Q&A: Dave Doeren optimistic players will take advantage of chances
NC State head coach Dave Doeren is entering his seventh year at NC State on the heels of the first back-to-back nine-win seasons in Raleigh since the final two years of Dick Sheridan’s tenure (1991-92).
Doeren is aiming to continue the winning ways with a rebuilt offense led by new co-offensive coordinators Des Kitchings and George McDonald, who have to find a replacement for three-year starter Ryan Finley at quarterback. Redshirt sophomores Matt McKay and Bailey Hockman and redshirt freshman Devin Leary are in the competition for the job.
Doeren met with The Wolfpacker in June to discuss this year’s team. Here are highlights from that sit down:
Is this team reloading or rebuilding?
“I don’t really look at either one of them as the answer. We have some competition at some spots that we need to resolve. We’re going to end up being the team that we deserve to be. That’s the bottom line.
“Do some young guys take advantage of their opportunity? Do some veteran guys that haven’t played a lot take advantage of it? Do we stay healthy? We could have every answer figured out right now and then 10 guys get hurt. I think that’s a good article to read, but in reality you never look at your team like we are going to rebuild.
“You are going to look for the next guy to step into the opportunity and be great. I can’t predict that unfortunately.”
What did you learn last year about your team, good and bad, that you carry forward to this season?
“I thought our offensive kids last year did a nice job of handling the pressure that was on them. All that was talked about last season was how are we going to replace this defense that lost nine starters; the offense has to carry it. I thought those guys handled it offensively. I thought the defensive kids used that as a chip. It made them really perform probably better than some people expected. Our tackles for loss, our sacks, a lot of them went in the right direction after losing some really good players. That’s a credit to them.
“What I took from that is the kids that need to be good for us, that have played a lot of football, need to take advantage of the platform that is there for them, and then it is up to us to find the answers in the other spots. There’s a lot of competition for some places right now.”
This is your third quarterback battle since being at NC State. You had one in year one between Brandon Mitchell and Pete Thomas, and then in 2016 with Ryan Finley and Jalan McClendon. How does this compare to those?
“I think it’s more like the one we had with Ryan and Jalan, although there are more competing than there were in that one. We have someone in Matt who knows the offense like Ryan knew the offense at that time, which mentally puts them ahead.
“But then there are physical things that the other guys have. We want to see if what they’ve learned from the spring, practiced all summer long and show in the fall, along with their strengths, pushes them past Matt or not.
“Matt is operating in a different way. He’s not thinking about what the play is — he’s thinking about what the defense is doing. Those [other] guys are still having to do both. It’s unfair to make a decision when that’s going on.
“We said here’s all the things you did do well and all the things you didn’t do well. In the summer, get that stuff right and then let’s see in the fall where it goes. The good thing is we have options.
“I want to see the maturation process, and then there is the leadership aspect. Your quarterback has to lead the offense. Who’s going to play that role really well? Sometimes guys might play a little bit harder and there’s a little bit more buy-in with that kid on the field.”
In a situation like this, is there any benefit to naming a starting quarterback before the opener?
“I think there’s a benefit if it’s obvious, just to keep people from talking about it anymore. You let everybody know here’s our guy and let’s get behind him. If they know, it can help the rest of the team because now they are not going to get asked that question. They know who the guy is.
“At Northern Illinois, when Chandler Harnish graduated, Jordan Lynch was the guy. There wasn’t a competition. There were other players, but we knew he was the guy. That whole offseason we had a starting quarterback even though he wasn’t a returning starter. There is a benefit in that for the guys playing with him. We just don’t have it yet.”
Is it more annoying to get asked questions about the quarterback competition or more stressful to make the right choice?
“I don’t know if it’s a stressful decision. If it’s handled the right way, I won’t have to make a decision. The stats will tell me what to do.
“If it isn’t that, then that’s hard. If these guys are all even, then that’s really hard. Then it’s probably not going to be a decision. It’s going to be, ‘I am going to have to go into some games and see who handles game day.’ That would be a bad situation. If that’s where we are, we’ll handle it.
“In Ryan and Jalan’s case, Ryan’s stats told us he deserved to start. Was it hard to break the news? Yes, but the stats were telling. These are things that we have done for 20 practices, and it's in front of you.”
Your co-offensive coordinators, Des Kitchings and George McDonald, are new to that role. How do you see that working?
“Every coordinator I have worked with has been different. Eli [Drinkwitz] leaned on his staff a lot on game day. He called them and would ask, ‘What do you want? What pass, what run?’
“In between drives, he was getting notes from those guys, setting up his call sheets, additions and subtractions.
“Watching these guys in the spring, George and Des worked really well together. I anticipate they’ll be asking [quarterbacks coach Kurt] Roper or [offensive line coach John] Garrison or [tight ends coach] Todd [Goebbel] for suggestions based on what their areas of expertise are for the game week.”
What positions do you feel good about from a talent and depth standpoint, and conversely where are you not where you need to be?
“I like our linebacker depth and our DB depth on defense. On offense, our tight end and wide receiver depth are areas where I have the answers. I’ve seen enough to know we’re going to be pretty good.
“I like a lot of our returners on the O-line and D-line, but we’re just young behind the guys that you know about. If we had injuries, we could be playing a freshman. We know who the starters are, who the rotational guys are. We know our top five on the O-line, or six or seven or eight, even. On the D-line, we have a pretty good two-deep.
“But we are an injury away from that backup being a true freshman. That’s a little scary. They’re good players, like [freshman offensive linemen] Dylan McMahon and Ikem Ekwonu.
“These are guys that are physically developed. They are not 260-pound guys that need to be in a weight room for a year. These guys are 300-pound guys already.”
What is a key for you on offense and defense to be as good as you want to be?
“I think defensively we need to get more takeaways, whether they are interceptions or fumbles — the opportunistic plays. We have defended well. We’ve limited explosive plays in the last three years. We’ve played good in the red zone. We’ve played good on third downs. We’ve been in the top in rushing defense. I’d like to see us get a few more possessions through turnovers on defense.
“Offensively, I think finding that explosive running game again like we had with Nyheim [Hines] will help our quarterbacks. We are going to have it in the pass game with [receivers] Emeka [Emezie], C.J. [Riley], Thayer [Thomas] and Tabari [Hines], I think we are going to be able to throw for explosive plays.
“Reggie [Gallaspy] was phenomenal for us, but he wasn’t an explosive runner. He was a grind-you-out, wear-you-down guy. With Nyheim, every time he touched it you could score.
“Does that happen with Ricky [Person], with Zonovan [Knight], with Jordan Houston? Those three guys are home-run backs. Getting that figured out on offense will help our quarterbacks a lot.”
What competition besides quarterback are you most looking forward to seeing this fall?
“The DBs, because there is some good competition in the back end. It’ll be that or the running back spot.
“There is talent and depth in both rooms, and I look forward to seeing how that plays out.”
How have you handled four new assistants coming onto the staff?
“I’m asking them to learn what we do and then to add thoughts and ideas where, ‘Hey this is something that we did that I think would complement what you have done.’ What we are doing is not broken here, but you can always get better.
“That’s where bringing in four new coaches and new recruiting people, there’s always ideas that you never thought about. Sometimes there’s problems that you don’t know how to fix and there’s, ‘Hey man, we had that same problem and we fixed it and here’s what we did.’
“There’s been a lot of that, and that’s healthy. I want that from those guys. It’s been good. We’ve added some nice guys.”
Are you the type that is more motivated on building off your successes recently or by the missed opportunities?
“I don’t like, regardless of what happened last year, just in general I don’t ever like losing an opportunity. The No. 1 [goal] for me is don’t beat yourself, don’t underachieve.
"You are constantly looking at the past, at where did those things happen? Where did you overachieve because you want to repeat that. Where did you underachieve and you don’t want to repeat that, and why did that happen and stressing those things to our guys.
“You are always one play or one player away. The Kansas City Chiefs against the New England Patriots [in the AFC Championship game], a really good football player lined up offside to seal the game. It’s not just here, it’s football, it’s basketball, it’s everywhere.
“It’s always that way in football. You are always going to have those. You can’t make up for them by reliving it. You just try to teach from it and not re-produce it if you can help it.”
Non-NC State related somewhat, but what are your early thoughts on the transfer portal?
“I’m anxious to see the data when the actual school year begins on how many kids didn’t sign scholarships. We were told at ACC meetings that there was 1,800 people in the portal, and 30 percent of those guys were on scholarships. So there’s a lot of walk-ons in there.
“Out of the 1,800, only 10 percent at that time had found a scholarship somewhere else. So what happens is we sign our guys in December, and then you are only left with a handful of scholarships. Then all of a sudden this new population of guys to recruit shows up and we can sign but only 25 [in a class], so there is not unlimited places for them to go.
“Then you have roster management issues for staff and teams. Maybe you had only one senior at running back, so you’re only signing one. You sign him and then signing day is gone, and three guys come in and want to leave because the other guy is better than them, he got more carries in the spring game. Now you’re down to two on scholarship and you got no scholarships left. That’s bad for the football team, and we can’t manage our roster anymore.
“Then you have APR issues when you lose a bunch of guys that were eligible, did everything right, but he’s leaving under a 2.6 [grade-point average] and you’re losing APR points on a kid where you did nothing wrong.
“I think there is a lot of unintended things that are hurting not just football coaching staffs, but I think the entire team. What if you are a kid that wants to be there? You love the program, and some kid is leaving and now you got attrition where there shouldn’t be attrition and that hurts you.
“They’re saying that kids graduate 50 percent less when they transfer. Is that a great thing for our academic model? A kid leaves your school and now he loses 15 credits because he is going to another school that doesn’t have his major.
“I think it’s always going to be a real thing. Some kids pick a wrong school. It happens, so let them go. But do we need to give a road for where they are immediately eligible? Add a year to their clock so that they can graduate from college, which is supposed to be our goal, and I think that would slow down some of this stuff.”
Do you anticipate some changes?
“It’s year one, so you got all these waivers out there. I think the NCAA is probably not liking that as well. I think there has to be accountability. If we are going to make it easy to leave, then you can’t hurt the team.
“Maybe they put a dropdown menu in the portal so, ‘I am entering the portal,' then it's, 'I am leaving on my own’ or ‘I was asked to leave by my coach.’ If he says he’s leaving on his own, then the schools gets another scholarship. Even though there may not be kids left to recruit anymore, at least we have the ability to go over 25 now.
“I know the Big 12 put out a proposal that unless you are a grad transfer you have to sit out one year and then gain one back once you graduated, which to me would help a lot. You’re not punishing anybody. Even if you have an ill family member, you can redshirt and go spend a bunch of time with that person and be there with them.”
Could the redshirt year be good for them?
“The kids that we’ve had, [former quarterback] Jacoby Brissett, [fifth-year senior nickel] Stephen Griffin, the guys that had to sit out a year that didn’t sit out a year at their [original] school, it has been a great year for them.”
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