JOHN HUMENIK: The first trophy

presentation we have this morning with Coach

Meyer, representing the Bowl Championship

Series, is the administrator of the Bowl

Championship Series, Mr. Bill Hancock.

BILL HANCOCK: Good morning,

everybody. I want to thank the Orange Bowl crew,

Danny and Larry and Eric for a great job, and on

behalf of the 11 conference commissioners and

the AFCA, we want to present the Coaches'

Trophy to Coach Urban Meyer and the Florida

Gators.

JOHN HUMENIK: Now we have the

Football Writers Association Grantland Rice

National Championship trophy, which is being

presented by George Schroeder, who's the

president for 2009 of the Football Writers'

Association for the Eugene Register Guard.

GEORGE SCHROEDER: On behalf of the

Football Writers' Association of America this has

been awarded since 1954, and it's the second time

in three years for Florida, third straight time for the

SEC. That's the second time that's happened -

1978 to '80 Georgia did that. I'd like to present you

with the Grantland Rice Award from the Football

Writers Association of America.

JOHN HUMENIK: The next trophy

presentation is being made by Steve Hatchell,

who's the president and CEO of the National

Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame.

STEVE HATCHELL: On behalf of the

National Football Foundation, our 12,000

members, our chairman Archie Manning and our

board of directors, vice-chairman George Weiss,

we are really proud to present this trophy to Urban

Meyer, second time in three years, which is really

special. This trophy has been awarded since

1959. It was started by General Douglas Mac

Arthur, Grantland Rice, the great sports writer and

legendary coach red Blake, and etched on the side

of this replica of the stadium in all silver are all of

the champions since 1959. And as the keepers of

the history and the legacy of the sport of football,

we are really proud to give this to Urban, who not

only is a super coach and a great job, but the

wonderful things he does for the sport. So we're

very honored to be able to give this to you today,

Urban.

JOHN HUMENIK: Our final trophy

presentation this morning is from the Associated

Press, John Affleck, who's the sports enterprise

editor of the Associated Press, is here to present

that trophy.

JOHN AFFLECK: The AP Poll has been

around since 1936, and this is the third time we've

stood on a podium with the University of Florida's

coach, and on behalf of the Associated Press and

our 65 media writers who voted late last night, I

want to offer a hearty congratulations to the

University of Florida as our 2008 national

champion.

JOHN HUMENIK: Coach, I know you

didn't sleep last night but just some general

comments on the evening and this morning, and

then we'll turn the floor over to questions.

COACH URBAN MEYER: I said this last

night. I'd like to thank Danny Ponce and Eric

Poms for the hospitality. I can't imagine a better

week as far as the hospitality and the people in

south Florida taking care of us, Howard

Snellenberg at FAU did a tremendous job. A team

that prepares like we do and take the seriousness

of our practice routine, he went above and beyond

what we asked him to do to make sure the fields

were right. A lot of people to thank, but most

importantly I'd like to thank our players, and this is

all about them. I want to make sure that our

players, this team goes down as one of the great

teams in Florida football history. It's one of the

greatest group of young people I've ever been

around, and I'm starting to get a little bit of

experience behind me now, 20-something years,

and that's saying a lot because I've been around

some great young guys.

Everything they have coming to them, they

deserve it. The team fought through our last two

ballgames, was the epitome of college football.

They fought through adversity, played two

excellent teams coached by -- I'm going to go back

to the Alabama game, by Nick Saban and a

tremendously talented team and then to go against

Coach Stoops, who's one of the best coaches in

the business, and have a great group of very

experienced -- I saw today in the paper how

experienced, just the offensive line and the

veterans they had. My heart is out to our plays. I

know our coaching staff feels the same way, but

this is as good a group of young people as I've

ever been around, and I want to thank them for

that.

COACH URBAN MEYER: It's very

humbling, and two years ago when it all happened,

I really can't remember much about it. But I just

asked the gentleman that gave us the Mac Arthur

trophy, I said, I'd like to read about this because

our name is on it twice. I think I owe that to them

and I'm going to read it to our team. I am a fan of

college football. I think college football is the

greatest venue going, and to think that our name is

forever etched on that great trophy, it's my

responsibility to learn more about it and make sure

our players learn it because they're on it.

That's why we did that. If you ever come

to Florida, our administration was good enough to

put a lot of money into a front door window to let

people see the history of Florida football when it

was never there before. You walk in there now

and it's legitimate. It's one of the great programs in

college football history. We're going to continue to

make sure that thing grows and grows and grows,

so it is the best place in college football.

COACH URBAN MEYER: This is going to

be a little harder. There's not much difference than

Nathan, my son. Nate, my son, and Tim. I love

Tim. He's family. He's everything. At some point

I'll get blasted for it, but I think he's one of the best

players to ever put on a helmet. I don't know if

he's the best quarterback, that's all relative and in

people's eyes they can choose whoever they want.

Tim will make a very well educated decision. I'm

going to put him on the phone with people I trust. I

did that with Alex Smith, I've done that with some

other players; they've made some great decisions.

So rest assured, and Gator Nation needs to know

Tim will make the right decision. I have no idea

what it is, and out of respect to Tim and his family it

hasn't even been discussed. I'm sure over the

next few days it will.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Yeah, I have

great respect for Coach Del Rio and he has

opened his program to us and we have opened

ours to him. I have great respect for his opinion,

and I'm hoping Tim will talk to him.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Well, we only

have about four left, five left, so we expect to close

this thing. Be we just want to make sure it's the

right four because usually recruiting classes are

made with your last four or five that you pick up.

The last week has been really good for Florida and

recruiting. Yes, we were on the phone actually the

day of the game, had many phone calls with top

recruits, and then I've heard from several today.

So this will be a tremendous boost, and obviously

the celebration on Sunday -- I made a comment

yesterday, what Florida has to offer a young man,

let's compare us against any other school,

academically, lifestyle, the location, and it's going

to be good. We're going to have a very good

recruiting class.

COACH URBAN MEYER: I'm not sure

what the word "dynasty" means. I'm very confident

now. I wasn't two years ago, that's why I made

that comment. We all saw what was coming. Our

coaching staff knew exactly if those young players

decided to come out early, the four guys on

defense, that means we lost basically our entire

defense. We knew the backups were not ready to

play. Deep in my heart when I knew Brandon Siler

came in to see me two days after the

championship, "I want to go to the NFL," Ryan

Smith, I had that feeling in my stomach, oh, boy,

we're going to have a hard time stopping anybody.

I don't feel that way this year. I see some

good players, I see a program that's set now.

We're good. I didn't feel that way two years ago. I

felt that was just an unbelievable effort by some

very good players and a 21-group senior class.

This is a 13-member senior class. Next year is

going to be a very good senior class, but behind

them is another group, another group. We don't

have that void is my point. Two years ago we had

a void in recruiting and it showed. Certainly it

showed last year in the Bowl game.

COACH URBAN MEYER: There's more

this time than two years ago because two years

ago was just running from here to there, and once

again, I knew what was coming. Do we take junior

college players to fill this void? And the panic that

our program was in.

I want to make sure, most importantly, our

players enjoy this and our coaching staff. I have

the best coaching staff in America and I want to

make sure they enjoy this. I'm in awe of Florida, I

really am. I was in the '90s when I watched them

play. Now that it's our program and we're playing

and we're doing -- our players are doing what

they've executed the last two or three years. I walk

in that stadium, and I told Jeremy last night, every

once in a while when I'm having a bad day I'll walk

in and stare at that wall. It's got to be one of the

great walls in college football history, and to know

that our team is forever a part of that.

It's a little bit like those bricks we put in

there for the All-Americans. We're not done with

that stadium. We're going to make that the kind of

place where everybody walks in and you kind of

take it in and you're in awe of that place. We're

going to make sure that we do that right, from the

Emmitt Smiths to the Jack Youngbloods to the

Chris Leaks to the Tim Tebows, those players are

going to be treated like they're supposed to be

treated.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Just great

people. It's a people business, college football, it's

not Xs and Os. I actually get a kick out of it when I

hear about the gurus, west coast versus the

spread, and that has absolutely zero to do with

winning football games. I love when I hear that.

It's a people business, and this team -- I

don't want to get too much into last year's team,

but this year's team was far superior than most

teams we've been blessed to have in the last

several years. The '04 Utah team, the way the '06

team finished, and really pretty went much the way

this season went with this outfit, that that's as good

group a group of young people as I've ever been

around.

It comes from maturity. I like to credit Mick

Marotti, our OSL staff and certainly our assistant

coaches.

In our big pre-game talk we show a

highlight video on basically Saturday morning --

whatever, Thursday morning, or Thursday right

before we get on the bus, and I'll address the

team. The discussion we had right before the

game, before we got on the bus, was this is not,

boy, this is kind of neat, good fortune, how the ball

bounced your way and the stars aligned right. This

has been a work in process for many years. When

our staff got together we had a vision what our

offensive line is supposed to look like, act like and

play like, and we got it. We had a vision of what a

quarterback should look like, act like and run the

offense, a group of receivers, a running back

position. You look on defense, two corners, that in

my opinion are the two best corners maybe in

college football. That's a strong statement. But

my point is then you also flip and it and return to a

punter and a kicker and a long snapper.

So this is not one of those, boy, this is kind

of neat; it's good fortune the way you guys are

playing. It's not, and I want our guys to

understand, everybody is going to go their own

ways like the Reggie Nelsons of the world. You

might not ever get a chance to play with guys like

this again, make it count. And they certainly did.

COACH URBAN MEYER: That's a good

spin; I might use that (laughter). I'm glad you

brought that up.

The first part about enjoyment, I'm a big

family guy and I'm a big coaching staff person and

a player person, so I want to make sure our guys --

I've already met with our strength coach and I'm

not sure how we're going to do that. It just felt like

two years ago, I mean, the game was over, bang,

classes started. That's all going on now, as well.

But I'm going to force myself and our staff to really

get some time with their families and do some stuff

together so we really enjoy this thing.

As far as the guys coming back, that's

going to happen here in the next few days. In all

honesty I'm not going to start using angles

because I don't want to ever influence a guy to

make a decision. Whenever you make a

life-changing decision, place of employment,

having a family, getting married, all those big

decisions you have to make, you put it all on the

table and you make sure you're doing it for the

right reason.

The good thing is, I couldn't say this four

years ago, guys were making decisions without my

input, and some uncle told me to do this and my

peoples can get me in the second round. I look at

him going what peoples are you talking about?

Peoples they're going to be talking to really can

advise them. I love this team because they're very

professional. Brandon Spikes, Percy Harvin, Tim

Tebow, Brandon James, those guys all make that

decision. I don't have any idea what the decision

is yet. But they'll make it the right way, and that's

family, coaches, people that know what they're

talking about, not some guru or some peoples.

That will not be part of the discussion.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Well, I saw it

last night, just parked myself in front of ESPN for,

what was it, four hours I had, right? The 3rd down

and 11 where he pulled it down and he hit and I

saw his leg drive and get that extra two yards, I

mean, how many guys could do this? He got hit,

made a guy miss, hit two people, and his eyes and

he looked over he knew exactly where that yard

marker was. The other play was when he

scrambled and hit Riley Cooper. Those were the

two plays on offense.

On defense the two interceptions - the one

by Ahmad Black that just completely took it right

away from the guy. Up by three and we were

driving the ball, obviously a prolific offense. And

then the one down in the red zone where the ball is

tipped and Major Wright made the play. Those are

the plays I'll never forget. On highlights it was a

phenomenal effort.

COACH URBAN MEYER: I don't think so.

I think the task at hand is to -- I made a comment

earlier that I really have a dream of what Florida

should look like, and it's getting real close. There's

still a lot of work to be done. The minute you start

worrying about other things, you miss a recruiting

class, you miss this great recruit, and that's not

going to happen. I'm committed to Florida. I love

Florida. More importantly, though, I love these

players, and these players are going to get our

best effort for a long time.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Kyle

Whittingham is one of my closest friends, and I do

believe Kyle is the best coach in the business,

what he does. He's the best assistant coach.

Brian Johnson, we actually recruited Brian. Brian

was unrecruited out of Texas and Dan Mullen and

myself went down there, and you knew when you

sat at home with his family, he wasn't big enough,

wasn't fast enough and didn't have a strong

enough arm, but he's a lot like the quarterback we

have. Brian Johnson when he said his team

deserves to be number one, he should say that.

When Brian Johnson cheers for Florida because of

his relationship with coaches on our staff, that's

good people. I'm not really a betting person, but if

I want to bet on a guy that's going to have an

unbelievable future, whether it's in football or not,

Brian Johnson is going to be an executive or --

he's going to have a great opportunity to do

whatever he wants to do outside of football, and

more importantly than that he'll be a great husband

and great father because that's the quality kid he

is.

I have not talked to Brian but I'm sure I'll

talk to him again soon.

COACH URBAN MEYER: It's

unbelievable. What does it mean? It just means

that it's just fantastic people associated with those

programs, and the resources you have at Utah and

the resources you have at Florida. Everybody is in

a hurry to take a new job, I'm going to go to this

job, this job, it's great. Just make sure the

foundation behind you has some success, and

Utah certainly has that.

Utah is not going away now. If you just go

evaluate that program -- I'm selling Utah, but if you

go evaluate that program, you keep hearing the

word "BCS conferences," I can't think of many

schools that are better than Utah, just the toys that

you have as far as facilities, and the resources and

alumni and everything, and a recruiting base as far

as the Polynesian culture. When you hear "BCS

conference" that means nothing to a lot of coaches

like myself. To say "BCS," you get your brains

kicked in every year and you finish 3-8, you're not

BCS. You might get a little bigger check at the end

of the year because you're in a nice conference,

but Utah is a much better program than most BCS

programs. That's most.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Who said that,

Percy? (Smiling). The last couple days were real

intense, just getting these guys ready to go. I

thought Coach Strong addressed the team. I'm

very cautious who we allow to talk to our team.

Those guys were ready to play. I don't want to get

too much into it because that's our business.

You know what the good thing is, guys

listen. This outfit, I made the comment before,

Charlie Strong, Mickey Marotti, Steve Addazios of

the world, we're really focused on it, and I think a

lot of it had to do with we didn't have a chance to

stop this team. Statistically it will tell you it would

be a hard deal to stop them. So I'm sure that's

where he was headed.

COACH URBAN MEYER: I've been really

intrigued by the no-huddle, by the up-tempo, and

we actually went to that the whole first week of

spring ball a year ago. I sent Dan Mullen to

Missouri and came back with the mechanics of it. I

hired Scot Loeffler. He's had some of that in his

background. I think the tempo of the game, that's

a pain in the butt, and if you only have two days to

prepare -- we did well because we had a whole

month and Coach Strong and his staff and our

players really worked hard. I'm going to really

study it because I love their offense.

Kevin Wilson, the coordinator on their

team, we played against him one other time when

he was at Northern Western and he was at

Bowling Green and the score was 43-42 at the end

of the day. Both teams had about 650 yards of

offense and my D coordinator looked at me in the

fourth quarter and said, we can't stop them

because of the tempo of the game, and I've never

had a defense feel completely paralyzed by an

offense. I'm glad we got to play them and we're

going to research what they do because I think

they're really good.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Right now he's

got to be one of the best players in America. He's

got the best first step. You saw that yesterday. I

think he played at about 80 percent. I saw him on

the sideline and I kept talking to him and he looked

at me right in the eye and said, I'm ready, Coach,

I'm ready. A couple of those runs he got out of

there, when he's 100 percent I'm not sure they

catch him.

But that was a tremendous effort. Very

unselfish effort. What he did to prepare for that

game is what legends are made of. Not many

guys I've ever seen do what he did as far as

preparing himself for that game.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Isn't that

something? David Nelson continues to amaze,

and Riley Cooper -- they're program players,

actually very talented program players. Usually

when people say "program players," they're guys

that aren't good enough to kind of step up. Very

talented guys that were influenced by outside

forces. David Nelson had kind of the attitude that

I'm not getting my fair share, and I should be

treated a little different, and that goes back to the

third uncle comment where people were

influencing his practice, and the fact was he was

not very good. He didn't practice very good, and

he didn't play very well. And now he's playing at

an extremely high level.

Billy Gonzales has done a great job with

him and it was his call. The jump pass, Percy was

able to do it, but Louis Murphy is a guy we trust but

he had a knee injury and didn't practice the first

two and a half weeks, and David Nelson has

earned the trust. I think we threw the pass, David

Nelson shows you the confidence that our

coaching staff put in that player. He knows it and

I'm sure that's why he made that play.

That was probably a two-hour discussion

on who was going to catch it, who would be open.

The technique, if you saw that play, just to build on

David Nelson, that wasn't go kind of run around

and run inside. He goes out and stock block, Tim

is going to jump pass, to leave your feet and tie

that up, that's not easy.

COACH URBAN MEYER: That because

he's extremely disciplined and practices his tail off.

That was a two-hour discussion about who's going

to get that play because you only get one shot at it,

and if you cut it short, go too deep, don't sell it,

you're wasting a play. We knew we were going to

call it at a critical time.

COACH URBAN MEYER: What I've

learned at Florida is when you take over a program

that's kind of bigger than life in some people's

eyes, it still comes down to a bunch of young guys

playing football, and I kind of got caught up in the

Gator clubs and signing autographs, and it still

comes down to David Nelson going four yards,

selling the stop clock, showing his hands and

doing the right thing, and that's no different than

Bowling Green, Utah or Florida. I graded myself

probably a C my first year because it was -- Florida

is big time now. But I've got news, there's a lot of

other big time places, and if you start to sleep,

you'll fall behind.

It still comes down to getting guys to go as

hard as they can, it all comes down to getting guys

to graduate, to live right. At the end of the day you

want a bunch of players that are committed to the

right thing. And it's not easy to get that. It's not

easy. In 20-something years of coaching, on one

hand I can hold the amount of teams that I've been

around the kids that do it the right way. I'm not

talking about a few, I'm talking about the core of

your team if you do it the right way, and we've got

it here at Florida.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Playing to win.

Play great defense. I thought it was a fine effort by

Charlie Strong, and he continues to prove he's one

of the greatest football coaches in the country right

now, excellent recruiter, even a better husband

and father, and my right-hand man. There's no

better coach in the country than Coach Strong,

what he did and what that staff did, I think Chuck

Heater and Vance Bedford and Dan McCarney,

that's as good as defensive staff, I keep hearing

about these defensive staffs and they don't have

the success. Charlie has done a fabulous job with

that group.

Turnovers, we had a couple. We were

tight with the ball. Usually fumbles are an issue in

Bowl games because you haven't been hit in a

while. Our guys did a good job with two

interceptions where one was a mistake by Tim,

one was a great defensive call where they dropped

the nose out in blitz package -- but we did, we won

the turnover battle.

Scoring in the red zone is where we won

the game. We were 4 for 4 in the red zone I think

on the year. We were No. 1 in America, and we

should be. For the amount of time spent for the

few plays you get in the red zone, we're way over

as far as the amount of time spent. But that's the

money; that's payday for our players, 3rd downs,

the red zone.

And then the last one, kicking game. I'm

not sure we dominated the kicking game. I'm a

little disappointed actually in some of the returns,

and then we ran into the darn kicker. We had a

chance to block that kick. But the defensive

turnovers in the red zone, that's how we won this

game.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Recruit, and

hire a tremendous strength coach. Dan knows, a

lot of times I'll hear about these coaches or I'll talk

to some young coaches and put their staff together

and I'll ask the question about the strength staff,

about the discipline in your program and those

things. He hired our former strength coach who

was at Virginia and now he's at Mississippi State,

so he just hit a home run. He's got a chance now,

and I would say Dan had zero chance if he couldn't

hire an ace strength staff that can keep that thing

together.

The strength staff in college football

nowadays, if you're -- you guys should watch this.

If a guy gets hired and puts that, I'm going to hire a

strength coach later, that's a guy that has no clue

what's going on, and he'll fail. Dan Mullen has got

a chance because he knows the value of the

strength staff, so he hit a home run.

And then obviously recruiting, he's got to

get out and get quality players and hire a staff to

recruit. I think Dan is going to do fine. Dan is a

very intelligent coach and he'll surround himself --

all great coaches know how to surround

themselves with great coaches, and we had great

discussions, long discussions about it, and he feels

very comfortable with the people he's putting

together on his coaching staff.

COACH URBAN MEYER: We really put in

two packages that our defense did a great job, and

one was bare defense, and they did a great job,

and then a lot of odd. We played much more three

down than we've ever played. Basically the whole

game was four down against Alabama and then

this game played three down and they call it bare

defense where they kicked down to stop the inside

run. Chuck Heater and I were talking a couple

nights before the game, we do everything an

offense doesn't like to see, and a lot of it was new.

So they did a great job, and Torrey Davis actually

made a great play. I saw that on the highlights last

night, as well.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Yeah, he's

talking about Ahmad Black and he's too small, too

slow, can't jump high enough, he's just in great

football position and he's a mini-Chuck Heater.

That's Chuck's adopted son. I always give Chuck

a lot of credit because he deserves it. Every year

he pulls one out. First year was Brown, second

year was Ryan Smith and Reggie Lewis. Last year

we had Major Wright as a freshman back there,

Joe Haden, and this year he pulled out Ahmad

Black. He wasn't -- he was almost getting his

movement to a 1AA somewhere and saying it was

time to move on. He wasn't allowed to be on

special teams because we couldn't trust him, and

now he's one of the most trustworthy guys. He

comes from a great high school program. He's got

a chance because he's got a great family, and we

knew that. It was just a matter of time. Chuck did

a great job with him.

COACH URBAN MEYER: I'm not going to

get into that right now and spoil a great day. I'm

going to tell you again that that's one of the finest

coaches in America. Just how important that is,

put that right up there, and I'm going to say

something else: A great husband and a great

father and a great person, as good a guy as I've

ever been around. He was my neighbor in South

Bend, Indiana. I trust him with everything, I trust

him with my family, I trust him with everything.

So that's a great question to ask. I can't

certainly answer it, and I don't want to push too

hard because I don't want to lose him. He's that

good, though. He's that good. Just once again,

there's a lot of good football guys out there that

can draw Xs and look real neat on the board. He's

good at that, obviously. But as far as a role model

and making sure these guys do the right thing -- I

mentioned Torrey Davis. When you said Torrey

Davis I say Charlie Strong. You say Ahmad Black,

I say Charlie Strong. That's how good he is.

COACH URBAN MEYER: I've put a lot of

bugs. I've shot it at people and made it real clear.

I'm not sure they listen. I think Charlie fell a little

bit when he got that interview because he's Charlie

Strong. He'd get very upset and I'd get very upset.

Search firms, I'm not into that because

guys have called me and talked to me and athletic

director is supposed to go hire a football coach.

Do your homework, go hire a coach. Yeah, that's

a good question. It kind of angers me sometimes.

I've been involved in those phone calls, and I can

tell on the other end, talking to a deaf ear. I'm

busy and I don't have time to talk to you unless

you're interested. Don't play people. I need to be

careful. I'm going to get very angry here in a

minute and I shouldn't be here. That's how much I

care about Charlie Strong.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Yeah, I didn't

know that until a later day that they said regardless

it's the same healing time. Actually a hairline

fracture heals a little quicker than a high ankle

sprain, so there was a small fracture. But the

injury, the time delay and the thing that still

bothered him yesterday wasn't the actual fracture.

I had the same question, what does it mean? A

high ankle sprain, that's a separation -- I'm like a

doctor now with the high ankle sprains. That's a

bad injury especially on a skilled athlete. You look

at a guy like Percy, they've got the real skinny

ankles, and the time off, the healing time was for

the high ankle sprain.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Chris Rainey

has ankle sprain. I texted him last night. He said

he was real sore. It was right in front of me and I

was worried about it. But I think it's an ankle

sprain and he should be fine.

COACH URBAN MEYER: Well, we play a

tough schedule, we play in the Southeastern

Conference and you saw a couple other teams

with high rankings. We've got to go back to work.

Our guys have had some real physical games, and

so if -- speculating, I'm not going to do that, but

we'll see who comes back. Regardless, this team,

it's not going to be like last year. It will not be like

that. I don't know our record because we've got to

stay healthy and most other things. But as far as

the program, it's much better than it was two years

ago as far as the group of young players coming

up. So how good? We could be very good next

year.

JOHN HUMENIK: That will conclude

today's Q & A, Coach. Thank you for your time.

Congratulations again.