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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 20, 2010

David Cutcliffe

THE MODERATOR: We now welcome Duke head football coach David Cutcliffe. We'll ask for a brief opening statement, then go to questions.
Coach.
COACH CUTCLIFFE: We have a huge challenge playing a Virginia Tech team that's truly gotten in its form. They've hit stride on both sides of the ball. Certainly, as always, in the kicking game they've got threats. Everywhere offensively, Bud Foster, that defensive staff, they do a tremendous job. I have the utmost respect for Frank Beamer-coached football teams. I think they do it as well as anyone in the country.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach Cutcliffe.

Q. How delicate is Sean Renfree's psyche right now?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: Not as bad as you'd think. You'd have to know Sean. Obviously it's been very difficult to have the number of turnovers he's had. He is a fairly quiet youngster, so you worry about him internalizing to some degree.
But he's been great. Sunday morning when I met with him, he wasn't near like what you might think he would be. I think he understands what he's got to do. As always, it's not all his fault, but they are. When you let go of the ball, you sign it. He's made some bad decisions. We just got to put him in better situations.
Needs just to settle down and do what he does. He's a very smart, disciplined person and player. That's the way he needs to play the game.

Q. Why do you think he's gotten away from it? Look at what he did against Army last year on the road and coming into the season he was playing well.
COACH CUTCLIFFE: I think he really got outside of himself. I think he thought he had to do that. We weren't playing well defensively early, to say the least. From that point at Alabama he started trying to win games. You can't do that. It's not what he does. He's not a gunslinger. He kept going right back to trying to play like a gunslinger. Lay one out there, expect a guy to go out and get it for him, force one in, think I could get it by him. You don't think anything; either you do or you don't.
He's well-aware that he let it get the best of him. We're playing better as a team, to be honest with you. People can't understand this. We certainly played well enough to win at Maryland and against Miami. If he just plays like himself, we've got a chance. We're a lot closer than people think. I think Sean is starting to realize that. Put a little more pressure on the players around him to win the ballgame.

Q. Could you give us your thoughts on Tyrod Taylor.
COACH CUTCLIFFE: I think without question he is the best dual threat quarterback that I've seen. I would go as far to say he's the best in the country. There are guys running well that you see. You see Kim Newton, a youngster at Nevada, certainly Tyrell Pryor. He's as good a runner as any of them, maybe better. I think he may be the fastest. He's a drop-back passer. You see very few drop-back passers that are as gifted as he is in the pocket that can do all that other with his feet.
I just think he's tremendous having been in the league with him, watching his progress. They've done a tremendous job of coaching him. Michael has done a great job of preparing him and taking him to another level each year. I have the utmost respect for Tyrod Taylor.

Q. Coach, such a difficult place to play, especially for night games. What are your boys going to do to prepare for this game? Do you think a noon kickoff is going to do something to feed that stadium's mystique?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: We went up there two years ago at night. The windchill was minus 19. That's about as hard as it could get, other than people didn't feel like yelling. It was a great football game in a bitter cold night.
We can't do anything what you always do. You prepare for crowd noise. You focus on your discipline. That's just part of playing on the road in those types of environments. They certainly have a great environment there.

Q. Is there any one key aspect that you have your boys gearing in on to stop any of the runningbacks?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: You're describing the hard part there (laughter). You know, they do a great job of using all their weapons. What you just have to do is go in and be disciplined and try like crazy to tackle well. They're very difficult to tackle, all of them, Tyrod, the backs, tight ends, the wide receivers. They're all very difficult to tackle.
One thing you would focus on is to tackle as well as you can to give yourself a chance.

Q. With your offensive rÃ©sumÃ©, I was wondering, when you go play a team like Virginia Tech, they're coming off a game where someone ran for 240 yards on them, as an offensive coach you would like to establish the two-dimension look, how much harder does that make that?
COACH CUTCLIFFE: Well, they were ahead 49-14 and had 434 yards of offense themselves at the half. It kind of skewed the game. It's a little different intensity level for the defense at that time, their defense.
But Bud Foster does a great job. That youngster from Wake Forest is just unbelievably fast. He got in the secondary and ran away from people. That kind of just happened. That's an aberration.
What we have to do to obviously attack this defense is play well, take care of the ball. The concern you have is making first downs first. Whether it's run, pass, you hope there's balance. The thing you got to do against Virginia Tech is put together a few first downs, try to put together some drives. One of the things we'll focus on is trying to stay on the field as best we can.

Q. Do you think a lot of coaches don't like to say what you just said. You need to make first downs no matter how it's done. Coaches like to give you the conversation, We'd like to have the two-dimension look, we'd like to have balance, this and that, but really it doesn't matter.
COACH CUTCLIFFE: No, it doesn't matter. What I always say is we love to throw the ball. Everybody in this league knows that. We're going to come out throwing the football all over the place.
When you maintain the ability to run the football to whatever level, just choose to run it when you want to run it, that's the key. You just don't want to get to the point where people are laying their ears back and blitzing you all day long. We've gotten to that point at times and it's not fun for the quarterback. The running game can be the best friend of the quarterback.
We're gaining ground in that area. We're not there yet, but we've got good backs, much better-equipped than what we were, and our offensive line is much improved. We're going to keep pushing to gain that ground.
THE MODERATOR: Coach, thank you for being with us. Good luck this weekend and we'll talk to you next Wednesday.
COACH CUTCLIFFE: Thank you.

End of FastScripts

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