Coach Matt Rhule Press Conference Notes - Week 1 vs. UTEP -Excited to play a home game and UTEP-Coach has known UTEP’s HC for a while-“We’ve worked very hard to get to this day”-Was hoping the RB battle would be more dialed down at this point, but will determine who the true RB1 is closer to Big Ten play-Janiran Bonner is tough and a winner, he will do a lot of things, versatility wise-Will be interesting how the offense handles different defensive fronts-“I’d rather lose the first game than the last game, we’re going to play” - when talking about Dylan Raiola’s mindset going into the first game-“How we’d want him to play when he’s a junior, we’re going to start day 1 that way”-Blye Hill came back from his knee injury, then got some soreness in his hamstring. We’ll see how this week goes but not likely to play much on Saturday-Gunnar Gottula is injured, will not play-Malachi Coleman is healthy, had a groin injury previously which is why he is further on the depth chart right now-Tristan Alvano is available, kicking competition will take place this week-Need guys to learn how to win-Coach Rhule brings up the ice that his Baylor team has, brings up game-winning drives there, and says this Nebraska team needs to get there-Offensive football is about getting the ball into the hands of guys that can make plays-Jahmal Banks is here to impact other people, “such a life of gratitude” - he led the team in community service hours-“The impact of Jahmal Banks will be here for a while”-Dylan Raiola has done a good job of humbly working - he was in there at 6am riding the bike this morning-“We’re gonna run it and throw it, not just run it... we want to play complementary football”-When you watch UTEP’s offense, they test every facet of the defense - they use tempo, run the QB, spread the field, etc.-Different type of test than you get in the Big Ten-Rahmir Stewart needs to keep his weight down to 205, he’ll get some reps at special teams for now-Coach Rhule describes the amount of film watching required to prepare for a team like UTEP, especially when they bring in transfers-“Nothing should be different” in terms of playing in front of the fans-Wants to see us ride the high and lows of the game-Playing against a good pass rusher requires contributions from all 11 guys on offense-UTEP will come in and try to win-Blackshirts will be given out tomorrow-“Playing at home is about way more than just us”-Coach Rhule on running the bleachers - “this is gonna have to be a player-led team because I cant do this” -Looking to incremently improve throughout the season-“Phalen Sanford is the epitome of what we’re trying to build here”-We feel confident we can play ~10 guys on the DLine-Still deciding which Coaches will be in the box this year-Marcus Satterfield and Garret McGuire will likely be up there-Most of the position coaches on defense will be on the field-Managing the substitutions vs UTEP will be important given their tempo