Everything Rhett Lashlee said after SMU beat Cal

SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee spoke with reporters after Saturday’s 38-6 win over Cal in Ford Stadium to close out the regular season. Here’s everything he had to say about the 11-1 Mustangs.

Opening statement: “Just really proud of our guys. That’s a team that hadn’t lost by more than one score all year. Think you saw in the 2nd, 3rd quarter just how good their defense is. We were struggling to do anything. Really proud of our defense and our team, man. What a day, what a game, I think we had 16 tackles for loss, five sacks, kept them out in the end zone. Just can’t say enough about our D. Offensively, thought we had a really good, fast start. Then kind of sputtered a little bit, again, give them a lot of credit for that, and then finished the way we needed to. Pretty cool, these guys, back to back years, 11 wins, didn’t lose a conference game, and gonna be playing championship weekend two years in a row. Told those 30 seniors in the locker room, it’s been a pleasure to watch them play.”

On moving up in the ACC to a new weight class and going unbeaten: “Yeah, it’s hard maybe to process since we’re not done. Big challenge next week in the championship game, but yeah, I mentioned the weight class analogy and I said we got to be like Roy Jones, Jr. He won in multiple weight classes. I think our staff deserves a ton of credit for the kind of belief that they instill in our players. I think our players deserve a ton of credit for the belief they have in each other because it’s human nature. Man, they’re moving up and going into the season all we heard was, you guys haven’t beaten a Power Four team since I’ve been coach. That was two years. We lose our first one of the year to a Power Four team because of me. Then to just rattle off nine a row. They just play. They respect everybody we play, but they don’t fear anybody we play. I don’t know, I’m kind of in aw of those guys.”

On Preston Stone throwing a TD on his final pass: “It was good. Preston Stone’s a winner, he’s a champion. He’s led us last year. The way he’s handled everything this year is a big reason for our success. He’s got a bright future ahead. He’s going to graduate in December. He’s a Mustang for life. I think our whole entire fan base appreciates him. I think it was really cool for his last snap and pass in Ford Stadium to be a touchdown. That was pretty cool.”

On SMU offense and Kevin Jennings: “I thought Kevin quietly played one of his better games of the year. I think we scored on three of those first four drives. I know we didn’t score on the first one. We had 21 points pretty quick on their defense. All three of those drives, we had to grind it and finish it. It’s not like we were hitting a 70 yard bombs for a touchdown. That’s hard to do. Give Justin (Wilcox) and Peter Sirmon and that entire Cal D. I said it was the most complete defense we played, it really was. The way we started fast, I think give a lot of credit. But then, the two drives in the second quarter, our D held them once on downs, I think, and then held them to a missed field goal on the other. We were backed up, and we went 3-and-out both times. We didn’t, if nothing else, flip the field or go score, maybe put enough distance to kind of feel comfortable. Our D obviously came up big, but what I’m getting at is, we were sputtering, going to halftime and come out. Not exactly starting fast in the third quarter, and I thought what was so good about how Kevin played is he didn’t get frustrated. We had a lead 21-0, then 21-3, then 21-6. We knew the way our D was playing that even though we were frustrated, we wanted to go score, if we didn’t turn it over and let them back in the game, we have a pretty good chance of winning. I think that just shows a lot of maturity, because he’s still 20-of-30, 225 yards, two touchdowns, no turnovers. Some big 3rd down conversions there early in the 4th quarter to put a drive together, I think we took five or six minutes off, kicked the field goal and then after the turnover, hit the one to Brashard to put the game away. Thought he played really well tonight.” 

On SMU freshman RB Derrick McFall: “Good to have him back, he played a lot earlier in the year and then we just didn’t want to burn his year unless we had to, so he had one game left. He was able to play. I thought obviously he had a great run on the touchdown. Having now him and LJ and Brashard gives us some depth there. I think he showed his explosiveness on a couple of those catches of why we think in the future he’s gonna be pretty special.”

On SMU TE Matthew Hibner: “I’m telling you, Matt’s a dang good football player. I mean, he’s as good a tight end as there is in this league. There’s some good tight ends. Had that big touchdown that him and Kevin had. He ran the back shoulder, made some other good plays. Not surprised by Matt at all. Proud of him to be getting those opportunities to show what he can do.”

On facing Clemson in the ACC Championship: “You’re going to play Clemson, you’re going to play Miami, either way, you’re playing a really good football team,” Lashlee told reporters. “Coach Swinney, Clemson’s become the gold standard of our league over the last decade, decade and a half. I really respect how he runs his program. I grew up wanting to be like Bobby Bowden and Mark Richt. I really appreciated how they ran their program at Florida State, just the way that they won big, but the way they did it. I think Dabo’s kind of that coach of the last decade or two in this era. I have a lot of respect for how they do things. Excited to get the opportunity to share the field with them.”

On Moochie Dixon’s showing as of late: “I think we got Moochie for three years, so he came in our first year, transferred in, and made some big plays in all three years he’s been here. There’s been some ups and downs, but Moochie’s got a chance to play for a while. He’s going to get a chance to make a team, and he can run. He’s got great hands. He’s got one of the best smiles in the building. He’s been playing really good football. I think Moochie and Key’Shawn and Jordan have been playing really good football the last three or four weeks, and I think that’s really helped our offense, especially with losing RJ. Banged up a little bit in the backfield, and just the outside receivers have been playing well for us lately.”

On SMU stepping up and winning this week as others fall: “I’m just in aw of our guys. Nothing I’ve done. Our coaches and our players have done a great job of not getting bored with the routine. Clinching and closing is the hardest thing in sports. Doesn’t matter the sport. Last three outs of baseball are the hardest three outs. Well, we’ve been playing in the playoffs the last six weeks. We had to win every game until this week, we had to win every game just to get into the conference champion game. We didn’t know we were going to be able to clinch maybe a week early. Then when you have the CFP rankings involved, like I think you saw how hard it was when Boston College came in here. You had to go on the road and then again, just the way our defense has played these last two games. I think Scott Symons, the Broyles Award, there’s a lot of really good coaches out there. If there’s someone out there more deserving than him, I would love to meet them.” 

On doing what no other former G5 team has done in history this year: “I didn’t love school, but history was my favorite subject. I like knowing what’s happened and what’s been done, you know? Then to try to prepare our guys for something new that none of us have experienced here. I did, I tried to look at the schools, not only last year, but over the last decade or two, that have made the jump — haven’t been a lot — and done it well. I talked with some of those coaches and tried to find out what they did to try… In doing that and trying to get some info, that’s where, like, hey, you need linemen, those kind of things, to see if we could hold up for 10 straight weeks. Now we’re going to play 11 straight weeks of power conference play, 11 straight games.

“In doing that, you see the history, and you see things like, wow, no one’s ever gone from a Group of Five to a power conference and started better than 1-1 much less have a winning conference record. You start to see all those trends. It’s fun to try to do things that haven’t been done, and our guys bought into that. They just bought into it, and they found a way to just take it week after week after week, and it’s so hard to do. I think it’s coach speak when we say that, well, we’re saying it because it’s what has to happen. You think we’ve got 18 to 22-year-old guys… it’s hard for me to focus on that. But 18 to 22-year-old guys, and now with social media that wasn’t here a decade, decade and a half ago, just all the stuff they’re inundated with and the pressure. You can’t shield them from it, so they know, hey, if you win this week, you’re clinching… Just special. Like I said, they’ve done something that, for the most part, hasn’t been done this way. That’s pretty cool.”

On committing 17 penalties: “Yeah, I mean I see the stats. I mean 17 is a lot. It’s got to be a record for me and us. I know we had a lot in our first game here too. Look, there’s a couple of times we’ve got to look the other way. The second guy usually gets caught. They hit you; you hit back, you get the penalty. So, I’ll have to look and see. Yeah, I’m worried about it. I don’t think we were guilty of all 17, but we were clearly guilty of a bunch of them. And it doesn’t really matter. The officials are in charge. If they say you’re guilty of 17, you’re guilty of 17. You know, we can’t have 17 penalties and win the next game or any of the games that we have left because the competition is coming. So, you know, if we had 17 every game, I’d be worried. You know, it’s kind of weird. Up until this year, we’ve always been one of these penalized teams. This year we’ve had more penalties than we have in the past. Not 17. And so, yeah, I’m not a fan of it. I think this is important. It’s funny, though, we did a study a few years ago.  There’s a little bit of a myth in sports that the least penalized teams win. You know, the timely penalties that happen, those hurt you. Like a couple of years ago when Cincinnati went and played in the college football playoff. They’re one of the most penalized teams in the country. They were physical mothers… You know what I mean? And so, you have to find that balance. And this year, we don’t love indiscipline penalties, which is pre-snap, post-snap, unsportsmanlike conduct, pushing a guy, or hitting a guy. That stuff can’t happen because pre- and post-snap, you can control that. So, yeah, I’m worried about that. At the same time, to move into a league that we’ve never been in and to compete, we had to play with an edge. And that’s a fine line. So, yeah, we got to clean that up. But I’m not happy with it.”

On the achievements of this team and season sinking in: “Probably not, because of the way they just show up each week. Like even, I think, I went to a Roderick Daniels on the sidelines late game and told him it was a pleasure watching the him play for the school. He said, ‘Coach, we’re not done yet.’ I don’t know. They play like it hasn’t really sunk in, because we’re still in it. You know what I mean? We’re still in it. We got a big game coming up this week. Hopefully, we’ll be playing for more down the road.” 

On the final send-off for all the seniors: “It was one of the reasons I was getting emotional on the sidelines. I was emotional in the locker room. I think I’m good enough that I’ll get through it this time. And I started to crack a minute ago. Like, okay, here’s the best example because you’re right. You named a bunch of guys. Robert Daniels is another one. A lot of guys that came here out of high school. Isaiah Nwokobia is not as old as him, but he’s been here. You know, transfers, we talk about a lot, and that’s big. But we have a lot of guys who’ve been here from the jump. Both of our quarterbacks came out of high school. But the best story I can give you to show you what this team is about is after I recruited Ben Sparks in 2019. I think my last year here, we were recruiting that class, I believe. It was him, it was Marcus Bryant, Branson Hickman, all those guys. My time may be off. I may have coached him here. I don’t think so. So I remember going to Oklahoma and recruiting Ben Sparks. And he was a part of that offensive line class we thought was very good. And then I left and came back. Well, that was 2019, this is 2024. And post warm-ups, Logan Parr has been struggling with the groin issue. And we thought he was gonna be able to go, but we didn’t know how long. Post-warm-ups, Garin comes up to me and he goes, ‘Hey, Logan, I don’t think you can go’ during the post-warm-ups. We start Ben Sparks, and we don’t miss a beat. You know what I mean? So I think that’s as good of a story for those kind of guys as there is. Special moments for them, his life’s getting out here. He’s a selfless guy that has played a lot throughout the year. And he’s kind of that sixth man. It’s kind of like basketball, you have a big-time sixth man. Well, he’s like the sixth man of the O-line. He and Andrew Chamblee, I think Andrew Chamblee played in the second half when Savion was banged up. That’s what we knew was gonna have to take place. And those guys just were stars in their roles.”

On focusing on Cal and not looking ahead: “I think it shows their maturity. They want to finish. We talked about attacking to finish this week. To finish is a big part, I think, we are now 11-1 over these three years. It was really cool to just we wanted to finish well. We wanted to go 8-0, we wanted to win the regular season outright. We didn’t want to share it, and we were playing for a lot. Because the college football playoff still comes out with rankings for two more weeks, and we didn’t need to stumble and have a setback. So, it does show their maturity. It’s human nature last week to relax, but they’ve not flinched so far.”

On breaking the single-season attendance record at Ford Stadium: It’s special. I mean, Ford Stadium can be one of the hardest places to play in the country. It can. It can be the hardest place to play in our league, and it can be an atmosphere that really helps us like it did this year. I mean, even today, I thought was great. We’ve never had good crowds on Thanksgiving weekend. I mean, the city’s gone, all the students are gone, and we still had a great crowd. You could hear them, and you could feel them. And before you think I’m crazy, just because our stadium seats are up in 35000 or whatever, Cameron Indoor is pretty rowdy. It’s like, what, under 10,000? You know what I mean? It’s not about size and numbers. It’s about packing and being loud, passionate, and rowdy. I think we saw the start of what it can be here this year. And so, look, we’re still the new kids. This is just year one. We’re not done with this year, but it’s not like anything that happened this year carries over to next year. We’re going to have to create a tradition, a culture, an expectation of: this is SMU football. This is what Ford Stadium is supposed to be like year after year after year.”

On if SMU deserves a spot in the CFP after the final regular season game: “It’s not my choice, but yeah, I do, I don’t think there’s any question. You go 11-1 (8-0) 9-1 against power-four opponents. There’s a lot of stats out there. I don’t know. I mean, I hope that that’s the way it’s been. Now, we have a chance to still control it by winning next week. And hopefully, you know, win a championship. That’s the number one goal. And if you do that, maybe not only are you probably in, but you probably get a bye. I don’t know. But, yeah, I would hope so. If I’m watching a game last night that I thought was a great game between Georgia and Georgia Tech, and I think Georgia Tech showed what the ACC is all about. And I keep hearing, well, if Georgia wins, they’ll be 10 -2, and they’re automatically in. Well, I don’t know. We’re 11-1 (8-0). I’m not comparing schedules. They’re a great team. They should be in. They’re in the SEC Championship game. Heck, yeah, they should be in. And I think we should be, too. I respect the committee, that’s their call. I know stuff happened again this week, so maybe we will move up, or maybe we won’t. I do hope that our team is rewarded for their body of work and what we’ve done. And I’m not mistaken, us and Oregon, I don’t even know if Oregon’s played yet, would be the only two teams to go undefeated in the power conferences. I hope that means we are one of the top twelve teams. Regardless, I hope it’s the reward next week to play for a championship like they said it is. But again, we have to worry about what we can control, and that’s how we play next week, so we have to focus.”

On the national media attention, SMU is receiving: “It’s special. I mean we’re trying to build our program back to being a national program, where it has been before. To go back-to-back years with eleven wins, and to do what we did in the ACC. You hear all the things in the playoffs and all that about brand bias, and they’re real, that’s fine. Those schools and those brands have earned that. Like, it may be frustrating if you’re on the wrong end of that, but Dabo Swinney and Clemson, what they’ve done over the last decade and a half have earned the brand bias, right? They just have. We haven’t. We’re the new guys. It is fun to see us have a year that kind of gets the attention of the country, where they go, ‘Okay, whoa. SMU might be a program that can build a program that is sustainable year in, and year out, is talked about as a Top 25 program, and someone that could compete to win their conference and compete for the playoff either year in, year out, or frequently.’ That’s what we want to build here. To do that, there are steps to that process. Last year was a step in winning a championship. This year was a step in a new league,  showing we belong, and we can compete, after your point, being ranked nationally in the top ten. All those were steps. Nothing happens just like that. And so that’s the good part about it, is I think these guys have laid a foundation for what we can continue to build here.”