Everything Boston College QB Grayson James Said After Loss to No. 14 SMU
The Boston College Eagles (5-5, 2-4 ACC) lost to the No. 14 SMU Mustangs (9-1, 6-0 ACC) 38-28 on Saturday evening.
After the game, Eagles quarterback Grayson James talked about his performance and how this past week has gone for him.
Below is a transcript of everything James said.
JAMES: Obviously, I've been in this position before, starting football, but obviously not so this magnitude. I was prepared all week and went through with the game plan, felt confident in what we could do as an offense, and just wanted to go out there and execute. Didn't get it, didn't come out with the win at the end. So it hurts, especially coming home but we’re looking forward to next week North Carolina and getting the win.
Q: Feel pretty good? Do you feel better when you play more and more games this year?
JAMES: Absolutely, and I feel like as games are going on, I feel more confident, more comfortable, we can execute better as an offense, just kind of getting in that groove, finding a rhythm. I would say I definitely felt that.
Q: You mentioned coming back home. Did that help kind of calm the nerves early on?
JAMES: I would say so. I wouldn't say I was rattled at all early on, it was just kind of just finding a groove and how the game wanted to go, and how they were going to play defense against us, especially coming off the bye week, kind of just was expecting probably getting something different, and it wasn’t anything too crazy. I mean, I feel like we were able to move the ball like we wanted to. We just didn't execute in crucial times when we needed to.
Q: Just comment on the running backs giving you the 2-and-4, 2nd-and-3 constantly in that second half. Just how was that going to play out with Pitt and Carolina in these cold weather games coming up?
JAMES: Yeah, that'll be huge for us. Coach O'Brien is always just constantly preaching about being on track, and that just makes it a lot easier for us as an offense… Just easily convertible situations. So, I mean, we got a lot of backs that can go out there and run the ball for us very well, an O-Line that blocks their butt off every week. So, I know we're confident in what we can do in the run game, and they make my job a lot easier when that happens.
Q: What was the biggest thing you learned from this game, and particularly in that final drive, what’d you learn from that one as well.
JAMES: Just give ourselves a chance. It's a tough situation to be in, it’s not always gonna be pretty or perfect, but just give us a chance to win. Anything can happen. I gotta get the ball out of my hands, not take sacks, that's entirely on me. But yeah, like I said, just got to give us a chance to at least try to win the game.
Q: Grayson, tough loss. But how do you feel about kind of coming back home, playing in front of family and friends? And did you have a lot of family and friends in the stands? And just how was that being able to come home and kind of perform in front of them?
JAMES: Yeah, it felt awesome. I think my final ticket count was around like 33 or 34 people so I had a good amount of family that was able to come see me so it was nice. It was a lot of fun, fun time out there, just from the jumps, being able to see them in pregame and stuff like that. But it's tough when you don’t come off on the winning side. So that kind of dims the mood a little bit forsure because that's all I want to do is win and win for BC football. So that didn’t happen today, so I wouldn't have marked as a failure, but we're onto next week in North Carolina and what's in front of us.
Q: Can you just take us through how this week unfolded, just given the Tommy situation?
JAMES: Yeah, I found out the news from coach on Sunday. He told me and then told the whole team what the plan was moving forward and he gave me a vote of confidence as well as everybody on the team as well. So we just move forward. I'm confident myself and having that behind me definitely helps a lot. And I felt like we were able to execute today, we just didn't come up, like I said earlier, in the crucial moments.
Q: To have that kind of put on you. I mean, you had a week to prepare but like this point in the season, I mean how much of that is like a weight on your shoulders there to kind of like [say] ‘here you go, it's game time?’
JAMES: Yeah. I mean, it's definitely [a] difficult situation, but it's nothing that I wouldn't want to be in a position to handle. I always prepare to play and whenever I decide I wanted to play college football, you want to play in games like this, and hurts not to win, but we got two more opportunities in front of us to go handle business, and I know the entire team is looking forward to that.
