LIONS HEAD COACH DAN CAMPBELL QUOTE SHEET
September 10, 2025
Opening Statement: “OK, back at it, man. It’s good to get back to work. Day one, ready to roll.”
On Lions WR Jameson William’s contract extension being finalized: “Yeah, it’s good. As much as you can kind of get that business side out of the way, it’s good. We were hoping it would’ve been done sooner than that, but it doesn’t always work that way. Glad to get it done, Jamo’s come a long way, and we expect a lot more out of him, too. It’s good.”
On Bears Defensive Coordinator Dennis Allen and why his defenses have been so successful: “Very detailed. He’s very detailed. His guys always play hard. Man, the essence of defense. They run, they hit, they challenge. They make it hard on you, nothing comes easy. He covers himself a lot, man. He’s kind of been through it all, he knows where people are trying to expose that defense and so he’s got answers for everything. Like I say, when you accompany that with the way they play, that’s why he’s always had really good defenses. So, he’s an excellent communicator, knows how to teach, energetic, passionate. So, all of those things are always going to rub off on your players. Look, I’ve got a lot of respect for DA. I’ve got a lot of respect for all of those coaches, it’s a hell of a staff over there, really is.”
On how much he expects teams to have an answer for Lions EDGE Aidan Hutchinson: “I think anybody we play is going to – I always think, what would I do? WWDD? I would not let Hutch wreck a game, there’s no way. So, they will have answers. They’re not going to let him, particularly on passing downs, they’re not going to let him ever have a one-on-one. And if they do, it would be rare or ball’s out really quick. They will, and he knows that, we know that, it’s understood. That’s the game he has to play. That’s not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure. But it also means other guys have to step up and win. It’ll be about us putting other guys in positions to where we think will draw some of those, and they have to win and win quickly.”
On the interior defensive line and if he thinks there is more to pull out of them: “Yeah, I do. I believe that. Look, there’s more to give everywhere. I mean, that’s the most obvious. The coaches, the players, what we do fundamentally, technique-wise, how we set it up a little bit. And so, I would anticipate us being much better this week.”
On how imperative it is to fix the offensive line issues and address the run game: “Oh yeah, definitely. But we will, I mean, we will. We’re going to be out there today, man, we’re going to address it head on. We talked about it in walkthrough. The focus, the footwork, the little things. And we’re going to make sure we establish that today, day one, in practice and that we’re on point with our footwork, hat placement, all the little things. We’re ID’d correctly, we’re coming off the ball. Or if not, we’ll do it again and we’ll get it right, we’ll get it right, we’ll get it right. And we are going to be much better. We will be much better.”
On his impression of Chicago’s first game under Bears Head Coach Ben Johnson: “Did a really good job. I thought, man, I thought they played pretty fast. Those receivers were moving. I thought the shifts, the motions, I thought the O-line came off the ball. (Bears RB D’Andre) Swift ran hard, quarterback played fast. It was – I thought it looked really good, man. Looked pretty good, which is what I would expect from Ben’s unit. Look, they’ve got good players over there, and he’s got the system in and it’s about attacking the opponent. And we have good players over here, too. We’re pretty prideful, and so we just have to play our rules and apply our rules and make sure that we get it right in practice and carry it over into the game.”
On how he prepares for Bears Head Coach Ben Johnson’s play-calling style: “You’ll practice one or two things, you do it for every opponent. But, I don’t really care about trick plays. If you – let’s just handle the meat and potatoes of an offense, a defense, what we think they’re going to hang their hat on, and let’s stop that first. Let’s worry about that, let’s make sure we’re all on point, and we’ll handle the other stuff with our rules. You have to have proper eyes, man, we give you those rules for a reason. And look, they may hit us on one, that’s alright. That happens, you get back in the huddle and let’s go to the next play.”
On if the team has prepared to defend specific trick plays they know Bears Head Coach Ben Johnson may have: “Look, we’ve got a menu. A very large menu of things. So, there can be anything, but we’ll be good. I mean, you can’t sit there and paralyze yourself with what if, what if, what if. The most important thing is you’ll get in trouble if you don’t handle the nuts and bolts of an offense. If you can’t stop the run, we bleed out explosives, then that’s where you can get in trouble. So, I’m not worried about the other stuff.”
On how much the outside noise fuels him: “What fuels my tank is losing. That fuels me because I don’t like losing, our players don’t like it, and you go back to work, man. And you get back to the basics of what you do, man, and you hit it head on. Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, we’re all accountable. And if we want to win, we have to do the little things right and prepare that way. And then we have to play that way, so that’s what gets me going.”
On if he is surprised by the alarmed reactions from the media and fans: “No, because that’s where the standards are at now. So, that’s the nature of what we’re in right now. That’s a good thing, that means we’ve risen above what we were at one time. That’s our world, man. That’s our world. But I know that if we felt that way and acted that way, we’d be in trouble. So, we can’t worry about all that. I mentioned this the other day, all you worry about is getting better. You really do. We have to get much better about our fundamentals and communication. Just those two things alone. And if we improve that, a whole other step above what we did last week, we’re going to be much better. And then, let’s get a little bit better the next week, and it’ll take care of itself. It really will.”
On Bears TE Colston Loveland and Bears WR Luther Burden and how they prepare for rookies that will be a big part of what Chicago does: “Look, both of those guys are good players. We like both of them, and Loveland, he’s a mismatch piece. Look, he’ll mix it up in the run game but he’s a pretty dynamic receiver, has dynamic ability. He can stretch the field. He’s big, he’s long, he’s got really good hands. So, there’s no secret they’ll try to use him. And I just go back to this, there will be times where there’s a one-on-one and we have to take advantage of that, or they will. And then we have to mix some looks up, no different than any other team that we play with, and guys have to do their job.”
On the Packers defense dictating the offensive unit and what they can do to combat that: “I think a lot of what really came out of that game and what it was – like to me, we’d gotten ourselves in a hole. And it really, when it became a three-score game, that’s where it really got hard. It wasn’t the two-score game. If you can just pull it within one score, we’re good to go. But when you become a three-score game, then it becomes very hard because they know you have to go over the top. And so, I do think when you play that, the right thing to do is to stay patient with it. I mentioned this the other day. When you go 31-of-39, you have 30 minutes to time of possession, and you had 22 carries on the ground, that smells of you’re winning the game. But, we didn’t do enough, it’s not enough. And so, we tried to play it right, we just didn’t execute. We just didn’t execute, and we had a turnover. And so, I think what we did was right. And you have to just stay in that, you have to stay in that. Just play that game for a while, stay patient because I do believe we get in there, we get within one score, defense gets a stop. Now all of a sudden, man, you’re good, you’ve got timeouts. But you get in that type of game, it gets really hard.”
On if it would have been feasible to run the exact same offense as last year: “So after one game, tell me what it looks like that’s drastically different. You didn’t see any pre-snap motions in that game? I want you to go back and look at all of our motions, pre-snap motions, fast motions, shifts on the road.”
On the Bears defensive unit missing key players and what stood out to him on the tape: “They played a lot of nickel obviously without (Bears DB Kyler) Gordon, and to your point, without (Bears LB T.J.) Edwards. And then (Bears DB) Jaylon (Johnson) wasn’t out there. Those are three really good players for them, and I think they’ll all be back. I think at least two of them will be back. So, getting any two of those three is going to significantly raise the bar and help those guys a lot. Just the type of player and the communication. But what you see is a sound defense that plays hard. And if they get those pieces back, it just gives them more flexibility to do more things.”
LIONS QB JARED GOFF QUOTE SHEET
September 10, 2025
On the key getting the run game going: “Yeah, great question. We have two really good backs and two good tight ends for that matter that can do a lot with it after the catch, so getting it to them means space. Finding those voids underneath a zone defense that has that space, being able to put them in those places. And I thought we did a good job with that. Now, would we have liked to break one of those off for like 15? Sure, but sometimes that doesn’t happen.”
On his initial takeaway of the team’s Week 1 performance after watching tape: “Just sloppy. Just have to be better in the details and communicate better. I mentioned this after the game, it starts with me. I’ve got to communicate better and take a little bit of stress off of those guys from a communication aspect. Yeah, just be better. Just get back to our bread and butter. We’ve got good athletes, we’ve got good players, we’ve got good plays. If we execute the bread and butter, we’ll be just fine.”
On what he needs to communicate better on: “Just clearer and making sure everyone’s on the same page. Very often we’ll have two or three plays that are called in my headset, that are called in the huddle and making sure that we all know which one of those two or three that we’re going to run.”
On how much of miscommunication comes from playing at a different stadium: “Yeah, I mean it should be cured on the road. If we were on the road, I’d say it’d be cured as well. Certainly, at home you hear a little bit better, but I don’t think that’s – that wasn’t why we had miscommunication, it was just straight miscommunication. Happens and it’s inexcusable.”
On if he thinks the Packers defense adapted to their offense: “I think they did a lot of what they’ve done. I think they had some new wrinkles that were good. I think they’re a really good team, they’re a really good defense, they’re very well coached, they’re a year older than they were last year and they played well and we didn’t. I don’t know if there’s much more to it than that. They’re a good team who played well and we’re a good team who didn’t play well and that’s the outcome.”
On the negative media and fan reactions to the outcome of Week 1: “Don’t care. We’ve heard negative from the outside before. Is there anyone in this building? I don’t think so.”
On putting last year’s success behind and moving forward with two new coordinators: “I think we’ve put it behind us to be honest. I don’t feel like there is, certainly not a narrative in here, of anything about last season. I think we’re very aware that last year we had a good year, this year we’re 0-0 and now we’re 0-1. Very aware of the reality of that. I don’t think there’s anything from last year that comes into this year and gives you a head start. We know it all starts over and have to find a way to get a win this week.”
On what jumps out from watching the tape of Chicago’s defense: “I think they’ve got a good team. I think they’re very well coached and I think always have been, to be honest, on defense. I think bringing in a guy like (Bears Defensive Coordinator) Dennis Allen to coach their defense is a strong coach. He’s a good leader and has done it for a long time. They’re sound and they know where they’re supposed to be. They’ve got really good, smart players, they’ve got good veteran players at this point. Those guys have grown up. And yeah, if they get some of those guys back, they’re even more dangerous. But we’ve got our hands full regardless of who plays, and we have to play better than we did last week.”
On if he feels like the offense is close to being successful in the deep passing game: “Yeah, it’s one game, so if there was something downfield open then I should’ve thrown it. I don’t feel like there was, but if there was, then I should’ve thrown it.”
On if Lions RB Jahmyr Gibbs and Lions RB David Montgomery have a chip on their shoulder to succeed going forward this season: “Yeah, I think everyone does. I don’t think it’s just them. I think it’s them, I think it’s the O-line, it’s myself, it’s our receivers. I think we were very straightforward and honest with ourselves about the reality of what we did and didn’t do last week and how we need to get better. I expect us to get a lot better this week, and today it started and tomorrow it’ll continue and just continue to improve.”
On why it takes time to find an offensive identity every season: “I don’t think it matters necessarily if your players are coming back, if your coaches are coming back. I think every year is new and every defense is new and there are trends in the League that change and come and go, certainly offensively and defensively. Maybe certain runs that worked in the past don’t work anymore. You have to find those little niches that your guys are good at that are also successful plays, and I think that’s no different than last year, the year before, or any time in the past. I think that any time you’re in the early parts of a season, like you said, it takes three or four weeks for the offense to get their footing, and I feel like it’s been that way ever since I was a rookie.”
