MARK STOOPS Q&A:
* A lot of the same mistakes that we made in another loss here earlier against South Carolina, Stoops said.
* Tried to talk to the team about controlling their emotions tonight. You don't win games by being psyched up. You win with discipline and execution. I tried to beat that into their heads, but it didn't work. Obviously, I'm not getting through to them. I know what winning football looks like and what it doesn't look like, and that wasn't it. I've got to do a better job and challenge them some more.
* Nobody's going to be perfect, and we've shown we're capable of playing winning football, but it's very frustrating to go play like that in front of a great crowd tonight.
* Penalties really killed us tonight. To have the ball at the half-yard line and come away with zero points (loud sigh) it comes down to discipline. If we could have that one to do over, we'd get under center and sneak it.
* We knew coming into the game that possessions would be a premium with the way they play. We had a lot of first downs, but we couldn't come away with points in red zone and the high-red zone. As bad as we played, we still had opportunities.
* Very uncharacteristic for the special teams to have so many issues.
* Vandy does a nice job with their offense. Frustrating yards at times, critical conversions. You like to think you've done well when you hold someone to 20, but it wasn't good enough.
* Stoops says he's searching for answers for why they haven't played well at home the last three years. Wants to know if there are too many distractions going on.
* On why the offense is starting slow so often... Says it was a pretty good start tonight, but some stupid penalties just sidetracked it.
* Asked why his voice is being heard by the players... Not sure. Works hard on that messaging. Thinks they respond most of the time. We'll see if they respond now. If you don't come and play well in this league, you will lose. They need to understand that. I think they will respond and continue to grind.
