Dave Doeren: "There Were A Lot Of Positives"

NC State head coach Dave Doeren met with the media after the Wolfpack's 34-6 home win over East Carolina.

Opening statement...
Emanuel McGirt getting his first start. It was awesome to see that. Tabari Hines getting his first touchdown. You have these young guys playing.

To see Keyon Lesane get a run at the end of the game. Jordan Houston catch his first pass. To see Emeka Emezie make two strong catches in the second half. Just a lot of really good things.

For Matt McKay in his first start to have 300 yards is pretty special. I thought the offensive line was able to rotate guys in and protect. There were a lot of good things that happened today. We’ve got to clean up several things, obviously. I was disappointed in our kickoff coverage. We did kick the ball well, that was good to see, with Trenton Gill. We’ve got to be able to get it down and tackle better on kickoff coverage. 

There were a lot of positives. I thank the fans for being there. It was hot today. Hopefully you enjoyed what you got to see from our players. We need you. We need you for four quarters. I know it’s hot. I get all that.

We want to be special. Please just continue to do all that you can to be back in there for us in the third quarter. We love you if you can be. It means a lot to these kids. 

We are 1-0. Half of the teams in the country are not, and half of the teams are. It’s good to be on that side of the ledger. 

On McKay’s preparation for the start...
As practice went on throughout the week, you could see him getting more and more confident.

On Thursday, he had his best practice that I’ve seen since he’s been here. I told the guys ‘If he throws like that, we’re good Saturday,’ because he was throwing dimes. He was very confident; he was very calm. He put his time in, studied, and prepared.

I tell the players that if you are prepared, you won’t be nervous. He prepared the right way for this football game. 

On some of the defensive adjustments...
Every year I’ve been here, we’ve played odd on third down. So we’ve always had it. Last year we played ECU in three down the entire game. When Tony (Gibson) got here, we are kind of bridging the gap from third down to being able to play it on first and second.

We feel like it gives us a lot more answers for RPO football. We’ve had a lot of injuries on our defensive line. We don’t have enough defensive tackles to play four down for an entire game with a rotation. We have good depth, which you saw at linebacker today. We are just trying to use our players to the best that we can with what we have.

We did get into some four-down fronts with that defense, which we’re still going to be able to do. As we get Josh Harris back, as we get some of these guys back soon, it’ll open some things up if we want to play both as the season progresses.

On defensive rotating...
I felt a lot of guys worked hard in camp competing to get on the field and earned the right to play.  
I fee like playing our guys as much as we can early sets us up when you have an injury... getting Icky in the game was a big deal, getting Dylan McMahon in the game was a big deal.

What adjustments did you make?
They were throwing quick in the boundary.... we rolled our corners up, played a little more Cover 2... I knew it was going to be an adjustment, feeling them out.

On Tabari Hines...
He’s so excited to be playing right now... he and Payton. Payton had tears in his eyes before the game.

When they get back and have success it’s a huge deal for them.

What did you see from Jordan Houston?
He’s really gifted catching the ball... he runs hard, he’s powerful.  

It’s good when you can rotate those guys and keep them fresh.  

How did you prepare the defense mentally and physically?
They were coached very well. I thought our defensive staff had a nice game plan, and the players executed.

That’s the thing about the three-down package, you get more speed on the field and you can be multiple... you give the offense a lot of pictures to look at.

Did you anticipate throwing as much as you did today?
It’s really built to take what they give.  In a lot of cases you see a screen on this side and a run here... it’s based on the looks. 

A lot of what coach Kitchings and the staff put together is the look they give.

Impressions on defense...
I thought there were a lot of contact plays at the ball.  I thought their offense caught some great 50-50 balls.

Making them earn every yard they get, getting hands on more footballs. Getting takeaways like that is what it’s all about.

When we play really good on defense it helps our offense so much.