Dave Doeren weekly press conference video and transcript

NC State plays the first top-10 matchup in program history this weekend. The Wolfpack travels to face the undefeated Clemson Tigers Saturday, and head coach Dave Doeren started the week with his weekly press conference Monday afternoon.

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Video and transcript highlights of Doeren’s weekly press conference are provided below.

Watch Dave Doeren’s press conference

Dave Doeren press conference opening statement transcript

Dave Doeren: “I just want to start off just saying thanks to the fans and parents and students and recruits that came to the game the other night. It’s another great home atmosphere, especially shout out to the fans that stayed the entire game. I appreciate your commitment to our kids and our players. It was great to see the light show and the entertainment that’s going on in that stadium, the fireworks, the music, the fourth quarter, the wagon wheel, the whole thing, man, it was awesome. Those continue to make this thing better. I think our students section’s really, really getting to be a lot of fun, and that wasn’t like that when I got here. It’s gotten so much better over time, and I want to thank you guys for that.

“Going into the game against UConn, I was really proud of our team. I thought we played really hard, we were prepared, challenged our guys throughout the week to be in the moment and to work on us, not overlook an opponent, not let our guard down, just to be present on the opportunity that we had to become a better football team. Obviously, we knew that the conference schedule was looming, and , the matchup that we have this week was in the background, and I thought our guys showed good leadership and maturity. There’s a lot of teams, we all watch college football, we know some teams don’t do that, and our team showed maturity, which was something that we needed to do.

“I also think our Texas Tech win looks even more impressive now, seeing what they did. Congrats to coach McGuire on his win over Texas. For us, guys are getting better, andd that’s the challenge we have each week is we want to be a better version of ourselves than we were the previous Saturday and be better than we were in the UConn game, than we were in Texas Tech and so on. From an offensive standpoint, we started fast, obviously. I don’t know if you can start faster than that great throw from Devin [Leary] to Thayer Thomas. One of the goals we had was to be better after the catch, better after contact, have more YAC, yards after contact, yards after catches, and Devin Carter answered that, Thayer Thomas, Keyon Lesane, Demie [Sumo-Karngbaye], Michael Allen got in the mix there doing it Delbert Mimms, so it was a lot of guys that took that to heart.

“I thought Devin Leary played fast, made quick decisions, distributed the ball, was accurate, obviously had one he’d like to have back there, which was the turnover before the half, and he’ll learn from that. It’s nice when you don’t have to punt. I don’t know if I’ve had a game like that as a head coach. So that was really nice to be able to end every possession without having to punt the football, and one thing we did a great job of was manage third downs. We had manageable down and distances, which means you did well on first and second. That’s you’re down in distance management. When you do that the right way, it makes coach [Tim] Beck’s job a lot easier and the kids performed better in third and 1 to 2, third and 2 to 3 field position range. Negatively, we had some penalties. Two pre snap on guys and one on our staff, just had 12 men on the field trying to substitute a guy out and didn’t get that done in a fast enough fashion for the officials.

“We had two sacks we probably could have avoided with throw aways, and then we had two drops that were catchable. Defensively, we had eight three-and-outs and two fourth-down stops. We stopped the run. They had zero explosive plays in their pass game, and I thought we tackled well with the ones and twos. It got sloppy at the end of the game, we put in a bunch of young guys, and they looked like they were young guys. It was good to get them that that game experience, but the product wasn’t very good. That’s something that they’ll learn a lot from and hopefully be better for the next time they get out there.”

“On special teams. Chris Dunn continues to be very, very good for us, and I was happy with Collin Smith with his kickoffs, and it was nice for him to get in and play a little bit as our kicker too. He had a nice field goal, kicked off well. I think, our punt return scheme, we could have blocked better for Thayer. We had one opportunity, and I feel we need to do a better job there. The fake field goal, obviously, whenever a fake doesn’t go well, I’ll take the credit for that. UConn did a nice job. It wasn’t what we thought we were going get, wasn’t what they showed us, and they did a nice job not rushing off the edge that they had been the entire game, so kudos to them on that.

“As far as this week, excited for the game. It’s a great matchup against a very talented group with an experienced talented staff, have great respect for Coach [Dabo] Sweeney and his program. Two top-10 teams competing on a national stage, and it’s why we do this. The kids have worked hard, staff has worked hard, and we expected it to be in this position. We expected to be 4-0 going to Clemson, and we look forward to playing a great team, and we’ll continue to focus on us. I think the path that has got us here is the path we’re going to stay on. It’s individual and collective improvement through great practice, great meetings, taking care of business.

“We will focus, obviously, on our opponent and know those guys but, more importantly, we need to know what we need to get better at and get it done. We’re playing at a great venue, longest home winning streak in college football, and we know the crowd will be into it, and it will be loud. And, when you talk about them, to me, it starts with their defensive front. They’re really, really talented. They’ve got a great rotation on the D-line. They’re skilled, they’re big, they’re really good football players on that defensive front, and they’ve done a nice job of recruiting those types of guys, developing them and coaching them, and they put them in positions to be successful.

“At linebacker, Trenton Simpson, 22, is a really good football player. He’s a sideline-to-sideline guy and really, really good player. They’ve played a lot of guys in the secondary, I know they’ve had some injuries there. They have good length at corner. You can see they’re not doing a ton of things, probably less multiple than they’ve been and guys are playing hard. I know they just had a tough game with Wake, but I have a lot of respect for Mike Reed, and I know he’ll have his guys ready. Offensively, their offensive line has stayed healthy. They’ve played the same five guys in all four games, they’re better than they were a year ago.

“I think their quarterback’s maybe the most improved part of their offense. He’s playing with more poise, he’s more accurate, he’s definitely given his guys a chance on deep balls. His receivers, he’s got two guys that are long that are making plays for him. Their tight ends got four touchdowns, and not surprising to see [WIll] Shipley playing the way he is. I have great respect for Will. He’s competitive, he’s talented, he’s got a lot of great spirit and demeanor. So it’s a great matchup. I’m excited to get to work and get into the game planning today and start our practice and go out there. I love our team and our mindset, and I’m excited for them with this opportunity.”

Q&A Transcript

I know you don’t usually focus too much on the rankings, but, having this team in the top 10 for the first time in 20 years, how significant is that for you?

Dave Doeren: “Well it’s not for me. It’s significant for our team, and it’s for our university and our alumni, and it’s great. We worked really hard to move ourselves up in the national footprint of this sport. It has taken a lot of time, blood, sweat, and tears and commitment from a lot of people. I know that it’s not a stationary spot either. You go up or down based on your performance, but you still have to get to that spot, and we’ve worked hard to get there.

“We’re going to embrace the opportunity being there, and we know a lot comes with it. So I think it’s something to celebrate for sure. It’s not something to say we’ve arrived yet because, obviously, the rankings at the end matter a lot more than they do after the fourth week. But 20 years is a long time, so I think it’s something that should be noted and something that people should be excited about, and I’m proud of our players. We were, three years ago, 4-8. These guys have worked really hard to get our football team where it is right now.”

Dave, it has to be asked, obviously, preparation for a potential hurricane coming through this game as well. What types of things will you do this week to prepare for that on top of preparing to play in Memorial Stadium for the first time since 2018?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, there’s a lot. You consider crowd noise, so we’ll have to have the noise going and going to have to have wet balls. We’ve obviously, or I’ve been through the hurricane situation before. I hope we won’t have to play in something like that like the Notre Dame game, that was nuts, but we’ll be prepared if it is raining, and, hopefully, it won’t be one of those things that has devastation that comes with that either. Sometimes these things fizzle out and sometimes they get pretty strong, so we’ll just have to see where it goes, but we’ll plan for the worst and hope for the best. “

Completely different question here, but this team, so far through the first four games, ranks right now seventh in stopping teams in terms of third down conversions on defense. Clemson, meanwhile, is number sixth in the country in third down conversions offensively. How big of a component is that going to be this weekend in trying to get them off the field?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, that’s big. I think third down on both sides of the ball is going to be a huge thing. Last year, when we won this game, we had 42 minutes, roughly, of time of possession, and that’s because we were successful on defense on third down, and we were successful on offense on third down, and those things lead to time of possession, which is a big deal when you’re playing an explosive offense like Clemson’s. So we’ve got to manage third downs on offense, we’ve got to win third downs on defense and how do you do that? Execution, obviously, but also giving yourself favorable down and distances on both sides of the ball, trying to get them behind the chains and us trying to keep ourselves from being behind the chains. It’s going to be a huge part of the game.”

Back to the hurricane a little bit. Is this something you’ll monitor? Is it something someone on your staff is responsible for kind of keeping track of, and I imagine it impacts things like travel as well?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I know we’ve already started talking to a meteorologist at one of the local spots here. I’m not sure who it was, but Adam Clark from my staff has been in communication with them. I know Boo Coorrigan is following it. And we do have to have plans on travel. I mean, if we can’t fly, then how are we going to get there? So there’s a lot of things that we’re having to be ready for in case it gets like that.”

Obviously, you mentioned that you expected to be 4-0. This games been circled for a long time by a lot of people. Do you get a sense that everything you want to achieve this year is sort of in front of you at this point?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I think all of us that are playing our first conference game, we’re all undefeated in the conference right now. There’s a couple of teams that have played one. And so, at this point in the season, there’s a lot of hope for everybody.

“I think you just got to handle your business if you want to control your own destiny. Right now, that’s our goal. It’s take it one week at a time and you look at what’s in front of us we got a lot of challenges waiting for us here week after week after week.

“The Atlantic Division is real. There’s a lot of really good football teams on this side of the division right now.”

It look like against UConn you guys ran more tempo on offense? Is that something you wanted to look at in this one and how do you evaluate the job you did with that?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I mean, we’ve varied the tempos throughout the year. I think you’re right. I think we did mix it up a little bit more. Some of that’s just a game flow thing for Coach Beck, too. When he sees the defense’s tired and he wants to step on them that way, then he’ll do that.

“And some of it’s our defense. Like, if we’re playing a lot of snaps we got to be smart. You don’t want to go out there and run tempo three plays and three and out and your defense is tired. So, it’s complementary football. We’ve been basically going three and out, three and out, three and out on defense. They were rested. Tim knew he could play at whatever tempo we wanted.

“You got to fit those things together so that we’re working to protect both sides of the ball.”

And I wanted to ask you about Demie. I know coming into the year you seemed really high on him. He’s averaging 6.5 yards per carry. Has he maybe even exceeded your expectations through this point in the season?

Dave Doeren: “No, I think he’s right where I would hope he was going to be. You’ve heard me talk about him for years. So I don’t need to repeat it all. But until you get in live game, you don’t know, this is where I thought we would have, watching him and how he played in practice.

“He’s very talented. He’s hard to tackle. He’s got good vision, and he’s patient. He can catch He’s tough. So yeah, he’s in a good spot. We just got to keep him growing. He’s still learning. Now each week he gets a little better.”

Dave, you got players like like Devin Leary and obviously Isaiah Moore and Drake Thomas playing key positions, and they also got great experience, too. How important is that coming into a game like this?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I can’t make a guy I have 47 starts. That’s something that takes time to accumulate for players. That linebacking group in particular, some of the D-lineman, our receivers Thayer and DC, we got a lot of guys that have played football and that’s good and it’s been in big games and won big games. So they bring a calmness to the locker room and ‘Hey, man, you know,.’

“They’re talking the right way. These are things they believe and they can talk to their teammates and they can show good leadership and they can be calm and in the midst of a storm and get guys to settle down if they need to. So, experience is something that I value a lot because I’ve had teams that were the opposite. You just got to, when you have it, ride the wave with it.”

At times you have you know, the all New Jersey backfield with Devin Leary and Demie Sumo. Have you seen that relationship grow and does it help to have guys from a similar area playing together?

Dave Doeren: “I think there’s a pride about it. I’d really never thought about it until you just said it. There’s a pride about that for them. Jersey tough as they would say, and, they’ve had a good relationship before the season. So that’s not new, but I think there’s some being proud where you’re from for sure.

First time NC State is played in the top 10 matchup like this program history, trying to end a 35-game home win streak. Is this the biggest game that you’ve coached at NC State and maybe is the biggest game in program history?

Dave Doeren: “I don’t know. I’ll let you guys figure that out. I haven’t studied 35 years of games. So, I don’t want to speak out of turn on that.

“But in my 10 years, I would say probably so. But as far as the history, that’s a long time. I don’t want to step on anyone’s toes with that answer. But it’s a great opportunity against a great team and a great venue. It’s everything you want as a coach and a player and we’re excited for the opportunity.”

Drake Thomas was saying after the game there was such an experienced group this year that can handle the noise going into this game both before the game and obviously during the game. How big a plus can that be for you being able to handle all the hoopla probably go with this game?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, one of the things I talked to the team about yesterday, like enjoy the moment, enjoy the stage and enjoy the opportunity that’s in front of you. But that’s not what this week’s about. This week’s about winning the game, and how do you win a game? By having the best Tuesday practice of the season. Then getting the right food in your body, having good treatment, going to class, getting rest, having a great Wednesday.

“We have to stack things on top of each other all week. We need to win the game way before the game is played with our players and our staff, and that’s what we’re focusing on. And don’t spend your time on your phone reading about how great the game’s going to be.

“Let’s focus on watching film. Let’s focus on first down, second down, third down red zone, all the things we got to be good at. Let’s focus on the game plan. We’ve already discussed that, and I think the guys understand that there is a lot of things that can get you distracted in a week like this. We’re trying not to look at it as that. It’s just more of an opportunity to talk about two great programs.”

Dave, I remember you talking about going to Heritage High School to recruit players and how Thayer Thomas eventually stood out. Has his career exceeded your expectations, and how happy are you for the achievements he made?

Dave Doeren: “There’s no way I could have sat there in that game and told you he was going to have the career he’s had. I thought he’d be a good player. Knew he would help us. I had no idea. At that time he weighed like 150 pounds. You couldn’t have predicted what he is now, and you got to give Thayer the credit.

“The guy’s the hardest working player on this football team. He does everything right off the field, spend so much time on his body and he’s just in the training room now. He’s always doing things to be in peak condition. He eats right. He sleeps right. He watches extra film. He practices as hard as any guy in that locker. room if not harder.

“It’s not a surprise that he’s successful when you think about all the things he does right. I’m glad he came back because I think he is really putting in a exclamation point on what was already a good career right now.”

Do you think his ascension over his career kind of mirrors NC State’s and that the Wolfpack is sort of followed his lead in regard in terms of growing as a prominent program?

Dave Doeren: “I see why you say that. I think we’ve grown together, coaches and players, and Thayer’s a great representation of who we are. He’s blue collar, man. He works. He’s a grinder. He’s overachiever, and he’s talented and he definitely is an incredible representative of the DNA of our program.”

You mentioned the Notre Dame game a couple years ago. Other than it maybe shouldn’t have been played, what did you take away from that can help you prepare should there be nasty or unusual weather on Saturday?

Dave Doeren: “There’s a lot of little things we did in preparation and even in the game plan. We prepared maybe weren’t even going to be able to throw a pass, like how are we going to win? So we talked about things like that.

“We practiced, like I said, with wet balls. And so we’re just going to have to do similar to be ready for that and those conditions. I hope it’s not like that. That was terrible. You’re standing in water that was calf deep on the sideline and sideways rain. Hopefully we won’t have a similar situation.”

Can you go back and look at last year’s tape much at all, maybe just the personnel or scheme, and how do you evaluate last year’s game?

Dave Doeren: “I watched last year’s game. I think offensively it’s the same. Coach Streeter is very similar to what they were and personnel is very similar on offense. So you can look at last year’s game on that side of the ball. I think defensively they have changed more than they have offensively. But player-wise, it helps to go back and see how, who gave us problems and how they attacked us. I know they’re going to study that as well.

“So it’s an important piece, but you do have to base more of it on the four games this year, I think, when you’re looking at defense.”

You played Shyheim against UConn. Was it important to get him some reps going into this game?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, we wanted to get him back in there. It was good to see him. He had a great fourth down stop when he came in. We had a rotation. We used all four corners. We only played 42 snaps on defense. Those guys all played 20 something each. So it was good to get them all in there. Teshaun Smith got some good reps in that game as well.

“I think that’s a healthy rotation for us.”

I think you mentioned that DJ is one of the most improved players. What have you seen out of him going back looking at four games in his evolution?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, he’s endured a lot of criticism. Like I said, his completion rate is up. He’s throwing good deep balls. A lot of times a year ago he was overthrowing guys and now guys have chances to make plays. You can see his chemistry is good with his receivers. He’s throwing them deep. He’s back shoulder throwing guys, and his guys are making better plays for him, too.

“I think that’s part of this that gets lost sometimes. Quarterbacks take the heat and there’s guys dropping passes all over the field that could have changed the game. That changes the quarterback too.

“A lot has been said about his body transformation. Until I am right there with them, it’d be hard for me to comment on that. But he’s lost weight and he’s more mobile.

“He’s playing good. Now he’s got people hanging all over him. That two point play that last week was a huge play that he made, and there was a play in the Georgia Tech game on third down, similar situation. They are off the field and he finds the back and shuffles it to him with people hanging all over him. It was a critical play in that game kind of busted the game open.”