He sounds like a level head guy and not too cocky. CFN: Did the players get into the whole LSU-USC national title stuff last year? ML: To be honest, not really. Coach Carroll does a great job of schooling us on stuff like that. No one tells us what to say and what not to say, but he makes us understand that there are certain things we can control and other things we can't. Obviously the BCS and not going to the Sugar Bowl was nothing we could control. Beating Oregon State late last year, going to the Rose Bowl and beating Michigan were things we could handle. We were national champions and I think a lot of people think that too. No disrespect to LSU, they had a great season and deserved to be in the Sugar Bowl as well. I have no hard feelings about how things turned out. Our goal is to get to the Rose Bowl and we did that. CFN: You've seen LSU play. How would you have handled the blitzing style of defense they'd throw at you? ML: I think the Pac 10 doesn't get a lot of recognition for how good the defenses are and I did see some good blitzing teams last year. Washington State was a really good defense. Cal had a good defense. I think the thing about LSU is that they looked really fast. We wouldn't change for them, we would've used our speed to play our game. We're fast too. CFN: The Pac 10 is tough but it's not the SEC. You guys should theoretically beat everyone by a few scores. Do you guys take a cocky attitude that you should be winning and winning big or is that just being dangerous? ML: You kind of want to have confidence that you know you can win, but you have to take it one game at time. Cal was a perfect example last year. It's not like we overlooked them, but we were flat and we didn't take advantage when we had chances to win. We have to play hard every week. There are some Pac 10 teams still trying to find their way up from the bottom, but there are three to five teams that can step up and beat us. http://www.collegefootballnews.com/2004/QA/MattLeinart.htm
Dude's living in La La land. If he thought Wazzu and Cal would have prepared him for LSU's D, he was in for a lot of pain.
" Our goal is to get to the Rose Bowl and we did that." I wonder if that is the goal this year? Hmmmmmmm
LALA land is where he would have been by the end of the game if they would have qualified for the BCS National Championship game held in the Sugar Bowl. :champs:
True, but Lienert did face the #2 D in the SEC / #8 D nationally when he saw Auburn. No doubt LSU's D was better, but Auburn's D was no slouch..... now the offense might be a different story.
yes, but the difference between auburn's d and LSU's d in points per game was a full touchdown.. thats a HUGE difference.. people just dont realize how dominate LSU was. 10.8 points a game! thats friggin nuts! heh
Washington State finished 3rd in the Pac-10 with 227 yards per game Pass Defense wise.....good for 3rd to last in the SEC. Cal was 20 yards worse....at 250+
USC gave up over 500 yards of offense to Oregon State.... 4 teams in the SEC would beat USC 8 out of 10 times. UGA, UT, Florida, LSU. And had Auburn played the way they did in the middle of the season they would have beaten USC 8 out of 10.
I agree that LSU and UGA would probaby beat them, but not UT or Fordia. I mean mabe Flordia, but i wouldn't say they would win 8 out of 10. mabe 5 out of 10. I would bet money that UTwould not have beaten them last year. UT was not very good last year in my opinion, at least not good enough to beat USC.
