About the weapons on the passing attack...

“It's always great when we can get the ball into other people's hands and I think we've done a good job scheming up and just doing that. We got Arian [Smith], Adoani, Ladd, all of our wideouts, Marcus, and then the tight ends, the running backs too. It's really good to space the ball out like that."

About the tight end room relationships...

"I feel like in our tight ends room, everyone just kind of wants to see everyone else succeed. When I see Darnell out there making plays, I'm just jacked up on the sidelines or celebrating with him too. It's always good to see our other tight ends do well."

On being defending national champions...

"I think it's kind of hard to follow that up sometimes, but I feel like we've done a good job, and the coaches have done a good job of telling us that it's always one day at a time and this day is the most important day ever. Just focusing on what we can get better on throughout the days and weeks and just keep stacking days and not really think about past or future but focus on the present."

On how the bye week has helped with November games...

"I think we take it as a step ahead. It is really a work week. A lot of people say that, but do they actually mean it? Do they actually come in and buy into what Coach is saying and how many periods you are going to have? Are you looking to come in and say, 'I can't wait until practice is over,' or are you looking like, 'okay, this is what Mississippi State does and this is what Tennessee does.'" Last year, one thing that I learned was to get a step ahead on this bye week and hopefully we do it this year."

On what the Georgia-Florida game means to him as a Savannah native...

"It is exciting for me because it is a game that I have watched all my life. I am a kid from Savannah, and I used to go to Jacksonville to go to camps with my mom. I get really excited to play in that game. As a kid from Savannah, I smell the weather and it feels so good. The breeze feels like I am at home and playing at home again."

On if he pays attention to the landscape of the league at this point in the season...

"It means nothing, honestly. Every week we go in and we are 0-0. We have to prove ourselves every week. Now we are going in 1-0. Before we came in during May and March, a lot of people didn't think we were going to be good. A lot of people were sitting here asking questions. 'Are they going to be having a rebuilding year on defense?' or 'They are going to allow at least 35 points a game,' all types of crazy stuff. I just say that we take it one week at a time and we move forward. We try to go 1-0 every week and be where our feet are."

On where the offense is currently at…

“We definitely had our struggles. A lot of counters were messing us up. We weren't scoring in the red zone, so we had to get back to work and figure out that stuff. Just little mistakes that we were messing up on that was preventing us from having those huge plays and bringing us back and all that.”

On the offensive line making the mid-season list for the Joe Moore Award…

“Yeah, I just saw that on the way here, it is a huge win for us to get on the list we're excited, we're thankful for being on it, but we want to win it. I think we can be more consistent in the run game, but we have to do better. There’s still stuff that we need to fix.”

On what the Georgia-Florida game meant to him growing up…

“When I was growing up, it always was a huge experience. Everybody comes into town, the whole family does a cookout, so when we come down for it, it’s exciting and growing up it was just a huge experience for me.”