Washington State Cougars

Player views

Posted on 01 December 2009 by Dale Grummert

The players were especially talkative, and in some cases especially forthcoming, after the Cougars’ 30-0 colonoscopy at the hands of Washington on Saturday to cap a 1-11 season. What follow are a few of the quotes, some of which appear in a season wrap-up in Wednesday’s edition.

Meanwhile, a couple of news items Tuesday from coach Paul Wulff: One, he hasn’t ruled out making changes to his staff in the next few weeks, once the dust settles in the recruiting season. And two, Canuck backup offensive lineman Joe Eppele is giving up his senior senior to join the CFL draft.

DWIGHT TARDY

Senior tailback

“You want adversity. You want to fight back. That’s where your great players come from, when adversity comes. We had a lot of young guys that really don’t understand how to go about things like that. We put them in the right direction. We did a lot of talking. But talking is not what you need. You need to talk with your pads. I think next year will be a lot better, definitely a lot better. I’m not sure what it’s going to take to get back to where we were, in our glory days, but we’re on our way.”

“We had no depth, and when we had to call on our third-string guy, he wasn’t confident. To me, experience wins out every time. When we were winning, we had guys on the field since they were redshirt freshmen and now they were seniors.”

KENNY ALFRED

Senior center

“I think some things are possibly not watching video and possibly not preparing enough. For some players I think another part of it is maturity. Obviously we had a sort of roulette as far as our offensive line has been concerned all season. It makes it difficult to react to things and get experience, and that’s a very necessary building block for being productive.”

“I don’t think we weren’t ready necessarily. I think it’s guys understanding, when they see something on film … it’s going to happen in the game we’re going to play. If we see something, we call it out. We point it out. It’s there. Guys need to say, ‘OK, that’s what’s going to happen.’ Click the brain off, stop thinking and react to it.”

“Also, its’s pretty clear the team is crippled as far as injuries. I know it’s a tired thing to talk about. I understand that. But at the same time it’s true. For the team to be successful, depth has to be built. It’s really difficult to go out in any situation with a one-deep or when you’re playing with guys who don’t have that much experience. It just is.”

“It’s more about attacking each week as an individual battle. The problem we ran into — I thought we came out effectively in the Stanford game (to open the season), then injuries started to happen. Maybe guys started to — I’m being careful with what I’ll say, but things happen. Guys react to momentum, and I think a mature angle needs to be taken from a player’s standpoint. Guys need to understand how to be mature in a situation where there’s adversity, when there’s difficulty. When there’s difficulty, they need to be able to react to it and step up and attack it, as opposed to just seeing what happens.”

“Honestly, I know myself pretty well and I didn’t know how I’d react to this, and it won’t sink in for me for a while, that my career at Washington State is finished. I have literally no regrets personally, absolutely not. And I can say really easily I love this university, I love the professors, I love the fans that understand what’s going on — they get it. But more than anything I love the team. I love who I’ve become because of my time at Washington State. I wouldn’t trade it for anything — records, scores, anything.”

“Depth needs to be built, obviously. That’s a continuous process, especially where the team’s at now. Players need to react violently, they need to jump into the offseason with a violent intent and attack every workout. And they need to understand what that means. That’s something I’ve tried to show through my play, through my work ethic, through whatever. Hopefully that stuck a little bit, what I’ve done. There needs to be a huge reaction. What exactly the changes will be, it’s hard to say. But some need to be made, I’m sure.”

MARSHALL LOBBESTAEL

Sophomore quarterback

“I think people would be surprised — our record doesn’t show how our guys work. I think we should keep trucking and next year we’ll get better results.”

GINO SIMONE

Freshman receiver

“It’s a bright future. I believe that wholeheartedly. That’s the reason I’m here. I could have gone to other schools — one school is bowling right now…. And the reason I’m at Washington State is because I believe in the staff and where they’re going.”

XAVIER HICKS

Senior safety

“I just know this program is going to get turned around. I’ve preached it to the younger guys. I just believe in them. They’ve done a good job listening and understanding why they’re here. I just believe the recruits that do come in are going to see that and they’re going to want the same things as the underclassmen. They’re going to want change and they’re going to get it turned around.”