Inside the Huddle with Gonzalez

Inside the Huddle with Gonzalez
Senior offensive tackle Joaquin Gonzalez shares his thoughts.

	Joaquin Gonzalez

Coral Gables, FL (www.hurricanesports.com) – Editor’s Note: Senior offensive tackle Joaquin Gonzalez will pen his thoughts for www.hurricanesports.com fans during the 2001 season. Gonzalez is Columbus High School grad from Miami and a popular member of the team. A returning Football Writers Association of America first-team All-American, he’s also up for the Outland Trophy and and Lombardi Awards. Gonzalez is a member of the academic honors society, Omicron Delta Kappa, and was a 2000 inductee into the University’s prestigiuos Iron Arrow.

Oct. 8, 2001

Another Miami vs. FSU week. This is big time.

I have been fortunate enough to be involved in this rivalry for the past four years. I have been in Tallahasee and been beat 47-0, but I have also been in the Orange Bowl and won 27-24. No matter what the outcome the game is always an emotional one.

There are a lot of things that can drive our team this week, personally I will use a couple of them. The loss we suffered up there, 47-0 the year I was being redshirted. The unbeaten streak they have going. Also the one thing that has never left my mind was a comment that one of their players said a year ago. That was, the Miami-FSU rivalry was not really a rivalry because the same team wins every year.

Enough about that. Troy State was a pretty good team. We came out flat in the first half but were able to turn things aroud in the second half. As for the all the questions about us dropping in the polls. Who Cares? I really don’t care if we are number one or number one hundred and seven. If we keep on winning we will end where we want, at the end of the year.

I hope everybody is geared up for this Saturday. I know we will be and there is no worry of us coming out flat. I’ll talk to you guys later.

Oct. 1, 2001

There have been many things that have happened to this great nation in past couple of weeks, but still our way of life goes on. College football fans everywhere continue to enjoy the exciting games on Saturday’s. It has been tough to swallow the events of September 11, but I think the game of football provides us with three hours of entertainment and distraction.

As a team we felt we needed to do something to support relief efforts in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, so we headed to Dadeland Mall and signed hundreds of autographs with all proceeds going to the relief efforts. I would like to thank the hundreds of you that showed your support for that worthwhile cause.

Personally, I am going crazy with my MBA classes. Hint for anybody out there, don’t ever take four MBA courses during a major college football season, it’s torture. As always, I will recoup and somehow throw a Hail Mary which for the past four years ends up being caught, so I don’t see why it shouldn’t be caught this semester.

Last week we faced Pitt, which is a whole lot better team that what their record says. I think they played tough, which made our job harder.

This week we have Troy State, everybody wants to say Troy WHO? But we know that every team counts when you are trying to win the National Championship. Troy State had Nebraska on the ropes in Lincoln last year, so we are definitely not taking this team lightly.

There is one thing I want to say, and hopefully millions read this. Why can’t we make the Orange Bowl a stadium that opponents other than FSU and the big schools fear. I say this because this is the only time we have packed houses. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE show your support and come to our game on Saturday. Think about it, some fans have me begging as if we where ranked 107th. Believe it or not we are the number one team in the Nation until someone proves it otherwise, so lets give our opponents a number one fan support.

I make this promise to you! If we have more than 55,000 fans on Saturday, after the game everybody stay in their seats and I will shake each and every one of the 55,000+ fans. That’s a promise!

C ya Saturday and GO CANES!

Sept. 4, 2001

It was amazing to walk out into Beaver stadium on Saturday night. I will never forget that feeling for the rest of my life, the first game of my senior year. I think we were very well prepared for this game and I know this coaching staff will give us this sort of preparation week in and week out, so it looks like this is going to be a very successful year for us.

As always the offensive linemen have a tradition of going to eat at Flannigans after the travel squad meeting every Thursday. We always go sit on the same tables, same chair, eat the same food. It’s fun and we have been doing this for 4 years now and it has brought us closer as a unit.

This week Coach Schiano comes into to town, he has an advantage he knows all our players and we know he will do a great job game planning for us. But you know the Hurricanes, we will use this as motivation and try to make a statement that we will be the best team in the nation week in and week out.

See Ya at the Orange Bowl Saturday!

August 27, 2001

Fall camp was very hot. It has definitely been the most exhausting two-a-days in my five years at the University of Miami. I think this team is mature enough to understand what it is going to take to win this season, so we went hard all through camp, and fortunately got out of it, basically injury free.

One of the things about this year’s camp is our conditioning, Andrew Swayze and his strength and conditioning staff did a great job this summer in getting us ready for camp and for the season. There is no doubt in my mind this year we will be the best conditioned team every time we step onto that field.

The beginning of the year is always good, you get to see the new faces on campus and in the locker room. It is always a good sight when school starts because that means that camp has ended and that is music to every football player’s ear. Personally this is my last semester at UM, I graduated in December last year with a bachelor’s degree in business marketing and will graduate again in this December with my MBA.

As for this Saturday at Penn State, this is going to be an emotional game for them. I think if we go into this game knowing that and establish our game plan early in the game, we should be victorious in Happy Valley. One of the biggest things that we have going for us is the experience that we have across the board at all positions — this will play a big part in terms of being able to settle down in a hostile environment.

Don’t forget to tune in and Go ‘Canes!