LOVED IT, HATED IT : From #13 NC State’s narrow win over ECU

NC State won. I am happy. But this isn’t exactly what I wanted, however, it’s deep down what I expected.

NC State, coming in with a whole pre-season of hype and a national ranking of #13, wasn’t going to come in and dominate at ECU. At least that’s not what history said was going to happen. NC State, as a school in general, has a stigma attached to it. They’ll be at their worst when they’re ranked the best.

But that’s not a real thing, right? That’s just a myth, no?

Well, whatever it is, and whether it’s real or not, it’s obviously something that has seeped into the psyche of the guys in the locker room at NC State. It doesn’t seem to matter what sport. It doesn’t seem to matter who is on the staff. It just seems to be something that plagues the major athletic programs of this school.

But I swore it wasn’t going to happen this year. This team was too good to have an opening game lapse. They have a veteran team and a QB who’s been through the gauntlet. They have a defense full of future pros. They’ll blow ECU out of the water, which will catapult them into what will be one of the most successful seasons in program history.

But here I sit, just an hour after the game has ended, dealing with reality.

I’m so happy State won. There were a few minutes there where I was sure the worst-case scenario had come true. But man, this wasn’t exactly the way you wanted to start the season, even if the outcome was a win.

With that said let’s talk about what I loved and what I hated from this roller coaster of a win for NC State.

LOVED IT

Demi Sumo is legit – One of my biggest questions coming into the season was the running game. I knew Leary’s success was going to be closely tied with how successful NC State was going to be on the ground. And while I love Jordan Houston, I don’t think he’s the style of back that you can lean on as a workhorse. They needed a grind-it-out, physical back to compliment Houston. Today, we were assured that player exists on this roster.  Demi Sumo looked great.  He has some amazing runs, great yards after contact, and just looked like a guy that is going to break out this season. He finished with 79 yards on 14 carries and 1 TD. And while he wasn’t able to get in on 4 tries at the goal line in a big situation down the stretch, I think Sumo is going to be huge for the pack going forward (pun intended).

The Wolfpack Defense and Special Teams came up big – The NC State front line was consistent and great all day. They only allowed 59 yards on 21 carries to ECU’s running backs. The secondary could have been better, but they did come up with two big INTs. Meanwhile, Special Teams was great again, coming up with a blocked punt/touchdown. ECU’s offense isn’t all that bad, and they have some big-time weapons that NC State kept in check.

Thank you to ECU’s kicker, Owen Daffer– Not trying to kick a man when he’s down, but NC State doesn’t win this game if Daffer does his job. Thank goodness he didn’t. Daffer missed a PAT that would have tied the game, and a FG that would have won it. You gotta feel for the kid, especially in a small college town that passionate about football. But this is football, baby. You sign up for this when you sign up to play competitive sports at this level.

HATED IT

The Play Calling – Maybe you’ll disagree. I don’t know. But this is what I feared the most. NC State would come out with a conservative game plan on offense, and fall into a trance that would have them sleepwalking through the entire game. That’s kind of what happened offensively. NC State was predictable and ‘safe’ all game long. This is Leary’s year, man. Let the kid go back there and rip it. Empty that backfield, and let’s put up some points. Instead, it was the opposite. Leary was basically a glorified game manager in this one. There was almost no misdirection, no creativity, and no excitement from Beck. Heck, I saw more offense in the last 2 minutes of the UNC/App State game that came on after this game, then I saw in the whole time from the Pack.

And don’t pin this take on me, there was a lot of conversation about this on Twitter, the most notable coming from NY Post contributor, Thomas Casale.

I hope we don’t see worse play calling all season than what we just saw from NC State.

I could have drawn up better plays in the dirt.

— Thomas Casale (@TheTomCasale) September 3, 2022

It just seems like the pressure is always on Leary to make a play. Most of his throws are coming on 2nd or 3rd and long. It would be nice to see them just put the ball in his hands a little more, open it up and see what’s possible with this offense.

I also think the goal-line calls were awful and that stands out the most. A run up the middle with Houston (fumble) and then 4 straight with Demi Sumo (stopped). No QB sneaks, no putting the ball in your Heisman candidate’s hands to make a play. This is just my opinion here, but NC State isn’t going to reach its potential until they take the reigns off their offense. And I know it’s week 1, so maybe this gets better, but this isn’t new. This is something we’ve seen for a few years now that I’ve been concerned about. Playing not to lose instead of playing to win on offense.

Devin Leary’s performance
I won’t say I hated Leary’s performance, but it wasn’t a good look for game 1 from a kid who wants to be in the Heismann conversation. ECU’s defense did a good job against him, but ECU’s defense shouldn’t slow down a guy of Leary’s caliber. His 211 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT performance (17/33) wasn’t what I was hoping for and part of it was his fault, but part of it I hit on above (the play-calling). I don’t really think the staff put Leary in a position to succeed in this game, and maybe that won’t be a popular take, but it’s that’s how I saw it.

The NC State WRs (beside Thayer)
Thayer Thomas aside, I was hoping to see more from this group.  I wanted to see someone like Julian Gray, Keyone Lesane or Anthony Smith step up. Instead it was just Thomas who really stood out. No other receiver had more than 2 catches and the guy Leary hopes becomes his major deep threat, Devin Carter, dropped another catchable ball (that would have been a TD). This might be the reason for Leary’s performance, or maybe Leary’s performance was the reason for the lack of WR production. Who knows, either way, it’s got to get better in the next couple of weeks.

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Don’t get me wrong. I am ecstatic that NC State came away with a win. I’m so thankful the season is still intact, and I hope this was an aberration, a game that we’ll look back on and laugh at. But I think the reality is that this squad has some work to do, and some growing to do before we see them at their final form. I think there will need to be adjustments made by the players and some by the coaches as the season progresses. I think NC State fans, myself included, thought this team would hit the ground running. They didn’t, but at the end of the day, it’s a win and that’s all that matters.