Syracuse Orange College Football Pregame Quote, 10/07/2019

We play NC State this week and it’s obviously a Thursday night game. It’s always fun when we play in front of the entire country. They’re football team that is a little bit in the state of ours. I think it is a good football team that is going through some changes, I think they needed the bye week as much as we did for injuries. No change in our injuries at all, we are still waiting to see if we are going to get some guys back. Hopefully we can get some of those guys back because they are good players, but that happens in football and we need to play with the guys who are capable. Next-man-up attitude is the attitude we are going to have.

On players returning from injury:

Not going to talk about any of those guys. I think it will probably stay that way everything has been. Right now I would not bet on any of those guys playing. I think it is going to stay the same. You have to talk to the medical people, I am not going to talk about his business (Sam Heckel).

On coming off a bye:

You know I think the bye comes at an interesting time. We’ve got five games in the books, we are going to get another bye here after three or four I can’t remember the break-up how it comes. But, they are coming at good times, and they are coming at a good time for the physical part of it too. It’s a long season and last year the beauty of it was we got hurt at the right positions where we had a lot of depth. We are getting hit in some areas that are really affecting our football team. I think a lot of football teams across the country are going through the same thing, where coaches need to adapt and players need to step up and continue to try to do the things you need to do to achieve the goals you set out when the season started.

On improvements out of the bye:

Any time you get in a bye week there is two things you have to do: You have to get healthy and you have to try and get better. We’re working on all the positions to get better. We’re trying to see if there is someone locked into the two-deep that should have the opportunity to be in the one or in the one point five is how we talk about it. Somebody that has to have more repetitions in the game to see if they can help us this year instead of helping us next year. So, we are working on all of those guy and they did a good job. You can only do so much when you have guys who are out and guys who are trying to get healthy at the same time. Some guys did a nice job when they came in and we’re going to have to see how that goes. Personnel changes could absolutely happen.

On NC State defensive lineman Larrell Murchison:

That young man can play. He can flat play football. The biggest thing is I don’t think you can really stop great players, but we gotta find a way to slow him down and there are things that we are going to try to do that we will not publicly state, but he is one of the better football players on his team and we think he is a good player.

On two-back offensive sets and when can we expect to see more of that formation:

I think that was a matter of trying to get both of those young men on the field. That’s something we can come back to at any time. It doesn’t disappear, it stays with us.

On playing with more pace:

We worked really hard on it and hopefully we can play even faster. I think that is really the key, we are only as fast as our slowest guy we have on offense. And getting them up to speed is something we really have been working hard on and hopefully it is something we can put behind us in the rear view mirror and continue to accelerate that pace.

On the extra time this week and how it’s helped the team:

I think the biggest thing you get to do during a bye week is you get to look at yourself and you get to self-scout yourself. It gives you time to catch your breath and see what your opponents are looking and you get to really look at yourself. You think you are really good at something, but then you get to look at yourself and you are really not that good at it. Or you think you are not that good and then you look at it and you are really efficient at it. So I think the self-check is really the biggest thing that happens during a bye week. Once again, based off of where our byes are I think they come at good times for us.

On NC State’s Defense, and also Co-Defensive Coordinator Tony Gibson who was West Virginia’s Defensive Coordinator last year:

I think any time we play someone that is familiar with us, we have gone back and looked at it and I am sure they’ve looked at it as well. The guy is a good coach, he is the co-defensive coordinator, and I think their defensive coordinator from last year is still there. So, they may be working together, I am not sure the ins and outs of what is going on at NC State, I’m worried about Syracuse. But the defense is very good, it has some West Virginia-type qualities to it, and whatever defense they decide to play we have to be ready for it.

On Eric Coley’s production:

He’s really grown as a player when you look at his development. That is one of the things you get a lot of pleasure as a coach. Not only his on-field development, but his physical development. He’s changed his body physically, if you’ve been around the program like a lot of you guys have for a long time, to see him walk in as recruits, some of you guys get the opportunity to know them as high school recruits and then to see them two or three years down the road with the strength and the nutrition and the development that goes on with their bodies, it is kind of exciting. So, he’s one of those guys we have watched grow up inside the family and I am excited for him and excited for his family, he’s been doing some outstanding things.

On Luke Benson:

Luke is a guy who if you tell him to do something he is going to do it exactly the way you tell him how to do it. And any time you get you get someone like that you have a chance and obviously we’re watching him and physically he is not exactly where we want him to be, but he has some attributes you might be able to use in a football game that can help you win. He’s caught some footballs, he has made some plays, he’s not a guy we are afraid to get the ball to see how well he can do.

On balancing the protection of starting QB Tommy DeVito, and other starters, while also giving them the reps they need:

When we are out there, we’re trying to win a football game and we are going to play our best players. When the game is out of hand, all of the players, all of my step sons are important. And you get them in and out of the game based on that.

On similarities between Syracuse and NC State and whether he sees those similarities:

I do. The home field advantage is going to be big this year and we have to try to find a way to make up that advantage. You look at where they are, I think we are probably in a better situation with our quarterback situation than they are. But when you add up their defense, they have some high-quality defensive players, they’ve got some running backs who can make some plays, they’re playing at home, and they’re a hard team to beat at home. This is a pivotal swing game for both programs and I think it is going to be a highly contested football game.