Updated Sept. 20, 2009 @5:58 p.m. ET

If you are going around the Lions' facility or locker room hoping to get a quote from someone about last season's 0-16 debacle, good luck to you.

The coaching staff is almost entirely new, run by first-time head coach Jim Schwartz. Only 20 of the 53 players on the Week One roster were on the team a year ago at the same time, and the ones who are back are not too keen about digging up the recent past.

That's all by design. In Schwart'z eight months on the job, care to take a guess how many times the word "rebuilding" or a mention of 0-16 came up around the players?

"Not once," C Dominic Raiola told PFW just before the start of the season. "It's all about moving forward with him. It's all about improving today."

Think about how much has changed with this team, today compared to a season ago. Gone is the Tampa-2 defense, poorly run and staffed by the previous administration, and replaced by a more aggressive scheme. Schwartz is in for Rod Marinelli. Martin Mayhew took over for Matt Millen. Calvin Johnson has become a star. And Matthew Stafford has replaced Jon Kitna — and the four other QBs who played last season — as the engineer and centerpiece.

Fairly or not, Stafford was cloaked with the mantle of the franchise's responsibility before he ever took a snap that counted. But at no point did Stafford not want the pressure of being the guy in the crosshairs.

"I know the kid is special," Raiola said. "From the get-go, he came in and blended with the locker room and had respect for this organization. It's a privilege to play this game, and he embodies all that."

In his debut last Sunday, Stafford mostly struggled. He showed toughness in leading the Lions back from a 14-0 deficit but threw some wildly inaccurate passes and had a critical interception in the red zone. He ended up completing only 16-of-37 passes and had three interceptions.

He wasn't much better in Week Two, completing 18-of-30 passes for 152 yards, with one TD pass and two interceptions.

Setbacks aside, no one is calling this a rebuilding job, certainly not Schwartz.

"I don't expect to get beaten up and beaten down this year," he said prior to the opener. "I expect a lot out of this football team, and I'm not going to concede anything to expectations outside this building, outside this locker room.

"I know what we have here, and we expect to compete this year, so let's sort of throw that out there right now."

Schwartz comes from Tennessee, where they win games and don't stay down for long. It's not coincidence that the new-look Lions brought in players such as FB ­Terrelle Smith and LB Larry Foote, who met on opposite sides in the Super Bowl.

Foote, who has to be the first player in the modern era to leave a title winner for a winless team, was named a team captain along with Raiola and is buying into the new attitude in Detroit. In fact, he's helping create it.

"I am thinking about the reward if we can turn this thing around," Foote told PFW. "I was watching a show they did on the Steelers in the 1970s, when the steel factories were closing down.

"But they won four Super Bowls in the decade, and hopefully I can be a part of something like that here. These people need it."

The effort began in Week One. Even in a 45-27 loss to the Saints, this Lions team felt different, more legitimate. And in Week Two the Lions led the Vikings at halftime before falling 27-13.

"[Schwartz] wants to win now," Raiola said. "The time is ... we don't have time. We have to win now."

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