MOBILE, Ala. – South Alabama football head coach Kane Wommack, offensive coordinator Major Applewhite, defensive coordinator Corey Batoon, along with student-athletes Carter Bradley and Yam Banks met with the media Monday for the program's weekly press conference.
 
Below are highlights from the session.
 
Head Coach Kane Wommack
Opening Statement:
"We talked about this in postgame, but the Louisiana Tech game was a massive win for our team just in terms of our ability to respond after a touch loss and two straight road games. You worry about the effects of being on the road two weeks in a row, which were both really long road trips. I thought our guys did a tremendous job responding throughout the week. They played really physical.

"We came out of the gates and had returned the opening kickoff for a touchdown, but had a penalty called on that play. We were able to still go right down the field and score, and then came out with a [defensive] stop and returned a punt for a touchdown. They [Louisiana Tech] answered right back and I really thought they carried some of the momentum in the second quarter. Our guys responded at the end of the second quarter and then certainly in the second half. That was really good to see. You think about [that we had] a very similar situation last year. We lost to Louisiana in a close game a year ago and I felt we let the effects of that linger into our four-overtime loss to Texas State [the following week] and we did not execute very well. We got up, but we they answered back, we never responded. It was the total opposite for us this year. I thought that was a really good response for our team.

"On the flipside, we're looking forward to opening conference play. Louisiana has been the standard barer in our league. This is an opportunity for us to go to their place and do what we know we are capable of doing, and just continue to build consistency in our program. We'll have a great week of practice and then dune buggy over there on Friday and get ready to go on Saturday."
 
On the appeal process of the targeting call on Brock Higdon:
"I haven't gotten any word back on the targeting. We put in our request to the national office and they'll take a look at it. They will hopefully give us a quick answer back on it; I imagine we will hear something later this afternoon. I feel like we have a pretty good case for it [to be overturned]. When you look at the play, you can see that Brock isn't trying to go high at all. He's trying to go low on the quarterback and trying to bend the corner. As he deepens the corner, their offensive lineman shoves him. I think their lineman was trying to shove him passed the quarterback, but at that point, he shoved him right into the quarterback. Anytime you get shove in the back, your natural tendency is to dip your head a little bit. We'll see what their ruling is once they give us a response."
 
On what he thinks QB Carter Bradley meant by saying Saturday was a "weird game" in post-game:
"Typically, in a traditional game when the defense gets a stop, the offense is right back out. We had defensive touchdowns. We had a punt return for a touchdown, so our offense wasn't on the field for long periods of time, so that was a little bit different. We did some really good things in the run game where we rushed for 175 yards, call it 190-plus with the jet sweep, which was credited as a pass. That was great for Carter, but it really should count as a run. We had 12 explosive plays on offense, which is more than we've had in any game this season, but at the same time you look at the overall numbers and it was as much [production]. We've been averaging in the high 400's and had 500 [yards of offense] twice, so I think there's a few things that go into the dynamic of what you want to call a 'weird game', but ultimately, I thought we did the things we needed to do offensively, defensively and on special teams to have a really responsive win and a dominating performance in the second half."
 
On Louisiana:
"When you look at their team, you see that they've had two really touch road losses. I thought both those teams [Rice and ULM] did a good job with their quarterback run game; they were able to extend plays with those quarterbacks. Those two teams run a little bit different of an offensive system than we do, yet they were both able to establish a run game. I think you have to be able to establish a run game against Louisiana. You can't let them make you one-dimensional. From a situational executional standpoint, you have to do well on third down and in the red zone just like in any game. You look at their first two games compared to their last two games, teams were able to execute situationally against them. They scored in the red zone and took advantage of some of the mistakes that Louisiana made.
 
"From the other side of the ball, when you lose a guy like Levi Lewis, there's going to be something missing in terms of offensive production. Both their quarterbacks do good things and understand what their trying to get accomplished. They might be a little inconsistent in their execution, but I feel that's the thing they'll be focused on in terms of getting themselves better.
 
"They are back home this weekend and its their homecoming game. I would imagine that they'll have a great crowd. There are a lot of players on that team that know what it's supposed to look like, and obviously, the last to weeks is not what it's supposed to look like. I feel they are well aware of that, so I'd imagine that you're going to get a pretty good response from them on Saturday."
 
On if there is any kind of psychological hurdle for his team playing Louisiana:
"We dropped the ball last year against this team. You can say what you want. We were and still are a growing program, but we were in a tight game against a very good football team and we didn't execute in some critical situations. We felt like we dropped an opportunity and then let it affect us in the next opportunity. We've talked this season about being the storm rather than weathering the storm. That's a big piece of what we've talked about. I've shown them clips. It's amazing that the guys who weren't here a year ago and how well they, as well as all of us, understand what we have to do in this game in particular, the response that we want to have from a year ago, and then certainly what this means in the greater cog of the Sun Belt Conference."
 
Offensive Coordinator Major Applewhite
On what stood out in the film from the Louisiana Tech win:
"The explosives – we had 12 explosives and that was a positive. I didn't like the turnover on the pressure; we need to get the ball away and pick that pressure up. But 12 explosives are good. We were good on third down. In the red area, we had a drive we didn't want; I didn't like that we had to kick a field goal in the red area. But the big thing that stood out was just some of the penalties – the number of penalties. Drive-killers that put you in difficult situations, and in a game like that where special teams and defense scores, we're glad and we'll take that any day. You just get limited possessions. You usually have 14 to 16 a game, and it got cut down to 11 so you need to make them count. Some of those penalties put us off schedule."
 
On the message at halftime:
"The message to the offense at halftime was we're moving the ball, we found the enemy and the enemy is us. We need to stop getting penalties and let us be us. The guys were responsive and they take to their coaching and position coaches. We've had some success, we need to make sure we're handling it with humble hearts and just continuing to work and believe in our process."
 
On Louisiana's defense:
"There's a lot of zone defense and eyes on the ball. They're really good at taking the ball away. They have 12 takeaways through four games this year. They punch at the football and do a great job of going after the ball. Eastern Michigan, the second half got away; they had five turnovers in that half. Rice had three, but 12 takeaways is 12 takeaways and they're doing a great job of taking the ball away."
 
Defensive Coordinator Corey Batoon
On his takeaways from the game against Louisiana Tech:
"I thought the biggest thing was taking the things from practice and transferring them over to the games. They've shown up in practice, and we haven't capitalized on them in games. So, to see the players be able to finally finish was good to see. I couldn't tell you how many dropped opportunities we had in the first three games. To finally see the things that we've been doing in practice all the way back to spring, the negative plays and getting hits on the quarterback, things we've been doing all the time was good to see as well."
 
On how Louisiana compares to previous seasons:
"Schematics are very similar I think, obviously, when you've had a veteran guy at the quarterback position like they have with their guy for five years. I think the new guys that have come in have played well. They're just younger players, and I think that's the biggest thing. You see so much of their depth. They had tremendous depth a year ago, and a lot of their players have played meaningful snaps. You look at their roster, I mean, all these guys are guys that we saw last year, [Peter Leblanc], [Zy McDonald], the running back, the tight ends, some of these linemen have all played, but now they are thrust into a leadership role. I think that is what you are seeing happen on the offensive side of the ball. Still very talented players who have a very good understanding of their system and what they are being asked to do. It's a dangerous outfit."
 
On Louisiana's two quarterback system:
"It's difficult to prepare for. They both have their strengths. [Chandler Fields] is built very similar to Levi Lewis from a year ago. He's mobile, athletic, can throw off different angles and throws well on the move. I think Ben Wooldridge is more of a drop back passer who has good awareness. All of the guys do a great job of distributing the football to their playmakers. Michael Jefferson is a local kid from here, I think he's really picked up his game from a year ago. He looks a lot more at ease, you are starting to see his athleticism show. He has an extra gear that maybe you didn't notice in the past, but he's a good deep threat that we have to be aware of."
 
On using this game as a proving ground:
"We don't get caught up in those kinds of things. It's always been about us, our execution play in and play out, it's about doing the things in practice well enough and consistently enough so it shows up on Saturdays and then the results will take care of themselves. We say in here that every year is different, there's a totally different DNA. Their team is a different team, our team is a different team. So, it's about each play executing the way you need to."
 
On the performance and development of Yam Banks:
"Those are things that we've seen happen in practice, he makes those havoc plays. He's been disruptive, and it's just good to see it happen on Saturdays when it counts. I think his continued growth and confidence can be seen as the game develops. He plays with a little more of a swagger, whereas a year ago in his first year playing you could see he would get wide eyes. But, at the same time, he's put things on tape that he's going to have to correct. We can't be a big little team, where we make big plays and then give up big plays. I know he was disappointed in the two plays that he gave up, and he's going to work this week to be more consistent with his techniques and not taking so many chances."
 
Quarterback Carter Bradley
On why he thought Saturday was a weird game:
"Special teams was playing lights out, defense was playing lights out, in those games it's kind of weird to get a short field and get the offense rolling a little bit. I missed a couple of throws in the beginning where we could have got some things going but we didn't, and that was on me, just kind of ended up that way. But hey, I'll take a win any day like that over anything, it was just a weird one. But we've got this week and we are excited and ready to get this thing rolling."
 
On him not playing his best but still winning by 24:
"You can definitely take away some things and learn from any game and get better. It's always positive going into the next week and that's exactly what we're gonna do."
 
On how big the matchup is this week:
"It's another opportunity. It's another game that we get to go out and show who we are and the things we learned last week. The guys in the locker room, we're excited for another opportunity. It's the biggest one because it's the next one. So, we're gonna go into this one like it's another game and prepare like it's another game."
 
On bouncing back from the loss at UCLA:
"It's always about that bounce back. Guys in the locker room understood what we needed to do. We understood the message, we understood what we needed to do last week. I felt like me personally, I put us in a little hole, but we got another week and a new opportunity, so I'm excited and ready to get this thing going."
 
On nor getting too cocky about the performance:
"Last week, looking at it, having a little bit of adversity and knocking our game down, playing really successful those first three games, that's what I needed and what the room needed. It's excited to see where we can be and where we can go. It's just coming back to our base rules and knowing who we are, what this offense can do and just going out there and playing one play at a time."
 
Safety Yam Banks
On getting the takeaways in Saturday's game:
"It all starts in practice, with good scout team players. We've got a good competition in the scout team that we had the ability to take the ball away from those guys.
 
On his pick six:
"That was my first college career pick six. I knew he was probably going to chip me a little bit, so I knew I just had to keep my feet moving."
 
On how big Saturday's game is:
"It's a great opportunity facing these guys. We've got a lot on our plate right now, so we are ready to play."
 
On changing positions to Nickle:
"My skills fit pretty good. I was a corner when I first came in and Coach Wilson told me I was probably going to have to make the change and be a leader. I just listen to the coaches and trust the process and we made it work."
 
On the most challenging part of changing positions:
"Just being in the box a little more, tackling more, being more physical. I had to get that mindset. I don't have to guard anybody; I have to set an edge for our guys to come make tackles."
 
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