Raiders' Coach Pierce's Entire Press Conference Today
HENDERSON, Nev.--The Las Vegas Raiders (6-8), only four days after being shut out at home by the Minnesota Vikings, had a historic night in a 63-21 beat down of the Los Angeles Chargers.
The Raiders set multiple records for the franchise, and Coach Antonio Pierce was obviously in good spirits as he held his weekly press conference.
You can watch the press conference in its entirety above.
The Las Vegas Raiders are all smiles today after a historic 63-21 win over the Los Angeles Chargers.
Darrell Craig Harris, Raiders Today
Below is the transcript of what Coach Pierce had to say about the game:
Raiders Interim Coach Antonio Pierce
Q: You made the decision this week to put Bo Hardegree up in the box. Obviously, that had an impact. I'm just curious about what went into you making that decision? The second part of that question is: I talked to you this week about attacking down the field and you said: ‘That's what we have to do.’ Can you talk about how you addressed it with the team and how they responded, sir?
Coach Pierce: "First, for Bo [Hardegree], it's just something I thought about over some time. It's been building up and obviously after last week's performance, we needed to make a change. And I think it worked out well for us. To your second question, I've been saying every week, that's the plan. A young quarterback, you've got to let it go and he did. And second play of the game, boom, we took a shot. Yeah, it wasn't completed, but that set the tone and you can see what we were going to do the rest of the game. Obviously, there was more opportunities later in the game. We have a lot of skilled players that we know, and it just takes confidence. I wish we could have done it on day one, I wish we could just draw it up and it's that easy, but obviously it took us six games to do it and I hope that's part of what's going to happen moving forward the rest of the year."
Q: Was there a sense of catharsisim terms of getting a lot of the frustrations out by the players? We had almost everyone on the scoreboard tonight.
Coach Pierce: "We talked about just having a short-term memory. I'm going to reference what Davante [Adams] said last week, that we were on the wrong side of history. Well, we're on the right side now. And that's the way we want to be. But it's like anything, turnovers, points, they always come in bunches and for us it became a frenzy, right? You saw it on defense. You saw it on offense. Special teams jumped on it. Just look at the sideline. I think if you're going to watch the game, if you didn't see it, you can just hear it. There was a lot of energy down there by those guys. Hats off to our team, they responded four days after what happened here previously."
Q: What was it like knowing that you guys scored a franchise history as 63 points?
Coach Pierce: "We knew at halftime what the record was. I was made aware of it, and we wanted to be aggressive regardless of what the score was, even if we only had 21 or 10. We were going to be aggressive and that was our mindset. I talked to our team about it last week, about playing better in the second half and I thought we did. This one was playing a full second half and not lifting off the gas pedal and hats off to them because that was their mindset."
Q: What does this win do for the confidence of the team and the coaching staff?
Coach Pierce: "It's big. Obviously, it doesn't matter who you play, it's hard to score 60-plus points in the National Football League. But I think just seeing the guys understand that if we execute and we do things the right way … you hear it all the time, right? It's kind of a cliche, believe in the process, and I think the guys have done that. They bounced back and like I told them on Tuesday, because I'll be honest, we were all down. I was down, I was into it, and the best thing that they did was they came to work and their mindset, their mentality, their energy, their bounce in the building, the way they were talking ... I had to slap myself and get out of the funk. And they got me out of the funk. I told them that on Tuesday, I told them that again today. Hats off to our players because that's what leaders and real men do. They bring others along with them, they brought me along and hell, we kicked some ass."
Q: You and Jack Jones go back a long way. He obviously had the pick-six. Can you just talk about the growth that you've seen in Jack Jones?
Coach Pierce: I've seen that two or three times to be honest with you, which is crazy. I've seen him do it in high school, I’ve seen him do it in college, and then to see him do it in here and we just got into it because he was getting into it with the refs and the other team, and I told Davante [Adams] to go tell him to shut up. And I was going to pull him, and then on the next play he makes the play, then I had to really pull him because I knew he was going to really act like a fool. But man, this is a talented individual. When we brought him in, I told Mr. [Mark] Davis and Champ [Kelly], this is a guy who just needs some love and maturity. He needs a good locker room around him, which we have, and he has really blossomed here and I'm glad that he's a Raider.
Q: Could you please talk about the backup offensive linemen who came in and performed well? And just the pride that you have in the guys and the next man up mentality?
Coach Pierce: Yeah, I'm going to start with Jermaine [Eluemunor]. He got a lot of slack and people got after that that first game, right? Six sacks, bench him, do this and that. And listen, it was his birthday yesterday, and I said, the best way to celebrate your birthday is blow out them candles right there on No. 52 (Kahlil Mack), and he did a hell of a job on that man. I think all those guys amongst the offensive line and to our offensive line coach Carmen [Bricillo] and Cam [Clemmons], they've done an excellent job of just getting the next man ready. We've been rotating guys throughout practice. It came to fruition last week, a short week. Dylan [Parham] went in there and did a hell of a job at center. We took Greg [Van Roten] out at guard, put another guy in there. I mean, you couldn't tell. Be honest, that's coaching and that's guys buying into what the coaches are saying, all the stuff that we've been doing it came to fruition.”
Q: How can you bottle something like tonight and take it on the road with you?
Coach Pierce: I'll be honest, we're going to treat this game like we did every game this year that I've been a part of, at least with me at the helm. Short-term memory. I gave them victory Friday off. We've got a Christmas party and we’re going to enjoy it. I'll give them a couple of days off. We'll come back and get ready for these World Champs. We played them tough here and maybe let an opportunity slip by and we'll move on to the next one. That's just what we've been doing. The biggest window in front of us is the front, not worrying about what's behind us.
Q: Rookie quarterback Aidan O'Connell after the last game said he believed he was the guy. He had confidence in himself no matter what happened. You went with him and he gave it back to you in terms of how he played. Can you just talk about what you saw from him?
Coach Pierce: I never lost confidence in him. There were a lot of questions asked throughout the week and I made it very clear, and I believe it was yesterday, that I've never wavered on anything. You asked me a question and I said: Yeah, I'll keep evaluating this if that’s what you want to ask me, I'll look into it.' But I made that decision with Aidan [O'Connell] when I first took over, and I don't think you ever go back on your gut. And Aidan is a rookie. When I was a rookie and I played, I made mistakes. I had ugly games and it's hard to play the position he plays, so he's going to have rough days and he had a rough day on offense last week. But you know what he did on Monday? His ass was the first one in the building. Know what he did yesterday? He's the last one in the building, he didn't leave. He stayed there all day until he got it right. The same thing today, he didn't leave the building all day after our morning meeting. So, here's a guy, he has a great opportunity, no different than me, and he's taking advantage of it, and tonight he's on the winning side
The Silver and Black will return to action versus their AFC West rivals, the Kansas City Chiefs, on Christmas Day at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City. Don't miss it on Monday, December 25, at 1:00 p.m. EST/10:00 a.m. PST.
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