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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 15, 2017

Dino Babers

Greensboro, North Carolina

COACH BABERS: Obviously we have our hands full with Coach Petrino's staff and Lamar. This is going to be our last road trip of the year and we have not been able to win on the road. It's a very difficult place to play; even though I've never been there, in talking to other people.

We're playing a fantastic football team and we just got beaten up last week, so we're looking forward to seeing if we can go out and change all that.

Q. I apologize to you, my colleague is on the line, sort of rehash old ground here and I haven't had a chance to ask about it. After you beat Clemson, Coach Swinney seemed to be gracious on the field and came over into your locker room. I wonder if that surprised you and what your thoughts were on that.
COACH BABERS: Well, first of all, I was gone to the press conference, so I wasn't actually in the locker room when Dabo came over there and spoke to some of the players and stuff.

But if I would have been there and Dabo asked to speak to my players, I would have said, yeah. I wouldn't have a problem with him. I have a great deal of respect for him and what he's done at Clemson. I think he's a good guy, so I wouldn't have an issue with it at all.

Q. Did you find it unusual that a losing coach would come over and do that?
COACH BABERS: You know, no, I just -- different, yeah. Unusual; there's a lot of things that are unusual. I wouldn't say that's unusual. I would just say that if it's something that he really wanted to express to some of my guys or some of play thinks, I just think he's a good enough person and I think my players are good enough people that we could accommodate each other.

Q. Were you impressed by it?
COACH BABERS: Yeah, I thought it was really gracious.

Q. Assuming you are already well aware of Lamar Jackson's season this year. Having seen him last year at sort of his peak, would you how say he compares? And as the sort of follow-up to that, what's your overall philosophy on a guy in the mix for a Heisman who is on a team that has maybe lost more games and his team is not a competitive team for a championship?
COACH BABERS: Well, first of all, I think that Lamar is having a better year this year than he had last year, and he's an unbelievable player. Bobby has done a fantastic job with him and I wish him the best at the next level.

When it comes to the Heismans and winning records and losing records, I can't get in the middle of that. I've had a Heisman winner, but he was at the FCS level, and we were a playoff-championship football team, double-digit wins, big wins over Power Five schools.

I think all that stuff has something to do with it, but unless you have one of those guys competing for one of those situations, I don't really think you should get a vote.

Q. If you were to look at the defense, what can you say about the response after the 64-43 loss, just how the defense has responded in practice and what you've seen from not just them on the field, but their mentality, as well?
COACH BABERS: Well, obviously we're hurt and a little embarrassed. I don't think that's been -- I don't think that's a true representation of how our defense has played this year.

I'd throw it underneath the happening category, and hoping we're going to play a lot better versus an even more explosive offense than what we faced against Wake Forest.

Q. And then as far as the offense goes, I know that you talk about Dungey making improvements and whatnot, but what can you say, if you have to go for it with Zack, I know you had spoken about him playing within his means in the last game against Wake Forest. If it has to be Zack, what has he shown you so far this season?
COACH BABERS: Well, I think, you know, you can look at that first half and you can see what Zack is capable of doing. He's got a Pittsburgh game from last year. He's got the first half of the Wake Forest game this year. I mean, obviously when he's on, we're capable of scoring a lot of points with him.

Now you can flip that around and say the second half of the Wake Forest game, we only scored three points with him. So hopefully we get first-half Zack and not second-half Zack.

Q. Monday you said Eric needed a little more improvement to kind of be ready. Has he made a little more improvement in these couple days?
COACH BABERS: You know, based off of what the trainers are telling me, they say he's getting better and hopefully that it's going to be good enough by the time we get down to Louisville.

Q. Looking kind of at Zack's game, what did you see on film to try and work on him with this week? Was it a matter of missing spots in the second half? Something that Wake Forest adjusted that he didn't really counter to? What teaching points could you take away from that half?
COACH BABERS: Well, first of all that, second half is not all Zack, and the first half is not all Zack. I mean, it takes -- there's coaches involved. There's players, 11 players, rotations, different substitutions.

I thought that Zack, for someone who had not played all year, to be able to put that many points on the board for a football game, regardless if it was in the half, in a football game, was very impressive. Hopefully we ask that we can -- we need that based off of who we are playing and where we are playing them at.

Q. Dan asked you earlier, what's the mood of the team right now? They still upbeat?
COACH BABERS: No, I think they are a little embarrassed and I think that they have got a bad taste in their mouth, and hopefully their anxious to play another game to prove to people that they are not as bad as their last performance.

Q. Like you touched Lamar, can run and pass like Wolford does Saturday. Any initial adjustments you plan to make defensively to stop that?
COACH BABERS: Well, I can't say that over the phone and in the airwaves, but the biggest thing is is that Wolford is not Lamar. Lamar is the raining Heisman Trophy winner and he does everything better than the quarterback at Wake Forest.

And in saying that, that's not good for us. So we need to find a way to play team defense, and it's going to take a whole bunch of hats to be able to -- I don't even know if you can control the guy. To me he's like Michael Jordan; it's the Jordan rules: Lamar is going to get his. You just have to make sure you don't have two other running backs going for a hundred yards or a wide receiver goes for a hundred yards, because I just think that guy is so dynamic; he's hard to stop by himself.

They are not a one-man team, but you know, you'd better try to stop everything else so you can have an opportunity to win against those guys because Lamar is going to get his.

Q. Lamar Jackson, last time you played him last year, he basically ran all over you guys and now he's adding his arm to the equation. How are you going to control both his arm and his legs on Saturday?
COACH BABERS: Well, you're a little misinformed because last year, he ran all over us, and he threw all over us. He got both parts in last year and hopefully he doesn't get both parts in this year to the degree he did last year, because I think it was like a school record and people were taking pictures out on the stadium and stuff after the game.

So they did extremely well and hopefully they don't do that well this year.

Q. And what do you guys have to do to break this road losing streak, because I know you had close games this year, one at Miami, one at Florida State. What do you have to do to win one?
COACH BABERS: Well, I just think that we need to come out a lot more focused. I think everybody is trying to win but to win on the road is difficult and to win on the road in a tough venue with a very good football team is even more difficult.

We need to make sure we don't make any mistakes, maybe try to win the turnover battle, keep turnovers to a minimum, and if we can do those things, maybe we can keep it close in the fourth quarter and it will go our way.

Q. You had spoken on how the team had responded to the game and you said it's not just on Zack; it's on coaching and a bunch of different elements. What did you learn as a coach coming out of the Wake Forest game that you can take forward for these last couple in the regular season?
COACH BABERS: Well, I think the biggest thing is that we have to find a situation to play more people. We're playing the same guys over and over again. They are getting banged up and they are starting to look different. Not only on the football field but on tape.

We have got to get more people in there, especially when you don't have the depth that we have on our football team; when you have the amount of snaps that you're playing offensively and defensively, you have to find a way to rotate that stuff in there and rotate those guys in there so that at the end of the game, you can have your best players fresh.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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