Indiana moved to 2-3 on the 2021 season following a 24-0 loss on the road to No. 4 Penn State.
The Hoosiers have a bye week next week.
Here is everything head coach Tom Allen, wide receiver Ty Fryfogle and linebackers Micah McFadden and Cam Jones had to say following the loss.
Tom Allen | Indiana Head Coach
On the status of Michael Penix Jr. ...
ALLEN: Yeah, it's defiantly his shoulder, his throwing shoulder. So, we will continue to evaluate that. We have to do some tests tomorrow to find out what the key issue is.
On the offensive struggles...
ALLEN: Yeah, I mean they have a really good defense and they make it really hard to run the football and have done that consistently. We obviously got to look at the film and figure out the answers to do a better job. We got to do a better job as a staff, I have to do a better job as a head coach, and make sure we're able to take that pressure off our throwing game and stay on the field. We got to get first downs and we didn't get very many and that's just not good enough. We have to be able to do that to win games in this conference. So, to me, we got to use this bye week coming up to get guys healthy, but more importantly to get ourselves in the right mindset to be able to move the ball effectively on offense and win football games.
On the fourth down decision making...
ALLEN: More the distance you know. It's fourth and one inside the ten and I've said it before and I'll say it again, you don't win road games kicking field goals in those situations and I'm going to go for that every time. Obviously, we expect to get it, but the other one was longer than that and we kind of just felt like it's a lesser percentage. We talked about it and said, "hey do you go for it here?" and in hindsight we probably should've just went for it. We wanted to get points on the board and just get some momentum, just something positive.
On the offensive execution...
ALLEN: I think execution was a big problem tonight. Obviously, I'm going to watch the film and we'll have more specific answers about moving forward. Just from what I watched and saw, we just didn't execute with things we were trying to do and things we're trying to call. It's not just on the offensive line, but it obviously starts with them, big men lead the way and they got to get the job done and they weren't good enough. We got to coach better, we got to play better, and we got to find ways to ways to take some pressure off some things we can do well.
On the strength of schedule...
ALLEN: I would think so and we saw that today. What Cincinnati did and what Iowa did last night, they're very good football teams. All I know is we played those teams and they're all really, really good. It is what it is and there are no excuses. We'll look ourselves in the mirror, we're going to get back up, and we're going to fight. I promise you that. You know, that's one positive thing about playing good football teams. There's no question that they'll expose you on what exactly you need to work on and that's how you get better. You stay together as a football team and our guys will. We have a lot of character in our locker room and a lot of guys that have invested a whole lot in this program. I believe in them, and they believe in what we're doing. Bottom line is that we have to play better. We didn't get the job done.
On the quarterback play...
ALLEN: Jack gave us a little spark. I thought that he did a lot of good things. I don't know about that last throw though, it was just a little bit of miscommunication. I liked what I saw, and I think Jack's a really good football player. But we got to do what we got to do to put ourselves in the best position to win football games. First and foremost, we have to find up what's wrong with Michael and make sure he's health. His health is number one as is the case with all of our guys. But I liked what I saw from Jack tonight, and we just got to do what we can to help get this team get better, learn from our mistakes, and keep getting a little bit better each week.
On Taiwan Mullen...
ALLEN: Yeah, it's not good. He got injured last week and he went down twice in the Western Kentucky game. He tried to rehab, I thought we were going to have him and if you asked me yesterday, I would've said he was going to play. Just when we got him out there today, he just wasn't where he needed to be to feel good about him playing. I trust our medical staff on that. Not having him was a big blow. Obviously, Reese (Taylor) also went down, and we lost him for the second half. He's another one of our great players defensively. So that took a toll on that position in the secondary, but those guys battled. We got to hopefully be able to use the bye week to get those guys back and I don't see those being long term issues for those guys.
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Ty Fryfogle | Wide Receiver
On the offensive struggles...
FRYFOGLE: Going forward, we have two weeks of preparation for this next game. We will look at what we have done to this point and we're going to decide how we want the season to end up. A lot of guys are going to look at themselves in the mirror and figure out what we're going to do going forward. I feel like, with our offense, we could be way better than we are.
On the importance of the bye week...
FRYFOGLE: This bye week is very important for us. A lot of guys are going to get a ton of work in. Our guys are going to get together and figure out what we're going to do. We could be as good as we want to be. This is going be the turning point of our season. We are going to figure out how good do we want to be. I hope Michael Penix Jr. is okay, and he gets healthy. Jack Tuttle stepped in and did what he had to do. Jack is always ready, and I believe in that.
On what stood out tonight...
FRYFOGLE: We just didn't come out and make plays. We were flat. I feel that the defense played well but you know anytime you put up zero points you're most likely going to lose the football game. It's very frustrating because we had a couple of good drives where we got down field, and the defense set us up. But we got stopped on fourth and short. That's just something we have got to fix going forward.
On the message the rest of the season...
FRYFOGLE: I know this offense can be way better and we're going to be better going forward. It has been a month. We have got two weeks to figure this out and we're going to get it figured out.
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Micah McFadden | Linebacker
On the frustration level...
McFADDEN: Yeah, we definitely did do a lot of preparation for this game, but I don't think earlier our defense responded too well out there. We could've responded a little bit better, and just got the mission with one guy not doing his job. They're not making a play that he could've made, me and myself included, you know. They got an early lead, and we need to start self-reflecting on everything that we're doing.
On Sean Clifford's pocket awareness...
McFADDEN: Yeah, we knew he could scramble and get out of the pocket so a few of those plays were on myself and other guys just keeping them contained in the pocket as well, but it is something we need to address. I think some of the time we did well, and other times we fumbled some. That's something we've got to improve on.
On the importance of the bye week...
McFADDEN: I think so, yeah, and the overall feeling of our team is that the guys need to take a look at themselves in the mirror, you know, decide what's going to come of this year and how we are going to respond.
On the defense as a unit...
McFADDEN: Yeah, I felt like the guys stayed locked in throughout the day, and I saw a lot of encouragement on the sidelines and leadership. You know, there wasn't any lack of fight. I think it was the lack of execution here that kind of lost us that game.
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Cam Jones | Linebacker
On Sean Clifford...
JONES: It was very frustrating. Knowing coming into this game that containing him on the third down could lead to a scramble. We just had to collapse the pocket, and that's something that we couldn't do that he took advantage of.
On the touchdowns allowed...
JONES: Just almost there. The most kind of effort guys are making is to just try to get to the quarterback, get out of a spot. At the end of the day, we've just got to do a better job trying to protect the quarterback.
On the defensive injuries...
JONES: Tiawan is a great player, but the next man has got to step up no matter who's on the field. You've got to step up and make a play.
On the offensive struggles...
JONES: We came into this game knowing that we had to take the ball back to the offense creating ways that we keep going and just keep moving the ball back to the offense and letting them work things out. We're just going to try to keep taking the ball away and keep trying to make big plays.
On the importance of the bye week...
JONES: I think it comes at a great time for guys to take time to look at themselves in the mirror and figure out how we're going to go with this season. It's a great time to rest up, head back to the drawing board, and figure the season out.
On missed assignments from the defense...
JONES: Yes sir, in big games like this, you know, people, my teammates, want to make big plays. Coach always tells us don't press, just do your job. A lot of people were just pressing and trying to make big plays. This games just comes down to whoever made the least mistakes to win the ball game.
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