Copyright San Diego Union-Tribune
Editor’s note: The Union-Tribune this season invites readers to submit questions for San Diego State coach Sean Lewis. Today, the coach answers questions after SDSU’s win against Wyoming and heading into Saturday’s game at Hawaii. As a coach myself, I’m interested in how you describe the team in terms of accountability. I’ve noticed a lot of parallels in the writings of Jocko Willink in “Extreme Ownership.” Can you describe a little of how you communicate those principles to the team? Is it a staff-wide thing, or is it more of your own personal philosophy? — Mark Ring, San Diego A: It is a cultural, program-wide staff and player belief. Really, a great question. A lot of it stems from Jocko. I picked up “Extreme Ownership” when it was gifted to me back in 2016. It’s one of the most gifted books that I have passed out. I’m grateful for him being a great American, defending our freedoms, his leadership practices that he’s put out there — so much to the fact that my dog is named Jocko after Jocko. So, yeah, a lot of it stems from that. It’s had a huge influence and impact, and acceptance to everything that happens in my life, in my umbrella, and the care of our program. I’m going to own and work to make sure that is right each and every single day. The ownership piece of it is huge. One of his leadership principles of cover and move we use as well to where we’re going to look out for one another, we’re going to be loyal to the program, we’re going to be loyal to winning, and the humility to know that we’re all better when we do this thing together. Why are up men never used on punt returns? It seems like short punts bounce an extra 15-20 yards and this happens practically every game. — Trent Hable, San Diego A: We’ve had opportunities where we have used two returners. If you go back to Nevada, we used two returners. We have it a part of our repertoire going into each week. We kind of attack it — whether we’re going to go after blocking it, or whether we’re going to set up a return — as taking care of the ball. Valuing that is one thing we’ve been stressing a bunch. So again, very great, observant question. We do have the ability to use multiple returners. For the love of all that is good and decent in this cruel world, why don’t we have a returner set up for the longer field goal attempts from our opponents? — Koji Vu (@Koji_Vu) A: Based off the data that we had, we felt like last week that kid (Wyoming kicker Erik Sandvik) had a leg to be able to do it. Felt like he mishit the first one (short on a 50-yard attempt). He misit the second one (short on another 50-yard attempt). Yeah, probably an opportunity there, again, where we could have had a returner back, but that kid had put the ball in a spot where we thought he was capable of making those field goals. New points were going to be at a premium, so I wanted to stress and get after the kick a little bit. It felt like he had the leg, you know, based off what he had shown, what he was doing pregame, you know, to challenge that kick. I didn’t feel like that was too far outside his range. If someone tries a 60-yarder, end of half, end of game situation, right, like the infamous ‘Kick-6’ versus Auburn and Alabama. comes to mind, right? So it’s like those critical situations in that way. Yeah, I mean, upon further review, if I knew he was going to miss it, that second one, and my crystal ball came from Amazon Prime, we absolutely would have had a guy back. Do you look at San Diego State as a stepping stone or a possible long-term stay for you and your family? — Robert Ascencio, San Diego A: I view it as the greatest job that there is, and I’m willing to create a program and an environment that we can be here forever. I need the community to show up, need our university to continue to step up, need to continue to elevate as we go, so that the fan experience, our player experience, the resources that we have, match the expectations that we have in all facets of the program. We live in America’s finest city. This is a great opportunity. Readers are invited to submit questions after each weekend’s game through Tuesday to kirk.kenney@sduniontribune.com or on X to @sdutkirKDKenney. San Diego State (7-1, 4-0) at Hawaii (6-3, 3-2) When: 8 p.m. PT, Saturday Where: Clarence T.C. Ching Complex TV: Spectrum Sportsnet/Mountain West Network Radio: 760-AM
