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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 19, 2016

David Cutcliffe

Greensboro, North Carolina

DAVID CUTCLIFFE: I'm headed to do a little luncheon talk, so different time slot, but it's an open date for us. We're doing all the things we need to do, but No. 1 is healing. We're also having to kind of change our lineup with the number of losses that we've had from an injury standpoint, and then time to get some preparation going in earnest for Georgia Tech, which I'm real pleased with what we've done the last two days, and we'll hope to finish the week out strong. We're going to certainly need that.

I'll take your questions.

Q. You've obviously played Georgia Tech a bunch, and they're playing lots of plays in possessions, even more than they normally do, and they kind of said we've been dealing with everyone else for so long. I'm curious in a game like that when you know you're going to get two possessions, does that change your play calling at all?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: I don't think it necessarily does go into a game saying, hey, they're going to make 1st downs, we've got to be careful. I don't think that's the way you play a ballgame. But you do realize anytime that those games can be 10, 11, 12 possessions, and you do play football a little bit more nowadays per possession anyway. We're going to be true to who we are and try to put a plan together that gives us the best chance to be successful. If part of that is being -- trying to create explosive plays, you'd better use that part of that plan and use it well.

It's part of the strength of why he's won for so long consistently. That's part of the magic.

Q. Coach Cut, just wondering why you felt the game plan against Louisville last week to try and slow down the game and keep the ball out of Lamar Jackson's hands was the best one for you guys to have?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: Well, there were six and a half minutes left in the fourth quarter, and we're down 17-14, they've got the ball on their 20-yard line. We felt like at that point, we wanted to be ahead, obviously, but we thought that that was a game we needed a chance to win in the fourth quarter.

He's an incredible football player as well as an incredible athlete, but he's not alone. That's just a really complete football team, and there was no sense in trying to give them multiple opportunities. They create so many explosive plays that you knew you had to try to limit their opportunities, and so I thought what we did was successful, we just didn't get the job finished.

Q. What have you seen as kind of the mindset of the guys now as they're looking ahead to the second half of the season?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: You know, I've been really impressed. For a while now we've just focused on getting better, taking each game as a unique opportunity. I think they see it that way. We've got five teams left on the schedule. They know those teams are all Coastal Division teams, so it's a very familiar part of our schedule, but I think this -- I like our team, and I like them a lot. They're great workers. They're very humble. Just everything they're doing has been focused on getting better, and if we just continue that mode, and I believe they will, we've got an opportunity to do some special things hopefully.

Q. Earlier in the season you talked about you wanted more competition from second and third teamers pushing the starters. Earlier in this press conference you talked about maybe making some lineup changes because of injuries. Are you seeing the better performance by the guys that were backups pushing the starters now?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: Yeah, I think we would not have had a prayer if we didn't have some quality depth like we mentioned. Obviously I made that statement prior to all of these injuries, some people out for the season, and I've been pleased with the efforts of our young people.

I think there's another step. I mean, they're hitting on a huge emphasis for us right now. That's just as important as anything we do. It was the focus of practice this morning, just how hard everybody had to work to compete, and I want to see some people try to compete to become starters, not that we're selling out on the older guys. I just think we've got some people that have a chance to reach their potential that are very good football players.

Q. You mentioned because of the injuries you might have to make some lineup changes. Can you give us any rough idea of where that might be occurring?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: Well, obviously there have been multiple injuries in places, but receiver right now is one that we're just continuing to address. The secondary we're continuing to address. We've been beat up a bit at backer. Now we're playing a Georgia Tech team that's going to require a lot of physical people up front, so people have really played hurt on the offensive line and defensive line. It's been an interesting week in that regard. We're going to continue. I'm looking forward to tomorrow's practice. We're going to make a very competitive circumstance tomorrow. Tomorrow basically will be like our game this week.

Q. Talk about this bye week; does it come at the right time for you guys to get everything fixed and ready for the run coming up next week?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: It's helped. It's helped. Just having time from an injury standpoint but also from a focus and an opportunity to look at what we're doing. We've had good staff meetings and evaluation of what we're doing in all three phases of the game, and looking at our personnel. I think our players were to some degree ready for it, and now we've got five in a row to push to finish. The next three are going to come pretty quickly. We've got a Saturday, Saturday, Thursday, so we've got a big run dead in front of us.

Q. With Georgia Tech coming up next week, what do you see early getting ready for that game?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: Well, I've watched all three phases of them a good bit already, and they're a typical Georgia Tech team. They're talented. They play extremely well. They're extremely well-coached. In the kicking game, I'll just start with that one, and they're well-coached on defense. I think they're defensive staff does as good a job as anyone. Their players know what they're doing and they've got talent.

Offensively, I don't know anybody that runs their offense or knows more about running their offense than Paul Johnson does. It's a huge test for us.

Q. I'm curious as you've prepared for Georgia Tech, what are your observations about how Justin Thomas has played so far?
DAVID CUTCLIFFE: You know, he's better than he was a year ago. He's lightning quick. He's played well, he's consistent, he knows their offense. I think he's really, really good as a reading option quarterback, and he's got great hands, great feet, and he's made every aspect of their option offense effective, the fullback, himself as a good runner, and then certainly being able to get the ball on the perimeter when it reads it out there.

He's also been a guy that can create big plays in the passing game. They always have a great athlete there, but he's also an outstanding quarterback.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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