Rex Ryan Post Game Transcript

HEAD COACH REX RYAN

That’s a heck of a win. That’s a tough opponent right there and this was a championship-type game. We had a team that went to the NFC Championship against a team that went to the AFC Championship. We knew it was going to be a tough game. They have tons of weapons over there. It was going to be a battle to the end. Our challenge to our guys was to keep digging, to dig deep and find a way to get it done. That’s what I’m proud of. We felt confident that we’d win the game, we just didn’t know how. That’s basically how it went.

That field goal kicker we picked up is not bad. Nick Folk did a decent job with five field goals. This is the first time that the Minnesota Vikings have given up over 150 yards rushing in 51 games, so you have to tip your hat to our offensive line. Our running backs did a great job. We had that little clock management issue right before the two-minute. I was like, "Let’s throw it!" but I never thought we’d snap the ball [early]. That was a huge, huge problem there, but we overcame it. We’re happy to move on at 4-1. We’re right on schedule. We want to have the best record in the National Football League at the end of the season, and we’re right on pace.

On the Jets special teams during the four-game win streak…

We had all four safeties out there on kickoffs. We had our nickels; we had all kinds of guys out there. It speaks volumes about our football team. We have a bunch of unselfish guys who are willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done — starters, whatever it takes. Most teams will put all backups in there, but we want to get our starters up in there. Jim Leonard made a great open-field tackle on Percy Harvin. That kid’s a heck of a football player. There’s a reason we tried to trade up to get him. It was a great win for us.

On Brett Favre…

We were brilliant in the first half, I know that much, but you have to play four quarters in this game. We knew that he’s a good as it gets. He put up about 20 shots to Randy Moss, but I thought [Antonio] Cromartie played outstanding, albeit that one touchdown. You take that many shots down field with one-on-one coverage against Randy Moss, and I thought he really did a tremendous job for us. Brett Favre’s an amazing competitor and a tremendous quarterback. Then you have Adrian Peterson back there, and it that’s a tough matchup. That football team’s really good.

On Darrelle Revis…

I thought Revis played well. He gave up one completion at the end there that was a little surprising. He peeked a little bit. Favre stays alive so much, you have to plaster there, but I thought he did a good job overall.

On Cromartie covering Moss…

We knew that they were going to run vertical after vertical after vertical. When we put Cromartie out there, he did a great job against him when we played against New England in Week 2. With Darrelle’s hamstring being what it is, we weren’t going to take that shot. We didn’t want him to have to chase a guy 50 times who’s running 50 go routes. That was our main decision. But I thought Cromartie did an outstanding job.

On Vikings WR Percy Harvin’s first touchdown…

I’m not real sure what happened. We were real deep, playing a single high. I’d like our safety to be down a little lower than that, but you have to give them credit. They made a play there. I only saw what you did. I just saw the end result. I didn’t see who was to blame there. I just thought this was a typical Jet win. Resilient, team effort all the way against an excellent football team. I’m proud of the way our guys competed all the way to the end. We made a great defensive play at the end. We’ll take the victory. We’re not apologizing for anything.

On the delay starting the game…

We’re used to it. We had that first game where it was the exact same thing. It wasn’t the first time that it happened to us. Clearly, you can’t wait to get the thing kicked off. It’s like some caged animals. You just have to keep them in there and then release them.

On Favre’s interception…

We called it a 3-2-Kings-1. We were playing a Cover 1 and just wanted to get some pressure. Most teams would play coverage in that situation, but we wanted to change up our looks. We wanted to get pressure on Favre and get the ball out of his hand quickly. Dwight Lowery did a great job of breaking on it and taking it to the house.

On the Jets feelings at halftime…

We were happy to be up. We really had it going. Defensively, we held them to 56 yards or something like that. We had 206 on offense. We really dominated the game, but were only up nine points. We never had a great comfortable feeling until the end there.

On Jet WR Santonio Holmes’ play in the first half…

He looked sharp. He made a couple of big catches on third down for us. That’s just the tip of the iceberg here. We had a couple of balls that I thought we could have caught. Not just Holmes, but overall we could have caught a couple of key balls on third down to keep drives alive. It would have made it easier, but the result is what we’re looking for, and that’s to get the win.

On concern about the Jets' red zone production…

You’re always concerned with that. You’re down there, you’re dominating the game and you’re coming away with three’s…and we are fortunate to do that. You make an assumption that you’re going to make those three’s. We’re blessed to have an outstanding kicker and Nick did an outstanding job for us. You have to give the opponent credit on that. They kept us out of the end zone. That was unfortunate. If we could have knocked a couple across, we could have made it much easier.

On Jets injuries…

Not that I know of.