Sign of good coachWhatever halftime adjustments were made worked wonders for UNC. They looked like 2 different teams the first and second half.
Need to give some props to State's offense. State's defense wears down in 2nd half because they are on the field too much...Whatever halftime adjustments were made worked wonders for UNC. They looked like 2 different teams the first and second half.
Mack showed class by calling off the dogs to start the 4th quarter. Could have hung 50 plus if they wanted. Glad to see the backups and walk-ons get reps against teams like Mercer and State,
WOLFPACK!!!!
happened???
Mack Brown came to town....
State better get a coach that can compete with Mack. Recruiting dont win games no matter how good DD recruits.
That's true. NC STATE produces alot of NFL talent but can NOT win when it counts.You mean how well he used to recruit. Mack will keep the upper hand for recruiting talent within NC for as long as he is the coach at UNC.
That's true. NC STATE produces alot of NFL talent but can NOT win when it counts.
DD will stay on I am afraid.
who you think would do better?That's true. NC STATE produces alot of NFL talent but can NOT win when it counts.
DD will stay on I am afraid.
I see the QB for state who started the season is going elsewhere. Not sure where though. I wish him well.
State needs to look for another transfer or graduate qb for next season.
It won't salvage that offense no more than Brandon Harris did for UNC. The OL was atrocious and receivers lacked the ability to get open. Knight is a bright spot but the losses of Drink and Ledford were glaring. I still think Doeren sold out on not losing Kitchings the recruiter and is now stuck with Kitchings the offensive coordinator.
Will respectfully disagree on the above in the bold.
State had to replace a 1st team All ACC LT. An All ACC and All American LG not to mention All ACC, All American and first round draft pick best C in the country.
Hard to plug guys in and play as well as 2018, especially freshmen.
It just doesn't happen, anywhere, really.
What those guys did this year was pretty good considering they lost their best returning starter and team captain, Justin Witt to a season ending injury 5 games into the season.
This unit was 3rd in the ACC in sacks allowed behind Wake Forest and Clemson.
They improved rushing yards per attempt from 3.9 to 4.2.
Joshua Fedd Jackson made Pro Football Focus 1st Team. Joe Sculthorpe and true Freshman Ikem Ekwonu were 2nd team.
That was the most players from a school on 1st and 2nd team other than Clemson. They all return including Witt.
NC State has major problems, but the O Line isn't one of them.
Who they had to replace doesn't negate how bad they were. Yes they had to replace a ton but they looked bad. McGirt especially, that guy had no business starting on a P5 team.
I'm not as hung up on stats considering stats are heavily dependent on who you play and game planning. Of course your sack numbers are going to 'look' better when your OC is trying to break in a new QB by getting the ball out of his hands quicker. (Sam Howell has a high sack number thus looking negatively on the OL but his yards per attempt ranking is good for 16th in all of college football, by contrast Leary would have been ranked 106th at 5.8 yards per attempt. Simply put, Kitchings was giving defenses no time to even get to the QB but the 'numbers' look good for the OL). Of course your run numbers are going to improve when it becomes your bread and butter because you have no passing attack. Numbers aside, what I saw from the TV was that when NCSU played anyone with a pulse, they could get nothing going on offense, especially between the tackles. There were a few inside zone plays that they had success with but the State OL regularly was out-gunned and on many occasions State had to resort to outside running calls. Even despite the improvement in the running game, it was still ranked the exact same as your passing game in the ACC (they were both 9th). From top to bottom the offense was just a disaster and the OL is not excluded in that. PFF can rank them however they want (as much as I love PFF, they are simply an analytics site that takes no context into consideration), what was seen on the field cannot be denied.
I don't want this to be trash talk but I just think it's simple observation that if the OL was as good as you'd like to believe, then the offense as a whole wouldn't have been battling a Georgia Tech team trying to play spread with triple option players, for putting the fewest points on the board.
I know NCSU was dealt tons of injuries this year, I'm just not sure where those injuries were on offense. Bam Knight is a stud. The OL was better than any other group on offense. The WR cops is a concern. QB play is a concern.
What plagued NCSU on offense was the lack of downfield threat this year. Receivers could get no separation except in blown coverage and the coaching staff had no faith in longer developing plays for the offense. That's likely a product of having no faith in a QB to make a downfield read. They're young, that's understandable but will it get better? If there is to be any success next year, the playbook will have to be opened and we'll really find out what the OL is made of.
To be fair, the offense had a very tall task this season of trying to replace good players, trying to break in a freshman QB and trying to chew clock so not to keep a paper thin defense on the field all game.
Next year is going to be critical for Dave.
Feliepe Franks has entered the transfer portal....maybe another UF transfer will be what the pack needs.
Franks I wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole. He had a ton of baggage at UF.
Bentley is a safe bet.
Franks I wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole. He had a ton of baggage at UF.
Bentley is a safe bet.
Anybody....who you think would do better?
Not sure how I feel about this defensive coordinator hire.
Who was hired? Link?