What did UCLA coach DeShaun Foster, Penn State players say about the Lions' 27-11 win?

STATE COLLEGE — Penn State beat UCLA 27-11 on Saturday at Beaver Stadium. The contest marked the first career start for UCLA quarterback Justyn Martin. Few knew what to expect from the second-year Bruin who was replacing injured first-teamer Ethan Garbers, but he had a fine day that impressed Lions coach James Franklin.

” I was impressed with him,” Franklin said. “I’m not sure how tall he is, but looking at him during pregame, he’s a big guy. He seems very poised. The moment didn’t seem too big for him. First-time starting quarterback and talking to their head coach before the game on, you know, on the catapult, he’s running 21 miles an hour. So, he was talking about a big guy who can run, who was poised. So, I was impressed with every guy I really was. I thought overall, we played well.”

Added Martin:

“Prepped all week just in case, I didn’t really know too much about starting or anything. I was just kind of focused on the task at hand. You know, they told me to get the reps in at practice. So I prepared, they told me I was going to be the starter, and gave it my all. The coaches did a good job of preparing me.”

Read on for a look at other top quotes from the postgame interview sessions.

What did UCLA coach DeShaun Foster have to say?

Foster started his news conference with an opening statement.

“Defense came out and played well,” he said. “We weren’t able to get as many points as we would like. I thought my defense played well, but offensively, we kept putting them on the field in situations that are not ideal. This team has rushed for 200 yards this last few games and we held them to 85, so that’s a positive. Offensively, we were able to run the ball a little bit better. We’re going to continue to keep harping on the positives. Justyn Martin came in and played well. All losses, you have to learn from these, and we’re going to learn from this situation and go from there.”

Foster went on to say UCLA held regular starting quarterback Ethan Garbers out because of how slick they felt the Beaver Stadium field was. He was close to being able to play. But the Bruins ultimately held him out.

What adjustments did he see from the Penn State defense in the second half?

“It was mostly just, they brought more pressure,” Foster said. “This is a really good defense. Any time you get in passing situations and they know it, it’s going to be tough. They pressured us more and didn’t handle it how we wanted to.”

Last but not least, Foster was asked about the Noon ET start and his team’s travel experience to Penn State.

“It’s football,” Foster said. “We could have played at 6 a.m. and we would have been ready to play. Defense went out and stopped them first drive. Travel didn’t bother us.”

Top Penn State player quotes

“I think for us, we take pride in just showing up every Saturday, no matter who it is, no matter where it’s at. Tomorrow, we flush this game and move on to the next opponent. It’s about our process throughout the week and what we do well from this game, building on that, and fixing what we didn’t do well this game. Obviously, it’s a great advantage to play at home, but the schedule says we go on the road, then we go on the road. We’re not going to make a big deal about it. It’s just what’s on the schedule for us and it’s just taking that mentality.”

–PSU QB Drew Allar on the team’s 5-0 start ahead of a trip to USC.

“It’s been ever since last season, since we kind of just came out after half time with the mentality they are not going to score on us coming out of half time. We just have the mindset, really we’re going to stop moving down, and our confidence is high right now.”

–Lions LB Tony Rojas on the team’s terrific second half defense

“I think the guys we have on in the program, if one of our players isn’t playing it, trust me, there is another guy behind them that can step up and be as explosive as he will. So Quinn came in there, didn’t miss a beat. We had Kaytron and just really just kept moving.”

–PSU RB Kaytron Allen on not having teammate Nick Singleton available on Saturday.