NC State head coach Dave Doeren met with the media where he discussed the East Carolina win, updated the status of Noah Rogers, previewed Virginia, and much more!
NOTE: Click the video above to watch the press conference.
Opening Statement...
All right, recapping the win over ECU. Excited to beat 1-0, obviously, and with a lot of the things that happened in the game. It's a lot of positives.Also, as always, a lot of things you want to be better at. Loved how we started, you know, four straight, three and outs on defense, offense moving the football, playing really efficient, running the ball well, catching, throwing, and got out to a good lead and just had a lot of little things, derailed drives on offense, and I'll get into that. But one of the areas that we put a lot of emphasis on from last year to this year was starting fast. And with a lot of new parts, particularly on defense, I was excited to see what we'd look like, and thought the guys really did a good job executing early in the game.
First drive, ate a lot of clock, got points. I think we were 12 to 3 at the time of possession in the first quarter. And so really had put ourselves in a good position building a 17-point lead and disappointing, that we led them back in the game, you know. Got in the red zone on two drives where we had penalties that are on us to not have. Won a late hit after, Teague's trying to be physical and hits a guy after the quarterback was tackled and backs us up into a long yardage situation, a holding penalty on a tight end on a really good counterplay. And both of those penalties in the red zone, ended up being drive killers and then missed two field goals that are makeable kicks. And so, a lot of things that we can correct. That's the good part. And areas that we're going to spend a lot of time focusing on. That's the beauty of playing a game is it's a truth teller. You find out where you're at, the good and the bad. And so this week is about that. It's about identifying areas per player per unit that we want to really improve between this week and next week with our game. And one of those, obviously, is finishing, getting in a lead and being able to finish somebody. And not that we didn't finish. The defense did a tremendous job with a fourth-down stop. But just that third, really second and third-quarter window where we could have played better to put ourselves in a better situation to close the game. And there's a lot of reasons for it. It's not one thing. It's, you know, a few focused things with penalties and some young guys playing in the game.
But I like how our coaches worked together. I thought the players were awesome, very coachable on the sideline, took corrections, made adjustments.
Offensively, I thought C.J. played at a high level, was really accurate down the field, made plays on his feet. The skill guys caught the ball well. Wesley and Teddy obviously had explosive games for us. And I thought Justin Joly played really good without the football. He made some catches, moved the change for us on a couple runs after the catch.
And Terrell and Noah and Keenan all played really hard. I thought our pass protection was solid, and we gave up one sack, and it was on a play that C.J. tried to extend. And if he would have taken his check down, we would have prevented that from ever happening. But to only give up one sack against a team that pressures a ton, it was good.
Our tight ends in general, I think that room is as good as it's been, and it's versatile. Justin can do a lot of things, obviously, in the pass game, but he's improved himself immensely as a blocker. And, Cody Hardy and Dante, both were physical in the run game.
I thought both our offensive tackles, Jacarrius Peak and Teague Andersen, had a good game. Both played well. Jalen Grant was very consistent inside at center and was physical. It was good to see him play physically. He had five pancakes in the game. Anthony Carter was very consistent. We rotated guys at the right guard with Kamen Smith and Spike Sowells, and both will get better, two young players. Did some good things and did some things they got to get better at.
But overall, I thought our run game, thought our backs ran really hard, first of all. They took care of the ball. They made plays. There were some plays where there was a lot of penetration where they just got us back to the line of scrimmage. Hollywood is an explosive player, and he was very close to popping on a couple of them and just didn't have that big breakout run. But I thought he played really well, and it was good to see Duke Scott in his first action.
We had too many plays, minus yardage plays in the run game that we have to correct. And obviously, when you're playing against a defense like we were, that blitzes a lot, you got to handle movement. And at times, we did really well with that, and at times, we didn't. And so an area we need to improve. I love that we were 100 percent on short yardage.
Offensively, running the ball and with a down-the-field throw, they end up being a pass interference.
The negatives, we had two pre-snap penalties to start the third quarter, unacceptable. And like I mentioned in the red zone, we had to settle for less than touchdowns. We had two touchdowns down there. We want to be 70 percent or better. We ended up 50 percent.
On defense, three fourth-down stops, those are like turnovers in a game, and one of them to close the game out. We stopped the run, a team that rushed for 300 yards on us a year ago. We held them to less than one yard to carry, I think, 29 yards on 30 carries in the game. Really a group performance when you talk about stopping the run.
I thought our DBs tackled well with the exception of one play. Our corners really tackled well in the game. And had some nice open-field tackles on Anthony Smith, who's a talented receiver. We only surrendered one touchdown in the red zone, held them to two field goals, one which they missed and stopped them on fourth down.
The thing that I loved was just the fundamentals. Guys were playing square. They were shedding blocks. They were disruptive. We had 11 plays in their backfield. Only had one sack, but had a lot of hurries that helped our coverage.
I thought Cian Slone and Sabastian Harsh were standouts in the game. They were really disruptive on the defensive line in their first starts for us. And it was really good to see Caden Fordham back out there. I thought he looked like his old self. It's a big hurdle. You go through a bunch of them when you're coming back from, being out as long as he was. And that live game is the last of those hurdles. And so his confidence is through the roof. I thought he played well. He was physical. He played fast. So it's nice to have him back, him and Sean and A.J. and Kenny. It was a good rotation in there to keep those guys fresh.
Negatives, we had two third and longs. They converted on, and we can't let that happen. And we had a substitution issue, which is on the staff, not the players, that led to that touchdown. We should have got him down. That was the one tackle I was talking about. J.J. had a chance to knock the tight end down. Didn't wrap up. But we shouldn't have been in that situation against a tempo team, so it's something as a staff we have to do a better job for our guys. On special teams, I thought Noonkester was exceptional, did a great job, great hang time. They had no returns in the game. And we didn't get any returns either. We didn't have a punt return. We didn't have a kick return, so the biggest area, special teams-wise is just getting back to making kicks. And we have talented kickers. We have confidence in those guys, and I look forward to seeing them bounce back.
Like I said in my post-game press conference, I thought our crowd was awesome. It was a great environment. There were a ton of recruits there. There were families there, our student section. It was the heartbeat, the pulse, the thermostat of that stadium. They were incredible, and they brought it. And we thank you for that again. And as you know, we play at noon this week, and so asking you to get to bed early or stay up all night, whichever you prefer, but be at the stadium on time and get there and have a good time. Our tailgate's amazing. And get in the stands and be there for the kick and stay for four quarters.
It's a big game this week. Virginia's coming off a big win over Coastal. They looked really good in that game. Had a kick return for a touchdown, blocked a punt. You can tell they've worked really hard in recruiting and development. I think their receiver core is really impressive. Number six, Ross, had a big game, over 100 yards receiving, and a kickoff return for a touchdown. Number 11, Harris, jumped off the film with his speed. Their running backs run hard.
Their quarterback's a good football player. Head coach's son, Morris, has been around, has been in a bunch of different programs, and he's gritty, he's tough. You can see him make plays on his feet. He's got a good arm, throws with touch, and can throw it in there through a seam route. A lot of velocity in the game, and they got good weapons, and he can make you pay if you're not sound in your pass rush. And so we've got a great challenge against that offense.
Defensively, you can tell they've put a lot of time into the portal. They got a lot of experienced players, some returners and some new. Their corner, they got a 6-3 corner. They got two defensive ends that are 6-6 and 6-7. Melton's a really good player from Ohio State that they picked up. I thought their safety's tackled well in the game. Linebackers played downhill, played with their hands. They got big inside guys, and they got a good rotation. They got good depth on their front. And you can tell the kids know their scheme. They do a good job coaching. They're a much better team than we played a couple years ago when we played them up there, and Tony Elliott and his staff deserve a lot of credit for what they've done there in recruiting and developing the roster.
So with our fans, we need you there, and need you there early, and need you there for the entire game and helping us, talk a lot with our team about Carter-Finley Stadium and how important it is to take advantage, a home-field advantage, and how important it is for them to protect their turf and to show up every game with an edge and to play with an edge. And I felt like we did that in the first game. I was really excited about just the way these guys prepared and how they practiced, how coachable they were. And the day after the game, guys were excited to be coached. They sat in the team room, and they were really, really into what was going on in the room. You could see they wanted to get better. Met with them this morning, and same thing, you know, talk to me about what you got to fix on film, what do you have to be better at, and guys just throwing their hands up, open to criticism, open to ownership. And so those kinds of things make it fun, as a head coach.
So I look forward to this advancing, from one week to the next. And it was a great weekend of college football. That's the advantage of playing on a Thursday. You actually get to watch some games, a lot of one-possession games. I'm proud of the teams in the ACC. There's a lot of good wins in the league and a hell of a game last night with Miami and Notre Dame. It was fun to watch that football game. Any questions?
Dave, you just mentioned the ACC. Just to sort of expand on that, Georgia Tech obviously had a good win. Virginia had a good win, FSU, Miami. I think Virginia Tech, even their defense, did really well against South Carolina. The depth of this league, do you consider it sort of underappreciated, and what are your thoughts on the ACC relative to the other conferences in the country?
Well, yeah, I mean, you got to do it on the field. And, like you mentioned, there's a lot of inter-conference play in week one. So you got to see, Florida State had a great win over Alabama and Georgia Tech over Colorado. Obviously, Notre Dame is an independent, but a great football team. It was great to see Miami finish that game and get a win. And underappreciated, I would say, is an understatement. I think year in and year out, there's, maybe not the top ten number of teams that you see maybe in a couple of the other leagues, but the quality of our teams across the board and the depth of our conference, every week's a tough out. Man, it's every game, you got to show up. Anybody can beat anybody in this league. There's a lot of good coaches, and it's exciting. And it's been that way for a while. Since I've been here, you see it competitive, and you'll have, as the season goes on, teams that are ranked against teams that aren't, and they're one-possession games. I mean, there's a lot of really good coaches in this league, and the kids play really hard. And I thought, to start the season, there were a lot of games that were meaningful, and I agree. I watched the South Carolina-Virginia Tech game. I mean, South Carolina's quarterback finished that game, and Virginia Tech had a chance to get off the field there at the end and didn't because of that kid's effort. I mean, that quarterback's a stud. But that was a heck of a football game.
Hey, Dave, you talked about the kicking game and them bouncing back, but what kind of went into that position battle through camp that let Nick kind of win the job over Kanoah?
Well, I mean, it's a statistical thing through camp, and you have a lot of kicks. You have a lot of situational kicks. You have game-ending kicks. And so it's just charting the makes, charting the misses, charting, the 11-on-11 kicks, the kicks to win. And by the end of camp, Nick was ahead. And so, he went in, made his first kick, drilled it right down the middle, and that's what he did all through training camp. I mean, he was 91 percent over three weeks. And so you can't ignore what the guys do in practice. But you don't know how game day is going to be. And so, he's a young kid. He's a very talented kid. And Kanoah is a guy that we have a lot of trust in. So, we'll go through this week and continue to evaluate it. But we expect that position to get back to where it was, to where these guys are accurate in making the kicks we expect them to make.
And just to follow up, you talk about them bouncing back. As a coach, how do you kind of approach that in a position that's so confidence-based of them just being confident in making it?
Well, you just encourage them because they are talented. It's not like we're dealing with guys that can't kick the football and make kicks. They can, and they have. And so you just encourage them and you help them through. No different than any other sport when a guy's a little off. Just, what do you need? You encourage them. Teammates do the same and they get back to being who they are.
Yeah, you mentioned the penalties and just some, like, detail-oriented mistakes. Do you feel like most of that was maybe first-game jitters?
No, I don't. No, I think if they would have happened in the first quarter, I would maybe agree with that. But the fact that they happened later, particularly coming out of the half, to me, that's just poor focus. Two of the penalties were aggressive penalties. There were guys trying to finish guys. And like I said, Teague’s was a late hit. So that's just not disciplined on his part, wanting to be physical. CJ was already tackled. He's got to pull off in that situation. The holding penalty on Noah I thought was a great block. And so sometimes that happens. Sometimes the refs see it different than the players and the coaches. And I thought that was a really good block on that play.
Cody Hardy definitely could have let go. He had a guy out in space, and he was finishing him. But those kind of penalties, you just have to learn as a player, when you've got to catch up with your feet or when you've got to let go. The focus penalties, though, when you're talking about pre-snap, to start third quarter with a false start at receiver and then a false start at tackle, that's stuff can't happen. And that's complete focus driven. It has nothing to do with any game number that you're in. It's guys just being locked in.
So this weekend is a homecoming for Des Kitchings back to Raleigh. Have you guys had any conversations recently? Or in general, what's it going to be like going against his offense?
Oh, he's a good coach. I mean, we've seen a lot of their film over the years, in crossover films, and you see what they do. And they've had a lot of different quarterbacks. And so, every offense starts and ends with what the QB can do. And the guy they have right now can do a lot. And so we know that they'll be balanced. We know that they'll run the stretch. And that's been a big play for them. And their tailback runs really hard. You can see that. I mean, the biggest thing that jumps off the film with their offense is just the receiver skill. They're explosive. And they made a couple circus catches and got behind people. But they'll try to run the football, play actions, and, you know, have down the field throws and then screens and quick game. They'll mix tempo on you. So, looking forward to the competition. And it doesn't matter who's coaching on the other side of the field. It's about us. It's about us going out and executing our plan.
And then going back to the previous matchup in 2023, Virginia had a lot of what you would call those focus penalties, mental mistakes late in the fourth quarter. What have you seen now on film as that team's gotten a lot more older and experienced with their slew of transfers?
Well, it's not a big sample size. And that's the thing that's unique about all of college football. You're really getting to know your opponent in the year you're in more than playing them year after year because the roster changes so much. And in their case, there's a lot of new players. And so getting used to who they are and what they're doing with the guys they have and the game they played, they got up pretty fast on them. So, the second half wasn't really a typical play-calling sample of what you might get in a closed game or, their behind or a one-score game. When you get up four scores, it's a little different. And so you got to feel it out. And I think, really, the first three weeks of the season, there's going to be a lot of that. There is. It's going to be no different. We turn around and play on Thursday in game three against a team with a new staff, a lot of new players. And so, until you get three or four games on these teams, you're not going to fully know all the ins and outs of their personnel.
I was just wondering, when you guys got Justin Joly last year in the portal, did you know you were getting a pretty well-rounded tight end? And how has he developed since coming into your program?
Well, we knew we were getting a guy that had a lot of talent. Justin was a basketball player that was a receiver in high school. We played against him, so we saw him on the field, saw his body type and knew that he had a really athletic build to him. When we got him, you had to teach him how to work the way we work. It was a lot different than UConn. And so there was a growth period there for him, an adjustment period. And then once he settled in, you could really see his talent as a receiver. And he works really hard. The things that he wasn't great at, you could see he wanted to improve. And as the year went on last year, he got better and better without the football. And that was a huge point of emphasis in the off-season for him. He put on 15 pounds. He and Coach Locklear worked really hard on his blocking, and it showed up. I mean, I was really impressed, not only with his run blocking, but there was a few times he was in pass protection. He did a great job on their defensive ends.
And then just back to Virginia's receiving core, how does the group stress defense? It seems like they've got some different skill sets at receiver, Ross with speed, and Edine's a bigger guy. What's the challenge in facing some different body types and different skill sets?
Well, the good thing is we see that in practice. Our receiver core has a lot of different guys, too. And so across the board, our DBs, they've got to cover Noah. They've got to cover Wesley. They've got to cover Teddy. They've got to cover Joly. So it's not like it's something we're not used to seeing. We see it every day in practice. And as a DB, you've got to know your matchup. I mean, you've got to know what the guy does. You've got to study his film. You've got to study what type of player he is, what type of routes he runs, the stems of his routes, the breaking points of his routes. And so that's part of the week is learning, what's 11, what's 6, what's 7, what are these guys about, and how do they get into football, what are their splits. There's a lot of intel that you get into. And then it's making plays on the ball. They're going to throw it up to these guys, and we've got to make plays. And their guys have shown that they can make them. So there's going to be some contested plays, and we've got to go up and win those plays. Thank you.
You referenced the missed tackles. I think PFF only had four missed tackles. Did you guys do anything in summer camp that maybe prepared the physicality for the first game and that led to less tackles, or was it pretty much same old, same old?
No, obviously, DJ's got his way of teaching that. And I think there's been a lot of emphasis on tracking. We call it tracking ball carriers and where our eyes are on players and how fast we practice, guys getting to the near hip in an athletic position, even when we're not tackling, where there's more confidence that you're making plays. We did a lot more good-on-good work in preparation for this game than we have in the past. We felt like because there was a lot of competition at certain position groups in years past, maybe when the roster was more settled and you knew who guys were, you got into a little bit less of that and more scout work. We did a lot of good-on-good work. And so the speed of the game in practice was increased, probably, because you're going up against the starting offense as the starting defense more. And that's a fine line in that, because it's more physical when you do that, too. And you want to keep them healthy. The closer you get to the game, the more concerned you get about those type of competitive periods. But I do think it paid off. It was one of the, especially in space, I thought our corners tackled extremely well in that football game. I mean, it was 17 tackles that we had a corner, and that's a lot, and it weren't all run plays. There's a lot of hitches and screens and plays like that thrown out there where they had one-on-one plays where they got guys down and in some cases knocked guys back. And, I thought Jamel Johnson in particular, I mean, that kid really played a good football game for us and tackled like a safety. He came up and knocked guys back. And, obviously, the fourth down play was a huge player on a big tight end.
Hey, Dave. This is a two-parter. You've mentioned the crossover. Obviously, they have Des Kitchings. You have some Virginia fellows. Do you think with the NIL and the transfers and everything going on now that it sort of mitigates that type of knowledge, that crossover knowledge that you would have otherwise in maybe earlier years?
Yeah, I mean, it's been a long time since either had a staff member at each other's schools. And, with Tujague being here, I mean, there's really hardly anybody left from that team from when he was there. And the same can be said for when Des was here. So I don't really see that as an advantage other than knowing each other's stadiums and things like that. But I think you guys make a much bigger deal out of that than we do. We're going to take the scouting reports and the PFF and the film study as what we need to know and how we build our game plans and talk about their personnel.
Then my second question, sir, obviously Virginia this year is non-conference. The conferences are expanding. You can't play everybody every year. Is this something maybe down the line you would like to see more of, crossovers, with maybe a Virginia Tech or Wake Forest if they're not on the ACC schedule this year, local teams that fans can get to the games?
Yeah, I mean, you want to try to play nine or ten, power four games a year. And in our case, it's ten with Notre Dame this year. And so for me, when it's not a conference game, one of the eight, I like playing teams that have recruiting battles in them that are regional where our fans can get to those games or their fans can get to ours much more than playing a team, going to Texas Tech or going to BYU or, going across the country to play a game where we don't really have recruiting ties. I'd much rather play a regional team. And so, you know, if we hadn't played a lot, this is my fourth game against UVA in 13 years. And so it seemed like a natural fit to try to get them on our schedule when we both had an opening. And we were both trying to find another game. So I've tried to do it with Duke before, back when we hardly ever played Duke. And I just couldn't get them on the schedule because they had theirs filled up so far out. As far as playing more games, I think there's going to be a lot more of that. I mean, I think there's a lot of conversation, as you can see, with other conferences increasing in conference play. And I'm not privy to all that goes on in those meetings. But I'm all for playing as many conference games as we can. I think it's great.
Yeah, Coach, you were able to get five true freshmen in the game. What was it like to kind of see them get their first taste of college football? And there's a couple of redshirt freshmen that also got in there, like Brody Barnhardt and a couple of the guys.
Yeah, I'm excited to see their growth from week one to week two. There's a lot of nerves in those games for those guys, more than we probably realize as coaches. Ronnie Royal played his first full game. Brody Barnhardt played his first full game, both redshirt freshmen. Duke Scott, and then you got Teddy Hoffmann, who played really well in the game. I thought JoJo, Josiah Victor, the nose guard came in, gave us some great snaps. There's a bunch of them that played. But it's fun to see, Spike Sowells got in at guard and played a bunch of snaps. Chase Bond got in at defensive end, had back-to-back tackles. And so those kids have worked hard, and the ones that have earned the right to be out there, they get out there and play, and those reps are going to build confidence for them. They're now going to understand when coaches and players are all talking to them about how we practice and how hard you need to go and practice if you're ready for Saturday or for game day. They're going to learn a lot from that. And for us, we need these guys to come on, because the talent is there in some of these young players. And so the future is now. You want to get them out there, get them ready, and know that as the year goes on, they're going to get better and better and better.
And then just to follow up, Noah had a hard hit in the game. I just wanted to see how he was doing coming off of that.
Noah's good. Yeah, he's totally cleared and looking forward to having him back. So that's it.
