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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 8, 2017

Pat Narduzzi

Greensboro, North Carolina

PAT NARDUZZI: Obviously we're about 31 hours from game time. All the hay is here in the barn as far as the preparation for I think a very good North Carolina football team coming in here that will be hungry and well-coached by Larry Fedora.

Everybody wants to look at records. I don't look at records, I look at what I see on tape. They've struggled a little bit like our guys have as far as the quarterback situation, trying to find out who their guy is. I they found their guy in Chazz. They liked Nathan Elliott last week and didn't choose to put Chazz in. I didn't see him on the injury report, so I'm assuming he's ready to go.

I think they do a great job on offense and defense. They're young, continue to get better every week. They gave Miami all they wanted.

With that, we'll open it up for questions.

Q. Probably the least recognizable coach in any college football staff is the strength and conditioning coach. On a scale of 1 being the lowest and 10 being the highest, how important is strength and conditioning to staying or becoming successful on the field?
PAT NARDUZZI: I would say a 10, put another zero on the end of that, which would be 100. They're really important. Dave Andrews is our strength coach. He does an unbelievable job, not only with just lifting weights and improving our strength, flexibility, recovery, but he does a great job with our culture. So often our coaches are on the road so many months out of the year when you look at it, three months out of the year we're not around. In the summer, we're not allowed to be in. Maybe half the coaches our kids can't be around them by NCAA rules. The one guy that's allowed to be around them is probably the most important guy in this building, including myself, is Dave Andrews, our strength coach. Not only that one guy, but I think you have to have a great staff behind him. We have a great staff that the kids love. It's important.

If you have a strength coach that does a great job in the weight room, but the kids don't want to be in there. We have kids begging to go in Friday morning at 6 a.m. Even if they're in two deep, they want to get a lift in. Yesterday a guy after practice asked.

The strength coach is so important. It's probably, like you said, the most underrated position on our staff, most staffs. It's not overrated by the head football coach, I can tell you that.

Q. At some schools as late as the early 1990s, players never lifted in season. That philosophy has changed now, hasn't it?
PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, no doubt about it. Shoot, I got done playing back in 1989. I think we were still lifting during the season there. It was just more of maintain. But we're trying to get stronger during the season without wearing them out. There's so much to peaking during the season. Our strength coach talks about all the peaking. We use GPS on our kids, so we track how much work and intensity they're doing. I watch practice tape of the offense and defense, I'll say this guy didn't practice well, that guy didn't practice well. We'll go into a staff meeting, the GPS numbers from our strength coach verify what I saw on tape. I can almost see what you're talking about with our GPS systems. That goes along with our strength program.

Q. I noticed on your weekly iWord report, you had some good news with Hendrix and Maddox. How much do you expect to get from those guys, especially Maddox?
PAT NARDUZZI: We'll find out tomorrow morning. We'll see how they feel tomorrow, all three of them really, to see where they are. Again, that iWord, you always have my time, but that iWord probably means he probably could or he probably might not. We don't know. They all three could probably go or not go. Probably, that's my definition. Probably we'll see.

Probably. I mean, I don't know, we'll find out.

Q. Back to something you said, you don't look at records, you watch the tape. What did they do against Miami specifically to slow down their run game, and how do you prepare for that tomorrow?
PAT NARDUZZI: I think number one to play with a lot of confidence. They had a good beat on what Miami was doing. They played square, up front. Their D-line played really good. The linebackers were downhill. They made plays when they needed to. The other side of the ball, North Carolina didn't score when they had an opportunity. Got the ball, four downs at the one. They have to review the play. They could have had six right off the bat. They fake field goal on a fourth and long, which maybe it was better just to put your offense on the field. They had opportunities, didn't score points. That's scary for a football team.

They still got confidence. They're still playing hard for coach. That's the hardest probably coaching job you can have, is being a 1-7 or a 4-5 team, keeping your guys together.

This will be a great game tomorrow. They're playing hard.

Q. What do you especially like from your defense these last two wins?
PAT NARDUZZI: We've given up some plays here and there. But we've really been good in the red zone. I think that probably the red zone, and obviously last week, seems like a month ago, some of the fourth downs. We were four out of five on the fourth downs. Bronco and the Cavaliers wanted to go for it we were able to make plays, play fast, have confidence in what we're doing. That's what it comes down to, playing with a lot of energy and emotion.

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