Holtz Reviews 1996 Prospects
"Looking back at 1995, we dealt with an awful lot of adversity
beginning with the opening ball game (loss to Northwestern), and yet we
got better and better as the year went along. We hung in there, we showed
great tenacity and we found a way to win. The most encouraging thing is
that most of those players are coming back.
"We finished number 11 in the country and our only losses were
close games to teams that finished number six and number eight. A lot of
people off that team are back. We got the chemistry right last year and
that's always important. There's no guarantee that this season will be
a great year, but I think we're on solid footing now.
"By the end of last season we had gotten to the point where our
players went into games expecting to win and I hope we'll see a carryover
there.
"We know where we have questions in terms of personnel, and the
secondary and the wide receiver spots are where we still have to find some
answers. It's going to be important in those areas for us to develop before
we start the season.
"We will incorporate some of the things we did against Florida
State into our offense. We're still going to run the football, but we're
going to be a little more wide open in terms of the passing game. We just
took one part of our offense and expanded it. It's going to be critical
for us to read coverages, to be able to check off and to become very familiar
with what we're doing and how we're doing it.
"Last year we lost three games and we had a chance to win all
three of them. We also won at least three games that were extremely close
and that we could have lost. We want to get to the point where we can play
a national championship caliber team and not have to play a perfect game
to win.
"We want to get to the next level. To do that we have to make
the same amount of improvement this year as we made last year."
