“I expect both teams to come out with a lot of heart and effort. It's all or nothing for both of us: The winner gets a shot at playing for the championship; the loser goes home.”
“The score line from that game doesn't show what a good team they are and what a fight they put up. They caught some unlucky breaks in that game. And I expect that a lot of the things we were able to dominate them on in the first game, they will have corrected for this one.”
“We went into the locker room and got a hell of a motivational speech from our coach. We saw our season slipping away, and we came awake and came alive in the second half.”
“We can be really pleased with our second-half performance, and that we were able to make adjustments and shut them down on defense. At the same time, if we're going to beat top level teams in the playoffs, especially Cal, we're going to have to come out firing on all cylinders.”
“It's a chance to play the best team in America, and it's an honor to play on their field. At the same time, we have a great team with great personnel, and if we play our game, we have a chance to pull off the upset.”
“We've been doing pretty much what we usually do at this time of year. It's too late to start doing anything differently, so we're just concentrating really hard on what we've been doing right all season. We've also been having a little bit of fun in practice, because when it comes down to it, it is a game. We take it very seriously, but we can't lose sight of the bigger picture.”
“Our tackling is going to be critical; Cal is one of the best running teams in the nation. If we let them slip tackles, they'll hurt us pretty bad, so we need to stay in front of guys, and not let them get by us.”
“We have to make sure that our set moves come off right and we're not dropping passes. We need to continue with what we're doing, stay the course, keep doing what we've done right and we can put a hurt on Cal.”
“We're really looking forward to it, getting together with the people we play for. All the history these people bring, it goes beyond the 22 guys selected to play on the field.”
