Aug. 30, 2003
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NEW MEXICO vs. TEXAS STATE
Saturday, August 30, 2003
University Stadium – Albuquerque, N.M.
NEW MEXICO HEAD COACH Rocky Long
“I enjoyed the first part of the game, I didn’t enjoy the rest of it. Idon’t like to be in games like that. I’ve been on the other end and they’renot very fun at all. It was fun for our players, but it wasn’t fun for me. Alot of guys got to play. We played the first teamers in the first half andeverybody else in the second. We played three kickers, we ran four or fivedifferent guys. We played every player that we had that wasn’t redshirtingand that was suited up. We played everyone of them that was on defense andwe played them more than one or two plays. It rewards the guys thatpractice, they got to play in a tight game. So I guess it helps your teamspirit, but I hate those types of games.”
TEXAS STATE HEAD COACH MANNY MATSAKIS
“It wasn’t all that bad, the score made it seem worse than it was. The thingI noticed was that our guys finished, they played hard. I think we need toput something like this behind us and learn from it. We’ve got an offensethat’s moving the ball quite a bit. We were playing against a team that’s inthe top tier of Mountain West Conference schools. I thought we played clean,we didn’t take any cheap shots. I predict we’re going to be a lot betternext week.”
(on his decision to go for fourth downs): “We didn’t come here to keep thescore close. We could’ve kept the game within 30 points. The idea is to keepon pressing.”
NEW MEXICO KICKER Katie Hnida
“I really didn’t have any expectations about it. We were just going to seehow the game rolls. I was making some strides in my kicking, hoping I’d getanother shot. It’s been eight months since my last kick (vs. UCLA in the LasVegas Bowl) and I’ve been wanting to redeem that. It’s indescribable, ittruly is. I’ve been working for so long and gotten so far to get to thispoint. It’s just amazing.”
(on the reaction from her teammates): “We just hugged and they said goodjob. These guys and these coaches are a big reason this was able to happentonight. I really cannot stress enough how this situation at New Mexico hasbeen so good to me and made it possible for me to do what I’m doing here. Itruly don’t think this would be possible at a lot of other programs. It’s anincredibly special place.”
NEW MEXICO RUNNING BACK DonTrell Moore
“This is just a start. We’re only going to get better. I think we showedsome real versatility tonight. We showed signs of being able to go vertical(passing the ball). This is just a start though.”
NEW MEXICO SAFETY Sidney Wiley
“Coming in to this game, we knew we had to play hard. We were facing aDivision I-AA team that wanted to shock the world. Good teams come out andmake plays and that’s exactly what we did. We know that next week we play atTexas Tech though. We still remember last year’s game well.”