Comments from Georgia Tech coach Geoff Collins following the team’s spring game on Friday evening at Bobby Dodd Stadium.
Opening statement:
“Great night, great environment. Really proud of our fan base that came out to support us. These young men have worked so hard this offseason embracing everything that we’ve implemented as a culture, competing at everything, culture built on effort. All the things that we preach, it was good to see them rewarded with an unbelievable attendance. i think the lower bowl was almost completely full and I don’t know how many it holds, but that’s pretty exciting and those young men that are in that locker room deserve it. Great environment.”
On players being loose:
“The big thing for me, everything that we do in our program is we want to attack success. I don’t want there to be any fear in this program, so when they make a mistake, they know we care about them, we love them we’re going to coach them through the mistake, but we want them to take chances and go out there to make plays. With that, I want them to have fun. We made a big deal there, tonight’s a spring game, there were zero excessive celebration penalties on purpose because I want them to enjoy the moment. Obviously, when we’re in big-time ACC games, we’re going to be composed, but just the having-fun element, I wanted our fan base to feel the energy, the excitement that these young men do every single day.”
On development of the passing game:
“The big thing is seeing the coverages and making some good throws, but my favorite thing about this receiving corps and our quarterback-receiver relationships is our quarterbacks have faith. We play tight coverage across the board. I mean every single coverage, every single throw we contest, but the 50/50 balls, our quarterbacks have faith in delivering it to our receivers and you’ve seen it day in and day out throughout the spring – our receivers going up and making those plays and then you see it again tonight.”
On helping the defense:
“There was one turn of events late in the second quarter, the Gold team had gotten up i think by 2 ½ scores and I saw a little bit of look on the defense, on the White defense, that they were starting to fracture a little bit.
So I don’t know if anybody noticed, I called David Curry and I called Juanyeh Thomas out to the (midfield) logo and just talked them through (the idea that) all that matters is the next play. All that matters is the next series.
So they regrouped, went back, got a stop, went and scored. Then they got the ball coming out at halftime and in a matter of two series, brought the ball back to where it should be, so just, that was a very teachable moment for our guys. Every play matters, the next play matters.”
On a grade for the spring:
“I don’t know if I can give it a grade. All I can say is that I’ve truly grown to love and respect the guys on this team. They are amazing young men. Just, the transition is never easy but the way that they’ve embraced everything and just getting to know them, and we go through some challenging workouts – you guys have come out to practice – there’s a lot of things going on at practice. They embrace the challenges, they attack it, they try to get better every single day. I’m just really proud of them, who they are as men, who they are as teammates.”
