Tyrique Stevenson blog: I'll be healthy for UNC game, team will get back on track

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CB Tyrique Stevenson will have a weekly blog all season at CaneSport.com. In this edition, Stevenson talks about the Middle Tennessee game and its aftermath, including if he saw any signs of this coming, where the team goes from here and his own healthy off a groin strain.

CAN’T LET LOSS DEFINE US

After losing to Middle Tennessee this weekend, the message we got was don’t let this loss define us. It was a good game against a good opponent. We aren’t always going to come out on top, don’t let this game break us.

Basisically, we have to get back to work, we see what we need to fix, what we need to get on top of and we need to get back and just start going to work. There wasn’t any pity message, any pat on the back message trying to spare our feelings. It was just the truth. We had a lot stuff we need to work on and he (Mario Cristobal) said as coaches too, we all have a lot we need to work on.

Going into the week that’s what it was. I don’t think we had a day in practice where everybody was like `You know what, forget this,’ we just lost and everybody dragging heads. I didn’t see that any of that week.

It was just a normal week of practice after the Texas A&M game. Everybody came out and worked hard, maybe there was a little tiredness and soreness from playing a big opponent. It happens like that. But it was just a normal week of practice.

I literally did not see this coming. It was a shock for a lot of us. We came out and we practiced hard, we didn’t treat them lightly. We didn’t think we were going to come in and it would be easy. We didn’t think any of that. It was good practices. Even Coach Cristobal agreed with that and was like `I thought Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday were good practices for us, we were locked in, we were focused.’ And, you know, it didn’t show on Saturday. Just throughout the week I felt we were locked in, were focused and knew the game plan.

TRYING TO EXPLAIN THE LOSS

As for why this happened? I don’t even know. Everybody was moving one way or the other way, we weren’t moving as one. I feel like coaches and all, players, every position group had their flaws that game and it just happened to show at one of the worst times, which is Saturday.

I’ve watched the film of it. I just feel like they capitalized on the plays that were presented to them. That’s what it was. If we had capitalized on things it could have been a different game, or a couple of plays we could have prevented would have made it a different game. I just felt they came out and the opportunity that was presented them from our mistakes, they just capitalized on it. I felt they played a more clean game.

And for people that say we looked tired, I wouldn’t say we were tired. But that’s what it showed. Just mentally we were not as on edge as they were. It’s just from our standpoint a lackadaisical game, and we know we could have played way harder. I felt we were there physically, we were there emotionally, but mentally as far as no fans, delay of game with the rain, some players handle that different. I felt our mental part of the game wasn’t completely locked in, and it showed.

We have to be mentally locked in to the smaller details, the things that actually matter. Just going back to what coach Cristobal preached when he first got here – treat everything the same, nothing is too small, nothing is too big and how you do anything is how you do everything. We have to get back to that mindset and focusing on the little details that obviously lead up to the big details.

WHAT WENT ON IN THE SECONDARY

We knew coming in that their quarterback trusted his guys at receiver, that they were liable to throw the ball. They throw the ball at least 30-40 times a game, so we knew their quarterback had an arm to be able to make all those completions, complete the majority of the passes. He didn’t shock us but he definitely came out and played a good game.

It’s just simple mistakes, simple busts. We have those every game, but at the same time, this is a game that they found it and they capitalized off it. Every game we go into we have people who know what to do, know how to do it, know when to do it. Sometimes it happens as a football player you bust, kind of get a mental brain fart. It happened a couple of times and they just exposed it.

MY INJURY … AND YES, I’LL BE READY TO GO FOR UNC

I pulled my groin on that long run, the touchdown saving run. I don’t think I’ve had to open up and run like that in a while. So just me running like that I overstrained my groin. It was just a sharp pain that continued to hurt with every step and every time I lifted my leg. Me and the trainers decided it wasn’t best for me to go back out there and finish the game because we didn’t know how dangerous and how threatening it was to me and my career.

When I was chasing the receiver down on that 89-yard play, it started hitting toward the middle of it. As I’m running and I realized I had to switch my form, switched my form and I kind of felt it pull. I wasn’t too much thinking about it because my only thing was `Make sure you go grab him, you’re already running so make sure you grab him.’

I’ll definitely be fine for North Carolina, will probably be practicing by the end of this week, getting back in with my boys and try to figure out what we can all be better at.

LEADERS TRIED TO STEP UP

All of us were in there pretty much giving motivation to each other, making everybody understand we are not playing our best game, and it’s showing. And that the only people that are going to dig us out of this hole are us. Me and a couple of other people were very passionate about it and didn’t like the feeling. A couple of people came in after the game in the locker room, spoke how they felt, stuff like that, some were more deeper than other ones, but everyone got a sense of understanding that @@@@ just happened that wasn’t supposed to happen.

Players were saying how we just went out there and bull@@@@tted, and now the whole world knows and that @@@@ is on display forever. So pretty much that we have to take 10 steps back. We’d taken a step back, now we took 10 more. We have to go back to work, we have to go back to finding our purpose, go back to being greedy again pretty much.

COACH CRISTOBAL’S CONVERSATION WITH ME SUNDAY

I talked to coach Cristobal a little bit and it was really no answer. He asked me what happened with the team and I was like, `I have no answer, coach.’ There’s nothing much you can say, not much you can do. All you have to do is watch the film and you can see that they wanted it a little bit more than us, and you can tell by how they played and how they capitalized on the mistakes we made.

I talked with coach Cristobal on Sunday before a team meeting, he just ran into me. He just asked me, `What happened? What do you think happened?’ I said I don’t know, you just have to get back to the drawing board and see the holes that we’re missing and we just have to start plugging them in with the right players and the right mindset. He thought I had an answer, but the answer is `I don’t know, coach, we just have to get back to work, figure out what went wrong, where the holes are and keep working and try to improve in those areas.’

WE ARE GOING BACK INTO FALL CAMP MODE

Just going into this week we’re going to get after it pretty much. We’ve got a lot of guys injured right now and stuff like that, so this bye week was a blessing in disguise. Just use this week to rest up, also get back to work, get back to grinding.

We have to go back to remembering – what I try to preach to the guys is we have the coaches, we have everything, but the coaches aren’t going out there and playing. We are going out there and playing. This is basically our team, these coaches just guide us along and give us the railroad tracks so we don’t fall off. Just it’s us out here in the race, you know?

So this week we are going to get everybody healed up and stuff like that, then pretty much get after it. We’ve got to. We’ve got to get back out there, change a lot about us mentally. I feel like we need to be a little more physical coming up. I tell the guys that everything we want is still in front of us, don’t hang your head too far even though this wasn’t supposed to go down like that.

We got beat by a team we were superior to. It happens. It’s college football, you never know what will happen. But at the same time our goal is still in front of us and nobody is going to help us to our goal or dig us out of this hole but us.

This week is just about us. We’re going back to the fall camp mode, go back into that real mean grind, that real hustle. Go back to locking in on the small details. Go back to just being that team that we came out in fall camp with so much energy and enthusiasm and wanting to play this game.

THERE ARE NAYSAYERS BUT ALSO THOSE THAT SUPPORT ME

A lot of people showed me support after the game, but some fans want to comment on my Instagram or tag me in something, respond to my story. Besides them I had a lot of people reach out and tell me to keep my head up and stuff like that, basically telling me to tell the team to keep their head up, too. Just stuff like this doesn’t define you all, but you all do have to pick it up.

The most meaningful message of support for me? That was Saturday night around 8, 9 o’clock from my mom. She always knows what to say and how to say it and when to say it. She’s always been good with that. So just her texting me when I was really letting it get to me, at the right moment, her just saying simple things of keep your head up and stuff like that. She texted me some things my Great-Grandma usually says, so that was one of the most meaningful messages. My grandma always says you can’t win them all, but at least you got the opportunity to out there and play. Seeing that and remembering you’re not going to win everything, but at least I went out there and gave my all and did the best I could do. That’s all I’ve got to give. I can’t be Superman and go out and do something extra.

And my message for fans that are upset is it’s going to be okay. We are upset too. We understand we have to get better. We understand that we basically laid an egg, but just we are going to continue to put in work to be the best team in the ACC. And we still want everything, what we are still striving for is still able to be grabbed so we are going to grab it.

WHERE I SEE THIS ALL HEADING

Just the rest of the season you’re going to see a team that will improve every week. We are going to come out and play our best game against North Carolina and then the week after that we’re going to be better than the team was last week. Just improvement. We’re going to use this week to take a little bit off, absorb this, use this feeling as motivation and just continue to be better each day and keep putting in 1 percent each day and try to be a better team than we were the week before.

And afew years from now? This is going to be another power program. This is going to be basically the Miami that it used to be. All coach Cristobal needs is time. I know some of these coaches aren’t going to be here (due to the usual coaching turnover). But just give coach Cristobal time to get the right coaches, right players in the building. We have the right players now and stuff like that, right coaches in the building right now. It’s all going back to getting back to that mindset that he had when he first came in and having us believing in what he was saying, actually taking care of the smaller details.