Heading into NC State’s contest against Syracuse last night, Redshirt Junior Linebacker Caden Fordham was the Wolfpack’s leading tackler. Fordham didn’t play last night, and NC State Head Coach Dave Doeren revealed to Pack Radio after the game that he would miss the remainder of the season due to injury.

As a result of Fordham’s absence, Redshirt Senior Devon Betty moved over to the MIKE Linebacker position, which is the position he played all of last season. Redshirt Freshman Kamal Bonner moved into the starting role at the SAM Linebacker position that Betty had been playing at.

Betty finished the game with 10 tackles last night, which was a career high. Bonner finished with 9 tackles, which was also a career high.

Despite the fact that Betty moved to the MIKE spot, Redshirt Junior Sean Brown, the SAM Linebacker, wore the headset that is typically worn by the MIKE.

Losing your MIKE Linebacker is like losing the Quarterback of the defense. NC State is already struggling this season, and the absence of Fordham for the remainder of the year is a significant blow for the Wolfpack.

Redshirt Freshman Quarterback CJ Bailey met with the media for his postgame press conference after NC State’s 17-24 loss to Syracuse tonight. You can watch the video ABOVE and read the transcript BELOW.

CJ, how tough is it to be able to work the ball down the field multiple times inside Syracuse 30 and just have them be able to take the ball away from you guys? How tough is that, I guess, for an offense?

It’s really tough.

The tough thing about our passing game and our offense is when I drop back, we make plays and we complete passes and move it down the field. We slip on the field and just we got to finish. Like that’s the toughest thing for us and we got to overcome that.

We got to finish. We can’t keep getting flags and turning the ball over in the red zone. We had four trips in the red zone and we didn’t succeed.

Then we had a field goal in our back pocket each time, and we didn’t take it. We fumbled, the interception and we missed a field goal.

It’s fine. But as an offense, we got to get better with finishing drives and that’s that’s really the main thing.

Y’all still finished with some really good numbers. What are you kind of telling yourself and telling your teammates about how to move forward?

I’m kind of telling myself just that’s the game going on. I got to be able to take care of the ball more.

That’s just the main thing. Like that’s what’s killing us. Like we play, we play so well.

Like I said, we’re flipping the field. We just keep turning the ball over. Like even last week I threw that pick at the end of the game.

That’s a problem. We can’t keep turning the ball over. I can’t keep turning the ball over.

Me personally. So that’s what I’m telling myself. And I’m telling the offense keep playing how they play because we playing really good.

We’re doing our job. We’re making plays. We’ve just got to finish drives.

And that’s the main thing.

Dave mentioned earlier when we spoke to him that the fact that turnovers are what’s the most frustrating part of this. He said coveting the football is the biggest thing that this team needs to work on. What types of things do you feel like the team needs to do overall to be able to start realizing that you have to covet the football and not turn it over at this point?

It’s all just mental stuff, like there’s little details and we worked on everything during the week.

We got ball security drills every day of the week, holding the ball and carrying the ball. Even though Kendrick (Raphael) fumbled, I’ve got to take care of the ball as I’m in the pocket.

We’ve got ball security drills the whole week. We still fumbled the ball. So we got to take care of it.

Fumbling is something that shouldn’t happen.

The interception, I’ve got to take care of. I shouldn’t have either. The main thing is we’ve got to take care of the ball.

That’s just the main thing going into next week.

What type of growth and development are you seeing from the skill guys that you’re throwing the ball to handing the ball to? Are they developing and getting better week by week? Do you see separation and do you see roles developing within those groups?

I see a lot, especially at the receiver position, like those guys are getting way more confident and we trust in each other way more.

Like as the weeks going on, as we kept on getting reps and even in practice, like I could see we’re playing with more confidence and we trust each other more. I could be able to take those shots to those guys and I know they will come down with it because we trust each other.

That’s all I see every week, confidence and growth.

I know it wasn’t the outcome that you wanted tonight, but now that you’ve gotten a couple of starts under your belt, do you feel like the game is starting to slow down and simplify for you in a way?

Yeah, coming into this game tonight, it felt really slow.

I really see everything. That interception I just missed. But as the week goes on and Coach Roeper keeps preparing me well, I can get way more confidence. I’m trusting everything I see.

Those reps, and me starting is really crucial for our future. I’m happy that I’m getting a chance right now.

I know the season hasn’t gone how this team wants or how you wanted, but is there anything specific that you’re really proud of that you’ve done or accomplished?

Specifically this week, the main thing I’m proud of is that we kept fighting. We did leave anything out there and everybody had each others back. That’s the biggest thing that I saw this weekend. I want to see that next week and moving forward.

I just keep playing like no matter the score, no matter how we plan, just keep keep playing. That’s what I’ve seen this week and I love it. That’s one thing.

That’s one positive that I love from the team.

Redshirt Freshman Wide Receiver Noah Rogers met with the media for his postgame press conference after NC State’s 17-24 loss to Syracuse tonight. You can watch the video ABOVE, and read the transcript BELOW.

How how tough is it as an offense to move the ball downfield to just give it away when you get inside the 30 yard line as as many times as happened tonight?

I wouldn’t necessarily say tough. I mean, I know our offense know, what we’re doing. We get down to the red zone and we turn the ball over. We’re doing good on pace.

We just got to stay on schedule and keep executing and focus. You know, that’s just a lack of focus right there. Got to keep pushing.

How would you evaluate how CJ (Bailey) did tonight and kind of his growth over the last several weeks?

CJ, he’s doing a phenomenal job stepping into a huge role and continue to lead the team. Just because he may turn the ball over or something, we don’t devalue. We encourage him to keep going and everything.

And I believe CJ is going to keep doing great things for us. He’s one of our biggest strengths on the offense. I can’t keep waiting to play with him.

Seven of your eight drives tonight finished inside of the Syracuse 30. How close do you feel like this offense is now at this point to having that kind of breakthrough performance overall?

I see a lot of glimpses and and a lot of things that we can get better at.

We just we’ve got to continue to stay on schedule and finish. That’s really it right there.

You guys had some explosion plays today. You had one for a touchdown. (Justin) Joly, (Hollywood) Smothers, obviously (KC) Concepcion. Are you starting to see the the work and the separation from where you were to where you are now? Is there more growth potential for this offense?

Oh, yeah, there definitely is a lot of growth. And first off, it starts from practice.

I feel like we’ve been practicing great and we keep challenging each other to practice harder.

It’s a lot of growth going on. I mean, today just shows what we can become.

It’s about how consistent we can do it.

What’s the message in the locker room after a tough loss like this, but especially coming off of last week’s game? How do you guys kind of stick together as a team to finish the last five games of the year?

I mean, it’s really we either are going to bend or break.

There’s a lot of guys in the locker room who’s not going for that. I’m definitely not going for that. I’m going to keep playing.

It’s a blessing to play this game. So why would we stop here? There’s still a lot of football ahead. A lot of great things can happen.

This is just the turning point of the season where we go into the second half. Change things around and get things going. The main message is finish the second second half of the season. We just got to finish and keep playing hard.

We haven’t been playing our Wolfpack football. We’ve been showing a lot of good things. We just want to execute harder, that’s all.

On your touchdown, what went right for you on that play and then just how did it feel scoring your first touchdown?

I mean, really right there, it isn’t too much. It’s just film work. You got to know where people are on the field.

Just simple scramble rules. I saw the guy on on the right of me come down. So that means I have to work my way up.

So that’s all it is right there.

NC State head coach Dave Doeren met with the media for his postgame press conference after the Wolfpack’s 17-24 loss to Syracuse tonight. You can watch the video ABOVE, and read the transcript BELOW.

Obviously, again we lost because the three turnovers going in to score. And all three different, but all three costly. I mean, you would hope that you’d at least get 9 points with three trips into the red zone and come up with zero on all three trips and you lose. Obviously that dictates the outcome of the game.

Syracuse quarterback played really well. He’s a good football player, very accurate and gives his receivers a chance to make plays and they did not turn the ball over offensively and we did three times. That was the difference in the game.

I am proud of our guys. They finished.

You know we were down. To see them come back like that shows me they got a lot of fight, and so I am proud of them for that. For coming back and fighting and giving us a chance to have one possession game there down the stretch.

How deflating for an offense is it to move the ball just to have it get taken away down toward the end of the drive?

I mean, it’s one of the tenets of our program.

We’re undefeated in the last five years when we win the turnover margin. Talk about it every week and the guys know it. We got to do a better job believing it.

It’s the most important thing. On the whole field is the ball. There’s a reason they named the game after it? And we’re not coveting the ball enough on offense, and obviously they did a better job of that than we did it with their offense compared to ours and their defense compared to ours.

That was the game. Three times we just marched right down the field. Did a really good job moving the football. Converted on those third downs, made some plays and each time we got down there was a different player. We got to get back to protecting the football. It’s how you win games.

How would evaluate what you saw from CJ (Bailey) today?

Awesome, good, some bad. I thought he made some good throws.

He missed a couple. He had KC (Concepcion) down the middle on one. Could have been a really good throw. On one of the vertical seams, but he made some plays for us.

I know he’s taking this hard, because of the fumble he had on blindside hit. I don’t put that on him, even though he should be able to hang on to the ball.

But when you get in the middle of your back, we should protect him better than that. The other one, he was definitely off the mark on the throw to Kendrick. That could be a better throw.

CJ is doing a lot of good things as a true freshman. I’m excited about him. I’m not down on him.

He’s going to get better and better each week. We’re going to ride him. He’s our guy.

Guys around him got to make plays for him as they did in the fourth quarter and just need more of them.

Number one, the 72 yard pass towards the end, it looked like the clock did not stop. I don’t know if it did or not. If it’s supposed to stop after first down. What’s your perspective on that? Did it stop because it was unclear up here?

It was unclear on the field. There’s a lot of things unclear on the field. I can’t critique officials.

You guys know that there was a lot of things down there that were hard to understand.

Your skill guys made some great plays, Concepcion, Noah Rogers. Are you seeing some separation and now getting back to what you envisioned from some of these guys at the beginning of the season?

We’re getting better. The chemistry between the quarterback and his receivers is improving. We saw explosive play from Noah. It was a great job by him getting back in bounds after the reroute.

I thought Hollywood (Smothers) sparked the offense and we needed a spark. KC, we got him involved. Justin Joly continues to make plays.

There are some positives. And there were some positives last week. We’re just not getting the satisfaction of a win from these things because we’re beating ourselves too much. That has to get fixed.

Whether it’s a costly penalty, we had two guys in motion, that’s a mistake by the quarterback. He’s got to let the guys get set for a turnover. The fastest way to lose a game is to beat yourself.

Been pretty good at that around here. Not beating ourselves over the last four seasons. We got to get back to it.

And this team will continue to work. They’ll continue to get better. And there’s some good young players.

And so we’re going to let those guys mature. Play for their quarterback.

What did you think about the atmosphere and the crowd here tonight at Carter-Finley?

Oh, it was awesome. Crowd was great. Very thankful.

I thought the uniforms looked great, too. Crowd was awesome, man. They were loud.

They were into it. It’s been a while. Obviously, it’s our first Saturday night game of the year.

Thankful to the fans and to the student section. They were great. And I know they’re frustrated by the outcome of these games.

Just hang in there. Some good young players that are fighting hard for you. And they’re going to keep getting better.

Syracuse finished this game 8 of 15 on third down and 1 of 3 on fourth down. How would you assess that side of the ball’s job on those potential drive ending plays?

We had opportunities for sure. A lot of third-and-mediums. And they made more plays than we did.

We’ve got to have tighter coverage. We missed Brandon Cisse tonight. For sure.

One of our best defensive backs. We missed having him out there. Missed not having #10 (Caden Fordham) on defense.

When you’re missing good players on a certain side of the ball on key downs, it shows up. Was it good enough? No, we expect to be better than 8 of 15. So 50%, you know, we expect to be better than that.

Obviously, fourth down, they were only one of three. So it means we were two of three. That’s pretty good.

And it’s the third-and-medium area, where they converted on some slants and just really tight coverage throws. Good catches by their guys. We’ve got to have tighter coverage and be able to break those up.

Noah, go ahead.

What’s the message to this team moving forward from this loss to keep them together? How do you try to keep their spirits up moving forward? 

I mean, we fought hard. I told them I was proud of their fight. And told them that we can’t turn the ball over three times in the red zone and expect to win.

I mean, it’s honest. I was proud of how they finished. And they fought hard, man, all the way down to the onside kick.

We had a chance at that football and Kanoah did a nice job. So you just tell them the truth. I mean, I care a lot about these players and just want them to play hard for each other.

Keep getting better. Eventually the tide’s going to turn if you do it that way.