Nov. 18, 2003

Head coach Frank Tavani:

On the team's performance at Holy Cross:
"I was very pleased with our football team's attitude and effort against Holy Cross. It's never an easy trip up to Holy Cross, never an easy place to play. In my 17 years here, in eight trips up to Fitton Field, I think I might be even now at 4-4. I do know one thing, the trip home seemed very, very short after a solid win. We're certainly pleased with the performance, but more so with the dogged attitude of this football team. A lot of credit goes to our football team and our staff for holding everything together and battling and now we're sitting here 5-5 and going for the first goal of any football team, having a winning season."

On the seniors closing out their careers on Saturday:
"This time has flown by so quickly, I think it's even harder to believe that our first recruiting class, even though we had to scramble and get everyone together in about three short weeks after taking over the program in late December 1999, it seems like just the other day that this group was walking in the door. They certainly will go down in my memory as the group that we started with and bought into a hope and dream. They didn't have a lot to go on, just our word that we were going to work very hard to get this thing turned around and set a new foundation and a whole new direction of attitude for this program. They will be forever credited with that. There will be some that will say maybe we came up a little short and would have liked to have left with a championship, but there's no disappointment on my part because they gave an all-out effort and a great attitude all four years. It's a tremendous group. I'd take them anywhere and I'd battle anyone with this group of kids. Certainly there's a lot of sentimental value in watching these kids end their college careers on Saturday afternoon."

On Lehigh:
"I always like to be a little prophetic, and I said it at the media luncheon in preseason, they have the best defensive personnel in the conference. I still believe that. They're a great defensive team and a very sound offensive team. They, like us, are peaking right now, playing their best football of the season. Kyle Keating doesn't look like the quarterback who didn't start the season, he looks like a seasoned veteran. The first tape that I looked at was against the University of Connecticut, a pretty decent I-A team with some good wins under their belt this year. You do all this high-tech computer breakdown stuff and you ask the computer to give you all the runs that people had over five yards against them, and particularly against UConn and there's not seven in there. That frightened me right off the bat. We know and have a lot of respect for that program and what they've accomplished in terms of their program and our conference, but we also know we're as good of a football team as there is on any given Saturday and we can battle with anybody."

On recruiting this year's seniors:
"It was late in the process and a lot of players had already committed visits. We were short-staffed at the time but I thought our system was such that we were going to find some talent out there. There's always some kids that you think are going to be really good and it doesn't turn out that way and then other players that are there just because it's late recruiting. John Weyrauch was in locker 103, not really projected out of that class to be doing what he's done, which again is a tremendous credit to him as an individual."

Junior linebacker John-Frank Stubits:

On drawing an excessive celebration penalty at Holy Cross:
"I was lined up as a defensive end on that play, and I had been talking to Casey McKeen all week long and he's kind of down after getting hurt and he called me at the hotel on Friday night. He was telling me how much he wished he could be there. I told him, if I get a sack, you'll be there right there with me so I gave him a little five-seven. I think I was a little too excited and the ref did the right thing by throwing the flag."

Senior receiver John Weyrauch:

On preparing for his final game:
"Right now it just seems like any other week. I don't think it's really set in my mind that it's my last game and I'm not going to have another opportunity to step on the field with my teammates. I'm still approaching it as a Lafayette-Lehigh game and you have to prepare a little harder and watch a little more film."

On playing with roommate Marko Glavic:
"Obviously he was a level ahead of me our freshman year talent-wise and with his abilities. I just tried to work as hard as I could on scout team to try and get up to that level where he was at. Thankfully I was able to work hard enough, I had some great coaching, and I was able to reach that level."

Senior quarterback Marko Glavic:

On preparing for his final game:
"It really hasn't sunk in too much yet. It probably will today when we start practicing and as the week progresses and the more hype and everything that gets going around campus. It's something that next week or over break will sink in and I'll realize that was my last college football game. When I look back on that game I'm hoping it's a win. That would be a great way to go out."

On playing with roommate John Weyrauch:
"I didn't really talk to him much as a freshman. He lived on the other side of campus and he was on the scout team so I didn't really associate with him too much. We didn't really become good friends until sophomore year when we were roommates. I always remember hearing, especially freshman year, about this kid on the scout team who was just ripping the defensive backs up. Phil Yarberough, who was a great receiver, told me to watch out for this Weyrauch kid, that he was doing great things with the scouts and that he would do good things with the varsity. All the DB's too told me that he was doing really well down there and that in no time he would be up. At first I really didn't know much about him, but he's turned out to be a great player."

Junior linebacker Wes Erbe:

On the defense's leaders and last year's performance against Lehigh:
"It's a combination of players. It's not that one guy but I think guys like myself and John-Frank and Pat Brown and Casey McKeen, when he was playing, really try to keep the group together and playing hard. We had a good gameplan, but we really played with a lot of emotion that game. They were inside our 50 a lot and we held them and forced a couple turnovers and held them on third downs, and I think that's how we won the game, at least defensively."