I think it was a great win for us and our team, to show how good our defense can be to all the young guys, especially going into the next week with a Thursday night game against Cincinnati. It gives us a lot of confidence. That was a tough win. We fought it out. For the team in general, that will be a big boost of confidence for us.
It feels good to win two in a row, but you can’t sit there and just think about 2-0, because that’s not the goal. The goal is to win every single game. You can’t win every game focusing on the record of the previous week. We just have to worry about the next game we have, which is Cincinnati. We have to not pay attention to the record, whether it’s 2-0 or whatever it may be.
I don’t recall the defense playing that good since I’ve been here. Maybe before, but not since I’ve been here. That felt real good, just to have the defense hold up its end of the deal. Our coaches and myself, we always told the guys on defense that the offense wouldn’t be able to score 40 points every single game, so the defense has to show up every night. That was just so good to see. They’re young guys and for them to play so good despite all the people saying how bad they are and everything, for them to play so good and actually be the reason that they won, because of the fumble on the late drive, that’s real good.
That win Saturday night just lets us know that we’re capable of doing our job just in case Russell has an off night. We can do our job and we will be there to back him up, just in case he does have an off night like he had Saturday. We can carry our own weight so the offense won’t have to put up 40 points every game.
I think everybody knew what we had to do. We had to go out there and take care of business. The coaches had a great game. I think Tenuta does have a lot to do with it. It would be hard for me to say he doesn’t. It’s his attitude, that he has and all the other coaches have.
CUT – Like I always say, I’m just happy to have the chance to be back out there. I don’t care if I get 1000 tackles or one tackle. I don’t care about my performance as long as I’m helping the team out in a positive way. – CUT
It’s a big deal, because that’s primetime TV, Thursday night. Everybody’s going to be watching and everyone will have a chance to see what N.C. State is about. Everyone is locked in to see what is going on.
No, the experience against UCF freshman quarterback Jeff Godfrey doesn’t make anything easier. It just makes us a little bit smarter on how we go about doing things. With a mobile quarterback, you have to be more aware of keeping contain. Last Saturday the quarterback broke contain because I didn’t keep contain. And that’s when he got a lot of the big plays towards the end of the game. They almost won because he started scrambling around and breaking contain. But luckily Bishop was able to force the fumble.
Cincinnati is a great team. They lost three regular season games the last two years, and that doesn’t just happen by luck. Their offense is very good. The quarterback, he can run and he can throw. He’s got an arm and he has good guys on the perimeter and a good running back. They are good all the way through on offense, so it’s going to be a good challenge for the defense. Just executing our assignments, knowing when to push the pocket, knowing what angles to take and how to execute our assignments correctly will be the keys.
It’s just important for us to get our rest. We have to rest up as much as possible so we can get our legs back. It’s a short week, so we won’t have as much time to recover and as much time to prepare, so it’s important we prepare well what we have to prepare and rest when we can.
Audie’s performance didn’t surprise me at all. He’s that type of player. He puts that effort forth on the practice field, so to actually see the fruits of his labor come true, that’s not surprising to me at all.
I think both Dean Haynes and Mustafa Greene are going to be great talents later on in their careers. Right now it seems kind of fast to them. They are still learning and adjusting to the game speed. But I think that before the year is even halfway through, you will see both of these guys have great performances. They are both good talents and that is going to show.
