[Upchurch/MGoBlog]

This week I talked to Khalid Hill about his first-quarter touchdown, which came on fourth-and-goal from the Penn State one-yard line. The goal-to-go sequence was set up after Hill caught a pass from Speight on third down at the Penn State 17 and rumbled to the three-yard line. A one-yard loss on first down, incomplete pass on second down, and two-yard pass on third down set up Hill’s fourth-down carry. Check out the GIF at the bottom of the post to see exactly how the run unfolded.

Penn State’s defense had only faced one other fourth-and-goal this year, and even then they kicked it. I’m guessing with their personnel changes at linebacker and all there wasn’t a whole lot of film on how they were going to line up, especially with you guys split so tight. How tough does that make it when there’s not much film to refer to for what a defense is going to do?

“You kind of can figure out what they’re going to do as the game goes on. We do a good job of communicating to our coaches what we see on the field and what we might see, so our coaches do a great job of gameplanning and putting in what they think might be on the field so we have a similar image of what might be on the field.

“Like, on that goal-line play we ran the ball and we knew what they were going to be in. The one thing we didn’t know was that they were going to be knifing their ends in. When the thought went in to run the ball for the touchdown they were setting the knife on the edge, so I kinda knew once I got the ball I was going to press the line of scrimmage, make the linebackers bite, make the D-ends knife in, and then bounce to the outside, and that’s what I did and found a hole in the end zone. Coaches do a great job of trying to figure out what they might do, do a great job of finding film of what they might do and research on coaches and stuff like that.”

With the presnap motion and Asiasi going back and forth there, it looked like the defensive back might have overreacted after he ran to the middle. Did he get one gap too far outside?

“I wouldn’t say that. I think he moved right to where Asiasi wanted him, because he was able to kick him out where I could find a hole right inside of him. I mean, we have so much motion and stuff like that at the goal line that teams tend to do that. Certain teams tend to overrun stuff and have a hard time getting back, so we catch them in a mess-up and find a hole and get in the end zone. That’s what basically it does. We do motions to see what they’re in, to see whether they’re in man or a certain blitz or something. If that was a mess-up on his part it worked out for me.”

Related to what you were saying before, on this particular play the defensive tackle knifed inside and you were about to get engulfed. Before a play, do you know sort of ‘if X happens, I’m going to bounce to here’ or do you see a guy in front of you and just go wherever you see daylight? 

“Pretty much I was in my stance and they shifted. The D-tackle shifted outside, and I was going to hit it where he was. At first he was right over—inside, if there was hole in front of Kalis I was going to run at Kalis and just sort of push Kalis but he moved out, and I was like, Okay, it’s going to be either I run straight ahead or I’m going to bounce it.’

“Like Coach says, just follow your tracks and your tracks will take you where you want to be. But also following your tracks will put defenders in a spot that they don’t want to be in, because, like I said, if I ran straight ahead the backers came down and got Ty. Tyrone Wheatley Jr. did a great job of collecting the backer, and I was able to go around him and get in the end zone. Asiasi did a great job of kicking out the corner or whoever that was on the outside and I was able to find a hole.”

What’s harder: scoring on a dive or finding the right GIF to respond to Stribling or McCray or Dawson?

[/laughs] “Finding the right gif to respond to those guys, man. It was actually crazy. When we first found out GIFs were a part of twitter we just went on a rampage. It was funny. Actually, on the iOS10 I can have gifs on my phone, so we’ll just be texting them to each other. It’s crazy. I’ll show you. [/takes his phone out and opens a text chain] Like if you press this you got gifs already here like a message board. So yeah, it’s cool.”

I’ve gotta download this tonight. So, if you keep getting in the end zone, are we going to see a touchdown dance? As one of the original members of the running man challenge group [Michigan edition], it seems like--

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, I said it last week but on the first play of the game I gave up a sack for a touchdown and Wilton got hit pretty hard. I made it my business this week to come out and produce quick, off the bat, to get the first catch and take it down to the goal line. I thought we were going to score after that so I was like, I didn’t score but at least I contributed. Coach said ‘Hey’ and called me and I scored, and I was just so relieved that I was like, ahhhh, let me celebrate with my teammates. I don’t want to get flagged, but you got a dance coming soon. You got a dance coming soon. Everybody, my boys back home and everybody’s like, ‘Why you ain’t dancing? You love dancing!’ You’ll see something soon.”