Dave Doeren weekly press conference video and transcript

The biggest non-conference game of the season for NC State is Saturday when Texas Tech comes to Raleigh. The Red Raiders of the Big 12 Conference have received votes for the top 25 after a 2-0 start that includes an overtime win over previously ranked Houston. Prior to the matchup, head coach Dave Doeren met with the media.

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: “Hope everybody’s doing well. I like to start out just thanking the fans and students, parents, recruits, everyone that came to our home opener and appreciate those of you that didn’t let a little rain drive you out of your seats. That was awesome to see, and it’s good to be home. It was great to have some of our former players there, as well. Seeing Emeka [Emezie] and Kelvin [Harmon] on the sideline was pretty awesome, just to catch up with those guys.

“As far as the game, interesting week in college football,. I think a lot of people probably wish they would have won by one this past week. Makes our first game feel a little bit better, seeing some of the games go down in Week 2. It’s good to be 2-0.

“I thought as far as our team and our staff, there was a lot of improvement from week one to week two. I think everyone took to heart the respective areas of emphasis and really worked hard to put their improvement on film.

“I think the guys really worked, challenged them to bring their goals to life and put action behind what they’re talking about. Practice a little bit differently to really increase our cardio practice, not with number of plays, but how hard we’re playing, how far we’re running, and to earn the plays you want to make on Saturday in practice on Tuesday and Wednesday, and I felt like that happened.

“We played complementary football. It’s good to see that again. We got to play a lot of players. I think I saw a thing today there was 83 guys that played in the game for us, which may or may not be a record but it’s a lot. It’s fun to see some of those guys that serve as walk-ons that maybe not get a lot of reps in games, get out there and make play. It was awesome for them. It was good to get some other players in there that we’re evaluating still and it’s good for their development.

“I thought we blocked and tackled better which you heard me in my press conference last week. That was kind of the biggest area of disappointment was two fundamentals of football, and guys took that to heart. We finished drives in the red zone. We were four for four on offense.

“I think it’s a team that has to continue to take the same approach as we move forward. The thing that you forget this team has a lot of guys that missed spring ball. Had guys as you know that had season-ending injuries a year ago, and surgeries that were not cleared yet. Some of them were playing their first game for almost a year on the calendar, and when I say some there was seven or eight of them in that boat.

“I don’t say that as an excuse. I say that as a point of emphasis that this team has to improve every week because we missed a lot of time on the field with several players. Regardless how many snaps you have there’s a timeline that you have to go through to improve. You have to see things on film. You have to, yes, knock rust off, but more just compete at that level, against competitive players where it’s live. And you’re gonna see a lot of growth if we take that to heart.

“So it’s a team that has to improve week in and week out and so we’re going to stay on that mantra. I thought we used our first week as an opportunity to learn and grow. We have to do the same this week and to fuel the meeting rooms in the practice fields with detailed goals and a formulated action plan to get better.

“I think individual improvement, individual development increases our ability to collectively improve as a team. The good thing is there’s 83 guys that got visual for their resume, and your film is your resume as a player, and now they know what they got to work on.

“Positives on offense. I think we strained more. I thought offensively we worked hard to get a body on a body, not just in the box, but on the perimeter. You guys see a lot of guys playing with effort in the run game. We were 100 percent as I mentioned in the red zone. we were four for four. Second week in a row not giving up a sack in protection.

“I thought our running backs were productive not just running the football but in the screen game catching the football. Drop back game Jordan Houston had a nice down the field catch for a touchdown. It was good to see Devin Leary get back to being himself and playing ball, running the show, making plays, buying time in the pocket, extending plays. He played a really good football game and what we expect to see. I thought was good to see Chris Toudle make that play in the end zone for him and his confidence.

“It’s good to see a lot of guys with firsts. Anthony Smith’s first touchdown, Jalen Coit’s first touchdown. Delbert Mimms’ his first touchdown. It’s good for those guys.

“Negatives we had four penalties on offense, two of them were pre-snap in the red zone. We had one turnover, Delbert straining for extra yards and lost the ball and in that possession ended up being a field goal as the defense held them. And we dropped four passes that we thought were catchable. So those are all things we got to do better.

“On defense we had three takeaways. Tyler Baker-Williams had a forced fumble and interception, and then Jalen Frazier got the ricochet interception off Jordan Poole. I thought we played well in the run game. It was different offense than we expected. There was a lot of empty. We did stop the run. They were not trying to run the ball a lot, but we did take that away.

“I thought we got off blocks better, especially a corner you can see there’s a lot of perimeter screens they had to get off blocks and tackle. Good to see that. I thought Derrek Pitts did a really nice job there. Teshaun Smith did a nice job there.

“We definitely tackled better. We went from 26 to nine missed tackles, and I took a lot of starters out, too so it was good to see. We had nine three-and-outs, a fourth down stop. We had no pre-snap penalties, and I thought we played tighter coverage. We gave the blitzers a chance to get home. We defended some deep balls.

“Negatives we lost contain on a pressure that would have been a sack and that’s something we’ve got to stop especially with who we’re playing this week. And we had a DPI that we could have avoided. Aydan grabbed a guy when he didn’t need to.

“On special teams, good to see Chris Dunn go two for two. Collin Smith really kicked off well for us and that’s a weapon to have when he’s doing that, obviously eliminates a phase of the game for the other team. I thought our punt coverage was elite, Darryl Jones and Chris Smith and Sean Brown covered punts very well. I think we can do a better job with our hangtime still there.

“I thought our punt return game was really solid. Thayer had two really big returns and Jalen Coit got in and had a good return himself. The guys are playing smart. There’s so many opportunities on punt return and kickoff return for guys to clip and you see our guys using good technique and making smart decisions at the moment of truth. So that’s great to see their football IQ and their training’s paying off.

“Excited to come play another game at home and to have our first night game of the season. Just saw they announced the following week’s game’s at night at home as well. So, we got back to back night games.

“We will be wearing our all black uniforms this week. So, excited, and I know players are excited about that. And we need a raucous crowd. We need our 12th man to be here and to be fired up. We’re playing a really good football team in Texas Tech, a very veteran team. I looked at their defensive depth chart first thing this morning and first thing you see is they got 10 guys that are either seniors or grad transfers. It’s a very old group on defense. I’ll get into their personnel here in a minute.

“But just starting with our staff, Joey McGuire, their head coach, is a very good friend. When I was coaching in Kansas, he was a first-time head coach at Cedar Hill High School in Dallas and I signed his first division one player there, Marcus Herford, who’s now a coach. He’s a great young man.

“Got to know Joey very well, and then he became a state championship coach there and then moved his way up in the profession. He’s done a great job as a college coach. Excited to see him get to be a head coach at Tech. I remember eating pregame meal with his team. He had the best chicken fried steak and gravy you’ve ever had before the game, crushing that with him. He’s a good dude.

“He’ll have his team ready to play. They’re coming off a double OT win against a ranked Houston team and battled in that game. So it was an emotional win for them as well. They beat Mississippi State in their bowl game last year, who as you know we didn’t play well against. Beat them convincingly, and a lot of that team is back.

“I look at them, they’re a team that has a chip on their shoulder. Oftentimes some of the other schools in Texas maybe not get the notoriety of Texas and Texas A&M. I think those kids play with a chip on their shoulder there because of that. I have a lot of respect for Texas Tech, always have.

“Ten starters back on defense that are all older kids like I mentioned. They’re very long. They’ve recruited long guys on the defensive front. Has got really tall defensive ends. Their linebackers are very athletic. They run well. Their corners are wrong. In Coach Tim DeRuyter is a veteran D coordinator, hired him from Oregon, has been the head coach. Brings a lot of different looks and pressures and does a lot of man to man coverage.

“Offensively, they’re up tempo, they’re spread, typical formations that you see, but they got very long, rangy outside receivers. Their quarterback can run and has a great arm. You’ll see him throw deep out routes to the field from the far hash and does it with ease, and can make plays on his feet. Won the game with his speed on the scramble last week.

“It’s very good team come into town. A team that is being mentioned in the top 25. They play hard. They got good players, good coaches and I’m excited about the matchup and looking forward to our students and our fans and our parents and recruits. Get tuned up and have a great time and give us a lot of noise. Man we need it.

“I think there’s nothing better than a night game at the Carter when it’s rocking. It’s supposed to be beautiful weather, too.

“As far as the health of our roster, we’ll have Payton back, expect to have Shy Battle back as well and as you know Trent is out four to six weeks. Other than that, we’re very healthy as we get ready for this game.”

Q&A transcript

Hey, Dave, do you want to follow up on Coach Beck being upstairs. What were your conversations like in review after the game?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, no, he liked it. Felt like he could see it, and it’ll be something we continue. It was a positive I think all the way around.”

Over the last 24 hours your name has been mentioned as a possible replacement for Scott Frost at Nebraska. Is that a position you’re interested in?

Dave Doeren: “It’s week three of the season, man. I’m so fired up to coach my team this week. So, no I’m so excited about playing at home and coaching the Wolfpack. It’s not the first time that names have been on lists. It is what it is when you talk about that, but I can’t wait to get ready for this game.

“I mean this is a big one for us and a big season and a great group of guys. That’s where my head and my heart is.”

Texas Tech has done a great job in the red zone this year. They are six for eight and five for eight for scoring touchdowns. How do you take a defensive approach to try and stop down and put some more pressure on that offense to try and halt their momentum?

Dave Doeren: “We’ll get into all that and the game plan. The red zones, tight spaces, it’s you got to have a body on a body in coverage. You got to be able to contend for jump balls. Depending on what they’re doing you got to be ready for pick routes down there as well. In the run game, plus one runs with a big quarterback. We’re going to have to tackle and get off blocks.

“They’re a good football team. It’s what you would expect. Really, in week one, they weren’t really challenged a whole lot. Then this past week that was a back and forth game. You can’t get really too much in the stats, I don’t think, after two weeks. It takes time to really kind of balance out what you are, but I think just in general, you face a team with an athletic quarterback that’s always a major factor as you get closer and closer to the goal line.”

Does this team talent-wise matchup with anybody played in the ACC, anybody similar to what your face on down the road?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, no, I think so. I think there’s a lot of teams that have similar styles. We play Florida State, Louisville, Clemson, I mean, it’s spread offense, big receivers up tempo. Defensive line they’re multiple so you can’t really compare them anyway to one particular team but body types and style play very similar to a lot of the teams will face in the league.”

You guys have played some really, really tough teams this year already on nonconference schedule. Do you like that?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I think gets you ready for what’s coming. I think you have to do a good job picking the right teams to play non conference wise. I’ve always felt like this one’s a little unique. Usually, we’ll try to play a team in our recruiting area that’s non conference. It’s just not as easy as you think to find games. Sometimes you can’t.

“We were able to find a team similar to us. I think there’s a lot of similarities in these schools when you look at just the way that they play and the chip on the shoulder. Their fans, if you’ve ever been to Lubbock for game, they have an awesome game day. It’s a good team to play.”

“I just think, in general, from a model of scheduling, you probably, if you study it, it’s going to be more regional teams if we can make it that way, just from a recruiting standpoint for parents to be able to travel when you go on the road and all those things.”

Dave, it looks like you guys made a concerted effort to get Anthony Smith and Julian Gray snaps early. Was that by design coming out of ECU, or maybe game flow for this specific game?

Dave Doeren: “I wanted them to play more in the ECU game. I was disappointed that they didn’t. Like I told you guys last week, sometimes, as position coaches, you stick with what’s more comfortable. To me, those are two names of guys, there’s others at other positions that, they don’t have to play as much as the older guys, but they need to play enough to develop and grow because they’re very talented. And we need to keep getting those guys in the game. Because the more they play, the better they’re going to get, and I think that confidence and your nerves change as you’re used to being out there.

“So those are two guys that we look at in the receiver room as guys that will be the future of that position as we move forward down the road and we lose Thayer Thomas and we lose Devin Carter, familiar faces. You’re going to have your younger group. You’re seeing Porter [Rooks] on the field a little bit more when we go 10 personnel, but that younger group of receivers, Jalen Coit’s another one, that got in the game and made some plays. It helps to play them, not just in mop up duty, so that, if there’s an injury, they’re not nervous going into the game at Clemson, so that’s something that I believe in, and we just need to do a good job as coaches, and I need to make sure I’m on top of that with them to get those kids in the game. And I don’t know what the rep count is, but there’s just got to be a rotation where they’re showing up in there in each half.”

And just to follow up, are those two or three guys, can they specifically help you this season as well with what you’ve seen from them?

Dave Doeren: “You’re talking about Julian and Anthony? Those two?

Yes and Jalen Coit as well

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I think all of those guys are guys we’re excited about. We have good players in that room, so I think we’re excited about who’s in front of them too. Darryl Jones is playing good football for us right now. Thayer’s playing really good football for us. We have a lot of respect for what Devin Carter has done and the plays that he can make, so it’s nice to have a rotation.

“I would equate it to some of the basketball teams that I used to watch growing up. Five guys would go out, another five would come in, and they would just keep playing and wear are the other team down and, if you have a rotation at a position where you can do that, it’s helpful because your guys can play faster when they’re fresh. You don’t always have that luxury, and so there’s going to be things that certain players do better than others, and we’re going to use them for that. But in general, you want to have a rotation where you can get guys in and out of the game and keep them fresh, just like you see doing at running back and on the defensive line and some in the secondary too.”

Malik Dunlap is a player that you brought in out of Charlotte, and he played for you for a few years, just what do you remember about the way he helped your program? And what were the reasons for him leaving to go to Texas Tech?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I’m not going to speak on that. I’m happy for Malik. I’m glad he’s having success. As a young man, we really enjoyed having him in our program, and he made a decision to leave and he’s having success where he’s at, so I think that’s great for him.”

Coach, you mentioned last year sort of some frustrations with the amount of night games that you had, but are you excited to have these back-to-back night games to have this atmosphere, so you guys can get ready for what will probably be a primetime game against Clemson in a couple of weeks.

Dave Doeren: “I think playing at night is great. I love it. Playing at night eight-of-nine games, particularly when you’re traveling and getting home at four in the morning or five in the morning, that’s a different conversation. I asked the ACC to be cognizant of that for player health and really for coach health. We’re working on short hours that become shorter, and that’s not good for your mental health, it’s not good for your physical health.

“I think there just needs to be a balance. ‘Hey, this team just played three in a row at night. Let’s put them on at 3:30 if they are a marquee game.’ In general, I love what it does for the fans, how they get into that. It’s good for recruiting because people have time to get to your games, and our players like playing under the lights. There are a lot of positives, but the over and over and over and over part of it, particularly after road games, just needs to be monitored by the league, or by the television networks, whoever’s pulling the trigger on that, to keep the health of the student athletes and the coaches in-mind.”

Coach, how do you, as a head coach, get your players, get your coaches to turn up the intensity during practices? What do you change when you go from an opponent like Charleston Southern, preparing for them, and then preparing for a Big 12 opponent like Texas Tech?

Dave Doeren: “Well, last week, there was just an embarrassing bunch of film to look at, which made you want to do things differently as a player. They didn’t like how they looked on film, they knew that they needed to prepare in a different way. I challenged them to do that, and they did, and they liked the results. So, when that happens, you talk about it like ‘Hey, let’s study the last seven days guys. Here’s how we felt, and I’m talking about yesterday now.’

“Seven days prior to yesterday, we felt really bad sitting in our seats in here about what we put on film and how we coached. Then look what we did. We took that information, we came up with a different plan, we went to work. We had a very, very aggressive Tuesday. Guys ran all over the place. They were fatigued after, did it again in a shorter practice but same intensity on Wednesday, and look at the results. Guys played better, and so they know that now. Obviously, they know the competition goes up with Texas Tech, so that’s going to kind of handle it on its own from that standpoint. But the process of what we did is discussed, it is studied. The kids do understand the why behind it, and they understand the reward that comes from it. And so I think it’ll just kind of help itself as we go forward.”

Dave, I wanted to ask you about penalties, so sort of in line with that about how you review your process. What are those sessions like specific to penalties? When you’re going through film study and saying ‘This was a bad penalty.’ You talked about pre-snaps, all those things that go into that. How do you really drill that message home when you’re watching film? Do you, I don’t want to use the word embarrass a guy, but you have to point it out to him bluntly.

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, we do. It’s a conversation. One of the things I do is show them why, we call it the formula, but how we won the game. So you go through the areas, and penalties is one of the areas so you know, we have focus penalties. Those are your pre snap things that you just mentioned. So we’ll talk about. In this game, we had two offsides on the offense. So here’s the two players, their names are up there on the PowerPoint. Both of these penalties were in the red zone. That can have a negative effect on scoring. You took us from first and 10 to first and 15.

“We had another one on a fourth and four on a punt where a guy false started that we actually got them to jump offsides. And if had we not flinched, we would have got a first down. So we discussed what happens in those situations, and then you go to the next one. All right, during the play, combat penalties is what I call it, we had these penalties. We had a DPI, sometimes I’ll tell them like, ‘Hey, that was good coverage. That doesn’t get called very often. I wouldn’t change anything. The ref just saw it a different way.’ Sometimes I’ll tell them, like in this case, you can’t grab a guy. We flat grabbed the guy, and we didn’t need to.

“There were three holding penalties called. I thought two of them were calls that never get made, so I’m not going to spend a lot of time on stuff like that. But, on the other one, our hands are outside and we’re jerking guy, that’s different. You’re going to discuss the technique behind that penalty. And then we even discussed penalties that weren’t called that we thought probably should have been called. ‘Hey, we had a play where we picked a guy up and threw him down.’ Seeing that called, we’ve got to learn from that. We got away with one right there. So it’s just an education of, here’s what happened in the game, here’s what we can take from these moments.

“And then, you go to the next phase. Here’s the red zone, here’s what happened. Here’s third down, here’s what happened, and so just spending time on not just celebrating that we got pancakes and handing out bottles of syrup, but also teaching, you know from the game so that we can learn and get better as we move forward.”

Coach, have you given much thought to the potential 12 team playoff and what that might look like and how that might change how you schedule non-conference in particular?

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, I’m excited about the access. There’s so many questions that I have just because I’ve been in the playoffs twice as a FCS coach and how long those seasons were. We played 16 games one year and 15 the other, and that’s 31 games in two years that we played. How it impacts the academic schedule, what happens to bowl games? We’re scheduled out like until 2030. So what happens to some of those games? There’s a lot of questions, but we haven’t gotten to that. We’re trying to win our third game right now. That’s kind of where my head is, but those are things that came up. I am excited that the conference champions from the power five leagues get an automatic berth, and I think that’s good. There’s access for teams to get in, and we’ll see where it goes.

Certainly there was a lot of talk last week about the game against East Carolina and, if things had gone differently, no chance at the playoff. In the new system, you could lose a game like that and still come back and have a team that’s really going well at the end of the season make some noise in a playoff.

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, you could. Obviously, the non-conference games won’t count in your conference championship as far as getting there that way. But yeah, there could be a lot of change. As you know, there’s been a lot of changes in the last 24 months to college football, period. And so I wouldn’t be surprised to see a lot more in the next 12 as we move forward with this, just to get the answers that we’re all kind of looking for.”

You mentioned Payton coming back. How big is that for the defense playing against this kind of opponent?

Dave Doeren: “Well, first, I’m excited for him. He feels really good. He’s in a good space. He gives us another really good athlete to play a spread offense with and one that’s excited to go out there and play with his teammates and misses playing football. And so the rotation, as I’ve been talking about, gets a little better because Jaylon Scott’s playing really good, and that’s the thing.

“We’ll be able to play Payton and play Jaylon, and Jaylon can take some reps off of multiple guys because he’s cross-trained to play multiple positions, and it’s good to get Betty some more reps to help Isaiah. It’s good to get Jayland Parker some reps to help Drake, so all those things. It’s a long season. There’s a lot of plays. We didn’t have to play a lot in this past game, but in this next one, they’re a team that tries to snap it as many times as they can, so we’ve got to have that rotation, and having Payton back in the depth chart helps us there.”

Coach, when we were talking to Demie [Sumo-Karngbaye] last week, he mentioned that he didn’t get a lot of offers from a lot of the power-five type schools. What did you guys see in him that maybe some of the others didn’t when you were recruiting him?

Dave Doeren: “Well I don’t know what the others didn’t see. We saw a really good football player. Tough, a guy that can see, his vision, accelerates quickly, catches the ball well, physical, yards after contact, all the things you see now. That was a weird time, and I’m not saying he might have had a lot more if coaches were allowed to be out in schools, you just never know, but that was different time and, recruiting, we weren’t allowed to go out on the road.

“All these things were done on video and through Zoom calls and that was a very challenging year of recruiting, so we are fortunate to have another great player from the state of New Jersey come down and join us because, if you look at the season so far, Jasiah [Provillon] blocking a punt for a touchdown Demie doing what he’s doing, Devin Leary doing what he’s doing, that’s been a state that’s been good to us.”

Dave, I was curious your reaction to the Appalachian State win, and also, the big four teams, you guys included, are a combined, I think, 9-0 with five road wins between the four of the ACC teams in this state? Just your thoughts on kind of the start for the football in this state at the FBS level?

Dave Doeren: “Well, one, I’m super happy for Shawn Clark and his staff. I know those coaches. They’re awesome guys man. My oldest son, Jacob, goes to App State. He was so excited during that game, so I think it’s awesome. What an upset win for them, and it couldn’t have happened to a better group of people. Really a tremendous amount of respect and love for that staff, and the experience my son’s had there as a student has been very, very positive, so great for Boone and that community.

“As far as the league and the state and all that, I mean, we’re always cheering for people to do well in our conference, and it’s great that guys are going on the road and getting the job done. I was happy for Coach [Mike] Elko. I know that was a big one for them at Duke getting Northwestern, and that game for him was a big win, and Coach [Dave] Clawson got a good win against someone that used to work for him in Clark Lea. I know those are always challenging when you’re playing guys that are head coaches that used to work for you, so I’m glad to see that the league is doing well on the road, and the teams in the state are doing well on the road.”

Travali Price recovered a fumble, nearly had a strip sack. Through two games, he’s a freshman playing for you as well, just evaluate his skill set.

Dave Doeren: “Yeah, Travali plays really hard. I mean, that’s the one thing that, no matter what, when you watch his film, he is straining. He’s one of these guys that you never have to talk about effort with, and I love that about him. Not surprised that he made a play on the quarterback. He’s probably been one of the better speed pass rushers we’ve had in training camp, and losing Daniel Joseph, who was a good pass rusher for us, losing Levi Jones, who was a good pass rusher for us, it’s great to see Travali taking on that role, because we need that.

“Where are we going to get that that rush from is a question we have, so having him out there, getting Payton back, will be helpful as well. Jayland Parker did some good things rushing, Jordan Poole did some good things rushing, so we’ve just got to keep working those guys. But Travali will get better and better the more he plays and starts understanding how the flow of the game is, and he’s going to get better and better. He’s got a good career in front of him if he just keeps working.”