Xavier Restrepo blog: Don't blame Tyler for early struggles last game, we have to not let moment be too big at Texas A&M game

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Miami Hurricanes WR Xavier Restrepo will have a weekly blog all season at CaneSport.com. In this edition, Restrepo shares his thoughts off another strong game for him … and another Miami win … with Texas A&M on deck:

WE WEREN’T DISAPPOINTED HOW WE PLAYED SAT., BUT ME, TYLER AND SOME OF THE OTHER RECEIVERS MET AFTER TO GO OVER THINGS

Everyone knows Tyler Van Dyke is my roommate, and after the game on Saturday me and Tyler and some of the receivers got together that night, went over the little details, things like that. That’s what makes us better down the road. We didn’t throw and catch just because our bodies were so worn out, but the next day we did. And on Saturday night we just went over the plays, watched film, got the mental game right. Then let our physical game relax a little bit. We just did that.

A few other guys came, too. Our receivers, they’ve always had it, it was just a matter of putting everything together and we’re ascending in the right direction.For us we weren’t disappointed about the game, because as you saw Saturday it’s hard to win football games in college football. So you can’t really be disappointed. But you can be excited to get back to work, fix some things you didn’t do so well.

It’s hard to win a football game in college football, it’s simple but it’s hard. Very, very hard. When you start slow like we did it’s even harder. But to see our team come out second half and fire up the way that it did, that got me going a little bit. I liked that.

We ran the ball to win it in the second half, and our running game has been awesome. So you can’t take that away from us. I personally don’t care if we run or pass, I just want to win. And just winning against anyone, sometimes people take it for granted.

Big picture, the bottom line is every week we have to become better and better, have that 1-0 mindset. We just have to get more fine details in what we have to do.

UNFAIR TO LAY ANY BLAME ON TYLER FOR OFFENSIVE STRUGGLES VS. SOUTHERN MISS

That Southern Miss game, we saw what they brought, know what they brought. We just didn’t execute that well in the first half. Then second half came back around and we bounced back.

I mean, Tyler, he wasn’t really off. It was just we were executing poorly on the outsides, the interior. You can’t just put it all on the quarterback, and that’s what a lot of people do, they throw everything on the star player. You can’t really do that because people that are not on our team don’t know what’s really going on during the play. So you can’t throw that on Tyler. Tyler did an amazing job. Yeah, a couple of throws weren’t there, but he’s human at the end of the day.

REGARDLESS OF TEXAS A&M GETTING UPSET, THEY ARE ONE OF BEST DEFENSES IN NATION

Whether or not Texas A&M won this past weekend or not, they’re still an amazing team. They still have one of the best defenses in the country, you know? You can’t base them off one game. You have to respect them and respect who they are truly.

I’m seeing NFL talented players on their team, but them losing it’s never shocking to lose a game. College football is hard to win. Football games are hard to win, period.

So the mood going into this next game is to start fast, execute, finish strong. For us it really is just execute, know what you’re doing out there. This is as big as any game, but we have to treat it as another game, just be 1-0.

Saturday our game plan is going to be amazing. It is every single week. We just have to execute.

WE HAVE TO STUDY THE FILM, KNOW WHAT WE’RE DOING AND EXECUTE

Each team has a different style of defense, so that involves a different type of game plan. We just have to execute and worry about us. And I  feel like a lot of college football teams worry so much about what the other team is doing instead of what they need to be doing. So I just think we need to focus on what we need to do and execute all the jobs we need to do. We have to be in control of the game, not hoping for the other team to be in control of the game. We have to start fast, just execute on our side of the ball.

We’re taking the approach of worry what we have to worry about first. Get in the film room, know what they are going to run. And just execute at a high level. That’s it.

For me, I just can’t wait for the game. I’ve been doing this my entire life, whether a big crowd or not, it’s all the same. At the end of the day, first play, all those jitters get out and it’s football time. The kind of mindset I have, I have a dog `need to win’ mindset. As soon as the first whistle blows I block everything out. I just see the signal, the defense and the ball being thrown in the air.

WE CAN’T LET THE MOMENT BE TOO BIG IN THAT ATMOSPHERE

It’s going to be an awesome atmosphere, you know? A once-in-a-lifetime atmosphere. The crowd is just the crowd. The crowd, we’re not playing against the crowd. We’re playing against Texas A&M, you know? It’s just one of those things where, yeah, enjoy the crowd, but you also have to block it out. Because I feel like the crowd on away games can definitely dictate a game sometimes, when you allow them to. And when you don’t allow them to is when your team becomes dangerous.

It also won’t just be Texas A&M fans there. We’ll have plenty of Miami fans, too. My parents are going. Having that support system in the best feeling ever. I know no matter what happens I’ll be supported. They’ve just been telling me to worry about myself and the team.

We just have to stay locked in, worry about ourselves.

For us it’s just got to be a normal college football game. The normal weekend game routine. For us it’ll be what we always do before the game. Friday meetings, relaxing, getting treatment and stuff like that, just resting. Same routine as we do for home games. The game on Saturday. We’re not going to make it any bigger than that. It’s a normal college football game. The team on the other side is an amazing team, but we just have to focus on ourselves. At the end of the day we win and lose games. And when you have a great coaching staff, a great leader like coach Gattis and coach Cristobal on your team, they pretty much do all the uncomfortable stuff and we follow right behind them, follow their lead. Every week they have the same intensity, same needing to win. The thing I respect so much about coach Gattis is that guy really loves the game of football. And his passion and intensity is the same as mine. That’s why I love playing for him.