COACH TRESSEL: How about that Tribe (Cleveland Indians)? All right. Well, it was the end of a two-game night road stand for us, we knew it was going to be a challenge going in and I thought our kids prepared extremely well for it. And the atmosphere over in West Lafayette was great, and I was amazed at how many of our people found their way. I understand we filled both end zones, but I don't know how in the heck they got those tickets on the sides, but the Buckeye fans are unbelievable, and the energy that they provided was extremely helpful and I thought our kids came out of the gate and started with what might seem a little bit insignificant, but a kickoff through the end zone making Purdue start on the 20 instead of starting on the 30 like they'd been starting most of the time, 30 or better. I think they were third in the nation in kickoff returns going into the game.

It was very significant. And our defense went to work and seized the tempo of the game and really never let that tempo go. Offensively, we scored two touchdowns early. I was disappointed we didn't score more touchdowns than that, but it was a heck of a thing that Ryan Pretorius banged three field goals through there because points are critical, especially on the road.

I thought our kids played physical and were in command of the situation and that crowd being there certainly buoyed them as well, so we got a chance to come home with a road victory which is huge in the Big Ten. We had some outstanding performers, Shaun Lane was our Special Units Player of the Week. He's on all four units, the kickoff, kickoff return, punt, punt return, did a great job on all of them, excellent execution. I believe he's the one that caused that fumble that, again, knocked the wind out of their sails. And he just did a heck of a job on all those units and won that award.

The defensive player was Chimdi Chekwa and Chimdi did a great job out there in open field tackling, had 10 or 11 tackles, which if you don't make open field tackles, all of a sudden they're screaming down the field, and he did a heck of a job there and he has really grown in his role. He's given our defensive coaches the flexibility of moving Malcolm (Jenkins) back to safety in the nickel situations and really done a nice job out there in a very difficult position.

The offensive player of the game was Alex Boone. One thing we knew going into the game, that their edge players were very, very quick. They were kids that made sacks and played around blocks and made minus yard plays and so forth and we felt we needed excellent play on the edges for both pass protection and so that we could run on the edge, and both those things happened. Not only was Alex the offensive player of the game, but Kirk Barton was the Jim Parker offensive lineman of the game. So both those edge players, both those guys that we counted on to be strong for us stepped up and had a heck of a game over there and were recognized.

The Attack Force Player of the Week was Marcus Freeman and Marcus has had the fortune of having more snaps. Unfortunately Ross Homan has been banged up and will probably miss this week as well and maybe a couple more. Marcus Freeman has taken advantage of that opportunity. They shared a lot of playing time. They both deserved to play and Marcus has been playing more now than he had been in the first few games and been very, very productive and he plays the pass well, he blitzes well, he plays the run well, he's smart. He and James Laurinaitis get us lined up there and make the adjustments and so forth and Marcus Freeman was the attack force player.

We had three or four nominations for the Jack Tatum hit of the week, we'll vote this afternoon, so we'll get that message out to you as quickly as we can. And then the scout units were good again for the second straight week. We mentioned three weeks ago that it wasn't really what we needed for our preparation to make sure we had the right looks and have as good of work as we needed to prepare for the game and our guys have responded and had another good week of preparation there, and that's going to be critical as the time you practice shrinks a little bit as the season goes on and trying to stay healthy and daylight starts disappearing and so forth, that the quality of your looks need to be there, because you don't have time to repeat things, you don't have time to do it again and make sure we get it right, so we really need to put a lot of emphasis on that and those guys delivered this week.

Our scout special units player of the week was Donnie Evege. Donnie's going to be a good player here. Probably at this time we'll end up redshirting him unless we would get a rash of injuries and Donnie's going to be a good player and we're happy he's here. The scout defensive player is a young guy named Tom Ingham, a young guy from over at Centerville. Centerville has sent us a lot of good products and Tom did a good job on that defensive line and was actually nominated by the old linemen. They came in and pounded their fists on the table a little bit Sunday, which doesn't happen very often on behalf of a scout team player, and Tom was recognized with the defensive scout team player of the week.

And then Scott Sika, walk-on, offensive lineman from Strongsville, Ohio, did a good job helping that group get better and better and he was recognized as our scout offensive team player of the week.

As we move forward, the thing we've got to make sure we do is continue at the pace we've been improving because as you look out ahead, that's what it's going to take. We said last week that we'd been making solid steps one step at a time and that we understood that the Purdue step was going to be a little bit steeper step and we made that step and we've got to continue that momentum as we go, that begins with practice and film preparation.

One of the things that someone on the national call asked about, our defense, and they've been excellent, and they asked if we could -- what one thing comes up in your mind about your defense, and the thing I said was preparation. Our defense does an excellent job preparing, our defensive staff, Coach (Jim) Heacock, Coach (Luke) Fickel, Coach (Taver) Johnson and Coach (Paul) Haynes do a great job of preparing, our players do a great job of practicing, and then they continue to prepare. They continue to study the film. They continue to try to really understand the plan that we have and I think they go into the game, because of their preparation, with confidence.

When you really know what you want to do and you have a good handle on what they do, you're confident that you can get the job done because they're very capable. We have talented kids. But we have to make sure we continue that type preparation.

It's math mid-term time on our campus, as we have some students from our public relations class here, and they know it's that time of the quarter for us, and especially our young guys will be missing some practice here today and tomorrow because the math department happens to have their tests at 5:30 and 6:30 and that type of thing, and there are always help sessions for the whole class the hour prior to the tests. So we're going to be missing a number of our guys here in the next two days, but we've got to make sure that we make up that preparation time and we continue to take the steps that we've been taking.

As you watch Kent on film, Kent had a tough ball game against Miami. That was a battle. They went back and forth. And you watch their OU (Ohio University) game, it was the same kind of thing. You watch their Kentucky game, it was 14-14 at the half. You watch their Iowa State game and they came away from Ames, Iowa, with a victory. They're tough kids, you'll love watching their quarterback, you'll love watching that little running back, he's special. And those wideouts are good. Defensively they play a very similar style of defense that we do, a lot of pressure. They load up the box and dare you to pass and when you want to pass, they're bringing more guys than you can block. And I'm a little biased, their defensive coordinator, Pete Rekstis played for me at Youngstown State and coached for me at Youngstown and he does a great job with that group. So we've got to go to work this afternoon and get prepared as Kent State Golden Flashes come to town. Questions?

REPORTER: How's Beanie (Chris Wells) doing and do you expect to play him this weekend?

COACH TRESSEL: Oh, yeah.

REPORTER: How's his ankle?

COACH TRESSEL: It seems to be fine. He was ready to go back in. It gets stung occasionally. When you've had an ankle banged up or a wrist and you get it stung, you have to go and take a breath and you're usually ready to go back. He was ready to go back in, but at the point in time, we didn't think it was necessary, but, no, he should be fine.

REPORTER: I was wondering what you thought about the overwhelming amount of Scarlet and Gray at the Purdue game, what it was like for the team to hear the O-H-I-O chant going around the stadium.

COACH TRESSEL: I kind of led with that. It was amazing. You go to a stadium like that and all the discussion was it was going to be a blackout and an atmosphere that was going to energize Purdue. And it was a great atmosphere, but there was a lot of scarlet showing as well. We gave them something to cheer about early which helped and got them riled up and we appreciate -- there had to be over 20,000 people there from what we hear, and that makes a difference.

REPORTER: The first BCS (Bowl Championship Series) ratings come out on Sunday. Can you kind of tell what your personal viewpoint is on the BCS, how successful it's been and how much credence it should get?

COACH TRESSEL: I think the time at which the BCS ratings come out is probably a good time for a first poll. It's probably better and it will be more accurate than the poll that comes out in August and I know it won't sell magazines in August if we don't have a poll and all that stuff, but I think it's a good time, it's the right time. And I know back when we were in 1-AA, the poll didn't come out until they announced who was in the playoffs, so you were always kind of hoping you were going to be in that group or whatever, but we won't get too involved with it because there's nothing we can do other than progress and take care of our end of things, but I think it's a good time.

I think the BCS -- to answer the second half of your question, I think the BCS has been as successful as anything you could possibly have. We've been doing it for, what, 10 years now maybe? Thereabouts. And there have been some moments where you thought, well, this team maybe should have been in the top two and they ended up third or whatever, but we had that in 1-AA where they picked 16 and we were mad one time we were 17th. I swear we would have won it that year. So I think it's been successful.

REPORTER: How impressed are you with your team, though, at this point based on the way things have gone nationally at this point or are you impressed?

COACH TRESSEL: I'm impressed with their willingness to work hard on the task at hand. We haven't had every practice perfect. We haven't had everything done as well as we think we're capable of doing it, but I think they want to, and I think we do a pretty good job of correcting things when we do err. I think they want to get things done the right way and I guess I reserve my being impressed until I see how we are at the end of the year and how our grades are, et cetera, et cetera.

REPORTER: But is there a part of this team that you've seen come along that's come along faster than you thought it would or any part of it like that?

COACH TRESSEL: A guy who was a relative unknown as to how he would do was like a Chimdi Chekwa. Here he was, he redshirted last year, spent the whole year on scout team and chasing our guys around and trying to chase Teddy Ginn and Anthony Gonzalez and Roy Hall and Hartline and Robiskie and all those guys and now he's playing in the Big Ten. I'm not sure I would have predicted that a year ago, but he's a worker. Use that word with preparedness about our defense, Chimdi Chekwa is in the weight room. He's not very -- I don't know what he weighs, but he is strong. He spends time preparing. He spends time in the film room, practices extremely hard.

Anytime -- I remember when Ahmed Plummer was here last year as a volunteer guy in the weight room trying to decide which direction he was going to go after, pro ball, did he want to coach, it took him one year with us to find out he's not working that many hours. Chimdi used to grab Ahmed all the time and say, hey, talk to me about this or that, that's just the kind of guy he is, and that's the way you progress. So that would be one that would jump up to me that would -- I'm not saying faster than I thought, but he's done a heck of job.

REPORTER: Coach Martin has talked about how he's going to rest some of his guys, rotate his reserves in and out mainly because he wants to be refreshed and healthy for the second half of the MAC season. Is it tough to play a nonconference game in the middle of your season? What's your philosophy in maybe trying to -- I don't know if you'd consider resting some guys for the rest of the Big Ten, to get them ready for the rest of the Big Ten.

COACH TRESSEL: What do they say, when you rest you rust? No, we're putting a game plan together and those that deserve to be in the game and deserve to stay in the game once they're in it will play and is it difficult playing a nonconference game in the middle? Yeah, because many times you can say, okay, nonconference, okay, that's over and now let's focus on the Big Ten race, or in their case, focus on the MAC race. But there's nothing we can do about it. We have 11 teams in our league, so someone's always going to have either a bye next year because there will be bye's next year, or someone other than a Big Ten team and that's just the way it is. And we can't spend any time worrying about we'd rather have it the other way, we've got to get better today and Saturday and Coach Earle Bruce used to always tell us you're either getting better or you're getting worse and we've got to get better.

REPORTER: In talking about how difficult it is to move out of conference in the middle of the conference, how much does Appalachian State and Stanford help you in that regard?

COACH TRESSEL: We haven't talked about that type of thing because again, it's about what are we doing and we think that we're capable, if we play the best we're capable of playing, we're capable of being successful, so that's what we have to focus on. We really -- they asked me after our game, what did I think about USC losing, I didn't know USC lost, but I wasn't thinking about those types of things when we're in a game, and hopefully we're not thinking about anything other than getting better.

REPORTER: Are there common denominators in those big upsets do you think, as you look at them? Is there a trend that we can draw from all of this?

COACH TRESSEL: Turnovers. That's just a guess. Wouldn't you say, Coach Bruce?

COACH BRUCE: Yeah, I'd say that, and then coaching.

COACH TRESSEL: Strike that from the record. You guys would have more fun if Earle was up here.

REPORTER: Is there a lack of focus? I mean, USC is up by four, playing a team that's only won once or twice in the last couple years, there has to be some element maybe that maybe they weren't as sharp as they needed to be.

COACH TRESSEL: I think whatever mistakes created your poor performance than you're capable of many times can be traced to, you weren't focused on the task at hand, sometimes it's dumb luck, the ball gets deflected and whatever, but usually you can have a bearing on the outcome of your performance if you are capable.

REPORTER: And is this a concern for you, obviously playing a nonconference game in the middle of this season you're just coming off a big game and you've got tough games coming up to finish up in the Big Ten?

COACH TRESSEL: We're certainly hoping not. I don't know the answer to that obviously, and obviously our guys are interested in getting better, so I'd like to think they'll keep rolling their sleeves up and one of those -- you make your greatest improvement on Saturdays. You improve a lot in practice, but, boy, it's not tested at game speed until Saturday and we need to improve.

REPORTER: What did you take away, I know you touched on some of Todd's (Boeckman) interceptions in the post-game, but after looking at the film and looking at his day, what did you take away from Todd's performance and the interceptions, maybe things that he needs to learn from that, your receivers or --

COACH TRESSEL: The thing I took away after watching the film is that I really think Todd progressed. There were a couple times where, in fact, the one time I remember where he got hit late down in the red zone, we had to kick the field goal and when he came off, he mentioned we should have adjusted our route to such and such and that's what I was waiting for and that was too late because they were bringing a full blitz. And you know what, when you watch the film, he was exactly right. And as you watch the film, his understanding seems to continue to grow.

We said going into the game, don't overthrow the deep ones, we're going to go up and get them or break them up. And we didn't do that on a couple. One interception at the beginning of the second half was probably the one that concerns me the most because really he should have just thrown it away, second and 10, who cares, let's go. But the other two, it wasn't real bad where he put them.

REPORTER: Gibson didn't make the trip to Purdue, what's his status right now?

COACH TRESSEL: He'll be practicing with us and so forth.

REPORTER: Why didn't he make the trip?

COACH TRESSEL: Personal reasons.

REPORTER: Coach (Doug) Martin said he inherited a program that had not had any recent tradition. How does a coach build tradition in a place such as that?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you have to begin creating tradition of your own. Now, when you have a head start at a place like Ohio State, but still you can't live on what Earle Bruce did or John Cooper or Woody Hayes or Paul Brown or whatever, you better build a little tradition of your own. As I've watched Doug and his program, and again I'm a little biased because I stay in close contact with Pete Rekstis, but I think he's done a heck of a job and they got it rolling pretty good last year and got banged a little bit and lost a few at the end that kept them from going to a bowl, and you watch their games this year, the games this year they lost the turnover margin like 4-2 or something, they were losing the game. The games they win the turnover margin like Ohio U, who I think is a solid team, they decisively won the game, so they're not far from becoming a lot more consistent and that's what he's doing. He's in the midst of building the tradition that they can then build on the vivid recall of that, I think they're doing a good job.

REPORTER: Whatever limits were on Brandon Saine last week, will they be taken off this week?

COACH TRESSEL: Whatever limits? Yeah, we want him to carry five or six times, and I think he did. I don't know that we would want him to carry 25 times. We'll know a little bit more during the practice week. He's one of those freshmen that's going to miss -- I think he'll miss all of Wednesday based upon his exam schedule, so he'll get a lot of reps today, see how that goes, because he's not only going to hopefully play more on Saturday, but he's going to hopefully practice more and we'll see how that goes, but he came out of the game fine. And Thursday he'll get X number of reps and I'd like to think he'll be available for more duty than he was last weekend, but we'll see how the game unfolds.

REPORTER: About building tradition, you mentioned building tradition.

COACH TRESSEL: I didn't bring that up, but --

REPORTER: Three in-state schools this year, is that important for you coming from Youngstown State to make sure that you have these in-state schools on the schedule?

COACH TRESSEL: It definitely is part of what we believe in from a scheduling standpoint now that we're playing 12-game schedules. We want to play someone from out there in the country that we don't normally get to play like we did with Texas and Washington and USC coming up and so forth and the next thing that's important to us is home games. We have 36 sports, which is the largest in the country and that's very, very important for us to be able to help with the comprehensive program, so we give the in-state people first opportunity, if their schedule allows, there's some years where we have three, like this year, and I think there's a year coming up where we don't have any, somewhere in '09 or '10 (2009-10) or somewhere in there, there's nothing like playing in Ohio Stadium.

REPORTER: Talk about Eugene Jarvis and his similar running style that looks like Garrett Wolfe from Northern Illinois.

COACH TRESSEL: He's good. I don't sit and watch the opposing offense that much, but as I'm watching the defense, I look at the play-by-play as I'm going, so as I looked on the play-by play plus 17, plus 9, plus 14, this guy, he makes things happen. I think he's fifth in the country, somewhere in there. He is a little bit like Garrett Wolfe and we had a tough time with Garrett Wolfe.

REPORTER: Being from Berea, can you talk a little bit about the Tribe?

COACH TRESSEL: The Tribe, we're going into this next series fresh, C. C. (Sabathia) didn't have to go twice, (Fausto) Carmona didn't have to go twice, and they didn't take us to the full five, so we're a little fresher, and we'll take two and hit to right.

REPORTER: I want to ask about a couple of the injured linemen, Todd Denlinger didn't get to play and has there been any kind of break through with Lawrence Wilson, any chance he'll be back during the regular portion of the season?

COACH TRESSEL: That's an easier answer than the first one. Lawrence Wilson, I would say our best case scenario, again, without making a medical proclamation of any kind is that he would be back for a post-season game. As far as Todd goes, I'm kind of thinking Todd will be ready. He will probably not go very hard today, and then ramp it up on Wednesday, and hopefully Thursday he's at full speed. And he wasn't that far, because of the adrenaline and so forth, from going Saturday, but we just didn't think it was in his best interest.

REPORTER: Jim, is there anything at the midpoint here of the Big Ten schedule that surprises you most in the rest of the conference whether it's what Illinois has done or Indiana being 5-1 or the way Michigan started and has come back? Is there anything that stands out to you?

COACH TRESSEL: I felt and I said to you guys many times that this is going to be a much better Big Ten in 2007 than it was in 2006. I just feel as you look at all the teams, look at the whole group, there's a lot of good football teams in our league. So I'm not surprised a bit about Illinois doing what they're doing. I think they're an outstanding team. I thought that last year. Indiana doesn't surprise you as their quarterback develops and I think I mentioned to you guys after week one that, don't worry, Michigan will be back. So we've got good teams.

REPORTER: You have two linemen, Boone and Barton, honored this week. Where do you see your line play coming along as you're hitting the midpoint in the season?

COACH TRESSEL: It starts with communication and decisions, and they're communicating and making really good decisions right now. I think as we evaluate all of our position groups, we talk to them all the time about things that we need to do better, and they're no exception. They need to do some things better. But I think it begins with your communication and making sure you're blocking things the right way. People give you so many different looks in this day and age on defense and if you happen to have your calls right, it really can help you and I think we've been doing a good job with that. And the more confident we get and the more polished we get, I think that allows you to play even more physical and more confident, more assured, and I'd like to think that that's where we can move as the season goes.

REPORTER: What did you see in Chekwa when you started recruiting him that jumped out at you? Would you agree he was a little bit of a find?

COACH TRESSEL: Yeah. They had a good high school team and their coach kept saying, hey, the best guy is this guy, and they had one of their players commit early to a school and then he kept saying, I'm telling you, this guy has got great character, great work ethic, not that the other one didn't, but, you know, so we kept following up.

And Tim Beckman and Darrell Hazell were the guys involved and they went down and watched in December at an all-star practice, getting ready for an all-star game, and they said, oh, my gosh, we think the one that the coach thinks is the top gun is. So we went after it right then and we're excited that Chimdi is with us.

REPORTER: You talk about when you rest you rust, but with Beanie Wells limping off every game, would it not make sense for him to sit out every week and see if his ankle would solidify?

COACH TRESSEL: The only reason you would do that is if you thought you were further injuring to go, and at this moment, our medical people don't think that that's the case. Now, if there's ever a point where they do, then you absolutely would do that, but at this moment, from a medical standpoint, there's not a feeling that way at all.

REPORTER: Does someone have like a turf toe or something?

COACH TRESSEL: Something.

REPORTER: We've seen a couple different strategies out there, the new strategies we're seeing is coaches are waiting until the last minute to call a time out, we saw it last night and in Florida versus Auburn, is there any thought to using that strategy?

COACH TRESSEL: It's funny, we were talking about that last week in our Thursday checklist meeting with our staff, and it almost doesn't seem like that's why the rule was created, because I can remember for years a coach screaming and yelling at someone to get their attention because a player had to do the timeout, and I don't know that the rule has changed such that you can call a timeout from the sideline for the purpose of doing those things, but like anything else, it's within the rules, and whether it's within the purpose of the rule, I don't know, but I don't know whether it adds to the game.

REPORTER: I want to ask you, from a defensive standpoint, it didn't seem like you'd played three down linemen with that nickel look much this year, it used to be you took a linebacker out. It looked like you went with the three down linemen most of the game last week against Purdue. Can you talk about coming up with a wrinkle like that and executing it when you really hadn't played it? Does that speak even more about your coaching and your personnel on that side of the ball that they were able to do that?

COACH TRESSEL: Our guys had used that probably 35 or 40 snaps leading up to that game. In fact, in 2002, we used it the whole game against Purdue, and we were a little banged on the front. So it made perfect sense to our coaches, it wasn't like they invented a new defense for the game, we played every one of those defenses before, but we probably hadn't played them as much. And the other thing it does, is it gets a little more speed on the field and we thought Purdue had excellent quickness with that corps of receivers and when you have a tight end like Purdue's that was so fast, that was like having four wideouts in the game at all times, even though he lined up as a tight end. So our people thought it made sense to add speed to the field and just seemed to be the right thing to do and it ended up being the right thing to do.

REPORTER: With so many wins, the team's got to be feeling pretty confident, talk about the mentality of the team, are they pretty motivated?

COACH TRESSEL: Well, you'd like to think that they're comfortable and confident and at the same time realistic. Realistic with the understanding of how much improvement we need to make, realistic with the understanding of the challenge that remains, but they seem to have a good head on their shoulders. I'd like to think that that will continue.

REPORTER: Jim, what do you anticipate doing from here forward on the kickoffs with (Andrew)Good and (A.J.) Trapasso and Pretorius? Is that competition now.

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know that Pretorius kicked off but maybe a pooch.

REPORTER: No, I mean previous games he had.

COACH TRESSEL: No, right now Good and Trapasso, that's our two deep on kickoffs.

REPORTER: Would you be comfortable keeping a rotation like that or would you like one of those guys to sort of win that out?

COACH TRESSEL: I don't know that we have enough data to say one over the other. They both had a couple real nice ones and they both had a couple knuckle balls there, but I hope we get more consistent with that kind of distance. I think that will help us.

REPORTER: Is Aaron Pettrey looking like more of a redshirt this year?

COACH TRESSEL: He's already redshirt. So I wouldn't expect Aaron back until early November from what I hear from the medical folks. One last question, Lori.

REPORTER: You talked about the difficulty of playing an out-of-conference game at this point in the season. Is there a certain type of opponent that would make that transition easier and does Kent State fit that mold?

COACH TRESSEL: I think the things that they do offensively and defensively are going to be healthy for us to have to face. They come after you with their defense. They play a lot like some of our opponents coming up. Offensively they bring a quarterback into the mix who you have to account for in the run game. I think Julian Edelman ran 22 times on Saturday and that will be healthy because we've got a lot of that out in front of us, so I think the things that they're doing are going to be a heck of a challenge for us and hopefully we can grow with our understanding of how to cope with those things.