Sept. 21, 2004

Maryland head coach Ralph Friedgen:

Opening remarks and reflecting on the West Virginia game:
"We had a good practice last night, the kids worked hard. Reflecting on the game vs. West Virginia, I thought we played extremely hard as a team. We made some errors but I was proud of the way our kids hung in there and kept fighting. These are things that the only way you can experience them is to be in that environment and deal with it. As I told my team last night, `We should be better for that experience. If we haven't gotten better than that loss was in vain'. To me, we need to grow from it."

"They know I don't take losing very well, but I told them I was proud of the way they played. As long as they play hard like that ... if we lose the game, we lose the game. We'll move on and get better. Can we play better? Yeah. Can we play harder? I don't think so."

On Duke:
"Duke is 0-3 but very well-coached. They have a new offensive coordinator, Marty Galbraith. We'll anticipate a lot of shifting and movement and some trick plays for us. On defense, they have co-coordinators. We've got to continue to improve our kickoff coverage and we've got to be ready for fakes against Duke."

"We anticipate having everyone ready for this game. We had a few kids nicked up in the West Virginia game, but I anticipate everyone practicing before the end of the week. When the Duke game is finished, I want to be 3-1 not 2-2."

On quarterback Joel Statham:
"He had three interceptions in the first half and, I might add, they weren't all his fault. In the second half, he came back and gave us a lead and a chance to win the football game. I do appreciate and enjoy his perseverance. He's growing and he'll get better. Right now he needs to focus on getting better."

"One of the things we had trouble dealing with was communication. Crowd noise was very loud at West Virginia even though we practiced that. Last night I turned it up even louder, and he seemed to do a better job in our two-minute drill of handling that yesterday."

On back-up quarterback and true freshman Jordan Steffy:
"We'd like to get Jordan more experience. I'd kind of like him to improve his practice. Yesterday he practiced much better and if he continues to grow in practice then he can look forward to seeing more time in games."

On evaluating Maryland's youth and depth:
"I guess I'll feel better when we stop turning the ball over. That can't continue if we want a chance to win. One of the things that I stress is playing without error. One of the areas we have gotten better at is the penalties. We had five penalties this week and the offense didn't have any. So if we take the turnovers away, you'd see a big difference."

On Conrad Bolston:
"Conrad Bolston had probably the best game of his career [against West Virginia]. He had a good game against Temple and we saw him improving but he played very, very well against West Virginia. If he can come on and play at a high level, it would help our football team tremendously. Conrad's been a guy who has played in spurts. But he played 71 plays Saturday and it was tough in the trenches Saturday. Not for the faint of heart and he played an excellent football game."

On Domonique Foxworth's performance
"I've said it a number of times, if I had a son I'd want him to be like Domonique. We went with an all-out blitz on the last play vs. West Virginia. It was third and four, its no time to be conservative. I think Domonique outguessed himself. I think he was expecting a fade. He made a guess and he guessed wrong. That play didn't beat us."

"He's such a student of the game that I think he might have outcoached himself on that play. I have a tremendous level of comfort with Domonique. He can play for me anytime, any game and in any situation. I want him on my team."