What Gerad Parker said before Troy plays Louisiana Tech

Troy (4-4, 2-2 Sun Belt) hosts Louisiana Tech (6-2, 4-0) on Saturday for homecoming — the first meeting between the two programs. The Bulldogs lead the Sun Belt West and are undefeated in conference play. Gerad Parker, whose team earned its first road win of the season last Thursday in a 24-21 overtime victory at James Madison, said the standard of preparation must rise to match the opponent.

"Success and failure are both imposters," Parker said Monday. "There's a set of standards and a way that we must play. Our preparation, our accountability must go up. Our distractions must go down."

Parker said Louisiana Tech's identity starts with the turnover margin — "Turnover margin, turnover margin, turnover margin. They lead our league in it. It's the reason they're winning the West right now and are undefeated." He also said wide receiver Jywon Boyd is dealing with an internal matter and is not available "at any point in the near future," while both quarterbacks Goose Crowder and Tucker Kilcrease are available but in Parker's words "beat all to hell."

Full transcript

On the season, homecoming and the task ahead:

Gerad Parker: "Good morning. Hard to believe we're already in the back third of our season in game nine this week. It seems like a long time ago since we played last Thursday night. Great effort by our staff and players. Very happy for our players and the resilience to be able to grab our first road win on a five-day week, but it was a valiant effort by our defense and turnover margin being the key piece of it and how our offense kind of began to find itself in many ways minus the penalty play that we have to clean up.

"A great effort, one that we've already put to bed, and we've got to move forward because we have what is right now the Western leader in this conference in Louisiana Tech. We've got a huge task ahead of us and play another great opponent. There's a lot of respect for what all we've seen on tape. Our preparation, our accountability must go up. Our distractions must go down. And we have to understand that there's no emotion based on our performances or what had happened in the last game, whether it be in failure or success. As I've told our football team many times, success and failure are both imposters. There's a set of standards and a way that we must play and our staff must coach and accountability and standards for us to learn how to be at our best together. That's the whole key.

"Our team shared a great moment and that's the key to this — how good can we play at our best together to create memories that last a lifetime. Certainly excited about homecoming week here at Troy and hosting a home game on homecoming, welcoming back the 1976 and 1996 conference champions and bringing a bunch of guys back that have worn the same colors and the same helmet, to have them back as champions and let these guys feel some ties to what they hope one day when they get old they'll be able to come back and bring their family back to Troy University and celebrate the same things in their future."

On his reaction after Hayden Wolfe's game-winning field goal at JMU:

Q: "When watching the broadcast on Thursday night, I looked for you at the end when he kicked the 27-yard field goal and it seemed like you just kind of took a minute for yourself before everybody came over to you. What were your feelings in that moment?"

Gerad Parker: "It was not relief. If I'm being honest, maybe a smidge. But what it really was was a big nod down of some gratitude to just my family. My mom and dad who made the trip up with our best friends and came up and drove the four and a half hours from little old Louisa, Kentucky to come watch us play. And my mom was at her best when our best was required and her energy.

"It was a thought to my wife and children who've been through a tough week at Troy from some passionate fans. It was a big mode of gratitude to our staff and players who were resilient and found a way and they needed this moment.

"More than anything, it really was just a nod of gratitude. Everybody has different reactions. I think keeping composure at times when you hit game-winners, but you also may get a negative result, to me are important in some ways. That's not a kick I hit. Hayden Wolfe hit that kick. And I think our team won that game. For me to run around crazy and act the fool — maybe isn't the best look in my opinion for what this program's about, which is about our players. This is a player-driven game and we're here to serve our players.

"I think just taking a breath and thinking about all of them and all our scout team players and non-travel players that weren't a part of this — I quickly thought about them too because they have just as much to do with us preparing to win as anybody. So just a lot of gratitude there and a lot of thoughts about the people that have helped me and our team and other parts of our organization get to that point."

On the offensive line changes at halftime:

Q: "In the second half, I saw that you moved around the offensive line. I think you moved Luke into center. Why did you do that and how do you think it helped?"

Gerad Parker: "The why is the key first. We had a tough go of it at center, and with that it was a lot of communication issues that just popped up. I think some crowd noise, to be honest with you, in the first half, and their move calls and some things that they did up front really got to us. That always starts with the center. It's not the end-all, be-all, but it affected us some there.

"Before we were to go down too much further, it was simply something we had to do to give ourselves the best chance to win — to make a change and move some pieces around, which is why we did it."

On Justin Powe's performance against JMU:

Q: "Can you just talk about the game that Powe had? Obviously, the pick stands out to everybody, but those two breakups at the end were just probably just as big."

Gerad Parker: "I'm glad you said it. It's the truth. As good of plays as he made were the two pass breakups to finish regulation. He's in perfect body position on both of them. Does exactly what he's coached to do when he's supposed to do it. Those were two elite plays, just as the pick-six was. The pick-six was pretty special too. I just thought that he played at such a high level and attacked the ball really well.

"And I think too, if we can treat him with love and accountability in our team meeting — I also showed him some run fits and some things and mistakes that he made along with everyone else that we've got to continue to get better at. I think if we approach it that way, we don't get to a point where we just have relief or we feel good about how we play but we don't see the things we can keep getting better at. He played a great game and attacked the ball so well and showed poise on two late plays. That was the reason we got the game into overtime."

On team momentum and the danger of the "relief syndrome":

Q: "Throughout the season, you've said you have the pieces and you're still putting them together. After coming in as big underdogs and getting this result, do you feel like the team's morale will continue to grow?"

Gerad Parker: "I think you're spot on. Winning matters. I think though ultimately it's for our guys to see who they can be individually and collectively as a team together at their best. We've just not seen that yet out of this team. We took a massive step towards that at James Madison. That can be used as a catapult, or we can have what coach Saban talks about — the relief syndrome, where you take the collective breath and say, 'Wow, we won. Let's let off of it.' And it can affect you negatively.

"For this team to be at its best, we've got to worry less about preparing with certain emotions of either embarrassment or whatever that may have been from the last loss at home. There can't be a set of urgency that's only responsive or better against failure than it is when you have success if we want to be who we want to be here.

"If the proper momentum is taken from winning and knowing that we prepared really well — there were steps taken in all phases towards better, there's still much to fix — if that's the message and that's what we take from this as a team that grows, then it'll be used as a catapult. We'll play our best football down the stretch, which typically in my tenure here, we've done. We played really good football at the end of year one. We played really good football last year when needed to get to the conference championship game. It'll take our best now late in the year, and I hope we find that through preparation in the week."

On the overtime chess match with the field goal unit:

Q: "It seems like you had a little bit of a chess match going on there in overtime when you ran the kicker out on second down and they called timeout, then you ran the offense back out."

Gerad Parker: "It kind of hit me that we would think about kicking the field goal there. I particularly didn't want Hayden Wolfe to go out there and assumed that they would call a timeout to ice him. They did, which is what we wanted — to send him out there for. I wanted to see if they would. Had they not, we would have kicked the field goal from there and let it go because I wanted to be uninterrupted for him.

"They did call the timeout, and as soon as they did, the plan was to go back to offense, get more yards coming out of a timeout where they couldn't slow us down, which is something they did very well during the game — I'm sure you noticed. They still held us a little bit coming off the timeout, but it still got us in a position where there was a little bit of uncertainty for them. We knew what the plan was coming right out of it. Went right back to some run game that got us, I believe, down to the nine-yard line, making it a pretty good hit for us. That was the thought there as we talked through on the headset."

On short-week preparation and maintaining urgency:

Q: "In your two weird weeks with the seven days and this shorter week, it seems that preparation goes well for you. What's the difference versus a regular week?"

Gerad Parker: "I think there was less time for any type of distraction or to wear out the weight of such failure. That put us back to work. I think our team felt a certain sense of a back against the wall in our preparation. Our staff felt it too. I thought our game planning had to be clear and concise — get back to clarity equals velocity. What do our guys know? How can they execute fast? How can we play fast? Those moments have happened, and that's what happened on a short week of a five-day week.

"The lesson now, off of a little bit of a longer time and it being a nine-day game window, is how do we keep ourselves in the same mode of preparation and urgency without either practicing too much or trying to put up too much offense, defense, special teams scheme because we get to watch more tape — that we can't execute at a high level. It's a fine line. I think the short weeks kind of allowed us to do that in a positive way. We need to learn some lessons, me first as a head coach, to making sure we approach this week properly coming out of a little bit longer time."

On improving third-down efficiency:

Q: "How do you get better on third down? I think that in the second half of that game, that was the first third down you converted — just four for 15."

Gerad Parker: "We've not been good. We particularly have not been good throwing the football with enough efficiency, which is the key there. I think we were 0-for-8 in the first half on third down and then we were four of seven in the second half. That was critical — two of those being runs and two being passes.

"There are things you could point to about third down, but I think the biggest thing is we're just simply not throwing the ball well enough in big moments and little details that we're getting closer on. I thought we were better in that game, honestly. We just didn't hit them. We got open and got on top of people better. I'm hoping we've closed the gap on that.

"We've got to get open when there's man windows — the windows are tighter. The urgency to which we've got to win and be on time from our pass catchers, but also being accurate with the football at the quarterback position, are going to be key there. We've got to be better if we want to finish down the stretch like we want to on third down."

On quarterback health and Jywon Boyd's status:

Q: "What's the status at quarterback with Goose and Tucker?"

Gerad Parker: "Both are beat all to hell. In November, that's where half of our football team is. They're both available and ready to roll, but they're both beat to hell."

Q: "Healthwise, how are you guys coming out of the game? Can you talk about the status of Jywon?"

Gerad Parker: "To our health, there's really nobody else besides bumps, bruises and beat-ups. That's kind of where it is at this point. There's nobody that's been ruled out or that we feel like will be down the stretch of the week. There's just some guys we're going to have to get through the week and monitor, as with every team that's going through this late in the year.

"To Jywon — I appreciate the question. It's something that we're dealing with internally that has not made him available at any point in the near future on this football team. That's about how I'll keep it publicly."

On scouting Louisiana Tech:

Q: "When you look at Louisiana Tech, what stands out to you about them?"

Gerad Parker: "Turnover margin, turnover margin, turnover margin. They lead our league in it. It's the reason they're winning the West right now and are undefeated. They can run it. Their screen game is excellent. Their passing game is excellent. They get it to the right people. They have two special players and a lot of really good players on offense — the wide out and tight end are special and they find ways to get them touches. They can run it to you. Special teams is really good, and defensively is where they leave much of their identity as well. They create turnovers on defense. They keep the ball inside and in front. They've done an excellent job to this point.

"This is a tall task for our football team again, as we just faced the leader in the East going into that game and now we face the leader of the West. It'll get harder and harder. Tall task, one that I know our players and staff are excited to get ready for."