Wolfpack Weekly with Dave Doeren returns Tuesday evening as the NC State football team approaches the season opener against Wake Forest on Sept. 19.

Follow the live updates below:

Intro

Doeren starts this appearance by reflecting on the beginning of a crazy fall semester, not only as a football coach but also as a parent of a freshman at NC State.

"Life's changed quite a bit. Zoom has been quite a savior for how we've been able to teach, whether it's through install, film review, etc. It's made our ability to do our jobs much better than we thought it would be. I'm not sure how we would have been able to do what we've done without it."

Doeren says he feels for the high school athletes that have also been tremendously impacted by the virus. He feels his staff has done well adjusting to virtual visits and finding creative ways to stay in touch with recruits.

"I was just trying to be positive," said Doeren on the speculation of no season earlier this summer. "We were all watching the Big 12. We all knew the Big 12 had the swing vote out of the Power Five. We all sighed from relief when they announced they were moving forward.

How to have success this season during a pandemic

"I think last season was a really hard season in a lot of ways. If you look at the injury aspect, it may of prepared us in a weird way for the season ahead. We stopped saying 'next man up' because it felt like we were saying it way too much.

"Whoever can embrace not knowing what's next the best will have the best chance to have success this season. That's really been our operation and thought process around here. Our players deserve a lot of credit."

Gameday protocols

"I'd love the opportunity to have our fans back whenever that becomes something reasonable to have with the virus. Our players have worked so hard and they deserve to have the recognition."

Doeren adds that he is very much in favor of allowing a select number of player parents/family into the stadium with social distancing programs. He says he's in no control of it and doesn't know when it could happen, but

"I'm not talking about having their girlfriend out there. I think it's important to have mom, dad and the grandparents out there if they can."

Doeren says football is a unifier. "All the national tragedies we've had, sports have been there. This year, football should be one of them.

Depth Chart

"Some positions are pretty settled. In fact, some positions have not been very impacted by this. Knock on wood, tight end is one of them. On the other hand, some positions have struggled from the contact tracing protocol and we'll be looking at it closely as we approach the opener. We will rotate more in this next game than we ever have because of the conditioning implications of this game after the offseason we've had."

Reiterates that most experienced players are learning multiple, similar roles in order to prepare for potential same-day absences. For example, guards learning tackle positions or outside wide receivers learning interior receiver roles.

Chris Combs tribute

Doeren reflects on his friendship with Chris Combs, who passed away last week after a battle with ALS. He says they were great friends and Combs taught him a lot about the university.

"Every time we got a recruit, he would call me or text me to congratulate me. He was a true fan of this university."

Bounce back this season

"Our youth was the silver lining last season. I believe we were the second-youngest team in the country if you look at the total number of freshmen played. I think they were kind of scarred from the disappointment last year, but that adversity will only help them moving forward. The silver lining from this year's camp was that a lot of guys received reps.

"We're still getting guys back from quarantine. Thursday we'll have weight room with Thunder. Friday/Saturday we'll have practice. On Sunday, we'll have a mock game at 8 p.m. and take them through several game scenarios to have the guys ready to go. After that, we'll begin our game week preparation for our season opener."

New co-host Jeff Gravely joins Tony Haynes in the season debut for Wolfpack Weekly with Dave Doeren.

The first guest is strength and conditioning coordinator and associate director of athletics Dantonio "Thunder" Burnette.

Burnette is discussing the experience of what it was like to run a weight program for the team through the isolation period of the early summer through the return to facilities following strict COVID protocol.

Burnette agrees that last year's 4-8 season was an outlier in the program.

"We had a bunch of young guys playing, a bunch of young guys that just weren't ready physically." He adds he expects improvement not that front with a more mature team both mentally and physically. Adds the team is bought in to the system.

"This is going to force a lot of guys to be ready. We don't have to worry about preparing the entire roster [conditioning wise] for week one as everyone knows they could find time this year."

He adds Coach Doeren does a good job of telling guys to ask for a sub if they're not ready to go 100%.

Lastly, he says almost nobody calls him Dantonio anymore. Now, it's almost always "Thunder" or "Coach Thunder".

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