Legas’ return, Anderson’s connections to New Mexico, and other highlights from USU’s Week 10 Press Conference

FILE PHOTO: Utah State football takes the field before their football game against Air Force on October 8th in Logan. Photo by Lorene Hale

LOGAN – On Monday, Utah State football head coach Blake Anderson addressed the media to preview his team’s upcoming Week 10 matchup with New Mexico. Also participating in the press conference were junior outside linebacker Kaleo Neves and junior tight end Josh Sterzer. Here are the highlights from the half-hour presser. The full audio can be found on the Full Court Press podcast feed on 1069thefan.com

Importance of Saturday’s game

Anderson: “No bigger game than the one we’re going to play Saturday…We are fighting desperately to be bowl eligible. Fighting to stay in the race whatever that looks like. And it’s proven to be chaotic. But this is a big game. It’s a must-win for us. We talked about it in the meeting room. It’s a must-win. It’s the next step to get closer to bowl eligibility, closer to a winning season and stay in the race.”

Cooper Legas’ expected return

Anderson: “I expect Coop to be the guy. He had a great practice last night in a non-contact environment. All indications are is that he’ll move forward without problems and be the guy. He obviously can’t have a setback. But he is on track and past that part of the protocol and should be the starting quarterback and ready to go on Saturday.”

Sterzer: “Cooper brings that experience. He’s not quite super experienced, he does have more than Bishop. He can stay cool and collected. He does open up our playbook a bit more. Everybody loves Coop, we all ride with all of our quarterbacks so we’re excited to have him back.”

Other injury updates and filling in for still-injured players

Anderson: “Broc Lane is good, had a great practice last night. Byron Vaughns, (Falepule Alo), those are guys that are trending in the right direction, I would expect to be ready. MJ Tafisi is day-to-day. He would not have been able to play yesterday, and we’ve still got a week ahead of us and he is moving in the right direction. Probably the most questionable for us right now would be him. The others all should be ready and able to practice, honestly probably full-speed as early as Tuesday if not Wednesday.”

Neves: “It’s pretty late in the season so injuries are kind of inevitable at this point. So that next man up mentality, we’re gonna have some people step up and make sure that they’re ready to go.”

Growth of outside linebacker/striker Kaleo Neves

Anderson: “Kaleo just keeps getting better and better every week. He was slated as the number two [on the depth chart preseason]. And going into the spring game with Switzer going down. I think he took the offseason very seriously. Not that he’s played without mistake, nobody does. But he has reduced his mistakes drastically throughout the course of the year. He’s shown the ability to play with range, play in the backfield, play physical where he needed to.”

Neves: “With every game I learn new things, I do things that are great and I do things technical-wise that I can work on. But as far as the season has gone on I’m pretty sure I’ve done a pretty good job of fixing those mistakes and keep progressing and moving forward.”

Connections to New Mexico

For context, Anderson’s first FBS coaching job came at New Mexico where he coached for three seasons from 1999-2001, taking a role first as a running backs coach and then wide receivers coach in 2001. Anderson worked under then-head coach Rocky Long. Long currently serves as the defensive coordinator for the Lobos after tenures a head coach at New Mexico (1998-2008) and San Diego State (2011-2019).

Anderson: “(Long) gave me a huge break in the profession. I did not have a pedigree, didn’t have some fancy name or any trophies on the shelf. Just a hard-working guy coming up in the profession. And Rocky put some trust and faith in me and hired me to come coach running backs, eventually moved to coach wideouts before moving on as a coordinator at Middle Tennessee. I would tell you I owe a tremendous amount of credit for my career to Rocky Long and his faith and what he saw in me as a young coach. I’ve referred to him as my football dad, he doesn’t necessarily like that as much as I do. But I really do believe that without his trust and giving me an opportunity, not sure I’d be the head coach sitting in front of you today.”

On off-the-field distractions

Anderson:  “We’ve dealt with our fair share of things off the field through the course of my time as a head coach. Not sure that I’ve seen any more than what we’re dealing with now. Just trying to keep focused on the kids and give them my very best and give them a chance to get better. It’s hard to say we’ve seen any heavier or any worse than what we’re dealing with right now.”

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