Doeren on CTE, new rules, replacing NFL draftees, more

CHARLOTTE — At the 2018 ACC Football Media Kickoff at The Westin Hotel in Charlotte, NC State football head coach Dave Doeren spoke to the media about a number of topics, including the dangers of CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy) replacing the players lost from last year’s senior class and recruiting. Here are some of the highlights.

On the dangers of CTE and the steps NC State takes to protect its players: “Player safety is a big deal. I’ve only been a head coach seven years, but in the last seven years through the NCAA and NFL, you’ve seen a ton of research being done. Brian Hainline heads that up for the NCAA. And we’re just trying to learn about it, to be honest. I can’t give you the facts. We know that it’s there. Don’t know exactly what all the exact information is. But we care a lot about these guys. We care a lot about this game.”

“From the changes in practice where we can’t have two-a-days on back-to-back days, we don’t ever wear full pads on back-to-back days, wear half pads, full pads, pro pads, so we’re changing that rigor of contact from back in the day when, I’m not that old, but when I played we had 14 straight days of two-a-days and they were all full-padded. That just doesn’t happen anymore. So the ability to develop players, which is what we take incredible pride in at NC State, starts with being healthy. … I think we’re all learning as we go, and at the end of the day, I have three sons. We treat our players as sons. We want them to compete hard in a very physical sport but compete as safely as they can.”

On freshman linebacker Payton Wilson’s status: “As you guys know, Payton suffered an injury probably midway through his senior year and re-injured that knee a couple months back and has had it repaired. He’s doing great. Saw him in the training room the other day, and don’t know if he’s out for the season. I don’t know. He is a phenomenal athlete. His recovery time will be faster than most people’s. So we’ll see. But great prognosis. He’s feeling really good and was the top player in the state last year.”

On the growth of NC State’s in-state recruiting: “We were talking about why [senior linebacker Germaine Pratt] should stay home, and some guys like Germaine have done that, and you’re seeing those guys, B.J. Hill, Kentavius Street, Nyheim Hines, Will Richardson, these were these in-state guys that had out-of-state opportunities that stayed home that are now reaping the benefit of the blueprint.

“The thing that we have that other people don’t: Raleigh, North Carolina, is the fifth-fastest growing city in the United States. … You couldn’t live in a better city than we live in right now. Our University has 23 sports, 21 of them went to postseason play. This is a great place to be, not just because our staff and our players have built a great football program. The entire thing, the big picture of it, it’s just the timing is right, and it’s hot. If you were buying stock, you might want to buy a bunch of it and get ready to sell it, because it’s going up. But we’re excited about what’s happening in the state, and you can see that.”

On the new redshirt rule: “The redshirt rule in general I think is a great rule for many reasons. Back when that rule was created, the old redshirt rule was there were 120 players on scholarship at that time, and since then it’s been reduced to 85, and so our usable number of players has gone down, and over the course of the year when you have attrition and players get injured, it affects your roster, and the number of players taking reps adds up, then their higher percentage for injuries takes place.

“So now to be able to take those guys maybe in fall camp, let’s say we’ve got 20 signees, maybe five of them are ready for the first four games, so you play them, and then maybe they prove they’re ready for the rest of the season, and you keep playing them. Maybe at some point they get injured, or you know what, we shouldn’t have played him this early, thought he was ready, he’s not, we’re going to redshirt him.”

On senior defensive end Darian Roseboro and his importance: “Darian is extremely strong. He’s tough. Those two things, when I think about how he plays on the edge, he’s going to knock people back. There’s going to be a dent on that side of the ball which disrupts play and helps guys behind him. I think that’s the biggest thing. He has experience, which you can’t coach. He’s played for three years. He’s made a lot of plays in big games. It’s important to him.”

On the expectations for redshirt senior quarterback Ryan Finley: “You know, I think for Ryan, he’s as hard on himself as we could be on him. I think it’s just daily improvement. I think he believes in the process, I believe in the process, our coaching staff, our strength staff. It’s a daily grind to get better at what you do, and where does that get him in the end, we’ll see. But I know he has goals for our team. He has goals for himself, and the only way that he can reach those things, these watch lists, all that’s great, but I know if you talk to him, he’s not going to win a single award if he doesn’t handle the day-to-day work he needs to do. He knows that. And I appreciate that because he believes in that.”

On replacing Nyheim Hines at running back: “Well, we’ll see how it plays out. I’m excited for Reggie [Gallaspy] being a senior, and he’s dealt with a lot of knickknack injuries, and he’s healthy and he feels great right now. So for him to be going into his senior year feeling good is a positive thing for these guys. But we have three young backs that we don’t know enough about yet. We’ve got to get them out there and battle test them and get them hit and get them into a bunch of drills, see if they can hang on to the football, how are they going to protect.

“You take Nakia Robinson, who had a good spring game, Ricky Person, highly-touted young man, has a lot of tools, and Trent Pennix, who just got here at the end of June, those three guys are going to get soaked. They are. How it ends up, I can’t give you the answer. Would we love for one guy to take over, sure, that’s great, but I have no problem with the rotation, too, because they all have good skill sets.”

On the NC State fans and home-field advantage: “Well, we have the best fans in the state of North Carolina. Our football fan base is incredible, and if you’re in Carter-Finley Stadium and that place is rocking, I don’t care where else you play. It’s intimidating; it’s loud. They can’t hear. Our players feed on it, our recruits feed on it. Everyone knows how I feel about people leaving the stadium. I want them to stay, okay. But it’s an awesome place. We sold out every game last year and expect to do the same. Our season tickets were higher last year going into where we were compared to last year. I expect that trend to continue and look forward to being out there and hearing our fans cheer for our players and get after the opponents.”