Notable quotes from Chris Klieman’s press conference

“Looking at the film (from Saturday), we did some good things, did some really good things, and we made some mistakes that we’ve got to clean up. I think we have their attention because there’s some things – just some detail, some recognition of running the correct route or the correct depth, maybe a blocking scheme that got screwed up a couple of times. We talked about it on Saturday night. We didn’t blow the coverage, but we didn’t get the best leverage with the coverage. So, we’ve got some things we’ve got to get shored up this week. We have, in essence, a pretty short week because our Friday gets rolling really early with some meetings, then walkthroughs before we head on the plane to head to New Orleans.”

“Jon [Sumrall] was at Troy, and he was here last year. He’s a terrific coach. They’ve got a really good scheme. You know, we watched all the Troy film from last year when we played them. Now, it seems like we’re watching them again because we just have the one game.

But it’s a really well-coached team. It’s a lot of similarities offensively and defensively from scheme. I’m sure there’s going to be some difference, just because you got to have your personnel match your scheme, but it’s a really well-coached team. They’ve got really good players. We know we’re going to play in a really tough environment.”

“I don’t think anybody played poorly live. We just probably made a few mistakes that hopefully we can clean up from game one to game two.

I thought our running backs ran really well. I thought DJ [Giddens] made some great cuts. I was pleased with getting Joe Jackson a few carries, and then [it was] awesome to get La’James White the touchdown because Jimmy deserves it. He’s worked hard for a number of years, and it was good to see him.”

“Terrific running back [Makhi Hughes], it starts with him. I think he was freshman of the year, and he’s an all-conference kid coming back. They’re really good up front, and they’re trying to get him touches. He’s an extremely talented, downhill guy.

A young quarterback [Darian Mensah] that had a lot of success in the first week. They have really good skill kids outside.

They have so much experience up front in the offensive line. And with that running back. Obviously, that’s the first thing we have to do, is try to control – you’re not going to shut down the run game, you got to try and control it a little bit.”

“Well, the biggest thing, we didn’t convert on fourth-down. If I call, we missed out on a couple of fourth and shorts. That was the big thing. I think the biggest thing that that crew did, now it’s a different football team, theirs and ours, is they tackled so well.”

“I don’t think so. Maybe, had it been the same staff with Coach [Willie] Fritz, potentially. And I couldn’t tell you how many guys they still have on that team. I know there’s a handful we have, a handful that played in that game, and a lot of guys that were a part of that team that probably remember the loss. I know guys like [Brendan] Mott and Austin [Moore], guys that played a ton, those guys probably remember a lot more.

But no, you can’t think of it as that. We’re getting an opportunity to go on the road. I think it’s important for this group to go on the road because we’re going to have to win some games on the road.”

“It’s all week, actually. You don’t want to get up and say “here’s what we got to on Saturday morning.” It’s the hydration all week. It’s recovery, it’s taking care of your body. It’s nutrition, it’s sleep. We’ll do some specific things with our athletic training staff and our nutrition staff and strength staff as the week continues to progress, but it’s individual accountability. Guys got to take care of their bodies.”

“I think some of it was the looks we were seeing. He had a couple of times where he pulled the football and ran that was a designed give, but they close so fast on the running back that he pulled it and was able to make a big play. The designed runs are a lot less right now than in the past seasons. Twofold on that, one it’s a long season, as well as we feel we’re doing some better things in the throw game, and have some things that we probably didn’t get a chance to get to or didn’t use this first week that we’re excited about. … We’re still a little bit of a work in progress in the pass game, but I know we’re working on it every day and getting better.”

“We wanted to get both Sterling [Lockett] and Dylan [Edwards] back there, and we had Jacob Parrish back there as well because we had Phillip Brooks here for a long time, ever since I was here, returning punts. So, all those guys had done it in practice, and we wanted to give everybody an opportunity because we just thought the chance of having your one and only punt returner all year long maybe isn’t the best. So, we want to make sure to give all those kids an opportunity.

Jacob probably will do it a little bit more when it’s punt safe or in our territory. And then, Dylan and Sterling catch the ball really well and we want to give both an opportunity.”

“Once we got to that situation, and I can’t remember when we put Jacob in, early in the fourth quarter, I communicated with Coach [Matt] Wells that we’d go with Jacob next for a number of reasons. Maybe because he’s been here a little bit longer because it’s still a dead heat, but we were hoping to get another possession so we could get [Ta’Quan Roberson] one as well.

Both are still battling on a daily basis, but saw some good things out of both guys and both needed to get their feet wet and play a game of college football here at K-State.

“We pulled Austin Moore precautionary at halftime. He’d been dealing with something, and was feeling good, but we pulled him so we could use Rex Van Whye a little more. Rex needed those reps.

Asa just wasn’t ready to play with something he has been dealing with, and we’ll see how practice goes this week, but we’re more optimistic this week than we were last week.”

“I was really impressed with Sam Hecht. I think he’s the one that kind of goes unheralded when you of think of he’s a quiet kid anyway, but he’s playing a really critical position for us from a communication standpoint, from a call and ID stuff, to snaps.

Operationally, we were really good on Saturday. We didn’t have any poor snaps. We had really good timing on some of our jet sweep series. We were great with the play clock, with our quarterbacks and our centers.

And I thought [Michael Capria] did a great job. Capria came in and got 13 snaps and did a really good job. But Sam’s probably the one that jumps out at me that I was really impressed with.”

“They’re sound for starters. They’ve always played really good defense. Got a lot of respect for them. They play hard, they know their scheme, and they know where their strengths are, and some of the things where they’ve got to be able to shore up sine things just like every other defense. Every defense knows you, maybe not a true weakness, but an area that is susceptible.

I don’t know how much, it looks very similar, but it’s one game. I’m sure there’s some other tweaks and other things that they’re doing defensive that they haven’t shown yet because they didn’t need to last week. Similar to us, we got a lot of things that we haven’t shown yet. I think that’s part of the chess match of early season football of what are you going to show in the first week, based on your opponent, based on the score, what ca you hold back? I think they’re probably in the same reign as we are, as far as we didn’t show everything, they didn’t.

It still comes down to, do you get off blocks and do you tackle? Those things they did last week for sure, and they always did it at Troy.”

“He’s come a long way from spring when we moved him there, and he was really learning how to play the position. Put his heart into it, and said this is his best way to make a contribution. Put on a little bit of weight, got a little bit stronger in the summer, and really worked, continued to work on his pass rush skills.

We don’t want him to be a third-down specialist. That’s his best role, but we don’t want that. We’re fortunate with the amount of defensive ends that we do have that we can rotate a little bit by down and distance with the guys we have now. Obviously, we have to make sure that Tobi’s ready to play every down because tempo will change that, and he’s getting better and better at playing the run and understanding it. I’ve been really pleased with his progress since we moved him last winter.

“I think that was his first start, and I thought he threw the ball really well. I thought he had control and command of what he saw pre-snap. I think that’s the biggest thing for a young quarterback. It’s something that we work on with Avery and Jacob, is what they see pre snap. Is it true in what you see post snap? And he looked to have a really good command of what they were doing.”

“I think we’re close to 80, somewhere in there. We’ve got everybody in the backup offensive line that we wanted to get in the game. We got all the running backs that we wanted. We wish we’d have gotten [Evan] Cantu in there, but we got all those running backs in. We got a number of wide receivers, and Andre Davis, who’s missed some time, and Andrew is going to be a really good football player for us, he just missed some time. To get him in there.

To get a lot of those kids at linebacker from Gavin Meyers to Zach Wittenburg, Tyson Struber. Getting some of those younger kids that are still learning the system, I think was important. So, it was good.”