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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE MEDIA CONFERENCENCEApril 22, 2015Dave ClawsonDAVE CLAWSON: We've had a very productive off‑season. Our players continue to make measurable gains in our strength and conditioning program. I thought our spring practice was very productive. It's our second year in the systems now, and kids are playing faster and have a much better understanding of what we're doing schematically on both sides of the football in the kicking game. We will be an extremely young football team next year, but I think we have some talented young men that will start to develop into really good ACC players. We're looking forward to hitting the summer and continuing to get better, and look forward to the '15 season. Q. First and foremost, after having a year under your belt with this team, what can you say you've learned as a coach about the group that you have and the personnel you have and what you took away from that year one? DAVE CLAWSON: Well, I thought our kids competed hard last year, and that was important, but I also think there was a significant gap in a lot of areas between us and the rest of the ACC. We've got to close that gap and we've got to do it in a number of ways. We've got to close the gap in recruiting. We've got to go a great job at Wake Forest recruiting players. I thought on both sides of the line of scrimmage last year we were out‑manned and overwhelmed at times. When you don't hold up up front, it doesn't even get to the perimeter match‑up. Clearly we have to make a lot of progress on our offensive line and our defensive front, and I believe we're doing that. I think we've done that through recruiting and our kids are getting stronger and to me look more like ACC football players now than they did a year ago. Q. And when you look at spring ball, now that you've wrapped up and everything, what can you say about maybe some of the guys that have shown up for you the most, some of the leadership? I know you talk about offensive line and the defensive side, if there's anybody that stuck out to you after spring? DAVE CLAWSON: Well, spring football is about getting players better. There's a number of players. Certainly on defense, Duke Ejiofor is really developing into a good football player for us. We've got a bunch of young freshman defensive linemen that we red‑shirted a year ago, Willie Yarbary, Chris Stewart, Rashawn Shaw, that these guys I think are all going to be good players in time, they just don't have any experience. They haven't played snaps in games. That will be a learning curve for them, but they'll become good players in this conference. And the biggest jump was on the offensive line. I mean, as we left spring football, we have three redshirt freshman starting on our O‑line. That's certainly never ideal, but I think these guys are going to be good young players, and in our top 10 probably five or six of them are freshmen. Again, these guys will learn and develop, and we'll have a good offensive line in the near future. Q. Building on what you said, you said the players are playing faster in the second season, so what lessons as a coach do you take into a second season to maybe pass down to your other assistant coaches? DAVE CLAWSON: Well, I don't know if there's lessons. I mean, I think we have a bunch of coaches that have coached for a lot of years and understand the process of building a program. I think the second year in any system, you're going to play faster, you're going to think less, you're going to process quicker, whether it's the quarterback position, reading the coverage, or the offensive line and protections, handling a blitz pickup, to a corner and a safety being able to switch off a route better. I think there's certain things in football you just need to get repetitions on, and it's continuing to get reps and seeing different looks and then mastering those techniques that allow you to grow as a player and eventually grow as a football team. You know, when you're as young as we are, you can't get enough reps. You can't get enough experience. I think that was good about our spring. We got a lot of young players, a lot of repetitions. Every rep for them that things happen a little bit differently is a great teachable moment, a great learning opportunity to get that on film, and you've got to get to the point that you don't repeat mistakes, and a lot of the mistakes you make as a day one spring freshman corner, if you're not making those mistakes by practice 10 or practice 11, we've made ourselves a better football team. Again, I don't know if there's a grand lesson here. We've been through this process before and know what to expect, and we know we're on an upward trajectory here. Q. How did the spring leave you in terms of your running game in terms of getting better at it this coming fall? DAVE CLAWSON: Well, we got better at it. I still don't think it's where it needs to be. But we're definitely improved. I mean, we ran the ball better this spring than we did the spring before. You know, part of that is I think our offensive line is more talented. Our tailback Isaiah Robinson was a very improved player from a season ago to the spring. But part of it is we're going to continue to get better, and that's going to come from recruiting. We have three tailbacks coming in, and those guys are going to have a chance to make us better, as well. We've got to continue to get more physical at the tight end position and win more blocks at the point of attack with those guys, and again, every time those guys get stronger and get another rep, we get better. We're not going to go from one of the worst teams in the country to one of the best in one year, but I'd be very disappointed if we don't make a significant gain this year in how well we run the football. Again, I saw progress in the spring, but we've still got a ways to go. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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