Dave Doeren radio show recap

Here is a recap from this week's Dave Doeren radio show, recorded live on Tuesday on NC State Wolfpack football's Facebook page.

Safeties coach Joe DeForest joined Wolfpack Weekly with Dave Doeren Tuesday for the assistant coach segment. Hosts Jeff Gravely and Tony Haynes began by talking to DeForest about his background, which includes 33 years of coaching experience, an engineering job for NASA and being a two-sport football and baseball athlete at Louisiana-Lafayette in college.

As for his thoughts on the 2020 season and his first year with the Wolfpack, here is what he had to say:

On junior safety Tanner Ingle:

"He's a leader. Players gravitate towards him and his energy. You can see it when he's out on the field, he runs around like a Tasmanian devil. He just hits people, as small as he is and he just brings something intangible to the defense."

On junior nickel Tyler Baker-Williams sliding over to safety against Miami:

"Our free safety in our system is in the run fit 80 percent of the time, so that position is critical. By going through so many kids that played a game and got hurt, we had to find out, 'Alright, who's our next best guy that can fill the role and be a run stopper?'

"T-Bake can play coverage, he can play on the roof, he can play in the box. We just said that's our next best option, let's do it."

"He played a great game. There were some things that he has to get better on because that was the first time repping at that position. There were some little things that the nickel never sees in the run fit that he had to see, and he did a good job. You run around a little bit more spinning into the post and spinning into the half, coming down and blitzing.

"He's a great fit for the position. We'd like to get Tanner back and get more healthy bodies to choose from."

On the 3-3-5 system:

"Our system is there to stop the run, we got a lot of eyes and we got different ways to bring different safeties. We can spike the right safety, the left safety, the strong, the free, a backer, a backer and a safety. There's so many moving parts to it and it's so multiple that it's hard for offenses to get a beat on it.

"The misconception is you can't stop the run, which is not true. The hardest thing is, if you're not pressuring and got a three-man rush, he's going to have time to throw the ball. Even though you're dropping deep, all these DBs into coverage and linebackers, you got three guys rushing the pass.

"So it's give and take and that's what the mix comes from. That's why we show a three-man rush and bring five. We'll show a five-man rush and only rush three. It's the multiplicity of what we can do.

On sophomore safety Jakeen Harris:

"Besides the game he got kicked out for targeting, he's played every snap. And he plays every snap in practice.

"His next step is to be able to play the ball better and be able to see a vision more. That comes with a lot of reps, and he's getting better. But that's something he really needs to work on and he's the first to admit it."

On Miami quarterback D'Eriq King:

"He played a great game, you definitely give him credit.

"Going into the game off the bye week, we had a lot of time to study him. We felt like his downfield accuracy was the area that he hadn't done a great job and he obviously improved that over the bye week and played really well.

"We were concerned about him as a runner and doing things on his feet. We were concerned about their tailbacks. We knew they had good speed at receiver and tight end."

On feeling on the team after a tough loss against Miami:

"We gave ourselves a chance to win in the game and King had to play a near-perfect game to beat us and he did.

"With all that being said, I still felt like there were two or three plays we could have made that had nothing to do with them, that could have changed the outcome. With that, it just gives our guys an understanding of how valuable every rep, every detail is."

On redshirt junior quarterback Bailey Hockman:

"I was really happy for Bailey, excited for him. Obviously, we need him to play well as a football team, as our starting quarterback.

"He's been through a lot. I think by overcoming different things throughout his career, he's learned how to deal with adversity. I think he's also learned that he needs to take advantage of his opportunities and he did that Friday night.

"There were really two plays in the game that he would probably say he wants back. One was to Emeka Emezie down the sideline and the other was the last throw to Emeka with the ball placement.

"Outside of that, I thought he played tremendous. There was rush him, he threw with people in his face, he put the ball in good locations and gave his guys a chance."

On redshirt junior receiver Thayer Thomas' trick-play touchdown pass to Hockman:

"That particular play, we've been working for almost a month. I asked Tim Beck during the week, 'Are we going to dial this one up or what?' I call it and he started laughing. He said he'd like to get it off early in this game because of how hard they pursue.

"You just bank those plays and then you have them ready for certain types of teams. It was obviously a good fit for that game and the guys executed. It was a heck of a throw by Thayer with a guy in his face."

On sophomore running back Zonovan Knight's kickoff return for a touchdown and special teams:

"We've been repping Ricky Person, Bam and Jordan Houston throughout the year. For whatever reason, it took us too long to get there. That's dumb on our part, obviously.

"I think Coach Goebbel, early in the year, felt like ball security was something that he was concerned with and Bam's proven that that's not his issue.

"It was great to get him into that role and I think the guys on that unit will play even harder now. When you have a guy back there that can house it every time, it's a lot of fun to be a part of a unit like that.

"You're getting about 70 percent of the kicks through the end zone now. I think this week we'll get some. They're not a high touchback rate team, so it could be another week it's an opportunity."

On getting opposing defensive lines to jump offsides:

"It starts with the quarterback. He has to do a good job with the cadence whether it's a hard count or a no-play type deal. Then everyone has to be disciplined to hang in there and it's not just the O-line.

"You got the running backs, tight ends and wideouts that can't move either. You're allowed to when they come across the ball, touch them and that's a five-yard penalty.

"We've taken advantage of that. It's helped us because when you play good D-lineman, you don't want them to be able to jump your snap count all the time. It slows them down, it helped us a lot in the Pitt game."

On fifth-year senior tackle Justin Witt:

"We're trying to get him back into game shape. He missed a lot of time. Having him in the rotation helps.

"It's hard for Bryson Speas because he's not only playing tackle, he's one of our guard rotation guys too because John Garrison's trying to play seven or eight guys in the game. Having Tim McKay out, having Tyrone Riley out, Derek Eason out, we're short. So having Witt back helps a lot."

On the potential return of sophomore linebacker Drake Thomas:

"We knew they wouldn't play Saturday but we didn't want Miami to know that. So we had them warm up. We're hopeful that they'll play this week. They both practiced some today. We didn't put them through everything. We're hoping to have both of them for the game."

The Seminoles have played four different quarterbacks this season. On preparing for Florida State's quarterbacks:

"You can't get ready for that many quarterbacks, so you just adjust on the fly.

"We're going to get ready for Jordan Travis. They're a different football team when he's in, way different. We have to prepare for him. If the other guys are in, it's a lot different. They're not as talented as runners as he is.

"We'll just have to see who they show up with and who's playing, but we're going to plan on seeing No. 13 in the backfield."

On Florida State quarterback Jordan Travis:

"He makes them go and he can score in a heartbeat. He's an electric player. He's going to be a pain in the butt in the league for a while.

"He reminds you of Lamar Jackson, he can accelerate. He gets out of trouble and he makes people miss. He's a really, really athletic quarterback."

On Florida State's success in blocking kicks this season:

"They got a big D-line. When you'rere blocking field goals, that's because you've got long, powerful defensive linemen. That's part of it. That's where you're getting blocked kicks on their field goal and PAT units.

"The two punts were against North Carolina, and to be honest, they were not sound in their protection that game. They changed their protection going into our game. We played them after them.

"What they were doing, I think Florida State saw it, schemed it up and took advantage of it on one play. In the other play, their defensive tackle just rushed in on a safe punt and ran over their shield and blocked it.

"They've got big guys and they're going to come hard. They're long. We got to be sound in those units. They'll take chances too, so we've got to do a good job running our systems.

"It's been an edge for us this year. We've created explosive plays in three games on special teams. We need to get some more."

——

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