WATCH: Dave Doeren Speaks After Practice 2 Days From NC State vs. Clemson (with transcript)

Head Coach Dave Doeren met with the media after practice today, two days away from NC State’s matchup against #21 Clemson in Death Valley. You can watch the video ABOVE and read the transcript BELOW.

Did you see CJ (Bailey) this week in practice? Is he building confidence?

Yeah, he’s building off of what he did in the second half. Yeah, he’s ready. He’s had a great week. The guys are playing hard around him, so great opportunity for CJ.

We’re excited for him.

What do you think he does particularly well that sets him apart from other Freshmen?

He’s consistent.

I think there isn’t any moment that we’ve put in front of him where he hasn’t responded as you would hope, regardless of age, I mean, any player for that matter. And you go back to the spring game, he went against the first defense the whole day and had a really good day. So every time we’ve put him in a challenging situation, he’s just been the same guy.

He’s been consistent, he’s been uplifting. He’s had energy, he bounces back if something happens, he’s very coachable. So those are habits, and you always fall back on your habits.

It’s about not rising to the occasion. I saw someone write that, that’s not what happens. The guys return to the habits that they’ve created, and he has a lot of winning habits.

Emphasizing pushing the opposing teams D-Line off the line of scrimmage

To me, it’s the value of winning the line of scrimmage, regardless of play call.

A lot of people get into, ‘you should have called this, you should have called that.’ Wrong, you should have executed better. You can hand off an inside zone, block it up, and have a touchdown.

I mean, drop back on a pass and execute, it’s gonna be a good pass. Defense, doesn’t matter what he calls. 11 guys play hard, play together, it’s gonna be a good defensive call.

And so the line of scrimmage gives the quarterback more opportunity, right? Gives the running backs more opportunity, gives the receivers more time to get open. And then conversely, defensively, you win the line of scrimmage, then they have less time to throw, smaller holes to run. And so that’s where we have to win games.

And I don’t care what you’re running on offense, it always starts and ends up front. And including tight ends, including backs, including DBs, linebackers, whoever’s in that box and the trenches, they gotta win. And so me being on that line and looking at which way that thing’s going is a measuring stick of our toughness.

And so that’s something that we need in this program, to be the team that we wanna be.

What are some of the bigger challenges, Dave, that your team faces against Clemson on Saturday?

Well, I mean, they’re talented, they’ve been in the same system, the continuity that he’s had longer than me, obviously. So they have a system, their kids know it, so do we, we have a system.

The crowd noise is always on the road, and particularly when you’re down there, can be a part of distracting guys. And guys not focusing on the right things with all the things around them. And so it’s just the environment, and conversely, there’s nothing better than getting a big crowd quiet, and you have to do that, you have to earn that through the way you play the game.

And so we got a big challenge in front of us when you go into someone else’s stadium that has the fanfare that they do.

You talked about Coach Roper having all the quarterbacks ready to play. What have you seen from Lex (Thomas) this week?

Done a great job, really impressed with Lex’s preparation. I said this the other day, or I think it was last night on my radio show.

But he has not taken reps physically behind the one and the twos, but mentally you can tell he’s taken reps every snap. He jumped right in, no mistakes, directing guys the right way, encouraging his teammates, making good decisions, functioning. He’s ready to play, and so we feel good about Lex, and I’m really excited about what he’s shown us as far as how he prepares to play the game.

And I’m not surprised, I mean, the family that he’s from, and that’s what those guys are about. They’re about working and doing all the stuff it takes to be ready.

How much does enrolling early help a guy like CJ be ready for this moment?

It helps, yeah, I mean, it’s just reps.

It’s reps against college defense, and the speed of the game, and the system, and the nuances of the system, the terminology. Even though he might have run a lot of similar concepts that were called different things, and even defensive ID, they might have called it this, we call it that. And so you’re just, football is a foreign language, it’s funny.

You go from school to school, or even in the NFL, and one guy calls inside zone this, the other guy calls inside zone this. And so there’s translation, and so the earlier you’re learning the language, the faster you can process information.

Have you seen Grayson (McCall) help Lex and CJ kind of get prepared?

Yeah, he’s a great teammate.

I mean, he jumped right in to helping those guys in the meeting room, on the field, talking to them in between series, walking in the huddle with them, and listening to them talk, making sure he’s saying the right things. He’s done a great job preparing these guys as well.

Is the noon kickoff skewed to travel, are y’all gonna walk through down there? How are y’all gonna approach that?

No, I mean, it’s no different than playing here last week.

So the fact that we just played a noon game helps, because you have a routine that the guys have already been through. We are a morning practice team, as you know, so we’re used to waking up early and playing football. So noon kick’s actually a good thing for us when it comes to the normality of playing early in the day.