Dave Doeren Spoke with the Media After Practice Thursday Before Syracuse

NC State head football coach Dave Doeren spoke with the media after practice today leading up to the Wolfpack’s Top-20 matchup against #18 Syracuse. You can watch it above, or check out what he had to say below.

If Devin Leary isn’t able to play, will Jack Chambers start vs. Syracuse?

“You’ll find out on gameday.”

On how the week of practice has gone

“It’s been a great week of practice. The guys are excited to play a really good Syracuse team. We’re not trying out any new Quarterbacks. Same guys we’ve had since training camp started. Everybody is practicing and working hard. It’s that point of the season where you can tell we’ve had two really physical games. They’ve given us everything they’ve got. Proud of how we are pushing through. The Bye week after this will come at a good time. Try to get some guys back to feeling normal.”

“We are going to have a healthy Tyler Baker-Williams. That’s a very happy addition having him back.”

“Proud of these guys for managing the 5 straight night games we’ve had. At times we haven’t gotten home until 3am. It’s a remarkable group.”

 Does the offense change much if Jack Chambers is in the game instead of Devin Leary?

“Did you watch the game? Well, then you saw that it changed a little bit. Everyone has a different skill set. If Devin is in the game, it’s his offense. If Jack’s in the game, if MJ [Morris] is in the game, if Ben Finley is in the game, they all have their strengths that we will try to play to.” 

On Garrett Shrader’s improvement from last year to this year

“Garrett Shrader is impressive. One of the more improved players I’ve seen this year. 70% completion rate. I went back and watched our game against him last year, and he really struggled throwing the ball. He ran well against us. 10 touchdowns and 3 interceptions this year. He’s done a great job and so has their staff. Tucker is still leading the ACC in rushing, so it hasn’t taken away from his production. 

On facing a team that has their primary receiver lined up on the inside [Oronde Gadsden II]

ECU had a couple guys in the slot that were really good players. But Gadsden plays everywhere. They move him everywhere. Make it hard for you to locate him. Isolate, and have one player on him to stop him. Gadsden is definitely their target. Their second leading receiver is their tailback. Gadsden is very important to them, and we need to know where he is. 

On if he’s surprised how good Syracuse is

They’ve got a lot of players back. I said this multiple times in the offseason when asked about the Atlantic Division, but whenever you have a starting quarterback back, which all of us do, it allows you to improve your roster dramatically differently than when you don’t. I’m not surprised that any of these teams who returned their starting quarterback are better because they’re not worried about that piece of their offense. You can do a lot of other things.

We have the same thing. Unfortunately for us, losing Trent Pennix was a big blow for our offense when you talk about getting better. But when you look at what is going on up there, they’ve been very healthy offensively. I think Shrader was in year one with that system and now he’s in year two with a new OC. Dino is a very resilient guy. I have a ton of respect for him. He’s a program builder. He did it at Eastern Illinois. He did it at Bowling Green. He’s done it at Syracuse now. It doesn’t surprise me that they are playing the way that they are.