Page 27 - Toledo Football Media Guide - 2012

2012 OUTLOOK 27

With Coach Campbell

Q: The Rockets were 7-1 in the MAC and in a position to win the MAC title in each of the last two seasons but came up short both times. That has to be a big motivator for this team.

Campbell: No question.We’ve been in a position towin the conference each of the past two years. It takes a lot of hard work, week-in and week-out, to get to that point. We want to be the team in our conference, the team that is always there fghting for the title. But as I said, that ultimate goal, the MAC Championship, is still out there for us.

Q:TheonlyMAC teamthat has defeatedToledo thepast two seasons is Northern Illinois. Does that make the game at DeKalb on Nov. 14 all the more important?

Campbell: It’s potentially a big game, no question. But it would be a mistake to limit your outlook to just one game in this conference. If you’re not prepared eachweek, you’re not going to show up for a game and you’re going to get beat. Also, we tell our kids that every teamout there is usually playing their best game against the Rockets because of our tradition. We know Northern Illinois has a great football program, but we don’t want to discredit anyone else we play in our conference. Everybody’s got a story, everybody’s got talented players. Every week we will have to play our best to win.

Q: Will you keep some of the team policies and motivational tools that were started under Coach Beckman, like requiring players to sit in the first two rows of class, requiring them to participate in community service, breaking the team up into smaller competing groups during practice and so on?

Campbell: I’ll give Coach Beckman a lot of credit. When we frst got here (in 2009), we spent a lot of hours early on developing the foundation of this program. We worked really hard to change the academic standards of our team and to change the image of our program in the community. That hasn’t changed and it won’t change. We will continue to require players to sit in the frst two rows of class. We will continue to be involved in the community. We will continue to do the kinds of team-building activities that motivate players.

We want to keep all that and make it even better. This past spring we had our best semester academically since we’ve been here, well above a 2.9 team GPA. Community service-wise we had more hours served this past spring than we’ve ever had before. We had great competition amongst our players last spring, as well.

Q: How does it feel to be coming into your frst full seasonasheadcoach?Obviouslyyou’vehadexperience as an assistant coach, but how is it diferent now?

“ We are blessed at quarterback, that’s for sure. Terrance ranked No. 6 in the country in quarterback ef-ciency and Austin was No. 21. They have both done a great job of being productive in our system. Both of them have led our team to victory in big games. Our team is confdent with either one of them at quarter-back.”

- Matt Campbell on quarterbacks Terrance Owens (left) and Austin Dantin (right).