Joe Tiller
12/3/2007
Opening statement …
“Certainly we were hoping to have an opportunity to play in the postseason, and it’s a great opportunity for our team to play another football game. Our team is anxious to play, and it will be a heck of a challenge. The idea to play in postseason, once again, is always valuable for your program and more so for the players than anyone else. It’s great to know that we are going to represent the Big Ten in one of the contracted Big Ten bowl arrangements.”
On Central Michigan’s improvement …
“I watched the MAC championship game with great interest with the thought that we might be playing one of these teams. Watching that game, I thought Central Michigan was a much improved team from the time we played them until their championship game. This will be challenge for our football team, but one we look forward to.”
On facing an opponent a second time during one season …
“You have to do a really good job of throwing out the gauntlet and challenging (the players) to make sure they’re ready to play their best game. I think if you play a team you’ve played in the regular season and if you happen to beat them during the regular season, they’re on a real mission when they play you a second time. As a result, you have a team that plays with a higher effort level than the one you saw the first time out. You have to fight fire with fire and get your guys going, and that’s a challenge. I think it’s a bigger challenge than some people realize.”
On cutting back prebowl practices …
“We’re going to make the adjustment and see where that takes us. It didn’t matter if we were going to play on the 26th or whenever, we were going to try a different approach. You can’t stay with the same approach forever. Our philosophy, for this season and every season, is we’re not going to stand still.”
