Sometimes as a coach, you think it's better to lose a game and get bumped down a few pegs, but they didn't want to hear any of that. They stood by what they said. They stayed true to their word and, hopefully, they'll keep rolling along.

I told the kids that this is a four-lap race. If we would lose this game, I don't know if we'd have the energy and the gas to keep going. We have four games now to get where we're going.

They are very athletic kids who make it pretty easy to coach. But I didn't have any big kids for over 15 years, so I was overdue.

To be tested in a game-situation like this in front of 1,500 fans and their great student body, we hadn't seen anything like that. Sure, we needed it. Our players understood when you're under the gun, you have to find an extra gear and dig down and concentrate a little bit harder and we did that in the second half.

He bumped into me way too much during the game, so that is the third thing he's got to do, stay away from me, ... He gets kind of excited down there.

I didn't want to be the first coach to get a Gatorade bath and lose the game. Akron didn't go away. It wasn't as much mistakes by us as it was the way they played.