Darian Mensah on Malachi Toney, His Performance, and Pitt Game

What is it like seeing him still be able to do stuff consistently, specifically on third down, which is seeing how he comes up in the clutch moments, when you guys need him to come in the clutch moments? Yeah, it's not surprising. The dude works his butt off day in and day out. And so come Saturday, he's super prepared. We had a great third down plan this week, and I think we did a good job, basically. What was it like being around the old DL1 guys? I know they hit the commercial a few weeks ago and whatnot, but being around them, does it spark anything? Did they say anything to you? Just what's it like being around a group that was the last one still with a title there? Yeah, it's motivating for sure. All those guys always have great knowledge of the game and also just like the group as well. So being around those guys is pretty cool. I'm done with that. When you guys are preparing for this game and you hear the team talking a lot, does that spark anything? Is it making it more personal? because I mean, they obviously said some things about Malachi Felton and Danny Moon that you guys supported the entire game. What do you say to them, things like that? Yeah, we just play ball. You know, we're not too focused on just talking. We're just focused on doing our jobs. Coach always talks about, you know, want to go 1-0. And where do you think this team is after, you know, seven games? And how much more improvement do you guys think you can make? A lot more. I think that, you know, we had parts of the game tonight, but today and uh definitely some stuff to clean up but uh long way to go but you know i'm proud of you know the way our team battles week in and week out uh there you know Malley seems to really have a really great great game whenever he's playing at home when you when you're a freshman do you just see things you get sort of a different spark when you're playing in front of a home crowd uh for sure yeah he's got a bunch of people to recruit I think he has some of the best fans in the country and the freshman kind of calm your nerves a little bit. It's a little bit more quiet, too. You know, everybody's not screaming when you're on the field, so for sure. Right? Darian, you know, you never want to be in third and long situations, but when you pick those up, what does it say about the execution that you guys have on offense that you can, you know, pick up a third and long? Yeah, like I said earlier, we had a great third down plan. Pitt was really good on third down. They kind of, you know, their goal is to get you in third and long, And so I think our plan was executed at the high level. I think it shows our focus and attention to detail. Yeah. What is it that you guys say about the week out? Please tell us about the week out. In what town? We're just hungry. I think that the guys last year's team had a sour taste in their mouth the way it ended last year. And so I kind of feel that energy. There's always stuff you can improve a week in, a week out. So we're just focused on getting better. You threw a nice deep ball to Malley, but he took a big hit. When Malley takes a big hit like that, What is the first thing you say to him when you're on that? Just ask him if it hurt. I don't know what I'm talking about. The dude is tough as nails. He told me it didn't hurt. To be honest, I think I could have just thrown it a step sooner or nailed it on the shot. It was open on the corner route, too. That safety kind of curves in the middle. But, yeah, I check on my guys. Pitt had three sacks in the first half, none in the second. Is there anything that you guys knew he changed, like in the protection? um that you saw they were doing or what you guys talked about going to the second half that you know didn't work better to be honest no uh we just had to settle into the game uh we had a bunch of false starts earlier in the game so it's just a sign of you know just calming the energy down and you know picking stuff up i think my line does a great job with picking blitzes up all year so uh having those sacks kind of means whatever to me uh last question from William in the back yeah James from Valley was getting fed but what does he mean to also help other guys take a big step Yeah, it's huge because we're going to need those guys down the stretch to make plays for us. Obviously, we can't just go to Long Valley. And I think if you don't have a gap, we know that it's a true freshman. That's definitely a big way to end their world. Thank you, Darren. Appreciate it. Thank you.