Tony Gibson: "It's Time to Shut Up and Put Up"
No. 24 NC State defensive coordinator Tony Gibson met with the media Tuesday afternoon ahead of the Wolfpack's upcoming matchup in the Duke's Mayo Classic versus No. 14 Tennessee.
NOTE: Click on the video in the player above to watch Gibson’s interview.
On matching Tennessee’s offensive intensity without over-fatiguing players…
It's hard. In our background, a couple of us — myself, Coach [Joe] DeForest, Coach [Brian] Mitchell — were in the Big 12, so that was every week. That was the type of offense that we played. We had to do different things in practice to get reps and make them as game-like as we can, so two-huddles, trying to run guys as fast as we can at them… The biggest piece of that is we have to communicate. That's where the breakdown comes, if we're not communicating to get the call in. I have to do a really good job of doing that, and then the kids have to respond as well.
On Nico Iamaleava...
We went back and studied him in the summer against Iowa in the bowl game. He's very poised in the pocket. He can extend plays. He's smart, understands their system, and knows what they want to do. Obviously, against UTC in the first half, he was very accurate. I don't think he threw an incompletion until midway through second quarter. We're going have our work cut out. We're going to show up and hopefully be better than we were a week ago.
On what stood out against Western Carolina…
Just self-inflicted things. The first play of the game, we should've had an interception for touchdown, but we dropped it, and then the second play of the game, we had an interception in our hands, and we dropped it. Then we get an ejection for targeting. When I looked out and we first broke our huddle to run on the field, we had eight new starters, so it was a great learning process for us. I'm really happy with the way we finished, and we adjusted throughout the game, but we have to get much better.
On adjusting from game one to game two, especially going from playing an FCS opponent to a Top 25 team…
The speed of this game that we're about to go to, we've not seen anything like it in preseason or fall camp, as far as the tempo that they use. That's our biggest adjustment right now. What we're looking for is we have to play very, very fundamentally sound, and we have to communicate. Again, I can't say that word enough. If we don't, it will be ugly. Our guys have to make sure that we're talking, getting the right call, getting guys in position to make a play, and then we have to make plays.
On helping Caden Fordham get in the right mindset after the targeting disqualification…
He's played a lot of football. He knows. quarterbacks are untouchable when they go to slide and give themselves up. That was not very smart on his part, but it's a learning tool we can use moving forward. We have to stay off the quarterback [when he slides]. They’re going to protect those guys, and they should. It’s not very smart on our part.
On Sean Brown taking over on coms after Fordham’s ejection…
Sean's a very good communicator. We worked a lot of different guys with the green dot in fall camp, and Sean happened to be one of them, so the transition was easy. We missed a couple things that resulted in big plays because we did miss checks. With Caden in there, would we have missed those? Probably not, but we did.
On the six missed tackles despite eight new starters…
That was big. The six that we missed for the game, one was a 50-yard run by quarterback. Again, that was a blown assignment, a missed check, and then missed tackles; we missed two on the same play. They came, and they cost us when we did miss them. Our goal is to not miss any, so we have to get better with that.
On not letting one week’s mishaps impact the rest of the season…
With the format of everything, your conference games matter, but this is a national game against a great program, and we're going to be better. I promise you that. Defensively, we will be better, or they won't play. It's going to be a fun night, and I'm excited about it. What we have to do is just keep preparing and get our guys ready for the tempo piece of all of this.
On D.J. Jackson playing his first game…
That was a great feeling for that young man. He's missed three years. To get his first snaps and play a lot… I think he ended up getting 20 snaps, but I’m very happy for him. Again, he’ll get better as we keep going on.
On the impact of missing plays against a higher-tier opponent…
We better [make them]. Again, it's all focus stuff. In the first play of the game, I don't make many good calls during the game, but that was a good one, and we missed the opportunity. What we have to do is, when they give us a layup, we have to make it, and we didn’t.
On the safeties and nickels…
Good. There were some, again, miscommunication. We gave up some things, but it's great to be able to win a football game, regardless of the opponent, and get better from it. That's exactly what happened. Western Carolina did a great job — I'm not taking anything away from them — but our kids are going to learn from our mistakes. We won the game. Our goal was to be 1-0 by the end of the week, and we were. We're never going to apologize for a win. It was ugly, but it was a win.
On getting the team to lock in ahead of the Tennessee game…
That's what I told them. I hope that we weren't looking to this game going into week one, which I don't understand why we would do that when we get 12 opportunities. It's time to shut up and put up right now. It's all out there. Again, it’s a national ranked team, a great stadium, a great venue, and the world is going to be watching. What are we going to do? They better come to play.
On the defensive line…
It was good. Obviously, Davin Vann played really well; he was our defensive player of the game. I thought he made some big plays at big times that we needed. I thought Brandon Cleveland played well. Noah Potter played well. Travali [Price], all those guys [played well]. It was good to see. The run game with the tailback, they weren't even trying to run them, but that’ll be a bit little different story this week. Tennessee's big, and their tailback's really good, and their run game's good, so we’ll get tested.