Nov. 14, 2006

In Attendance: Bill Wagner (Annapolis Capital), Gary Lambrecht (Baltimore Sun)

Wagner: So what's your thought on Ballard? Is it too early to make a determination on his status?

Johnson: We'll see. I don't know. He will have to make a lot of improvement between now and Saturday to play. I would be surprised if all three of them (Ballard, Rossi, Sharp) played.

Lambrecht: Was Rossi in red today?

Johnson: Yeah, all three.

Wagner: If Ballard can't go are you comfortable with Kettani and Hall?

Johnson: Yeah.

Lambrecht: Is the strategy going to be to just let them get ready for Army and the bowl game and not play them against Temple?

Johnson: No. If they can play, they will play, and if they can't, they won't and we will play somebody else. That's just the way it is. There is no use stressing over something you can't control.

Lambrecht: You sell very well to the players the notion that they can't overlook anybody and they've pushed that through very impressively twice in a row and now you are staring at one more, the hapless Temple Owls.

Johnson: All our guys have to do is look at the tape. They have some good players. Just look back to last year. They pushed us to the limit. They were ahead of us at the half. We know who we are. We can't just show up and beat anybody? I think we've figured that out the last few years.

Wagner: Referring a little more to what we were talking about yesterday with the schedule, because I did read something somewhere that said the schedule jumps up dramatically next season. Do you see that? Do you see the schedule being all that tougher next season?

Johnson: I don't even know who we play next season.

Wagner: Pittsburgh, Wake.

Johnson: UConn just beat Pittsburgh so are they any tougher than UConn? I'm not even going to talk about the schedule anymore. It's ridiculous. It's a joke.

Lambrecht: But aren't you ranked something like 40th in schedule strength? I mean it's very respectable.

Johnson: I bet their have haven't been a lot of times where Navy has played two teams ranked in the Top 6.

Wagner: I think people probably look at the bottom end of it and don't look at it as a whole.

Johnson: You know what? You can look at Duke and it's just like I said when we were playing Duke. You can look at them all you want. They play in the ACC and their four non-conference games were two SEC teams, Navy and Richmond. That's a pretty good schedule. There are a lot of teams that wouldn't win many games with that schedule. Stanford's non-conference schedule was Navy, Notre Dame and San Jose State, who is going to a bowl game, and the rest are Pac-10 games.

Lambrecht: Not to disparage anybody but if you take out two or three of Notre Dame's opponents who have they played?

Johnson: You could say that about anybody. It's just something for people to talk about.

Wagner: Do you see Navy continuing the series with Rutgers? I know you are playing them next year. That was a relatively even series and all of a sudden with Rutgers jumping up that's a game you have to play up to win, as Chet likes to say.

Johnson: Cuz, let me tell you something. There are very few games that we don't have to play up to win. Tell me games that aren't playing up? Who are we going to play that we don't have to play up to other than the two Service Academies?

Wagner: Well when Chet explains the schedule he says it's 1/3 playing up, 1/3 even and 1/3 you should win.

Johnson: I don't care how he explains it. I'm asking you to explain it to me. I mean it sounds good, but explain it to me. Are we supposed to beat Duke and Stanford? Is that not playing up for us? I would think that's playing up. Any time we are playing a team from a BCS league, trust me brother that's playing up.

Wagner: I guess people could argue that Temple and Eastern Michigan aren't.

Johnson: The MAC teams are probably even. Ask Temple and Eastern Michigan if they think they are supposed to beat Navy. I guarantee you they would say yes. They won't tell you that playing Navy is playing up. For them playing up is Louisville and Clemson and those teams in the BCS. They don't look at us as playing up. The only team that I would venture to guess that judged us as playing up this year might have been UMass and they were one of the better teams we've played this year. Do you think those Conference USA teams look at us and think that's playing up? I guarantee you they don't.

Wagner: Along those lines do you think you should be ranked? Aren't you surprised that you haven't received any votes?

Johnson: No. We've lost too many games and we lost decidedly to the two teams that are ranked.

Wagner: A lot of people would lose big to Rutgers and Notre Dame.

Johnson: You know what? I don't worry about all that. I just try and play the next game, but I laugh when people talk about the schedule. We're Navy. How many winning seasons has Navy had the last 30 years? To say that anybody is playing up to play us is an exaggeration.

Wagner: But that opinion might change if you keep winning.

Johnson: I hope it does. It's always going to be a challenge here.

Lambrecht: Did you like the way Kettani went about his business on Saturday?

Johnson: I thought he had pretty good composure. He didn't get too excited. He went in and took care of the ball and ran hard. The speed of the game was probably a little fast with some of the blocking and he would probably be the first to tell you that he has to get better at blocking.

Wagner: What did you think about his analysis of himself? He said he was a little quicker than Adam and maybe had better hips. He really broke it down.

Johnson: Ask Adam what he thinks about it. He and Adam can sort that out.

Lambecht: Nothing like competition.

Wagner: Have you had a talk with Price? I know the kid wants to come back and play, but eventually do you tell him it's just not happening this year?

Johnson: I've talked to him a couple of times and he can't go. He also missed treatment this weekend.

Wagner: Do you think he's just getting a little discouraged about the whole thing?

Johnson: I'm sure he is. He wants to play and he comes out and he's tried a couple of times and he can't go. In my mind I've just kind of put it that he isn't going to play and I quit worrying about it. We have moved on. Jeromy Miles is playing well.