Dave Doeren Discusses National Signing Day

NC State head coach Dave Doeren met with the media via Zoom to discuss the Wolfpack's newest signees for the 2024 National Signing Day.

NOTE: Click on the video in the player above to watch Doeren’s press conference.

Opening Statement

We’re so excited to welcome these guys into the program. Obviously, a lot of work goes into recruiting, and I want to start just thanking our staff and our recruiting staff. There are a lot of really good people behind the scenes, a lot of conversations, obviously, on the phone, through text, and in person. Andy Vaughn, our general manager, does such a great job organizing everything and the way that we departmentalize things in there with our evaluation staff, director of player personnel, and and his assistants, and then our recruiting staff with [Alex Faulk] and what those guys do. It takes a village, for sure, to educate and show what NC State is, to teach them in small opportunities on unofficial visits, official visits, Zoom calls, phone calls, and to get everybody involved: the academic staff, our strength staff, nutrition staff, sports med staff, you name it. There's so many people and all the professors on campus. They gave us access to their departments for tours that spent time with recruits. It comes down to this day as the first signing date of the window, and we're excited about the young men that have joined the Wolfpack. I’m really excited. It's a good group of guys that fit our culture, that have learned a lot about us through a lot of visits and a lot of conversations, and it's an ongoing process. As you know, this is the first signing date of two and then with what happens after that in the portal world. Roster management is a different beast these days. When you get into developing players, which is something I love to do — it's one of my passions — it starts with the high school player. There are 17 young men that are joining our program, and they come to us from nine different states. We spent a lot of time with these guys, and we’re excited about what they're going to bring. Eleven of them are mid-year. Six of them were team captains during their careers. Some of them are local guys. Some of them are from Florida, Ohio, South Carolina, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and Mississippi. That covers a lot of ground. It's interesting to have a signing date this early, a week earlier than normal from when it used to be in February. We went into this really wanting to get some guys that fit exactly who we are, that love not just playing football, but the process of becoming really good at the sport. They want to compete. Obviously, all young people want to play early, and you hope that you find guys with that kind of ability, but you also want guys that love the hard work behind the scenes and understand that it is a process and that there's development that goes into it. The class starts and started with our quarterback commit, Will Wilson. I'm so excited about Will and have known him and his family a long time. I've developed a great relationship with them and excited about him. He's a young guy that can throw, can run, and lead. His father is his head coach as well. He comes from the coaching tree, and he's going to be here mid-year, and I’m excited for him to join the team and [see] what he can do. There's four offensive linemen that we're excited to start working with, and some of them will be here mid-year. Some of them won't, but we have probably one of the best centers that we've been able to sign since I've been here. A lot of the centers we've recruited over the years, we've had to train how to play that position, and to get Spike [Isaac Sowells, Jr.], as he goes by, in the program, we’re really excited for him. I wish he was here today for him to get here and start working with him. I always believe you build a football team inside out: with your center and your quarterback on offense, with your nose tackle and your Mike linebacker on defense. Getting a guy like that at quarterback and center in this class is great for the future of our program, and and then to find the guys to play across from them, two big nose guards that are 290 pounds and come from good programs, O.J. [Abraham] from American Heritage, a really good football program, we’re super excited about him, a big, strong guy knows how to win, and Jojo Victor from Grayson, another great high school. They’re guys that know how to compete and win. We found, obviously in our offense this year, how the tight end can be a weapon for us, and we're able to add two tight ends in this class in Gus Ritchey who a lot of you know about — local guy, tough, blue collar, can play in the box, out of the box — and then Preston Douglas, a really athletic player from Jupiter, Fla., Benjamin High School. I love the fact that we got two good tight ends in this class to help us with where we're building and growing in the offense. In the skill positions. Je'rel Bolder is a guy that we think can do a lot of things. I was really impressed with him in person. I was able to go to his game this year and see him play. He played safety and receiver, and they hand him the ball in sweeps. He’s a guy that's very well developed already physically, Colby Cronk is just a tough, really hard playing defensive end from Palm Coast, Fla. Terris Dudley is a guy we found kind of late in the process; he was committed to another school. He’s a big, athletic safety that we feel like reminds us a lot of Levi Jones, an athletic outside linebacker type that can really run in the secondary. He felt like Coach [Brian] Mitchell did a great job recruiting at the corner position guys that can play corner and nickel, that have some versatility to him. Caden Gordon is a really smart football player from Santaluces. Gerritt Kemp, we feel like he can play corner, nickel, or safety, same with Caden. They're versatile guys. [Kemp’s] from Hebron Christian. He’s a really good football player, and he's done a lot on his football team. They’re a really good team. Cam Strong from Anderson, S.C., TL Hanna, a really great program, a guy I got to see lift weights in the off season.  I was impressed with his work ethic. Again, he’s a guy on film that you see play corner and nickel. Tristan Teasdell, a safety that we feel like can play all positions in the back end. He plays free safety, strong safety, and nickel on film from Virginia. T.K. Whitset is a really tall offensive tackle, good basketball player, can move, and has a body that you want to be able to develop. You love getting guys that play hoops that are offensive tackles. He’s a physical player, and we look forward to getting him in the program. Michael Gibbs is another guy from a great program. I love Hoggard High School, and their head coach does a tremendous job building young men. I've known Michael a long time. I’ve been recruiting him a long time. I’m excited to get him in the program. He’s one of the better in-state offensive linemen. Kage Payne, another coach's kid, can play center and guard from Cincinnati, Ohio, and his father's a head coach down in Hilton Head, S.C. To add another coach's kid into the mix, you love the intangibles that that has, especially with a guy that can play center. He’s a really tough kid. He was in our camp this summer, and I like what he did when he was in the camp. He just wanted to be here, and I think there's so much to that. A.J. Prim, the one junior college player in this class, is an edge player that can play on the edge of the defense as an end and can also play inside. He's got good size, range, and wingspan, and I wanted to add at least one older player in this class at that position with us losing Davin [Vann]. I felt like that was important to add one more older player to the defensive front, and so I’m excited that he decided to join us. That was a tough fight. There was a lot of people on him there at the end, so I'm excited to get him in the program. Like I said, there's 11 mid-year guys, four offensive linemen, four defensive linemen, two tight ends, two safeties, two corners — or one safety and three corners, however that plays out — a quarterback, a receiver, and a linebacker. That is our class for December 4.

On how much recruiting Wilson and Ritchey early helped...

It helps when you get your quarterback early, for sure. That’s the one position that it's hard if you're coming down to the last week of recruiting. A lot of guys want to know who their quarterback is going to be in their class. That's a key component. From Will's standpoint, he committed really early. He was very solid throughout. He had a lot of people trying to get him to change his mind, and his loyalty was very impressive in a day and age where you see a lot of people flipping, particularly here in the last month at the quarterback position. There was a lot of moving chairs there throughout college football. With Gus, that story goes back to flipping him from another local school, and he's a great fit here. I always felt, when I first got to know Gus, that this was the right school for him. You could tell. He’s a tough, blue-collar guy. He loves contact. He's physical. He's been at every game we've played for two years, and getting around his family, it's a great fit. Getting those two guys that that just fit our culture, fit this place — they want to be here — and then having them help get to know the other recruits and be a part of it is great momentum. It does help when there are needs in your class, but more importantly when their guy's the quarterback. That is a critical piece of your class, and getting him as early as we did played a big role.

On what sets Sowells apart…

His father was a really good football player, so he grew up in a football family. He's been around the game his whole life. He has really athletic ability. You see him play both ways on film, so he's very athletic which for the center in our offense — we like running outside zone — we need our center to be able to get up and go. He is physical, too now. He can move people off the ball. He plays with a mindset that I like: a finishing mindset. For an offensive lineman, that's important. He's not a position blocker. He likes displacing other people. He is ultra competitive, big personality. He's going to be a lot of fun to be around. I know, from a media standpoint, as you guys get to know him, you'll enjoy his personality. He's just one of those magnetic guys. I told him: he has the stuff that leaders are made of, and he's a guy that, if he does the right things, he could be captain material. That's the kind of personality that, when you meet him, you feel. Your center, like your mike linebacker, there are two guys that have immediate platforms to lead, and when you have a guy that has that kind of charisma, it helps.

On what he looks for when recruiting tight ends…

There are really two types of tight ends. There's the hybrid that can be in and out of the box. You can put them in the slot. You've seen that over the years with us from Jaylen Samuels to Cary Angeline and now with Justin Joly. Then, you have your more traditional in-line tight ends that put their hand in the dirt, still run routes, catch balls, but they're more involved in the line-of-scrimmage play. Those body types sometimes are different than the other. Sometimes, that body types are bigger, thicker, sturdier-type guy. Obviously, if you can get a guy that can do it all, that's your dream for that position, but that's why we call them a Y and an H. They are a little bit different athletically at times. A lot of times, your H is a guy that, in really both positions, those guys usually are pretty good basketball players. They have good spatial awareness, but your H's are usually guys that are a little bit more on the receiver athletic side. Some of them might have just played receiver in high school, and they were bigger-bodied guys that you know you can fill out and grow into that spot.

On recruiting players who play multiple sports…

I've talked about that for years. I like multi-sport athletes. To me, they're training other muscle groups. They're competing year-round, and so they go from competing in one sport to competing in another sport, some of them three sports. Their competitive spirit is really edgy, but playing basketball, it's running, it's changing direction, it's jumping, it's teamwork, setting picks, setting up plays, understanding leverage on bodies... I think wrestling is one of the best sports in the world for football players. Guys that are good at that, to know how to use their hands better, know how to feel momentum of another person and use it against them, and how to play with that lower body and core strength. They have great grip strength, guys at wrestle. Those two sports, I love when I see that. You also know they're active guys. They're not just going home after school playing video games all day. They’re leaving school going to practice. They’re working or getting coached. They’re learning values. They're learning how to be a good teammate, learning how to work with other people. All those things, to me, matter. I love that. That's not going to change for me. I know it has, to your point, changed in society. There’s a lot more one-sport athletes out there, but from a coach's side, we love seeing that.

On signing multiple four-star offensive linemen…

That’s an interesting question because I don't really care how many stars they have. I know the recruits do. To me, it's more about what fits our needs, and if we see him play live, and we know that they're guys that can do that… Garett Tujague is a really good recruiter. He works his butt off at it. He's a good relationship builder. He's been able to put a lot of guys in the NFL. Then you go to our pedigree. It's 17 or 18 linemen now, when you look at O-line and D-line combined, that are active in the NFL from NC State. There is a track record blueprint of how we've done this here, and how we've done it with three-star, four-star, and sometimes no-star guys and developed them into good linemen on the O-line and on the D-line.

On having a quarterback who can run…

It helps. It makes all 11 players over there have to defend the run. Blocking scheme wise, you can get a hat on a hat when you do that. Obviously, there's some ad lib things, which you saw with C.J. [Bailey] this year as the year went on. He started scrambling, rushing for positive yards, had two rushing touchdowns scrambling in a game. It's nice to have in your offensive system. You can do it with the wildcat which you've seen us do at times, too, but it's better when it's the guy that can actually throw a post over your head, and now you've got to worry about him running a quarterback iso, quarterback power, quarterback counter, zone read keep, a quarterback draw, or whatever it may be, and you have your traditional pass game that he can manage as well. Our offense will continue to grow and evolve, but having the mobility that our quarterbacks now have, it does put more stress on the defense.

On players hosting recruits and the recruiting calendar in June…

I’d need like eight hours to tell you how screwed up our calendar is. As far as hosting goes, you try to match guys that you think they're going to get along with. If they can be in the same side of the ball or position, that’s great. Sometimes, it’s not. Sometimes, they know someone on our team, or they're from the same area, and they've got similar teams they played against so you know there's commonalities. Sometimes, it's availability, too. If we're bringing them in on a game weekend, we're not going to be able to have a host be a guy that's playing in the game because he's tied up. You always try to match guys that are going to fit, that they're going to be able to feel comfortable with. Sometimes, it's intimidating for a high school player. They come in, and they're hosted by a college guy, and you want them to get along. You want them to feel like he can ask them questions, and you want that match to be what that can be. For us, it's a process, and our kids do a great job hosting. They're really good at it. They understand the value of it. They know that these guys could be their teammates, and they do a good job reporting back to us. "Hey, Coach, that guy's a great fit. I would love to have him as a teammate." Those are the kinds you want to hear. Sometimes, "I don't know if he's going to fit in here, man. He didn't even talk the whole time he was here.” Or, “He wasn't that interested in football.” You want to hear what those guys have to say, and so we do value that piece of it.

With regard to the June official visits, I thought we were going to have an end-of-June signing date or beginning of July. That was kind of what everyone said last year. We thought that was going to be passed, and in that situation, I think the June visits would have been fantastic. Let us go meet them in the spring, watch them practice. The ones that fit, let them come back on official visits in June. If they're ready to commit and sign, let them do that, and then they can go through their senior year, committed and signed, and we can do the same and know how many spaces we have left, but that got tabled. To your point, you put all this legwork into it, and so do they, and then they make decisions because they're worried about places filling up. Then you don't sign them until December. Now, we don't even get to go out. I don't even get to do home visits in December anymore, so it's really strange how the calendar is put together. I don't think it's very functional. I don't think there's a lot of common sense in it. I hope that they revise it. You hear all the time that they're in these committees to revise the calendar. Sometimes, we get input. Sometimes, we don't, but the way it's currently set up, it just doesn't make a lot of sense.

On the impact of the transfer portal…

It's changed a lot. We put a lot of time into them. It doesn't change how we look at them when they get here. I never sign a kid with the expectation he's going to leave. I sign him with the expectation that I'm going to graduate this player, I'm going to develop this player, and I'm going to see this player reach his goals as a student athlete. In some cases, that's what happens, and in some cases today, it doesn’t. I wish they could stay longer than a year. I feel like the way that this thing set up now, it really lends to not facing adversity, for some people. I think the portal is really good for guys that have been in a program for a long period of time, some of them even graduated, and they're not playing very much. Shoot, we all want these guys to play; that's why you recruited them. For whatever reason, after three or four years, they're not playing. We want the same thing they do. We want them to turn around at the end of their career with a college degree and feel like they've got everything they could out of it, and if playing time is not part of that equation at your school after that period, I'm 100 percent behind them going to find a place where they can be starters. We've had some guys do that, and I'm happy for them. I am, but you never make decisions like [that]. I would tell a recruit, “Don't commit to a school, don't sign with a school with the thought, ‘Well, if it doesn't work out, I’ll just transfer.’" To me, that's a recipe for not making it. It's a recipe for failure. You've got to go in all in, and it's no different for me as a coach. I don't sign a kid and say, "Well, if he's not good enough in a year, I'm going to tell him to leave." That's not how we do business here. We want these guys to be a part of this place, to get their blood in the bricks, to go through adversity, to develop, grow and succeed. Hopefully, that's what the majority of the guys will do. Some of their timelines to get on the field aren't realistic at times, not only because they haven't developed enough, but sometimes they're just behind a really good player. That happens. It does. I think people get really, “Oh, he's going to the portal.” There's a lot of reasons behind some of these decisions, and some of them will probably never be told, but I look at all these openings that you end up with, whether it's a player leaves for the NFL early, a player graduates and runs out of eligibility, or a player decides to go to another school, every one of these opportunities is an opportunity for a young man to join our team because someone else has left. We look for the new person to come in, take advantage of what we have here at NC State, and try to help him reach his goals.

On the new 105-scholarship rule…

It's tricky because it's not final. We've been told that we're going to be at 105, but we won't be at 105 officially until it's rubber-stamped at the legislative level. You have to have a Plan A and a Plan B currently because, like I said earlier, sometimes these decisions at the last minute get tabled, and the last thing you want to do is run off your walk-ons, cut them all, and then find out you're going to be able to be at 125 again, and they're going to wait a year. If we do end up at 105, we're not allowed to be at 105 until the summer, so you're still operating from now until then like it's an 85-scholarship with your walk-on program knowing, and we've told our walk ons this, that it could change. We could go from 85 scholarships — we're at 125 with our roster — and we're going back to 105, and so some of the walk-ons won't be allowed to stay whenever that legislation is approved and we get to that magical date. They know that and will be here for the winter program, go through spring ball, and compete with the mindset that they're trying to get themselves into that 105 roster, if that's where it ends up. For us, if we end up with extra scholarships, here are the guys, but you can't be at 105 in January. You're only allowed to be at 85 in January, and that's where this gets tricky because the signing date was today in December. It’s tough. The second signing date's in February after we've already started classes, and then you have your portal guys in the middle of that and after that in May. We look forward to knowing, as head coaches, what our roster size is. I think that's going to be great to actually know that, officially, and exactly when we can add those guys, so that we can make better plans. This has been a really challenging year, and I feel bad for the guys that are in the walk-on positions because it's been a huge asset to NC State's football program. It's been a huge asset to Wisconsin, Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas State, and teams that really value their walk-on programs. I've had over 30 walk-ons earn a scholarship at NC State my tenure, and a lot of those guys have played. Some of them are playing in the NFL [like] Thayer Thomas. Our starting punter right now, Caden Noonkester was a walk-on. Trenton Gill, starting in the NFL, was a walk-on. When I was at Wisconsin, J.J. Watt came in as a walk-on, and he's an NFL Hall of Famer. If those programs are taken away, I don't understand how that fits student-athlete welfare. It doesn't fit student-athlete welfare, but I guess it's okay in this case that we take opportunity away from student-athletes. I'm not sure how they resonate that, but they did, and we're just sitting here waiting. As a coach, my job is to have a plan if it passes and a plan if it doesn’t, and so that's what we have.

On the expectations for Prim…

Well, we expect him to come in and compete. You would hope that, at any program, a first-year starter that becomes a second-year starter improves his statistics. From an alignment standpoint in particular, he got bigger, he got stronger, he played with more confidence, and he made more plays. There's going to be a transition from junior college to Power Four for him that he's going to have to adjust. I'm excited to get him in our weight program. I’m excited get him in our nutrition program. He's got a frame. We're going to be able to do some really good things with his body and get him even more confident because when you're playing and you feel that, that you're getting stronger, you're getting faster, and you're getting more flexible, you play with more confidence. For AJ, I'm excited to get him here, get our hands on him, and get started working with him. He loves football, and so it'll be good to get him in that room. It's a good room. I really like the returning defensive linemen that we have, their attitudes and all that. It'll be fun to get him in there with him.

On winning in-state recruiting battles...

They're critical. I take a lot of pride in letting these in-state players know that. We love keeping kids home. We do. It's easier for them. It's easier for their families. We have a higher success rate with in-state players. We put more players from North Carolina in the NFL than any team in college football and it's not even close. There's a reason for that. They have success here. There have been a lot of good players leave, and for whatever reason, they get lost in the shuffle. As you saw last year, several of them left and came back because they saw our guys having success and they wanted to be a part of it. You see it. You see it with Noah [Rogers] having success. You see it with Hollywood [Smothers] having success. There's a storyline out there these in-state guys know that they can stay home, let their parents be close and have an opportunity to reach their goals, to win games, to go to bowl games and be in a program that does put players in the NFL and develop them. We take a lot of pride in that. There's always been really good skill in the state. It's no different this year. Je'rel is a guy that we had high on our board from the beginning. He's a good fit. We really felt great about him. His high school coach raved about him. Once we got his family here, you could tell that they were a good fit with us as well. That's fun when you get to meet the whole group and you can tell that this is going to work because of the way they've raised him, how they value hard work, how they value accountability, how hard they want him to train, and how they want us to coach him. It's a good fit. We'll continue down that path. Some years, you end up with a lot more in-state players than others. As this thing's evolved, more and more kids are leaving the state, getting a lot of money sometimes to do so. That part of it is evolving. Once we get into this revenue sharing and things change again, it'll be interesting to see how that changes things.

On Cronk

He’s put together. He’s really developed physically. He's tough. He's a kid who you love his motor. He's going to play harder than the guys across from him on a lot of snaps. Because of that, he'll get a lot of strain getting off of blocks. We call it block destruction: destroying blocks and getting to the ball carrier. He's really strong. He's quick. He's got a knack for it. He knows how to use his hands. We value not just his ability to rush the passer, but how tough he is.

On approaching the transfer portal...

It starts with what I'm doing now. You're talking to your current team about everything. Part of what you're talking about is next season. Where their minds are at and if they're happy where they are, if they're coming back. Then you get a feel for what your roster is going to be. You add 17 players today. That update on our depth chart is real now. It's not in flux. They've signed. You can see if anybody's leaving. Then here's some needs that we now have. Maybe we can address them in the portal. Maybe we can't. Sometimes it's going to be the second signing date. We may not feel like we need an older player in that room. There's more kids not signing in the early signing date than I expected. There will be a bigger pool in February than there was last year. You may see more high school signees in the second window than you did last year. I'm pretty sure you will. Each team will be different in how they address their needs, whether they want to get a guy that's got five years to play for or whether they only need a guy that's got one year because they got some good young players that they want an older player in the room with. We'll have to address that. It is a changing number. You have to see where things end up. Sometimes, unfortunately, it happens due to injury. That happens in some of these postseason games. You have to see if your roster changes there. Sometimes it happens in the offseason programs. It's an evolving number. There's more outflow from programs than there ever has been with two portal windows. Then you have the two high school signing dates and you have this moving target with when you can add players that go into the portal. Some of them are grad transfers. Some of them are first-year guys. Some of them are third-year guys. Roster management has become the number one challenge. Moving target too, for coaches. It's a science. There's a lot of communication. There's a lot of behind the scenes studying film by our staff on what we need. If these guys go in, are they good enough?

On the state of the quarterback room...

We're really excited about our quarterback room, with C.J., the experience he gained this year, the way he's playing and leading. Lex Thomas has really improved. He came in injured and has gone through a long rehab process. This year, he got better and better and better. He had his best week the last week of practice. I was really excited. We feel good about the three quarterbacks that are here. It doesn't mean you don't keep looking for guys that may or may not fit what you need. It's not like it was the last couple of years. We're not trying to find a portal starter or anything like that. We love the fact that we've got C.J. with Lex. Those two guys get along really well and Will coming in the building here mid-year. It's a much better position than we've been in. I love going into the offseason knowing who my starter is. It's a great feeling. I had it with Jacoby Brissett. I had it with Ryan Finley. I had it with Devin Leary. Your offseason is different when you know going into that next phase who that guy is that you're looking at. CJ is ready to run the show.