Jan. 2, 2008

Mobile, Alabama - The two coaches, Tulsa's Todd Graham and Bowling Green State's Gregg Brandon, met with the media on Tuesday night. Here's some comments about the GMAC match-up.

Tulsa's Todd Graham:

About the Game:

The thing that's going to come down to winning this game is the defense. I think the key in this game will be takeaways. Possessions will be really, really important. Anytime you've had a month off, it's curious to see how well you're going to play. It seems like we haven't played in a really long time, it's a lot like you're first game of the year, so hopefully you don't put the ball in jeopardy and have penalties. I think this game will come down to one thing - takeaways - if we take care of the ball, al year long, we've been able to score. If we take care of the ball I have great confidence that we're going to score.

About Bowling Green's Offense . . .

Bowling Green's offense is really good, They score 32 points a game. They're very elusive and very dynamic in their approach. They're very multiple formation-wise. They really kind of mirror us a little bit. I really like what Coach Brandon does. We're going to have to play good defense. You're going to have to stop somebody to win this game.

BGSU's Gregg Brandon:

About Tulsa . . .

Tulsa is a very explosive offensive football team, an athletic defense and well-coached. Anyone that can win nine games is doing something right. They do a nice job there.

About Tulsa Quarterback Paul Smith . . .

Paul Smith is a great player. You can see his athleticism and his ability to throw the football, but some of the things you don't see, that I see from coaching for so long are the intangibles - you can see his leadership the way he manages his team and his offense, his whole demeanor. I've been reading up on him and he's a class kid. He's a real good citizen in the community. He's a top-notch kid.

Bowling Green has great tradition in football. The last five years we've had the best overall record in the conference. In the 1980s Bowling Green was really good with quarterback Brian McLure who threw for over 10,000 yards, in the 90's they won a couple championships under Coach Blackney. We've been fortunate to reach three bowl games in the last five years. There was a lot of tradition at Bowling Green. Most of our roster is made up of Ohio kids, probably 70-percent. Ohio is a great football playing state. We recruit primarily in the Midwest, although we drop down into the south in Georgia and Florida. We have about a dozen kids from that part of the country, but most of our kids are from within six hours of Bowling Green. We're about an hour south of Detroit, three hours from Chicago, two hours to Cleveland, two hours to Columbus, three hours to Cincinnati, three hours to Pittsburgh. We're right in the hotbed of high school football. It's a great place.

About BGSU's Offense . . .

We've been fortunate. Our offensive line did a great job this season. We have three fifth-year senior starters in that line. The skill guys all took some turns at various times this year to help us. Tyler Sheehan, our quarterback, did a nice job running the offense. The last half of the season we've had the ability to run the ball better. Early on, we threw the ball extremely well, and then mid-way through we got into a little funk and lost a couple games, but we bounced back and finished strong. We have a type of offense that is always going to be attacking, trying to get points.

About the two high-powered offenses . . .

Tulsa's offense scores more points and make more yards than we have. I think in a game like this it's going to be who's going to be the best for three hours, it what it will amount to. So, anything that you did in the three months prior that got you here, hopefully you can play at that level in a bowl game. But anything can happen with college kids.