Enjoy the first - and only - time you're going to get a full press conference transcript from me. Trust me people, I'm representing the content of the interview accurately, while keeping only the relevant stuff. Presenting it in this form doesn't do you any better, and it's an enormous pain in my ass.

You see my daughter is… is… asked me to start teaching her football. So I don't know if her future goal is to be a sideline reporter, or the next Angelique, I don't know what she wants to be but uh, she's (inaudible).

Chengelis: What did you mean when you said you were the coach who's the most anxious to coach this year.

Well I think… you know, probably the best times as a coach is when you get on the practice field. Uh, maybe even mores than the games because that's when you're around, it's just you, the coaches, and the players, and you get to teach and watch them progress and learn, and when you get on the field there's none of that other stuff, if you know what I mean. So I'm probably as excited as I've been in a long time to just get to practice.

Snyder: You talked in the spring, a lot of your comments about Tate were about academics or maturity and stuff. What's your feeling on that at this point?

I don't know; we'll find out at the end of the week. I'm hoping that everybody - they grow and mature, not just on the field but off the field as well. You know, until we're allowed to do things with them you really don't know. I'm anxious to see how Tate responds to that. I know he's getting a challenge and I talked yo him this spring about this: "You're getting a challenge from Denard, you're getting a challenge from Devin, and if you're a true competitor we'll see how you respond." That challenge will continue in August.

Snyder: You said you had the seniors over. What did they say about, you know, him and his maturity?

We really didn't talk about individual players. They came over, some of the guys would say "hey this guy looks great" or "hey this guy looks great" but they more or less, they talked about themselves, and some of the things they want to do, some of the things they want to do in camp. And they seemed… they gave some great ideas, and I think - we've always met, I've always met with the seniors a few times a year. But I started earlier, and I'm gonna meet again a couple times. Probably, you know, once every 2 or 3 days in camp, just to get their input. And Im really excited about that (inaudible 1:58)

Rothstein: You said last year at this thing that if you didn't get to a bowl you'd be ticked. Where are you this year, what do you feel? Is there pressure more, maybe?

I don't know if you can put - again, this sounds like coachspeak - I don't know if you can put more pressure than you do on yourself anyway. I mean, you go into every ballgame, every season with a certain amount of pressure to win every game. Is there heightened pressure because we've done poorly the last two years? Externally, you may think so, but internally there can't be no more than we've already done. It's not like we're going "ok, first year we've got excuses, second year got…" nah, we fully expect our guys to compete. We always set a goal to compete for the Big Ten championship. Now I don't know if we're good enough yet, or if we're gonna deserve to win it. I would think that's gonna be our goal and expectation every year.

[?] You said the team's gotten closer from the adversity. How have you seen this, is it a surprise to you?

Well I think, no it's not a surprise, but I think young folks are that way. I think any time adversity strikes - and it can strike at various points - it usually will band your young group together more often than it tears them apart. I've seen that get our guys closer, talking to our senior class. I'll be able to judge through camp. I mean, they'll face adversity in camp, all teams do. You know, it's hot, they're tired, whatever, and they've gotta push through practice, and I think this team will be able to battle through that because of what they've been through before.

Borton: Is there any news about guys that won't be able to start, uh, fall camp. Because of injuries or… anything? [obvious Shaw leading question #1]

No, I don't, uh, and I don't know. I think we're pretty good, health-wise, talking to the trainers. I think Will Heinenger's the only one that, uh, that had an injury in the spring that won't be able to perform in camp. I don't have any concerns health-wise.

[?] There is a couple theories about if Michigan and Ohio State should be in the same division. Any theories on how that might break out?

Isn't that interesting?I think you guys know as much as I do. How this all is going to shake out. Is it geographically? Is it competitively? Is it history and tradition? I think, uh, we have a lot of smart people in our league, and they'll be able to figure out how to balance it out fairly and competitively, but still be able to keep your tradition alive. Because it may be where, uh, an institution can pick their two rivalry games that they wanna play every year. Whether in your division or the other division, who knows. I have not put - and this is an obvious tangent - I have not put one thought into that. Because right now I don't care. You know, I care that we play Ohio State every year, and I think fans care that we play Michigan State every year, but that probably gonna happen. I'm just worried about getting a first down against UConn right now.

[?] The question is the possibility of playing them twice a year, because, uh…

Yeah, that'd be… I'm sure our fans would be pretty excited. If you won it the first time you may think "well, I don't wanna play it the second time." I think Michigan loves to play against Ohio State and Ohio State loves to play against Michigan.

That would not diminish the rivalry in your eyes?

I don't think so.

Birkett: How about playing them on back-to-back weeks? I don't know if that would be a tough (inaudible).

I think it would sell out if you played three times a week, in Ann Arbor, Columbus, or Chicago. I don't think there would be any problem with that game selling out.

[?] How important is it to you that they play the last game?

You know, I'm just giving my opinion, but the last game, traditionally, has been terrific. I think that's, you know, I think you prefer that, but if you didn't, and say you had to play 'em earlier or something… as long as you're playing 'em. But I would prefer, again this is just myself, but I would prefer to play them at the end, just from a tradition standpoint.

Chengelis: Can you talk about the running back situation? Vincent Smith is back… [obvious Shaw leading question #2]

I believe Vincent is, talking to - again, talking to our training staff - should be 100% for camp, uh, and healthy, which is key for us there. And then, Mike Cox had a really good spring, he's a guy that we're really looking forward to progress, and Fitz Toussaint had a really good spring, he was injured last year. Those three in particular, we thought… uh… you know, should be guys that'll lead the charge for us.

Balas[?] What is Michael Shaw's eligibility status? [overt Shaw question]

Well we're still waiting on some - we don't comment on our guys' academically, and they still have two weeks of summer school left. Uh, which for some of our players, uh, we'll keep in touch with them.

Rothstein: Are you surprised with Vincent being able to come back as quickly as he has? Sometimes with these ACLs...

Not with the medical technology that's available these days, and the science-y part of it. Before ACL would be 10-12 months. Now - you have to do the rehab - now they can come back quicker.

Chengelis: With two quarterbacks - I know it's a really - could you see yourself shuffling them in and out, in and out during a game?

Not so much, Angelique, shuffling in and out, because you do want that - if they're on a roll, and in a rhythm, you don't wanna take a guy out. If he's hot, you let him stay hot. Certainly, I don't - I'm not opposed to playing two. Last year, we started in with maybe three in the thought process. But I wouldn't be opposed to playing two. Our biggest key is that they play better and more consistently. The biggest thing for us is just taking care of the ball. Taking care of the ball, executing the offense, and you know, if they can extend a play or make a play within the framework, they can do it.

You said up there that there were things you regretted from last season. Is there anything that really sticks out?

There's a number of things. You can go back after every game and search calls. I think it was a fair question, but I never really thought about going for two [against Michigan State]. If I'd known the end result would be what it was, I'd do it all over again, but uh, there's plays you call you would likke to take back, but after reviewing the film, after every game the coaches're like "gosh, I could have called this or called that." You know, you can play that "what if" game all you want. I don't think it does you any good other than learning. And we always learn. Always think we have to do that.

Can you learn, maybe, in the summer from that?

Well, you know, not one big thing, but I can tell you this, and I told the seinors this. I said the first year, with a team is a little bit tougher because as coaches you don't know your players as well, even though you watch them on film and all that. You know, you have to kinda ll, you don't learn their strengths and weaknesses as well as you would the second year. Same thing's true for the third year. The more you're around your guys, you know what makes them tick, what motivates them, what their strengths and weaknesses are. You try to find that out in 15 practices in the spring, and 29 in August, but… you know, that's not always the case.

[uh…] Let's say Denard wins the starting quarterback. Could you move Tate to another area on the field or is he your backup quarterback?

Tate's a quarterback. Denard could play other positions and we fully prepared him "hey listen, if you're not the starting quarterback, I don't want you standing next to me 70% of the time on the sidelines. Once you learn quarterback, you'll learn the other skill positions." But, you know, he's battling for the starting quarterback job, so he's not played anything else, and I don't think he'll play anything else in camp. Because he's trying to be #1, and I think he's right there.

[Snyder] Not having to play too much quarterback in the games… can that be simulated enough between spring, and fall?

Well, the one thing you can't - it's hard to simulate - is when you go live. And in the spring, they were live the whole time except the spring game, and I thought that's one reason our spring game wasn't as good as I'd like, because we had them just getting tagged. I think it's better for their learning purposes when they're live. I don't want to go live in August though, because you don't want to be (inaudible) in camp. In August, I don't think we're gonna make them go live. But I think we saw enough in the spring of them being live in eight practices or so, and really let them practice.

Rittenberg: Do you know when you're going to meet with the NCAA, is that going to interrupt your…?

It's on the 13th in Seattle. It's when we'll appear in front of the committee. And normally it would be our first day of two-a-days, but we've adjusted our schedule, so our… I won't miss any arctics. We'll still have two-a-days, they'll just be the next day. I've been fortunate enough to not… we'll keep it from being a distraction, you know I'll have to go and do it. We all at the University have to go, and look forward to meeting with them, and further that process along.

[?] Can you talk a little bit about the outside receiver position. You're stacked at the slot position, but there really hasn't been a home-run threat on the outside. Junior Hemingway's been hurt, Darryl Stonum's been hurt, who's the big home-run threat outside for Michigan this year?

That is one thing we have been looking for. Particularly in this offense, I think there's a misconception about the outside receiver's role. They can have a huge role in this offense. And we hope they have. Darryl Stonum and Junior Hemingway are the two guys we hope to lead that charge. We have some youngguys, some freshman enrolled early we hope can help out, but it startswith Darryl and it starts with Junior. Both of those guys have been in the program, Darryl's got great speed, and if they can give us a deep threat on the outside, we can be a whole lot better offensively.

Snyder: Is Darryl gonna face any extra discipline… from you? Because of, you know, the jail thing.

No, I think he's faced that discipline. And he informed us when it was happening.