Jaguars 24, Colts 0
Q. First off, your overall thoughts about the game? Obviously lots to like I'm sure.
DOUG PEDERSON: Just overall very proud of this group. Just how resilient they are. To bounce back from a loss last weekend to putting things together this weekend against a divisional opponent who I have a lot of respect -- obviously you know for Frank and his team. Just very proud of our guys, the way they worked in practice this week and how they came out and really took charge of this game from the opening drive.
Q. What did you see on film during the week leading up to this game that really allowed you to key in and shut down the run game of the Colts and take them out of so much of what they wanted to do?
DOUG PEDERSON: I'll tell you, a lot of respect for their run game and Stewart and the guys. They did a great job. It's nothing that you see on tape. It's just about us. It's about being physical and just understanding to stay disciplined in your run fits and your eye discipline on things.
Just our guys did a great job, just rallying to the ball, getting him on the ground. It was a focus for us this week in practice. Just a credit to how hard our guys worked to understand and then eliminate the run.
Q. Offensively what did you have in your game plan that limited you from taking the shots downfield? We saw a lot of underneath, intermediate type stuff. Was that game plan or a reaction to what they were doing?
DOUG PEDERSON: It was a little of both. Gus Bradley, gosh, he's great at what he does. What I appreciate about Gus and his scheme is they kind of just show you one thing. He'll mix it, but he'll show you one thing, and you've got to stay completely disciplined going against a guy like Coach Bradley.
I thought our guys did that. Trevor was efficient, got the ball out of his hand. Some of it was by play call and design to help him a little bit.
We had moments where we had some shots dialed, just for whatever reason we also had them alerted to some runs. They took it away, so we had to run the football in those situations.
It's hard to express that and explain that obviously when you're not in the game plan meeting and understand kind of what we're trying to get done.
Q. Both sides of the ball right out of the gate really clicking for you today. As a coach, can you feel it, especially offensively, early in a game that you know it's going to work on this particular day?
DOUG PEDERSON: You hope. You know, you've got a lot of football left. It's a 60-minute game. You've just got to take it one play at a time. One thing I learned a long time ago is you never get too high and you never get too low. Listen, they were down I think 20-3 last weekend and came back and tied that football game.
Anything is possible. We just have to stick to our process and stick to what we were doing.
Q. I've always been told that coaches learn the most about their team between game 1 and game 2. Did you learn anything about your football team today?
DOUG PEDERSON: I just learned that this group is eager to win. They want to win. They put in the hard work during the week. That's something I've been very proud of this group and really appreciate what they've done and how they've been able to take the mistakes from a week ago and sort of minimize them going into this week and really attacking the game plan and really just attacking their job.
Q. First drive of the game you had a 4th down situation. I think it was a 4th and 4 and you went for it at that point. Is that more of the push them to that confidence level you need them to be because you dominated the time of possession today.
DOUG PEDERSON: Yeah, it's just a credit to the guys. Execution there, I think it was a great throw and catch to Zay Jones to get the 1st down.
Again, we were in one of those areas of the field where it's a little bit gray. Too long for a field goal and maybe a little bit too short for a punt. You're okay if you don't make it. But I'm going to try to be as aggressive as possible, give our guys opportunities. I think once we got that one and another one after that, it just kind of felt comfortable for them.
We've just got to continue to work those scenarios and prepare our football team that way.
It does help the confidence of the team when you do go for one on 4th down and you get it and stay on the field. We ended up with points there.
Q. There was a little chatter last week about Trevor's accuracy, but today I'm sure this is his best completion percentage of his career, but did you guys work on anything in particular rhythm, timing stuff? You talked about the pitch and runs. In practice, though, did he really get diligent about trying to improve his accuracy?
DOUG PEDERSON: You know, every week we work on that kind of stuff and try to be as efficient as possible. My hats off to Press Taylor, the coordinator, and Jim Bob, Mike McCoy and the guys for really putting together a great plan and really helping Trevor. That's something that we as a coaching staff kind of take away from the week before. We've got to help our guys. We can't just throw a bunch of plays out there and expect them to execute. We've got to help them.
That's why we practice. That's why we go out and do the things we do. I thought Trevor did an outstanding job today getting the ball out of his hand. He saw things really well. There were a lot of catch, break tackles and first 1st downs, things like that. He threw hot a couple times. Those are all the things he's capable of doing, and yeah, we continue to work on that work every week.
Q. Defensively we've been talking about how good this defense could be for a while now. Was this maybe more of what you thought it could be than last week?
DOUG PEDERSON: Yeah, they played extremely well. We know Indy was down a couple of their pass catchers and good pass catchers, so who knows. But I'll tell you what, my hats off to Mike Caldwell, great defensive plan. The guys executed it during the week in practice, and again, to me that's where you win football games is during the week, and then you just go out and execute the plan. For them to fly around today and do the things they did, get after the quarterback, create turnovers, all the things we talk about, we saw it. Things are starting to kind of, I think, click for guys.
Still a lot of football ahead of us. We've got to play this team again, and we've just got another great opponent next week.
Q. Coach, we know that this is a passing league now, but we saw what seemed to be a concerted effort to really maintain balance today, I think 30 pass attempts, 37 run attempts. Was that in the back of your mind, or were you just calling the game in the flow?
DOUG PEDERSON: You know, again, I seem to learn from experience, but you do what it takes to win, bottom line. You do what it takes to win. If that means running it 37 times or 47 times or 50 times or 10 times, you do what it takes to win the football game.
It was just a great opportunity, and again, credit the offensive line, Phil Rauscher had those guys prepared, and it was good balance. Overall it was a great balance for us.
Q. When you were hired you talked about the process and you said it would take a while to kind of get to where you wanted to go, and you needed some patience from the fans. To be able to have a performance like this in the home opener, how much do you think this will keep fans engaged and keep that bond between the team and the fans stronger than it might have been in previous years?
DOUG PEDERSON: Yeah, I thought we had a really good crowd today. They got loud on a couple of those defensive 4th down plays in the second half, and that was good to see the guys out there.
Listen, you get paid to win games, right. You win, the fans show up. I'm a fan. I want to go watch a winner. I'll pay money to go see a winner.
We have to just win games. This was a great start today. There's a lot of football left, but the crowd was excellent today. Hats off to them. They showed up even after the rainstorm there in the first half. But credit to them, and hopefully we can keep the momentum.
Q. Except for the deep ball that almost got intercepted early on in the game, it seemed like Trevor was just on point with just about everything, his decision making, where he went with the ball, things like that. Could you talk a little bit about that?
DOUG PEDERSON: Why do you always bring up the negative first? (Laughter.) You know that holding call on 2nd and 10, but the third...
What was your question?
Q. With the exception of I won't mention it, it seemed like Trevor was pretty much on point with everything today, not just his throws but where he went with the ball, where he decided to go with it.
DOUG PEDERSON: Yeah, a lot of it was by design, the designed play call at the time. We worked on that stuff in practice this week. We knew going into this game -- listen, this is a Gus Bradley defense. They're going to be sound at what they do. They're going to be in the right spots, so we have to be in the right spots and we have to be disciplined in the passing game, and there are some areas of the field that you can try to get after, but yet the ball has to come out on time because they rally and tackle.
I thought Trevor did a great job in that aspect of just getting the ball out of his hand, getting it to the right spot. Guys stayed disciplined in the game like we talked about and executed that well.
Q. In terms of all three phases, is this as close to the kind of game that goes just the way you draw it up?
DOUG PEDERSON: I would have to say so. Maybe shy of the Super Bowl a couple years ago. But yeah, the guys, listen, they took full advantage of the week of practice and understood the game plan. I challenged them to stay in their play books and know the game plan inside and out, all three phases. They did that, and when they do that, you can kind of see the execution on the field.
Q. We saw two touchdown passes from Trevor Lawrence to Christian Kirk. Is that a connection that you've seen growing in practice, or was it just right place, right time, great play execution today?
DOUG PEDERSON: Yeah, it's something that we've started back in the spring with those two kind of building that relationship. Christian is a great player. That's why we went out and got him in free agency, and you can see it now two weeks in a row, some of the plays that he's made. He's made an impact for our offense.
Yeah, it's just a matter of them just continuing to work, stay on the same page.
Again, coming up with game plans that help Christian get open and Trevor to find him.
Q. Did you get a game ball in the locker room?
DOUG PEDERSON: I did.
Q. How meaningful was that, and did you almost run out of game balls because so many other guys had so many big performances today?
DOUG PEDERSON: It's special. It's my first win, obviously, as the head coach here, but it's a team win. We celebrate as a team.
I appreciate that, and it will definitely go on the mantle at the house, but my hats off to those guys in the locker room. They're the ones that did it. I didn't get hit. I didn't have to throw any passes or run the ball. So all credit to the team.
Q. You only have six division games, so starting out 1-0, how important is that to the race to winning this thing?
DOUG PEDERSON: It's something we talked about this week. The AFC South, it's a great division. It's only going to get better and stronger. This is a great football team today. It's going to be a different game next time we play them.
In order for any team to get to the postseason, you've got to be able to win your division, so this was a great step in that direction.
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