Tommy Bowden Press Conference Quotes

Oct. 24, 2006

On the Virginia Tech special teams: “In the last 10 to 12 years, they’ve been known as the most productive punt blocking and field-goal blocking team in the country. They give tremendous effort and they get results. I think it still is substantial that they are the top team that gets results in that area.”

On the Virginia Tech defense: “They play a lot more zone than Georgia Tech. These are two completely different schemes. The packages are completely different. I don’t think teams will commit nine (to the defensive front), because if James Davis. I think they might find different ways to commit eight, and this is an excellent team (Virginia Tech) to do this because they’ve always been an eight-man front. If we’re playing any team that has the ability to give a multiple eight man front looks, I think this is the team to do it.”

On preparation during a short week: “You’ve definitely got to limit what you do. We’re not only cutting practice times, but you are cutting days as well. You do go into the game with a smaller package. That’s not always so bad, because sometimes you can execute a small number of things and sometimes you have the tendency with more preparation time to put more things in.”

On going back to Blacksburg: “The crowd is really loud. They generate a lot of noise from what I remember. (Clemson played there in Bowden’s first year, 1999) They play a lot of Thursday night games, and their fans are use to it.”

On throwing the football: “Against Boston College, we had trouble running and we threw for 340 yards. We threw for 215 yards against Wake Forest and 194 yards against Florida State. We have shown the ability to throw when we have to, but we prefer to run. I am not concerned about Will Proctor.”

On the success of James Davis and C.J. Spiller: “I think you’re always hoping (for success). With James Davis’ productivity last year, you have it in the back of your mind (that he will have a great season). You never know about true freshmen coming in and being productive, so we surely did not expect this type of productivity out of C.J. Spiller. I did with James (Davis), because of his season last year.”

On the performance of backup offensive lineman Chris McDuffie: “We’re real pleased with Chris McDuffie. He’s a talented player. He played defense when he first came hear, so he runs pretty good. He’s really produced well, which means he’s been paying attention (in practice). To go in there and play that many snaps against that pressure, he played well. I talk to our players about being one injury away from a starter, and in essence every second-team guy is that, and thank goodness he took it to heart and practiced well and played well.”