Six things of note said by Georgia Tech (4-4, 3-3 ACC) coach Paul Johnson on Tuesday following last week’s 40-36 loss at Virginia and ahead of Saturday’s game against Virginia Tech (7-2, 3-2) at Bobby Dodd Stadium:
On the loss at Virginia:
“I’m really disappointed in last week’s game. Thought we had a lot of opportunities to win the game. The other team made plays in the end when they needed to make plays.
“We can play better than that and it’s our jobs to make sure we do.
“Virginia Tech is a huge challenge. Historically, a really good program. They are good this year. They have reall ygood players. Coming here 7-2 and ranked. It’s a game we need to win.
“Hopefully we will play better.
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On areas of improvement:
“Everybody has to do their part. And you adjust accordingly.
“I’m frustrated. I’m sure they are frustrated. It’s an even match.
“Go out to practice and hopefully have a good plan.
“I came in early this morning. we had a really good plan last week. There’s no reason we shouldn’t have done better than what we did.”
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“Every game is different. We’ve lost to two teams that will probably be ranked in the top 6. The last game we lost was disappointing. The first game we lost was really disappointing.
Woulda/shoulda/coulda and nobody cares, but you can make the case that should be 7-1 and ranked. But we didn’t.”
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“We’ve been ahead in three of the four losses with less than two minutes remaining and found ways to not get it done.”
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On if playing at home will help:
“I don’t know if we’ve played any better at home. We played pretty good at Miami. Clemson beat us. I can’t make any scenario where we would have won that game. They beat us.
“We had every chance to win that Miami game. A lot closer than anyone else has played them. That game on Saturday, Lord knows we had a chance to win that one.”
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On maintaining accountability:
“I would be doing them a disservice if I didn’t voice my displeasure when things aren’t well. I will call it out when it’s bad. If you can’t take that, then you probably aren’t going to make it.
“That’s life isn’t it? if you don’t learn to deal with a little bit of adversity you won’t make it far.”
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On Virginia Tech:
“The thing that’s impressive to me as anything is there’s very fewer things that go uncontested. Even the short passes or whatever, even on zone coverage…they don’t give you anything. They are in your face right from the start and going full bore. They do it against teams that throw it 60 times. Every once in a while they will get hit with big plays, but they also create a bunch of big plays.
“Miami hit them for some big plays, but they also picked them off three times.
“They give as good as they get.”
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On Georgia Tech’s defense:
“We struggle with tackles for loss, struggle with sacks, struggle with negative plays and struggle with turnovers.
“Up until last week we were better on giving up big plays.
“It’s hard this day and age on defense if you don’t get negative plays and sacks.”
