NC State head coach Dave Doeren met with the media for his weekly press conference Monday to discuss the loss at Miami and this Saturday's 7:30 kickoff at home against Louisville on ACC Network.

Here's a full transcript.

“Recapping the game with Miami, obviously a lot of hurt when you lose a game like that, particularly one when you knew you had many opportunities to have a different outcome.

“We were two of four in the red zone, we had two field goals, two touchdowns. I had said that earlier in the week, scoring touchdowns in the red zone was a goal of ours. We felt like we could swing the game. If either one of those field goals is a touchdown, that’s the difference in the game. When you lose by one you find many things.

“You stop them in the red zone on defense, they do a snap down with their field goal to get us to jump offside, which we had practiced all week. That was a huge mental mistake on Cory [Durden]’s side, one that he was very upset about during the game and understandably so, but that was three points turned into seven. That’s four point, we lose by [one].

“We had a drop, critical drop a pass by Devin Carter. Same guy makes two incredible catches against Clemson and has a basic human moment when he dropped a pass that obviously might have put us in field goal range, probably would have there at the end of the game.

“All these guys that make mistakes, they all feel horrible about it, but that’s football. We lost by one point, we had chances to win the game. All these guys will work hard to respond. That’s one thing I do know about our kids. They are going to bounce back, and they’re going to give everything they’ve got.

“We didn’t really have anything go our way. In games like that, we had a muff punt. Weirdest play I’ve ever seen. Anthony Smith forces a fumble, his helmet gets ripped off, he stands up and then the ball gets re-fumbled at his feet.

“Even though you are not supposed to keep playing I don’t what person on planet Earth would not try to recover that ball, and we don’t get it back. When weird things like that happen you got to overcome it with plays, and we just didn’t.

“It’s a loss, obviously you never want to lose a game, but we still control our destiny here. I think that’s the silver lining.

“The biggest loss of the game, Isaiah Moore is out for the season and that to me was the biggest loss in the game. Not losing the game, losing a player of that magnitude, a leader of that magnitude.

“And Chandler Zavala, who’s been out for a while, will not return either. Both of these guys need a surgery. Both will have an opportunity to continue playing. Whether they choose to do that here or to move on to the NFL, that’ll be a decision they make later in life. “We’re down now four defensive starters — Payton Wilson, Cyrus Fagan and C.J. Clark and Isaiah Moore. Four guys that we think are really good. It is the next man up here. The guys will work hard to step into their roles just like we have all season, but there’s a loss of production that does become a concern on defense.

“We’ve got to do a lot of really looking at what we’re doing. Fundamentally making sure we’re putting these guys schematically in the best places we can, and that kids that are playing well have to continue to play well around them and make up for those losses.

“I’m excited to see the guys step up, just like we’ve had this year. I think Jaylon Scott has stepped up and played his best football. Cory Durden has made some big plays for us. Devan Boykin came in and made some great plays in the Boston College game and now Devon Betty will have an opportunity to play more for us. You’ll get to see Levi Jones playing more for us.

“That’s the way it goes.

“My heart breaks for Isaiah. For those of you who didn’t know, Isaiah, he means a lot to our program. A guy that was playing as good as him, been through so much, that has done so much for us on and off the field, your heart breaks for guys like that.

“That’s life, and no one says life is fair, and no one says good things always happen to good people. That’s just now how the world works. Isaiah is very spiritual. He’s in a great place with God, and I know that he’ll take this recovery the right way. I think he’ll continue to be a great leader for our team. I know he will, and we’ll be here to support him.’

“Going back to the game, I thought the score before the end of the half by our offense was outstanding to get a touchdown. They’re a very athletic, disruptive defense, and to keep them out of backfield the way we did, they only had one sack. We only gave them two tackles for loss.

“We had 13 tackles in their backfield. To look at how that line of scrimmage stuff happen, we did not turn the football over. We won the field position battle 130 yards. There were things that happen that gave us a chance to win that game, and unfortunately we just didn’t make the plays.

“We were not good enough on third downs, and that’s the result of third and long too many times, and that’s the result of too many times there’s way too many third and seven-plus situations.

“I thought Devin Leary did some really good things. He also had kind of inaccurate moments that haven’t been him. He missed on a couple of deep balls, he missed underneath on a couple of easy throws. I know he’ll bounce back from that.

“I already mentioned the drops.

“Defensively I thought we played the run game well. We were in their backfield a lot. We tackled well. We just gave up too many big plays, seven passes over 15 yards, and they hit us on a couple of big plays on short yardage with play action.

“You got to give them some credit for executing those. Their quarterback made a couple of throws with guys right in his face that we didn’t think he could make and he did, so good job by him.

“We did not get any takeaways on defense, getting the ball back. Something we had been doing well. We were leading the ACC going into the game with eight interceptions and didn’t have any.

“I thought our special teams were really good. We gave ourselves field position on both sides of the football. We pinned them there twice. We had good punt pressure. We had a couple of opportunities to have some big returns in the kickoff return game and didn’t. We were close.

“Trent Gill continues to punt and kick off at a high level. Probably the thing that went understated in that game was Chris Dunn became the all-time leading scorer in NC State football history.

“For a guy that has done some incredible things that’s had a tough year because of one game, he definitely put his mark and his legacy on our program. He was 3-for-3 in the game.

“I thought our punt coverage by Anthony Smith and Delbert Mimms was really good, and fake punt was very well-executed and was a big momentum play in the game and led to a touchdown in that drive. It’s unfortunate that didn’t spark us more.

“Now we are on to a very impressive football team. Louisville had a 28-14 win and overcame four turnovers on offense, and still won by a two-score margin.

“I think their quarterback is an outstanding player. He’s not just an athlete. He’s a really good quarterback. He’s got 12 rushing touchdowns. He’s operating the offense. You can tell he’s played a ton of football for them and managing the game, just throwing the ball around and getting it to his receivers.

“Louisville’s always had good skill on the perimeter, and they do again. Their tight end is a good player. They move him around. They use shifts and motions for misdirection.

“The o-line is athletic. The run game, there’s not a lot to it but they’re really good at it. The wide zone stretch, stretch lead and then the inside zone and split zones. They have great play action pass series that comes off the run game and the naked series that allows the quarterback to be an athlete with the pass game, and they protect him well. Some of that is him getting out of things but they’ve only been sacked one time per game.

“They’re running the ball well. They rushed for 331 yards last week against Boston College. That’s hard to do against the BC team. They’ve rushed for 200 yards three straight games.

“A great opportunity to play a very physical, good football team here. Defense leads the conference now with nine interceptions, and they give you a lot of looks, a lot of pressures, multiple fronts.

“They play hard, their kicking game is very sound, and they’re a physical opponent.

“I look forward to being home. It’s been a while with the State Fair and the bye week. A month since we’ve been able to play a home game. Last time we were here we had a great crowd. This is homecoming, so we need a great crowd again.

“We control our own destiny. I know a lot of fans were disappointed, upset, whatever you may say about the loss we just had, and so were we, more than you. But we still have it all in front us, and we got to win one game at a time to make that a reality, and that starts with Louisville here at home.

“We need that 12th man like we had in that Clemson game, and this night game atmosphere and homecoming weekend. The more you can be there, be there early, stay throughout the half, be there in the third and fourth quarter, make their offense hard to run with that crowd noise, that is a huge thing for our football team.

“With this team, I know I said this earlier, they will respond. The best way to get over a loss is to get back on the grass, and get back to work and we need to focus on executing, not beating ourselves and finishing drives on offense for touchdowns. Defending obviously what we’re going to see here in their run game, their play action game. That’s where our focus will go.

“That’s where we’re at. Football is a fickle game and you got to make the plays when they’re in one-possession games, and we look forward to the next opportunity.

“Questions.”

Does it give you comfort the way your team persevered the last time you dealt with this? You lost to Mississippi State, lost two players, came back and won four in a row. Do you see the same type of bounce back with this team?

“We’re going to have the same demeanor. Everybody was hurting yesterday. By the time we got done meeting with them and talking, they know what we got to do, and I trust them to do it.

“The difference is you’re doing it with less than the last time you had to do it. Last time we were missing two starters on defense. Now we’re missing four. It’s a challenge. It’s also an opportunity, and we’ll look at it as the latter with our football team.

“That’s where we’re at.”

Moving forward do cross-train Drake Thomas or Jaylon Scott in the middle because they have more experience? Or has Betty has shown enough to hold down that spot?

“Tony [Gibson] is going to have to teach them all how to play. Jaylon already knows how to play all three spots. Drake has played Sam and Will. Levi has played Sam and Will. He’ll have to cross-train one of those guys like you mentioned, and then we’ll see how it plays out.

“I know he’s going to toy around with it this week a little bit. The goal is to get your most, I don’t know, your best three out there, and then have one that can spell the guys.

“That’s kind of where we’re at. I’ll have a better feel by the end of the week on what we’re doing there.”

Can you assess how Betty has played when he’s gotten on the field?

“He’s done a nice job. He’s been very productive. He made a couple of coverage mistakes during the game, things he’ll learn from. That’s the difference, right? There were times when Isaiah was a young player he’d make mistakes and learn from them.

“Betty is going to do the same thing. The thing I will say about him is he is a very conscientious guy. He studies film. He’s ready to play. He’ll everything he can to be as good as he can each week. I think that’s the one thing that he’s ahead of his years from a maturity standpoint when it comes to preparing for games.

“I would look for him, whatever role Tony gives him whether it’s at Mike, Sam or Will, he’ll be ready to play.”

How frustrating that some of the goodwill you built up with the fanbase after the Clemson win has evaporated after the Miami loss?

“It’s hard for me to answer that because I didn’t really read anything. I’ve been locked in here. I just can only guess.

“Yeah, it’s frustrating because you think we wanted to drop a pass or jump offsides. Nobody wanted that to happen, but it did.

“At the end of the day, they’re still 18 to 22-year old guys, and there’s sometimes there’s going to be mistakes that nobody likes, but that’s where we’re at. They’re still growing in the game.

“I’m going to love these players. I’m going to love our staff. We’re going to stick together. We’re going to work hard together and hopefully the passion and the grief of the loss to our fanbase will return to the support for the athletes, which is where it should be.

“These kids work really hard. They’re still in control of their own destiny, and be a shame if the fans didn’t see it that way once they get over the shock of losing a football game.”

What kind of impact does losing Chandler Zavala have on the offensive line?

“It hurts our depth. We were able to rotate. Derrick Eason was coming into the game and spelling Dylan McMahon, and Dylan was able to go over and spell Chandler. [Bryson] Speas was able to spell and McMahon. We kind of had a pair and a spare, I guess you would say, that was keeping each other fresh.

“We no longer have that ability, so it hurts your depth more than anything. It’s forcing Dylan McMahon and Derrick Eason to play full games instead of maybe 60 percent of the game. That’s the biggest part.

“Right now we’re in the process of developing that next man. Right now Speas is the right guy that can kind of play everywhere but center for us. We can move him in and our if we need to.

“I think the biggest toll that we’re having now is we had all this depth. That depth is no longer there. We were backed up like seniors with juniors, now it’s juniors with freshmen. It’s hard to have senior, junior, sophomore, freshman in every position group. We just don’t have that.”

Looking at the last two games it seems like the running game has struggled the most after losing Zavala. When you review the film, is it more on the reshuffling of the offensive line or is more the running backs needing to step up?

“It’s not on the running backs. They’re still averaging close to five yards a carry.

“I think there’s a couple of things. We’re throwing the ball a little bit more because we’re getting loaded boxes. That’s one of the things you look at how we’re being played. I think you need to pay attention to that, as well.

“Our yards per carry is not a negative for our offense. How many times do you want to hand it off in a box where they got more than you got? So you got to understand that part of football when you ask that question.

“I do think losing a starter, yeah there’s going to be some drop-off. I think Chandler Zavala is a gigantic guy. He’s very athletic. So we got a little smaller, just a little bit.

“I think it’s more when you look at Miami and they had everybody in the box and they’re zone blitzing and bringing guys here and there and slanting the lines and all that stuff. We were dishing the ball out and get behind, you’re starting to throw it a little bit more.

“We do want to have a balanced offense if we can, but I think Bam and Ricky are running hard.”

How do balance guys knowing they made a mistake, not harping on it but also emphasizing it?

“I think it’s just, ‘Hey, here’s what happened. Why did happen? Let’s figure out how we can understand what the mistake was.’

“If it’s a catch, where the guy maybe started to run before he caught the football, and you’re talking about finishing the catch. How do you finish a catch? You frame it. You tuck it, you run.

“If it’s a penalty, that’s a focus thing, and we deal with that all the time. We’ve been dealing with it since January. That one was critical because we knew they were going to do it, and we still jumped, and it was really disappointing.

“But sometimes things just happen. Like I said earlier, these guys aren’t perfect. They are going to make mistakes, and sometimes they cost you more than other times. That’s just the way that the sport is, and sometimes you can overcome them and sometimes you can’t.”

Can you talk through the fake punt call?

“We’ve had that fake in since training camp. Been waiting for the right moment to call it. It was a time we needed momentum. Usually when you get closer to the 50-yard line you get those fake punt, like their defense stays on the field.

“So you have to, if you want to really succeed on a fake punt, you have to call it when it’s a situation when you think they are going to come after a punt.

“We’ve been looking at how they lined up to our formation throughout the game. We felt like we had it, and called it at the right time. The guys executed it, like I said.

“If you watched the play, our left tackle on the play did a tremendous job, Demarcus Jones. He drove his guy into another guy, and ended up blocking two people on the play. It was a great job by Demarcus an then Trent getting around it.

“You always have things like that in your play bank, and sometimes you can’t call it because had they come out in a different look and it wasn’t good, we would have had to kill it and just punt it away.

“That was a good play for us in the game.”

You were able to hit Anthony Smith on a deep ball in this game. How big was that for his confidence and maybe something you see going forward?

“Well he’s the fastest guy on our team. We’ve tried it throughout the year. He’s still learning how to adjust to the ball and track the football down the field.

“That was a great play. Really happy for him. He’s getting more and more confident. I think that’s the thing I told him earlier in the year, ‘You’re probably not going to play as much as you want just because these kids that came back, when C.J. Riley and Emeka [Emezie] decided to come back for their COVID year.’

“If you’re a younger receiver, normally you’d be playing a lot more than you’re going to with those guys back, and so you got to take in stride and get better and better and be ready for your moment when it comes.

“He’s made some plays on special teams which has built his confidence and so it’s happy to see that. Happy to see him and Devin connect. It’s nice to have a guy runs 22 miles per hour in practice every day. He’s the fastest guy on our team. Have a guy like that that’s catching the ball, it helps. Helps you stretch the field.

What’s the main thing you want to take off the film and work on this week that you know Louisville is going to try to exploit?

“I think just the last two games in general because of what we saw, we got a lot of play action pass these last two weeks. Obviously Louisville already does that.

“Our ability to stop the run, we’re No. 1 in the league in rushing defense, when you do that you’re going to get nakeds and play actions. You have to be great at that, too.

“I think the ability to just not stop the run but also defend the play action passes and then nakeds the way that we want to. You’re not going to be able to stop them, all, but if they have to throw the check down or if’s a flood concept and there’s three guys on the sideline they can throw the short one, make them throw the check down on the naked.

“Trying to get them off of the deeper throws and just controlling our eyes better in the secondary on those types of things would be the No. 1 thing probably Jonas.”

Their freshman running back Trevion Cooley is a local guy. What have you seen on film so far and his progression?

“We liked him a lot at Knightdale. He’s a really good young man. I enjoyed getting to know him in the recruiting process. He chose to leave the state.

“You see him getting more and more. He caught a wheel route for a touchdown earlier. Just had his first 100-yard game. He was a track athlete in high school that had good track times as well, so we know he’s got that kind of speed

“He’s a tough kid, and like I said we got to know him. He was over here quite a bit. I think he’s really good, really good person.”

When Payton got hurt you replaced him as captain with Drake. Have you found a new captain for Isaiah?

“I haven’t. We just found out today. I haven’t gone down that path. We may do game captains, which I have done in the past. Just based on who’s really stepped up that week on defense.

“We have to see how they play out. I haven’t gotten there, yet.”

Are these injuries harder because the guys are leaders on your team?

“Yeah, if you wanted to pull the four most vocal playmakers out of our defense, you just did. That makes it hard. It really does. It puts more stress on the guys around them. They’re going to have to step up and take advantage of their roles.

“Drake’s going to have to be that vocal guy now. Devan Boykin, he talks a lot, coach’s son. These guys are going to have to step up and help us.

“I think anytime you have a loss on the roster, it’s replaced not only by the player who comes into the lineup, but the guys around them. The guys that have experience now just have to play a little bit better, each of them, to make up for that loss.

“Our guys unfortunately have experience with that. We’re just going to have to do a great job of it. Got to play complementary football. We got to play great on special teams. Our offense is down one starter, defense is down four, so offense going to have to help us out a little bit that way.

“That’s the way it is. I can tell you this: I’m not saying these things as an excuse. It’s the reality. It’s the reality of where we’re at. It doesn’t change our goals. We’re still one game at a time. We still play a good Louisville team, and I got a bunch of guys that want to win that game.

“So that’s where our focus is.”

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