"I don't know how we take anyone lightly" Clawson Presser

Today was Coach Clawson's Wednesday presser, and except for the writer who tried to get him going about playing on Thursday and if Thursday was Saturday......it was interesting enough.

He pointed out--as I will in my 25 questions preview tomorrow--that Miami is playing as well as they have all season.  They have done to Dysert and ditched the run, and they moved the ball quite a bit against a tough Temple defense.  He also noted their very tough OOC sked, and on defense said they do "a lot of different things."

Is he partly just doing the whole coach thing?  Partly.  But, Miami is improving and is not the team that didn't score for 10 quarters or so earlier in the year.

There was a lot of talk about the rivalry and Miami being one of BG's 2 big rivals.  He noted (with pretty good perception for a new guy) that Miami was the big rival for the Perry era teams and after that it was more likely to be Toledo.  Really, until the Ealey era, UT was not consistently good enough to make a real rivalry.

He complimented Miami's coaches, saying that it is relatively easy to coach when things are going well and much harder to coach when things are going badly.  Miami's coaches kept their players in the game and committed and that is a good thing.

Miami is now playing with confidence, and he was asked if BG was.  Coach said, on two different occasions, something like this:

"I don't know how we take anyone lightly.  For all our resiliency, I'd love to see us start fast and stay in front with four good quarters, but I haven't seen that out of us."

On the Freddie:Heisman question, he said all the right things:  He deserves consideration, especially with no clear cut guy.  He noted that it isn't just the reception number, but the fact that many of his catches have been game-changing receptions.

He isn't watching the reception record and won't do anything outside the flow to make it happen.  If Freddie makes it within the flow of the offense, all the better.

He said halftime at Buffalo was his most "animated" locker room of the season, but that generally all that stuff is for the movies.

Finally, even though Veteran's Day is a holiday, coach plans to work.  He may put in for overtime.