Cotton Bowl Media Day: Oklahoma Defense

DC Mike Stoops

On Johnny Manziel...

"He doesn't try to be anybody he's not. He plays to his strengths. He knows who he is as a football player right now and he uses those gifts to help him win. That's what any great quarterback or any great football player does. He knows exactly what he can and can't do and he tries to do those things as well as he can.

"Certainly his ability to extend plays ... there's not really a defense for that. Your whole defense gets stretched when you play him for 60 minutes and it's a handful."

On Manziel's surprising season as a freshman...

"Sometimes it's better when you don't know and have no expectations and go in there and fly by the seat of your pants and do things instinctively. He's very instinctive and those instincts are usually, as a football player, those are some of the most important qualities you can have. He knows what to do in each situation and he's done an unbelievable job.

On stopping Manziel...

"I don't think you stop him. I don't think anyone's stopped him. You try to contain him, limit his big plays, try to keep him in the pocket. That's all easier said than done. They do a job creating certain runs for him to give him running space and his offensive line does a great job of creating space. People don't realize what having such a strong offensive line does for his game. That's the other thing that I think makes him a great player is a great offensive line."

On whether a defense can overthink itself in planning for him...

"Well, again, you want to ... this game enables you an opportunity to create more looks. But we're not going to stray too far from what we've done all season. We have to adjust to him. And just how much we have to adjust to him, the game will dictate as you go along."

LB Tom Wort

On how the extra time benefitted the team in preparing for Johnny Manziel...

"The more time you get to work on a player, the better. Their entire offense creates problems for us that we need to work on. With all the different things they do, you need all the time you can get. So it's definitely a benefit to us."

On whether A&M is a different team than the one OU faced last year...

"Yeah. A lot of the same personnel but they made changes on their offense to adjust to the conference they're in. With a lot of the same players ... but their quarterback is a lot more mobile than last year. They've adjusted to Manziel and his style of play, which has made their offense even better."

On facing a running quarterback...

"I think we've lived and learned from some of the past games. Obviously, running quarterbacks — the quarterback draw, especially — have created huge problems for us. We've gone back, seen what we needed to do and made the adjustments that should definitely give us the best chance to succeed."

On his investment in the conference pride situation...

"I've always been an advocate for the Big 12. I love the way we play football here. It's obviously conference pride right here with the SEC and Big 12 going against each other. As I said earlier, I was just proud of the way Texas A&M went into the SEC and did real well."

On what makes the matchup intriguing to him...

"You've got two great offenses and two good defenses. Looking forward to seeing how it matches up. I'm looking forward to seeing how our defense can fix some of the problems that happened during the regular season. They went five-wides and would get us out of the middle and then run the quarterback draw. That was something we needed to fix. A lot of quarterbacks had a lot of rushing yards on us that way.

"Now that we're going against the best runner, we'll see if we can make adjustments. That's what I'm looking forward to seeing."

DB Aaron Colvin

On defending Mike Evans...

"He's good at using his body. He likes to box out DBs, running a fade or a quick stop. It's really just about getting in front of his big body. We've seen some big receivers this year, but they don't get thrown to as much as he does. He's definitely their go-to receiver, him and (Ryan) Swope."

On keeping up with receivers while Manziel extends plays...

"It's definitely tough because, for a secondary, you're already trying to play your receiver and stay locked to your receiver for a short time, and when you have a quarterback that can scramble and create more time for himself, it creates a problem. You just have to stay disciplined. You're going to get tired, you're going to get exhausted, but you've just got to keep playing."

On the A&M receivers' ability to move around while Manziel scrambles...

"They've gotten great. They're starting to create a bond between themselves. The receivers are sometimes bailing him out and sometimes he'll bail them out."

On whether they're 'flying the Big 12 flag' against the SEC...

"Definitely. And especially since it's an SEC team, everyone that says we're two of the top conferences and we want to be considered the top, so this is definitely going to help leading into this game."

DB Tony Jefferson

On preparing for Manziel's unpredictability...

"I don't think Johnny knows what he's going to do sometimes either. What he does is just amazing. But as a defense, you can't praise him too much. You've got to bear down and realize that we're going to have to put a stop to all that."

On his reaction to Manziel during the season...

"Just wow. But as a defensive guy, I don't like to give him too much credit."

On how much conference pride factors into the game...

"I think that's a huge factor nowadays. There's so much rivalry between conferences and there's so much talk between Big 12 and SEC, who's better, so I think this will be a good indicator."

"Yeah, I feel like it's a Big 12 game. They've been in the Big 12 and, plus, they run a Big 12 offense."