LOCKER ROOM REPORT: Wolfpack Players

Several NC State players met with the media following the Wolfpack's 24-21 road win over Virginia Friday evening.

Brennan Armstrong threw for 180 yards on 15-for-30 passing with two touchdowns and one interception as well as 64 rushing yards on 15 carries. K.C. Concepcion caught six passes for 116 yards, including a 48-yard touchdown in the third quarter. Payton Wilson led the Pack with 13 tackles while also logging half a sack for a loss of five yards as well as a quarterback hurry. Caden Fordham added 12 tackles, one tackle for a loss of one yard, and one QB hurry.

NOTE: Click on each player’s respective thumbnail to watch each interview in the player above.

Brennan Armstrong

“It is important to win, especially within the ACC. I’m bad at taking wins when the offense doesn’t do its job, so I’ve obviously got to be better at that. Like you said, a win’s a win. Still, I run back plays through my head. The game should’ve been over. The defense gave us two opportunities to seal the game, and we didn’t do that as an offense. There’s stuff to improve on, but like you said, we start the ACC [schedule] with a win on the road. It’s a great thing. It’s hard to do, but we’ve got to do better as an offense.”

I thought we would be able to get a first down there. We just kept getting three-and-outs. That puts a lot of stress on the defense. The defense just came off a long drive and got a stop. We came off the sideline, and we were like, ‘We’ve got to hold this ball. It doesn’t matter what we do. We’ve got to keep this drive going. Our defense needs some time off. They just played their butts off. We’ve got to do something as an offense.’ Then we go three-and-out. I just look back at those things, and it’s frustrating to me because I want to help those guys out when they play so hard. But we got it done. Penalties, man. At the end of the game, penalties won us the game. We got good field position. Julian [Gray] makes a great return. A few runs here and there got us in field goal range. That’s kind of how it goes.”

“I didn’t know what to expect going into it with the emotions. I felt like I handled it fine. It was pretty surreal, pretty weird, coming back and playing on the other side. I don’t really remember how I was at the start. I’m just thinking about how it finished. I can’t really remember. […] I didn’t get too fired up. I got a little fired up at the end when we weren’t moving the ball. Other than that, I felt like I was okay. Especially on that first drive, I didn’t know how I was going to be. I felt like I was okay there.”

K.C. Concepcion

“It was definitely interesting because I knew he’d come from here. We had his back even more.”

“It’s definitely amazing. I can’t even put words behind it. Best believe that that ball is going to my mom, for sure.”

“Really, I just saw open grass, and I just took it. As soon as I caught the ball, I saw my blocker, and I just went.”

Payton Wilson

“At the end of the day, the ref never sees the first person. They always see the second person. You can’t retaliate. You can’t be stupid. Fifteen yards in this game is crucial. It’s just a matter of staying under control, and luckily I have great teammates that were there to help me do that, Caden included. He was on me all night about keeping my head, not getting 15-yard penalties and stuff like that. Having great teammates around really helps.”

“They were doing stuff all night, especially No. 51. He was dirty. He was doing stuff all night. Like I said, they never see the first person. It’s always that second person.  At the end of the day, you just have to know it’s 60 minutes of ball. Cut all the other stuff out. We have a job to do. Don’t let anything get in the way.”

“A road win in the ACC is great, but it’s not the way we wanted to do it. We’ll continue to go to practice and practice our tails off. We’ll continue to get better, continue to be hard on each other. I think that’s one thing that’s great about this team: it’s how tough we are on each other, and we’re able to take it so we can get better each week.”

Caden Fordham

“It’s huge. It’s always hard to get a win on the road. Anytime you do, it’s a great thing. We’ve just got to fix some things we messed up tonight, and then we’re on to Louisville.”

“Those third-down stops, that’s how you win ball games. Credit to Coach [Tony] Gibson. There were big adjustments in the game we had to make, but they worked out in the end.”

“It’s fun. Credit to [Devon] Betty. He helped me out a lot. I’ll always give credit to that guy. He’s a huge part of what goes into us as linebackers. He’s always helping us out. It was fun to get out there and make some plays for the first time.”