Eddie George Monday Press Conference Transcript (Louisville)

Eddie George Press Conference 
Sept. 15, 2025
Bowling Green, Ohio 

Opening Statement:
Coach George: I feel good about where we are as a team. I think we are growing and going in the right direction but still becoming one unit. In realizing what our strengths and weaknesses are, we're getting better week to week. I did see some growth from us in terms of how we handled adversity last week. When you look at the tape, on the field, real-time, you're like, man, we got a lot to work on. Then you say, man, we're really close.

So, we just got to continue to harp on the little thing. All the things that we're doing offensively, defensively starting to show up. We just got to chop wood and carry water, you know those old cliches that you hate to use, but it's so tried and true. You just got to stay with it, believe in it.
Continue to work hard, not give teams opportunities, not help them in terms of our penalties. So that was a big thing of emphasis, and those things can be corrected.

This week is going to be Louisville. It is a great opportunity, a great challenge for us to go on the road in an awesome environment against a high-quality opponent. You look on this tape, you look at the roster this team is built to compete for a championship in their conference and possibly be a playoff team the way that they look.

On the depth chart, it really speaks to you that they got some dudes on both sides of the football. They do some great things. Holistically, they're well coached, they play aggressive and they're battle tested. That's what jumps off to me is that you look back at last year, certainly the teams they played, who they beaten last year to this season, they're a battle tested group, and they get after you. So, it's going to be an awesome experience, and an awesome opportunity for us to go out and compete against them and come away with a victory.

Question: What impresses you most about Isaac Brown on tape?
Coach George: Oh man, just that. You know you give him a seam. Listen, like Gail Sayers used to say all he needs is 16 inches of daylight. All he needs 16 inches and he's explosive, he can make you pay. So, it's going to be important for us to corral him. Everything starts with the running back, Isaac Brown. He's just a sophomore, but he might have a room at the Heisman house one day. That's the way it looks on tape. He's a phenomenal back. Doesn't get discouraged when the game isn't necessarily going his way through four quarters.

Look at GMU. They bottled them up until he had that one explosive and then everything else just went from there. Again, you've got to have gap integrity, he puts pressure on you to be right almost every single time. The moment that you're wrong, it’s hell to pay. So, you've got to be real disciplined in terms of your gaps and making sure you get him down.”

Question: What do you think of all the family connections within the program?
Coach George: It's a family affair. I don't know if it was intentional, but that's what it is. It's awesome that I can coach my son, and the AD has a son on the team, and Jacob Harris's father who's played here is behind him. It’s awesome to see the brothers, Rico and RJ Garcia, also playing with each other. It’s a dream come true for me to coach my son throughout his entire college career, watching him grow each and every year as a man and as a player. This is awesome, man. So, I'm glad to be a part of this.

Question: Is it difficult to distinguish between being a coach and a father with Eriq?
Coach George: No, not difficult at all. How I coach and how I father are similar. I try not to talk about ball when we go home, but football is a part of our lives and ever since he was a baby, he had a football in his hand, much like I had. We always talk about the game of football, back then it was Ohio State, or the Titans, or going to games, playing the video games, we've always talked football, both of my sons. So, it's deep in our blood. I tell him I'm proud of him, that he's good enough, he can do all things if he just believes in himself and his God-given abilities.

I challenge him to be better off the field as well. When I see opportunities to coach him and father him and give him advice, I'm gonna do just that. You know, I don't bite my tongue at all. So, it's all the same thing.

Questions: What’s your philosophy on penalties, especially coming from last week?
Coach George: Well, nine of those penalties were pre-snap and that's stuff that we can control. Staying on-sides, making sure that you know we have the right personnel group in. When you look at the end game, yeah, there might be some holding issues we have to resolve, but we, we preach that every day. We talk about attacking with the breastplate target, thumbs up, tight elbows and that almost ensures you're not going to get a holding penalty. So, the proper technique is taught every day that we're here. So, we didn't see necessarily see a lot of that, but the jumping offsides was unusual.
Or for the offensive line unit to have that many during the course of the game because we haven't done it in practice, we haven't done it all year. It was something different I guess about the atmosphere could have been the excitement of homecoming a little antsy. But those are drive killers, and we we've seen enough of that.

We get the ball, we're moving the ball methodically down the field, getting into scoring position and then we jump offsides and then we have to set up for a field goal. Then we have to jump start the offense yet again and we lost a rhythm because of way too many situations where we're first and 15 or second and 15 or second and 18 because of penalties and those are tough to overcome. We were able to overcome some of those things, but you're generating a lot of energy, just getting the chains moving to stay ahead of the chains.

So, we certainly cannot do that this week against this unit because they thrive off of your mistakes. Last year Louisville had 34 sacks. This year through two games, second in the country, 10 sacks, two games. This unit is experienced, they're very aggressive and we cannot help them in that situation. So, we're going to have to be very efficient offensively first to second down. That has to be corrected.”

Question: Are you surprised to be having to discuss penalties with the offensive line, considering their leadership?
Coach George: It happens, I think when you have a new quarterback who's still finding his rhythm with the offensive line. Some new nomenclature and terminologies that's being used, that could happen. They're very critical of themselves, I know after the victory, I noticed that some of the old linemen were not particularly pleased with their performance and the amount of penalties that we have. They hold themselves to a high standard and that's good. You can have a victory and feel like, hey, you know we won, but we're not satisfied, we left a lot of opportunities out on the football field and with that unit to take that accountability. I love it. So, I'm hoping that they can put it together this week and have a sound week of practice. Be clean and go out there and put our best foot forward.

Question: On the defensive line you were able to generate pressure last week, do you think there will be opportunities for that next week?
Coach George: There could be some opportunities there. JMUs defensive front was very aggressive.
I don’t know their roster in terms of how experienced they are, but they certainly look the part. They did have some success against Louisville.

Louisville has two weeks to prepare for us. I'm pretty sure they're going to look at the tape and figure it out. They’re offensive line is very athletic. They come off the ball with really good intentions. They're well coached up front. Again, it's going to be a great opportunity for our boys to sharpen iron against a really good unit and we want to go out there and finish, and be aggressive, and play our type of ball. We're going down there to try to win.

Question: Since the quarterback was the leading rusher against Louisville for JMU, is that something you feel comfortable going to?
Coach George: It can be. You saw a little bit of that. It was off schedule. It wasn't a designed run. I think we have to be mindful of how we use Drew in that capacity. He's not necessarily built to run the football multiple times in volume. I think it has to be a situation where it's strategic and intentional, we can't allow him to take too many hits on his frame. So that could be a part of it. You could see a package where we have, Lucian in to take those opportunities, but we'll have to evaluate that too.

Question: Are you working on the secondary this week? Last week there were a few busted plays.
Coach George: We've been working on it the last two weeks, we saw them against Cincinnati and that's experience. It’s stuff we've done day one install.

It’s about your focus. It's about being mindful, knowing the situation, knowing the plan, executing that plan at a high level. There were some miscommunications yet again with the back end and that's constantly going to be talked about and really emphasized throughout the course of this week and really for the rest of the season, because this unit is still relatively young on the back end. We're still trying to grow and develop each other week.

Question: Any update on Dorian Pringle’s injury status?
Coach George: Not yet. I haven’t gotten that report yet.

Question: What have you seen from Jeff’s coaching career and his rise in coaching? How many times have you been to Louisville and how’s your experience there?
Coach George: Wow. Well, first off, Jeff's had a phenomenal career. Really impressed with his body of work through the years, certainly now at Louisville. Not surprised that he's got these guys playing at a high level.
Clearly, he's a great offensive mind coach, but it’s all three phases. He’s well thought out. He covers a lot of all the fine details.

You look for a team, you look at how aggressive they are, how they play. How disciplined they are, they're fast, they're physical. So, I'm not surprised at all by the success he's having as a head coach. I've admired his career, certainly when I was an analyst there.

So, over the years, I have come to Louisville a few times. In fact, Louisville was recruiting me. When Howard Stellenberger was the head coach there and they wanted me to play linebacker. So that kind of ended that conversation quick. But a good friend of mine, Roman Oben, who went to Fork Union, was at Louisville, played at Louisville too.

So, I'm very familiar with the university. When I've made my trips up to Columbus from Nashville, I'll drive through Louisville, pass by the stadium and little did I know that I'll be coaching there coming up this week. Very familiar with the university, where they've grown, how the university has grown over the years in terms of going to the ACC and just the amount of investment that's been made into their program has been phenomenal. It's really awesome to see how sustainable it's been in terms of the competitive nature that you guys have built over the years.

Then when you think about Louisville, you think about just basketball, for some people, but they have over the years have become a true powerhouse in football that's sustainable. So, kudos to the leadership and vision of the constituents down at Louisville.

Question: Jackson Kleather was MAC special teams player of the week, thoughts?
Coach George: Jackson is having a great year or so far. Still, a long season to go. I think he understands that. It goes back to his preparation, his camp. He had a really strong camp this summer. He stayed healthy and locked in. You could see him grow from practice to practice and it just carried over into the season.

His confidence is high. Even when he didn't make one against Cincinnati, he never wavered.

Alex Bayer has done a phenomenal job of really keeping his count right during the course of the week. Making sure he stays in rhythm with his routine and being mindful of the surface that we're kicking off of at certain times to make sure he's comfortable. So, he's going to be needed throughout the course of this year because there'll might be some games where it comes down to that kick and I feel really good about really our entire special teams unit, all four core from punt return to kickoff return to our coverage teams to our punter.

Henderson’s also been phenomenal flipping the field and putting our defense in good position by having them down inside their five-yard line. We're really starting to play complementary football but there's still a lot of a lot of games to be played.

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