California Head Coach Sonny Dykes

 
General comments:
"I want to say how proud I am of the players and the way they hung in there and just kept playing. We got down a little bit early and nobody panicked. It's amazing what a little confidence and hard work will do for you. These guys have worked incredibly hard and have confidence in their ability to battle and figure out a way to win a football game. That's what we did tonight. None of this was easy – I promise you. I was really proud of our defense in the second half; I felt we played incredibly well. We gave up a bunch of points in the first half and they really tightened up and did what they needed to do to give us a chance to win. In the third quarter. Offensively, we had three drives in a row that we just killed. We had a third-and-short where we tried to draw Texas offsides when the center snapped the ball, and they didn't jump. We had a receiver bust through a route. We just kept shooting ourselves in the foot offensively in the third quarter. But the guys just kept playing, and we made some plays down the stretch when we needed to. We were fortunate that Texas didn't cover that ball at the end; it might have been a whole different press conference had that happened. We were lucky that didn't happen. We learned a valuable lesson tonight. I don't think you'll ever see that happen again with any of our players. But again, I'm really proud of the way they persevered and fought. It's a big win for them and a big win for our program."
 
On what it means to beat a traditional powerhouse like Texas back-to-back years:
"Our schedule's tough. Our schedule is probably top three in college football. This was a top-11 team; they were ranked 11th. We'll play these kinds of teams week in and week out. We did what we needed to do to win, and I think that gives you confidence. To get those stops defensively like we did in the second half, to make some plays down the stretch, to be able to run the ball at the end of the game and run the clock out, to get that critical stop – all those things we'll draw a tremendous amount of confidence from, and hopefully we'll build off that."
 
On California recovering after penalties:
"I think four of their drives we gave them 15-yard penalties. We talked to our guys at halftime about being disciplined and playing within themselves. We were killing ourselves in some ways. You have to give Texas credit, they've got a good football team. Their backs are big, their offensive line is physical. I thought our guys kept hanging in there and kept battling. We got them in some long-yardage situations. When we did that, we got them on the ground when we needed to. Once we quit giving them 15 yards on those drives and made them earn it, we had a lot more success."
 
On what the Golden Bears have learned from their first three games:
"I think our guys showed up. We didn't play particularly well defensively last week. We gave up a lot of rushing yards. They showed up Sunday and went to work. We knew we had some issues we needed to address, we still do. We gave up a bunch of yards rushing tonight. It's pretty clear that people are going to try to run the ball against us, but at the end of the game we made the plays to give ourselves a chance to win. It wasn't exactly how you'd draw it up, but we figured out a way to get it done."

California Players

Chad Hansen, WR
On how the first three weeks of the season have been, and producing at a high level:
You know it's awesome that all of my hard work has been paying off, and it may say that on the stat sheet but this win is for the O-line. They protected Davis and were able to do their job all night, and I was able to get open and do my job. All the credit goes to them, honestly.
 
On flashing the Longhorn symbol after a touchdown:
Yeah, you know me and my friends before the game got together and said that may be something that I want to do, so yeah.
 
Davis Webb, QB
On what it was like for him to beat Texas:
I grew up watching the Longhorns for so long, and you grow up in Texas that's the college in that state, and seeing Vance Bedford's press conference this week and him throwing a couple jabs at me, personally, and a couple players on our team saying how I was only a top-four quarterback in the Big 12, if I was still in the Big 12. So I had a lot of motivation for this game, and we out-toughed them. They did a great job executing their game plan, but all week we wanted to be the tougher team and get more effort, and I think we did that tonight. We ran the ball better than we have all year against a great top-15, top-12 team, and that's a great thing to pick up on, and we'll just keep on moving forward.
 
On what beating a national powerhouse like Texas doe for the program:
Me, personally, it's a statement across the country especially Texas that Cal has gone in there last year and played a great game, then when Texas came all the way out here, we played a great game so I think what Cal's done with Coach Dykes implementing a great culture, that's the biggest reason that I came here. When I saw the practices in spring and watched games, you could see the culture that coach Dykes has installed, that's the credit to him and all of his plans have carried out pretty good.
 
On equal passing and running plays vs. last week heavy pass:
I think the o-line played great and I think we challenged them this week to run the ball effectively, and they did that and then some. The Texas D-Line is no joke, they're all four or five-star recruits, Malik Jefferson played a great game. Chris Boys played a great game and there are so many guys on that side of the ball that played really well. I just think the credit is due to our o-line and our coaching staff that helped us prepare this week. We can enjoy tonight, but as soon as we get up here tomorrow we got another practice and got a tough one next week.

Texas Head Coach Charlie Strong

Opening Statement:
"This is a tough and disappointing loss. We gave up too many big plays on defense, had our chances on offense and turned it over a couple of times. In our first road game, we expected to play better. We have to play better, knowing our whole attitude when you're on the road and how your preparation has to be different. Having two home wins and then coming out on the road, we had to have our team better prepared and we didn't."
 
On Any Explanation about Final Cal Drive & Fumble:
"I don't think that hurt us. Number one, the ball shouldn't have gotten down there. We had too many opportunities before that play."
 
On Possibly Going For It On 4th Down:
"We had the ball and had two timeouts left and hoped that we would get a stop before then, but Cal busted out on third down."
 
On Seeing Improvements From The Defense:
"I don't think that the defense will hold us back, we just have to get defensive stops and we have to make plays on defense. If you go back to the start of the second half, we were able to get off the field. And right there in the fourth quarter, we were able to make some plays, but we do have to get better on defense."
 
On Defensive Game Plan Going into Game:
"We knew we needed to press and challenge the receivers and we didn't do a good job. Some of their throws came when guys busted coverage and were wide open. There was the one that they threw in the corner against us, the corner route against our defensive backs. You have to challenge guys and you can't be afraid to walk up on them."

Texas Players

Tyrone Swoopes, QB
On the challenge of switching over to conference play after today's loss:
 
"We can't do anything about the loss now. Nothing will change. We just have to go focus on the conference."
 
On the most disappointing factor:
"Not executing enough. All the penalties hurt us and all the small things held us back. That is the most disappointing thing."
 
Sheroid Evans, CB
On Hansen getting past him and the defense.
"We knew he was the go-to-guy and we prepared for him but we just didn't execute as a secondary."
 
On the young guys in the secondary:
"It's not an issue with them being young. We all watch film together. We just didn't show that. We didn't show that we put in the extra hours of studying our opponent and we gotta get back to it next week."