
just got back, his factor of running made a big
difference.
Q. I meant you offensively?
COACH PETE CARROLL: We knew we
could run the football. We blew a couple of
opportunities going down the field, we gave the
ball to them a couple of times on the interception in
the end zone and the fumble that was crazy.
Reggie tried too hard on that play, he'll regret it
forever, but he tried too hard to get the ball. We
knew we could move it. It was a matter of being
patient.
Q. So many times your team has went
down this season in halftime and the 2nd half
you've come back and put the pedal to the
metal and beat things up. Texas didn't let that
happen tonight. Talk about that.
COACH PETE CARROLL: That was very
characteristic in how we play. We played so well in
the third quarter. We did that again, but it was the
two drives at the end, we couldn't stop them.
Sometimes the momentum of our burst in the third
quarter sets us apart from the other team, but they
became more effective when they had to throw the
ball, because now he's running as well, that
actually helped them.
It's just the factor that he brings that makes
a difference with this team, they are good players
all across the board, but he's so unique. He's an X
factor, he just takes off running and that's the
issue. We weren't able to stop him when we had a
chance.
Q. At this time right now does it feel
like you lost this game or that Texas won this
game?
COACH PETE CARROLL: I'm not going
to take anything away from Texas at all, I'm not.
We had our chances to the win the game, we had
a 4th down situation, we had the ball in our hands
on the pick. We had plenty of shots, the whole
sequence of those last two drives when they had
the football and we could have stopped them.
It's simple as this, we had a turnover issue
in this game. It's how it goes. We understand that
philosophy and this night we needed to get it a
couple more times. The football was all over the
field. We had five different times it seemed like we
didn't come up with it, that we could have won the
game itself. I don't remember what the question
was.
Q. I know it's really early, but how are
you feeling about the coming season and
losing some of the very powerful seniors we
have right now?
COACH PETE CARROLL: I thought about
it a lot. What my thoughts come back to about this
football team right now, this is a program that has
found a level of excellence, a level of performance
and giving of their will to us that's extraordinary,
and we'll get back to work and see how it comes
together. We have great players coming in to
offset the guys that are leaving.
We've always lost great players but we've
replaced them. Recruiting efforts are extremely
important right now, to be able to come in and fill
these spots, let's get ready, let's go, we need them.
Recruiting efforts are obviously enormous right
now, to have another great year and get excited to
come back for spring football.
Q. Talk about how much you think you
left out there in the 1st half in terms of
opportunities when guys got in the red zone
and how that affected how far ahead you could
have been at halftime?
COACH PETE CARROLL: That was a
huge factor in this game. We could have had
points in the 1st half, we screwed up. That's the
power of turnovers. That's how it works. The free
safety made a great play to pick that ball off, and
then down in the corner. They earned that one.
We gave them the other one. That's crazy. That's
so far out of line with the way we performed. I
can't even imagine how to explain that one. But I
do know why it happened, Reggie was trying to get
a touchdown.
Q. Could you walk us latecomers
through the 4th down call.
COACH PETE CARROLL: It's real simple,
the series before they had great success moving
down the field. If they get the ball I don't know
what yard line it was, but it's the 40 or so, whether
they get it there and try to kick it down there or kick
it 20 yards farther, it's not going to make a big
difference. The difference is if you make the 1st
down you're running a squad down to win the
football game. It's unfortunate we didn't get it. We
missed it by how much, eye few inches.
Q. Matt Leinart played his last game for
you. Talk a little bit about Matt's impact the
last three years.
COACH PETE CARROLL: He's been a
great champion. He's been a great leader, a great
role model. He's been a blast to be around and
play with. It's time, you know it and I know it, it's
time to go. It's an awesome feeling to know you
have completed things and you've done everything
you can do, and he did that. He played fantastic
tonight again, and it's just too bad he couldn't walk
out of here as the Rose Bowl Champion one more
time.
It wasn't that he didn't do everything he
could. I think rarely you get an opportunity to see
a guy with all of his glory be such an extraordinary
kid, and he is that. He made the decision to stay,
and he should send a message to kids that that's
the right decision to make. Matt graduated. He's
going to get paid a ton more money than last year
and he got to play for his college one more time. I
know he wouldn't trade his experiences for
anything. He's a living example for other people
and that makes him a great leader, almost in a
small way an icon in the world of college football
and we're very lucky we had time with him. It's
been great to be with Matty.
Q. Where do you think he ranks in
college quarterbacks?
COACH PETE CARROLL: He's got to be
up there, with all he's done. I don't know, but I
know he's a great one. The top that has ever
played.
S Darnell Bing
On trying to stop Vince Young:
“It’s one of the hardest things possible...We tried to stop them as far as passing. We weren’t expecting him to
run as much. He takes the ball in his own hands...He’s a big guy, a shifter with speed.”
On being up late in the game:
“You can’t be confident. Even when there’s time on the clock, you gotta keep battling.”
On going for the 4th down with two minutes left:
“It was a great call. You gotta be by your team. If we would have got the first down, we would have been able
to run the clock out.”
On feelings after the game and looking back:
I’m not upset about the loss right now, because it hasn’t me yet.”
DE Frostee Rucker
On Vince Young:
“He’s a beast, man. He did his thing. They did an excellent job getting to his passes. This was a great game
that’s going down in history.”
On Texas’ offensive line:
“They’re back there, but Vince is bailing them out. You couldn’t simulate that in practice. He’s so big, you don’t
expect him to have quick twitch moves like that.”
QB Matt Leinart
On his feelings after the game:
“It’s difficult, no matter win or lose. We still like what we accomplished the last three years.”
On whether Texas won or USC lost:
“We lost it. I give credit to Vince and those guys but I feel like we lost it. That’s just the way it goes.”
On Vince Young:
He’s so big and strong. It’s tough to prepare for that and stop that.”
On any changes at halftime:
“We didn’t change anything. I thought we called a great game.”
On ending his collegiate career in this game:
“I don’t have any regrets. This is what I’ve wanted to do. We’re champions. They just got us on this night.”
TB Reggie Bush
On what he’s going to do next.
“Hopefully I’ll get a chance to take a vacation in the next weekend or something. Time to put everything in
perspective.”
On his Heisman award and if it affected Vince Young:
“He’s a playmaker. That’s what he did. Big time players step up in big time games.”
On this game being a Texas win or a USC loss?
”A little bit of both. I don’t feel like we played well as a team today. At the same time, Texas made great plays.”
On Texas’ defense:
“They were just playing good all day. They didn’t do anything special.”
On halftime adjustments?
“We didn’t make any adjustments. We just ran the ball more.”
On the Trojans in 2006-07:
Even with me leaving, I definitely expect them to come back for the national championship.
On his feelings after the game:
I’m sad. I wish we could take some of those plays back. Leave it all out on the field and live another
day...We’ve made some tremendous things happen here...It’s everything; frustration, angry, sad. Everything.”