NC State Wolfpack College Football Pregame Quote, 09/16/2019

Going back to last week, we’re obviously disappointed, but we’re not discouraged. It’s a bunch of very upset and mad guys and coaches alike with what we did and what we did not do. I think that’s the biggest thing‚Äîanytime you have a loss, it’s taking the opportunity to grow and learn from it. That’s what this is for us with our football team. It’s a huge, huge learning opportunity.

Offensively, I thought it was really two different halves. In the first half, I thought we moved the ball well. We had 21 points and a 93-yard touchdown drive, compared to the second half when we only had six points and couldn’t really get in a rhythm. We ran the ball pretty efficiently, but gave up too many negative plays. They had 10 plays in our backfield and seven TFLs, which gets you off schedule offensively. A lot of details, whether it’s a route depth or location, a split, being off an inch in certain places, not quick enough to the tuck, not accurate enough with the ball‚Äîthere’s so many little things that could have changed how we played on offense. I do think our red zone offense has been really good.

I like the way that some of our guys competed. There’s just a lot of stuff we’ve got to fix. We have an opportunity to do that, and I’m excited to do that with our guys. They were very good yesterday in our meetings with them.

Defensively, I thought we played slow. I didn’t think we tackled as well as we have. Whether we were losing the gap, misfitting the run or not setting the edge appropriately, we didn’t contest enough balls, which is something we had been doing well. I thought we gave up some stuff that we haven’t been, and we weren’t disruptive and we didn’t play with good enough technique. There were a lot of basic things. I thought they played fast and their tempo was good, and we didn’t adjust to that very well throughout the game. On special teams, the blocked punt was obviously a critical mental error, and really something that should never happen with our protection scheme that we have.

With all that being said, there were 11 minutes left in the game and we were down by four. We got a stop on defense and an unfortunate penalty that allowed that drive to extend, and I felt like that was a critical point in the game as bad as we were playing, to have a chance to win. We just didn’t do the right things. We have to play the ball better when the ball is in the air. Flags are going to be thrown when you don’t.

The best part about it is our players understand this. Our coaches understand this. It’s an opportunity. Every obstacle in your life is a choice in how you’re going to handle that adversity. For us, it’s an opportunity to improve, and that’s what we’re going to do.

We get to come home this week and play a night game. It’s a sold-out game and it’s a blackout. Our guys will have their black uniforms on. We’re excited about that.

We’re excited about an opportunity we have this week in the community and nationwide with the #SetTheExpectation game. Brenda Tracy, who is very well known, came here this spring and met with our football team and student-athletes. James Smith-Williams and a member of our men’s soccer team joined up and did something with our baseball program in the spring and have set it up to do the same thing with our football team. We’ll wear a shirt that advocates her cause, and I’m very excited and proud of our guys for wanting to be part of a solution to such a big thing nationally. It’s something that we can do to help Brenda and help her cause, and our world. I’m proud of our student-athletes for being a part of that, and I look forward to that opportunity for them to use their platform to help something way bigger than them. We appreciate her allowing us to do that with her, and all that it stands for.

Moving forward, Ball State is a football team that is really good on offense. They’re impressive. Obviously, I know a lot about the MAC and the skill level. There are good receivers, there are good running backs and there’s athletic players in that league. Their quarterback is playing at a high level. He has a 70% completing rate, over 1,000 yards in the games‚Äî11 touchdowns, only three interceptions, he knows his progression, gets the balls to his backs‚Äì and they’re almost 50-50 in the run and passing game. There’s a lot of play action down the field. Their tailback is a tough kid, he runs downhill. They’ve got four returning starters up front, and they play fast. They’re getting over 80 plays a game, so the tempo is going to be something that we’ve got to be prepared to play well against.

They’re scoring over 30 points per game. It’s a good football game for us to have at home, and it’s a good opponent. Defensively, they’re sound. They have a lot of players back that have played for them, and they’re athletic. All four starters in their secondary are back. They’ve got a free safety that’s 6’4, 220 lbs. that makes a lot of plays and is their leading tackler in the box. They’re a team that plays hard. It’s a coach that’s been there now for a few years and has played a lot of young guys that are now in their third year. It’s a good test for our football team, and it’s really a chance for our team to get back to running the football, throwing it and catching it and doing things we need to do. Defensively, we need to get back to being aggressive and playing fast. I think we got out of who we wanted to be in that football game. It was a great opportunity to learn. I look forward to that with our guys this week.

On QB Matthew McKay:

I think there’s always things we have to reevaluate. We have three games worth of information, and there are certain things he’s doing really well. There were some situational things on 3rd & 1 where we had RPOs called where that’s on us. We shouldn’t have him thinking about throwing the ball right there. That’s not on Matthew. That’s on us.

There were a couple third downs where he threw a good ball and the ball was dropped. Obviously, you’re going to say the receiver should catch it. I think there’s a lot that goes into him playing better, and he needs to play better. He was mad at himself on some of the things he could do better.

What is he doing well? He’s not turning the football over. He’s getting guys lined up, outside of the first play of the game where we had a delay. He’s managing the clock well. He’s doing some good things, but it’s his third college game and it’s his first road game in that environment. Did he play great? No, he didn’t. Can he play better? Yes, he can. As far as changing things, we have to grow. We’re going to evolve on offense. We’ve got a lot of new parts, especially with CJ Riley being out. As the season goes on, we’re going to be more and more of who we’re going to be. We have to do a good job of evaluating that. We did that yesterday: what has he done well? What hasn’t he done well? Let’s focus on the things that he’s really doing well and where we’re succeeding in the run game. What can we do off of the run game to help with the pass game?

I think that’s part of being young on offense. You think you know what you want to do, but when you play, you really find out what you can do. That’s our job to change some things based on the information we now have. The other two quarterbacks are practicing well. We have to continue to get them better. I tell them‚Äîeveryone in our program on the two and three-deep has to get ready to play. If they get an opportunity, they do at some point.

I’m never going to say that Matthew McKay underperformed to the point where I’ve got to pull him out. There’s a lot of things‚Äîwhen you look at our running backs or are corners or offensive line or tight ends‚Äîacross the board as a football team, we’ve got to play a lot better.

On RPO calls:

We’ve had RPOs all year, and they’ve been good. Sometimes we play with tempo, and when you play with tempo, it means you’re going to run that play. For example, if you have an inside or outside zone that have zones that he can throw, if they’re there, he’s going to throw them. Maybe you don’t want him to throw them, so we shouldn’t call the play that has the option. Just say hey, we’re just going to run the run. When you do that, you can’t play with tempo. You have to slow it down.

I think it’s just a learning curve. A more experienced quarterback would have said ‚ÄòI don’t care that there’s a throw; I’m running this thing.’ He’s a third-time starter, so that’s not on Matthew McKay. That’s on us.

Those are just things that you see to make it easier for him. We got to the next 3rd & 1 and we just handed it off. We took the game management piece out of it. As quarterbacks grow, you can add those things back.

On QB Bailey Hockman:

You’d love to say that Bailey will get some snaps. We’ll just have to see how it goes this week.

On overall position competition:

I think it’s great. I think it makes people have to practice well because the guy behind him is trying to take his job. The other thing it allows is for us to rotate in games. We have an offense that’s averaging 80 snaps a game this week, and when you look at some of the teams down our schedule, they’re getting almost 100 snaps a game on offense.

That depth is only good if it’s competitive. You want those guys to be able to compete in practice and then reward them with playing time if they’ve earned it. At some positions, we’ve been able to do that more than others.

On the Clayton HS grade-fixing scandal:

Every student-athlete at NC State goes through the exact same process that every student here goes through. It’s not an athletic evaluation. It’s on campus and they go through every class on their transcript. And then, because they’re athletes, it then has to go to the clearing house. There’s a two-fold process that doesn’t even go on in our office. There’s been nothing brought to our attention about our guys.

I found out in August about that thing, and I haven’t heard anything about it again until today. I feel good about what has happened on our campus.

On DEs James Smith-Williams and Joseph Boletepeli being listed first on the depth chart/playing

That’s our hope.

On WR Tabari Hines:

He’s been outside at times. He was outside in the game on Saturday. We’re looking all the time at how we can utilize different guys. Keyon Lesane is a guy that was banged up a little bit early, but now we can feel like he’s getting healthier too. It just adds another piece. Devin Carter and Emeka Emezie probably played a little too much.

On CB Kishawn Miller:

I will tell you he’s one of the hardest workers in our program, not just at corner. Kishawn works really hard and he’s consistent. He competes. He’s knowledgeable of our scheme. He understands what to do and how to do it. I think that’s the biggest thing: you get a consistent, hardworking performance every snap. He’s got great confidence in himself, and he communicates well with his teammates. That’s why you see where he’s at.

He’s been through a lot, and I’ve proud of what he’s done, as far as his work ethic. There are things he’s got to improve on, obviously, but he went in the game and competed.

On penalties:

Some of the penalties you can manage. I think clock management, that’s coaching and that’s players doing their job. Focus is your pre-snap stuff‚Äîoffensively and defensively. Those are things that we’ve been pretty good at. Some of the things between the whistles are technique, and offensive holding happens every play. Sometimes it gets called and sometimes it doesn’t. Pass interference‚Äîsometimes it looks like it and it doesn’t get called, and sometimes it doesn’t and it gets called. For us, we’ve just got to coach the technique the best that we can to try and prevent it from being called.

I think the things that were most disappointing to me were Jarius Morehead’s penalty out of bounds. He can’t do that. There’s no way he can do that as a senior that has played as much football as he has. Calvin Hart jumping on a guy that’s on the ground‚Äîhe can’t do that. Those were choices that were made in the game. I can limit that. They can limit that. We spent a lot of time talking about heat of the moment, moment of truth, right and wrong and focus. Those are things that, for the most part we’ve done well, but didn’t do well in this game. Nine penalties is way too many.

I feel like our football team shouldn’t beat our self. If we’re going to win a game, let’s not make it where we lost the game. Every penalty that we can take off the board is yardage one way or the other. We have to own that as a program. We talk about it a lot and we emphasize it a lot. That’s one of the things that we control, in some cases. I don’t think you always control a holding penalty. I don’t because it happens all the time, but a lot of these things are in your control as players, particularly late-hit type things. You can’t do it. Frustration sometimes sets in in a guy and he does the wrong thing. That’s just maturity and we’ve got to be better than that.

On media and fan overreactions:

Boo Corrigan has been very, very helpful to me. I think it all starts with him to me, me to my staff and then my staff to our players. Seven days ago everyone was loving everybody. That’s this game. That’s this sport. As the leader of this program, I can’t act like that. We just have to get better. We got hit in the mouth, so we need to get better and hit someone else in the mouth. That’s football and that’s what happens when you don’t play well. We didn’t. We obviously didn’t prepare well, so that’s on us coaches. We felt like we did, but it didn’t show, so we have to own that. Players have to own their part, and we’ve got to get back to work.

You’re one day away from someone loving or hating you in this business. That’s just how it is. You sign up for that when you decide to be a college coach.

On the atmosphere at West Virginia:

I can’t give them a game day, especially a road game like that. That was a great environment. We didn’t handle it well. They’ll get better from it. We’ve got another environment like that coming up in two weeks when we go down to Tallahassee. It was great to have that opportunity and to learn from it. Hopefully it will be something that helps us a lot moving forward.

On the level of competition being a factor:

It was a factor. They were the fastest thing we’ve seen in a long time‚Äîsince the bowl game. They have good team speed there, they really do. They play fast. You can’t simulate those things every day, there’s no doubt. That’s not why we lost the football game. It’s not. We just didn’t execute, so that’s what we’ve got to focus on. We’re seeing a lot of speed in our practices every day, but for four quarters of football, they had good players at the skill positions.