Jim Tressel Quotations | Page 2

His skills have not diminished, that's for sure. There have been some times I thought maybe we could've gotten him the ball, but it's easy from where I sit. I think Ted is really coming along and I think he's going to be a great one.

We have a little different world, but preparation is critical, especially when you're not as efficient as you want to me. To give a player or team the chance to be successful, it really begins with preparation.

We've made a decision to have Troy get the bulk of the work and probably 75 to 80 percent of the reps in practice with preparation being the key word there...We think the best decision is for Troy to be the quarterback and get the bulk of the work.

We certainly appreciate what those young men and women are doing for our country.

I thought that was the way it was supposed to be. You really become a part of the community, part of the institution. Joe Paterno is not just a part of Penn State, but a part of NCAA football.

I thought Troy did some real good things today. We'll go back and watch the film and I'm sure there will be lots of things that we say we need to do a little bit better, and maybe a ball or two we'd like to take a little off of or maybe not make that throw. But I think every time you're out there making decisions, you learn a little bit more, and I thought Troy progressed.

I think we got a lot accomplished. I think we know more about what the capabilities are of the guys we have and we know even more vividly how far we have to go at some positions as opposed to watching the films of last fall.

I think we learned some things about ourselves today. We saw some good things and we saw some things we need to work on. We didn't play a lot of our veterans because we know what they can do. It was nice to see some of our younger players step up and make plays. I thought we really played hard, but that didn't surprise me. Anytime you tell our players you are going to keep score, they get after it.

Dick LeBeau is the father of the zone blitz, and that's what we are. So everything he's asked to do there, he will have done a million times. That's better than somebody saying, 'Let me take him,' and then be in the wrong system. He's in the perfect system.

What I like about this group is that they all feel they can come in and make an impact. They know they've got to get caught up in the system and move ahead with their strength and speed and knowledge. But this class is spread so evenly in all areas that they all feel they will have that opportunity to come in and compete.