NC State WR Keenan Jackson, OLB Harvey Dyson, and TE Hunter Provience recently appeared on the Wolfpack Weekly Radio Show to discuss the loss at Vanderbilt, preview the App State game, and much more!

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WR Keenan Jackson

You’ve had two career games. Did you envision that occurring based on the work you had been putting in during practice? Could you feel it clicking and now see the results of all that work?

First of all, thank you for having me on here today. But yeah, definitely. It’s what you work hard for every single day: the opportunity to come out and perform at a high level.

It’s my third year here, so I definitely didn’t have that kind of production in my first two years. But at the end of the day, it’s the same goal, same mission.

I’m doing everything I can to help the team win. That’s my goal when I’m going out there. It’s become a bigger role this year, being able to do it on the team.

But at the end of the day, I’m just doing whatever the team needs me to do to win. If they need me to catch ten balls for a hundred yards, I can do that. They need me to catch zero and play in the run game all game, and do that as well. Whatever the team needs.

You’re the ACC Receiver of the Week and the first NC State player with back-to-back 100-yard receiving games since 2018, joining Kelvin Harmon and Jakobi Meyers. Considering the great receivers who have played here, how does it feel to be in that category?

It’s definitely cool. But as I said, it’s three weeks into the season. If I stink it up the rest of the year, nobody will remember that.

At the end of the day, we’ve got a game this Saturday. That’s my mindset. I definitely celebrated with my family, just being able to have that award and have good games over the past two weeks.

But it’s back to it. I try to keep the same routine of flushing the game, whether it’s a big loss, a big win, or anything else. You’ve got to put it to bed and get back to work.

One of the things that was so difficult about the Vanderbilt game was not just how it ended, but that you were in a position to be up late because there was so much good in the ballgame. You had three receiving touchdowns. Take me through what’s going through your mind when you’re running down the seam, and CJ Bailey releases the ball.

It starts with getting the call, whatever the play is. I’m thinking alignment, assignment, and what the defense is showing: the defensive picture and the coverage.

I’m thinking about where I need to line up on the play and what my job is. Then I’m reading safeties, corners, and linebackers, trying to see what they’re in and how it might affect my assignment on that play. What might I need to do to get myself open or get somebody else open?

But after that, it’s just playing ball. You go through all these reps in practice to play fast. That’s what Coach Phillips talks about: “Play fast, play fast. Run and react.”

After that, it’s just run and react. On that first one, they busted the coverage, so I ended up being wide open. I’m just seeing the ball in the air slowly and trying to focus it all the way in with my eyes.

I actually had a post like that at fall camp, maybe two years ago, that CJ threw at me. It came right over my shoulder, and I let it go below my eyes. So that was really what I was thinking: Focus, look it all the way in.

Then it’s just run and react, just playing ball. You don’t hear the crowd; you’re not hearing much. You’re just playing football.

I noticed you and Victor Snow communicating about who needed to be on and off the line of scrimmage during the third quarter. That ended up being a positive play, and your second touchdown came two plays later. How important is that communication and your role as a leader?

You’ve got to communicate out there. There’s so much communication that people don’t always see on TV. I’m glad you noticed that.

Whether it’s receiver-to-receiver or tight end-to-receiver, they do a great job. Hunter’s about to come on. They do a great job of making sure we’re legal on plays and getting receivers off the ball, on the ball, whatever it may need to be.

The quarterbacks, everybody is always talking. Always, always, always.

In that specific situation, Snow needed to be on the ball. But really, I could’ve been on the ball, too. That’s what happened. CJ had to come off the platform, so I was able to slow it down for us. He got lined up, and I think that was a play where they caught a facemask. We both had the ball, so I ended up getting some extra yards on that play, too.

You grew up in the Charlotte area and were a track athlete and a football player. Was track something you did to stay in shape, or was it a passion of yours? Would you recommend it for aspiring football players?

All of the above.

I would definitely recommend track to any serious football player, especially those at skill positions. But honestly, if you’re looking to stay active and you’re a big guy, you can go out there, throw, and do stuff, too.

That whole track program is great. A real decorated program. Coach Dustin Allen does a great job. He really does a great job with that program, winning multiple state championships on both the women’s and men’s sides. We’ve had elite cross-country runners on the women’s side and strong sprint and distance teams on the men’s side.

It was really just fun, man. It was fun being around guys who compete and being able to win. That’s what I love to do.

I’ve been around track my whole life. My mom ran Division I track at a university in Maine. My pops played basketball there. She was a track coach at Monroe High School while I was growing up.

I was around track meets my entire life. I used to scratch in the sandpit when they were on the line.

So I’ve been around track my whole life. It was something that I wanted to do, but it didn’t really work out with my schedule. I played baseball growing up, so it didn’t really align with that.

I was able to do it in high school when I stopped playing baseball. I definitely wanted to do it, and I had fun, man. I competed with some good guys. Some of them went on to run Division I track.

We were really good in the relays. It was a great time. I really enjoyed running.

When did football become important to you? When did you realize football was the sport you wanted to pursue?

When I got my first Division I offer, it was a no-brainer. I was like, “All right, it’s about time to stop playing baseball.”

That was right after my sophomore season. I played all three growing up. Football and baseball went back and forth as my favorite. I had a really good group of friends I’d grown up playing baseball with, so it was fun.

But I had to figure out which one I was best at. At some point, the one you’re best at becomes the most fun.

After my sophomore year, I stopped playing baseball. I played basketball that winter, but then I ran track in the spring. After that, it was just football and track until I graduated.

Dave Doeren calls you “Mr. Consistency.” How do you go about your business to play that way and earn that title?

That’s a good thing to be called by your head coach. Honestly, consistency is definitely something I’ve tried to implement in my life.

My pops instilled that in me when I was young: just being able to really focus on your priorities in life. That was the one thing he always preached: God, family, school, sports, friends.

That’s the order he presented it to me, and that’s the way I try to keep my life structured. I haven’t always been the best at it, but as I’ve grown, I’ve been able to build more of a routine and be more consistent in my life.

It just comes with time and maturity. It’s not always going to be easy coming into your freshman or sophomore year. Each year, you should be growing. You should be learning how to do things, and things get easier schedule-wise.

I feel like that’s helped me, just having a routine every morning, coming in, getting my body right, and doing the things I need to do to take care of myself. Really, Sunday through Sunday, I do the same thing pretty much every single week.

I feel like it translates to the field. If you can be consistent in your prehab, rehab, recovery,y and all that stuff, it’ll translate to making plays.

With back-to-back 100-yard games, do you expect to receive more attention from App State and other opponents in the future?

I don’t think it’s really going to affect my mindset or what I’m trying to do. If they do make an adjustment for me, it should just help the other guys in the room open up.

As long as points are going up on the board, that’s all I’m really concerned with.

It’s not really going to change much about me. As I said, I see alignment and assignment and whatever defensive picture they present. That’s the way I play football, and I’d say that’s never going to change.

OLB Harvey Dyson

How hot was it in Nashville?

I don’t think words can describe how hot it was, especially when it got to that fourth quarter. Our feet were burning throughout the whole fourth quarter, second half, really, from the start to the end.

But you’re from Texas. You’re used to that, right?

Yeah.

What was high school football like in Texas? You hear about the Friday Night Lights. You’ve got Cedar Hill High School just southwest of Dallas. How big is high school football in Texas?

Texas, we really pride ourselves on our high school football. If we have an argument with anybody outside of the state of Texas, we always argue them down, no matter what high school we came from, that we’ve got the best football.

There’s a lot of competition throughout the DFW area, but just Texas, down in Houston, or really anywhere in the state of Texas, where the stadiums are really big. You should look up Allen High School Stadium. That’ll give you an idea of what kind of stadiums are out there.

What are we talking about with Allen High School? Did it feel like Nashville?

Yeah. It was around a $90 million renovation. It’s bigger than some college stadiums, I’ll tell you that.

You started at Texas Tech in Lubbock for three years, then went to Tulane last year. You led the Green Wave in tackles for loss during an 11-3 season. What did you learn last year about bouncing back from losses, and what can you impart to your teammates after the tough loss at Vanderbilt?

The first thing you’ve got to do is look in the mirror individually as a person. Whatever happened in that game, whatever moments led up to the reason we lost, you can’t really put the blame on that moment or those types of plays throughout the game.

You’ve got to look in the mirror, see what you did wrong as a player, and ask yourself how you can grow from it and get better.

The second thing, you don’t want to point fingers. You don’t want to blame. You don’t want to make excuses for why something happened or why we lost.

You want to find a way to fix those issues and come together as a group and a team and get ready for the next week.

How hard is it to shake a loss? We were at practice Tuesday, and it did not look like a team that had its heart broken Saturday. It looked like a team that addressed it, moved on, and is doing something about it. Did you get the sense in practice that you guys have moved on?

Definitely. That was one of the first things Coach Doerene said to us: We can’t let this derail our season or what we want to do in the future because we’vestill  got all the goals we want to accomplish in front of us.

You can’t think about a loss too much because you’ve got somebody trying to put another L on your record that very next Saturday.

In my opinion, you don’t have time to grieve and be sad. After those 24 hours are over, it’s back to preparation for the next team.

You’re now on your third team, so you’ve had scheme changes under different defensive coordinators and position coaches. Is it hard to pick up new schemes? Is it terminology, timing, or chemistry? What goes into getting comfortable in a new defense?

Definitely. When you play in different schemes and for different coaches, as you first get to college, you start to learn the basics of football at a higher level than in high school.

Once you learn coverage schemes, run fits, plays, and all that, it’s not the same from scheme to scheme or team to team. But overall, you can put two and two together.

The terminology may be different. Maybe the coaches call it something else, or there may be minor tweaks. But it’s pretty much the same throughout college football, and every coach puts their own twist on certain things.

At your previous stops, did you play the JACK linebacker?

Yes. I played the Jack linebacker at Texas Tech.

A lot of people might ask, “What’s the Jack linebacker?” Explain the role, where you line up, and what you’re responsible for.

The Jack linebacker is an outside linebacker in an odd-front look. You’ve got three down D-linemen, and the Jack would stand up to the boundary. It can be moved around a little bit.

But our main position is going to be on the boundary. Stand-up guy, a lot of drop responsibilities within that, and a lot of having to set the edge and create pressure off the edge within that job assignment.

You’ve got to be able to cover. You’ve got to be able to set the edge. You’ve got to be able to pass rush.

Coach Doeren complimented you on your improved run defense. How have you tried to improve in that category?

I’ve tried really hard in the offseason, particularly in spring and fall camp, to key in on that because I don’t want to be labeled as a guy who can pass rush. I want to be an every-down defender.

I want to put my best foot forward in the run game and have no flaws.

I really honed in on that this offseason. I’ve still got stuff to work on, but I definitely can notice a difference in myself as well.

Is improving against the run a pre-snap or post-snap physical skill set? Are you working on different abilities, or is it thinking about run fits, breaking down blocks differently, and making the tackle?

I’d probably say it’s a little bit of both. Getting stronger in the offseason, working with Thunder, definitely helped me in that regard, bulking up a little bit more and understanding where my assignment is inside the run fit and where I need to put my hands. Small techniques within the scheme of the defense.

They’ve been doing a good job helping me with it.

Off the field, you’ve described yourself as reserved, chill,l and easygoing. You’re not that on the field. When and how do you flip that switch?

I think it starts right when I get to the stadium. As soon as we get off the bus and I feel the atmosphere, I know it’s go time.

As soon as we lock in, whether it’s a home or away locker room, that mind switches. We walk onto the field for the pregame walks, and before you put the pads on, it’s go time, my man.

You’re a fifth-year player with a lot of college football experience, but you’re working with some guys who aren’t veterans. Are you impressed by some of the youth on this team, and to what degree do you mentor those guys?

You’re right, 100%. I really found it a great challenge when I got here. Being on a team full of young guys, I really found out that my job here is to help them grow and to tell them things I wish I'd known when I was younger.

You bring up Elijah Satchell. I feel like I see a lot of myself in him. He plays the same position as me, the Jack, and he’s also had a great start to his season and his career. So I try to mentor him.

Even the other guys you named, Ziggy and Moretta, those are my young guys. So I try to tell them anything, whether it’s on the field or off the field, that can help them. I’ve got their best interests.

You were a redshirt freshman in 2022, when Texas Tech came to Carter-Finley Stadium to play NC State. You traveled but didn’t play. You know what it was like to be an opponent there. What’s it like now to play in Carter-Finley Stadium as a member of the Wolfpack?

Man, it was crazy. I can think back to that game when I first came here. That was our first away game of my college career at Texas Tech.

Walking into Raleigh and seeing the fans, it felt like as soon as we came out of the tunnel, they were right up on us, and it was packed. It was a surreal moment for me. I’ll never forget the lights turning red in the fourth quarter.

It was something I’ll never forget, and it’s a full-circle moment. Now I’m back here playing.

My first game here was against Richmond, an FCS school, but the crowd didn’t matter. It felt like we were playing a big opponent.

I love the fans out here, and I love the atmosphere on game day.

TE Hunter Provience

You won a national championship last year at the FCS level with the Montana State Bobcats, but that season started 0-2. Then you didn't lose again and finished 14-2. What were the discussions like after 0-2, and how did you guys focus and lock in?

I believe so. We had a players-only meeting. It was held by our captains, and it was just us players in there.

We really sat down, and we knew we were a good team. We knew we had what it takes to go the distance. So we sat down, talked about what we needed to focus on and work on, and then we put it into fruition. We really put work behind our words.

Losing to Oregon was kind of like, yeah, it was Oregon. But losing to South Dakota State, we were like, that should have been a game we won. So we knew what we had.

We were confident going forward, and we just put in work. It showed the whole rest of the season.

What's the process been like since Saturday to get over that bitter disappointment, where you guys played incredibly well on the road, flushed it Sunday, and got back to practice Tuesday? What we saw in practice Tuesday looked like a team that had gotten over Saturday. How did you guys get through that process?

We came in Sunday, as you said, and flushed everything. We didn't lose our confidence. We still played a great game, and one play doesn't break our team's confidence.

We came in Sunday, flushed it, and then on Tuesday we came in and knew we hadn't lost our confidence.

We're still going to keep practicing, keep preparing like we're going to win the game every week and face this opponent. No matter who we're playing, we're still going to practice hard and practice the same way. That's how we treat every week.

You've played Virginia and then at Vanderbilt. What's the adjustment been like going from the FCS to the Power Five level, both blocking and pass-catching?

I would say for pass-catching, it's pretty similar. But blocking is where it changes a lot. The line of scrimmage gets much wider at this level.

I experienced it with Oregon last year. It's pretty similar to the size of the guys that we play here, but it's just more consistent. Bigger guys consistently every week is a way to say it.

I know the score was a little lopsided against Oregon, but how did it go for you? Was that a validating moment for you, where you realized you'd moved some of those guys out of the way and could play at the next level?

Yeah, it definitely was. I was thinking the exact same thing after the game. It gave me some confidence for the rest of the year and moving forward that I could handle this level and play with these guys.

Blocking in the tight end room was one of the key elements of NC State football last year, and it still is a key element. How have you improved as a blocker, particularly from the high school level through where you are right now?

I didn't block a whole lot at the high school level, that's for sure. I was more of a receiver.

Going to Montana State as a freshman and over the next three years, I really developed a lot. We ran the ball a lot there, so I got plenty of practice with it. I think that's kind of what developed me into a good run blocker: blocking there, then coming here, learning even more from Coach Locklear, and getting practice against ACC-level guys every day in practice. That's been very helpful.

Last year, we talked to a big fella named Dante Daniels, who's playing in the CFL now. When I asked him about blocking, he lit up and said he loved dominating a guy. Do you like blocking, or do you prefer catching touchdowns? Would you rather dominate a guy at the line as a run blocker or turn around and catch a score?

That's a tough question. I would have to go with: if my block makes a touchdown and it's a pancake, I would take the block for sure.