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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE MEDIA CONFERENCEOctober 23, 2013David CutcliffeCOACH CUTCLIFFE: Obviously our biggest challenge of the year to date, playing Virginia Tech, playing them in Blacksburg in back‑to‑back years. Never easy. I think this particular Frank Beamer team is really hitting its stride. A very, very good football team. Not just a great defensive football team, but their weapons on offense are coming into place. Their kicking game, punt game, they have a punter that's leading the conference in punting. Coming off an open date, they're going to be fresh and healthy, getting some people back. It will be a huge challenge for us. We have to focus on playing the best football we've played all year long. That's what it's going to take. With that, I'll take your questions. Q. They've been able to force so many interceptions this season defensively, Virginia Tech has. How much of that is coming from the pressure they're getting with their defensive line? COACH CUTCLIFFE: Well, it's always going to be a combination. You'll never see a team that intercepts a lot of passes that doesn't have a pass‑rush. They go hand‑in‑hand. They also are very gifted in the back end. They contest every route, everything you do, with real quality cover people that are physical. You want to sign a real physical defensive back that can also cover. They seem to just change the names through the years and come up with those guys. A very veteran front with a lot of speed. They get in quarterback's faces, hit them, pressure them, hurry them, then of course sack them as well. So a great combination of those two things is what's caused that. Q. They've been able to possess the ball despite the fact they're not running it very well. When you look at that running attack, what's not working for them? COACH CUTCLIFFE: I don't know if it's really necessarily not been working. It's not the numbers that they're used to, but they're doing different things that are part of the run game. When you're throwing perimeter screens, when you're doing what they're doing, you will possess the football. It is part of your run game. But it's not what traditionally Virginia Tech handing it to a tailback has done. Their numbers don't look the same, but a lot of those other throws occur sometimes on actually a run call. That is part of your run game. That's a little misleading in that regard. Q. Shifting attention to your defense. The last couple games, the improvement you've shown, is that a function of guys coming back and getting healthy or did you make changes scheme‑wise or personnel‑wise after the Pittsburgh game? COACH CUTCLIFFE: Not really personnel‑wise. We are healthier. I don't think it's any one thing, though. There's been no big scheme changes. We continue to push and grow and work. We've had some young people step up and play better and better, particularly in the secondary. We've also had some defensive front people that are younger that are playing at a higher level so we're not wearing out the older guys. Quite frankly, our older guys didn't care much for being pushed around like we were the first half of the Pittsburgh game. The second half of the Pittsburgh game we played much better. Hopefully we can continue that trend. When you're going into a place like Lane Stadium, you're going to have to plan to play good defense, and play it early. Hopefully we can do that. I've really been very pleased with what our defense has done and how hard they've worked, the staff and the players, to continue to grow and improve. Q. When you go over last year's game with your team, do you emphasize the first quarter most or the last three quarters more? COACH CUTCLIFFE: You're not going to beat Virginia Tech with a half or a quarter.  You're going to have to put together a game. What I've done and gone through in detail with both staffs, first on Sunday and Monday before we get started with the players, then Tuesday morning with the players, what I thought we had to do to win, what we couldn't do that we did a year ago, where we hurt ourselves a year ago, even kind of got into the technical detail parts of that. It was an interesting game a year ago. There were times in the second half we played extremely well ‑ I mean, extremely well ‑ both sides of the ball and in the kicking game, and we didn't cash in, we didn't finish. I think you have to look at the entire body of the game to begin to see where it all went awry or went well for us. We have to try to play as well as this Duke team can play for 60 minutes. That's the bottom line. Q. Jameis Winston, the FSU offense, you don't have to face him this year, that offense. But with you being a former quarterback coach, being around a lot of great quarterbacks, you've probably seen him on tape or broadcast, but what have you seen from him? Where you would rank him amongst some of the college quarterbacks you've seen in the past? COACH CUTCLIFFE: I've watched him warm up when we played him a year ago. I watched him throw. I was familiar with him coming out of high school. He's from the same general area that I'm from in Alabama. He's extremely strong in his core and he doesn't have to overaccentuate throwing the ball. What I mean by that is his body is pretty quiet, allows him to be really be accurate. Looks to me, like for as young as he is, he's very accurate. He's very poised. That's easy to see on broadcast. He's comfortable in what he's doing. Randy Sanders, Jimbo works with him, Randy played for us at Tennessee, I coached with Randy, he's been trained well. So all of those things show up. He's obviously surrounded with a very good supporting cast. He throws on the run well. He throws from the pocket well. He can hurt you when he needs to run the football. What that spells is talent. I don't know him personally. But, again, he seems to be very committed and poised to the process. Q. Obviously with NC State having to travel down there, a team you know very well, do you have any advice for Coach Doeren? COACH CUTCLIFFE: Try to keep the football (laughter). You want to make first downs. That's a game that you play one play at a time when you play them. One of the key components in any of those games, those types of games, try to keep the football. He already knows that so he doesn't need to hear that from me. Q. Your program has hit a lot of milestones in the last year and a half. It's been 19 years since Duke has beaten a ranked opponent. What would it mean to get that win Saturday, beat a ranked team? COACH CUTCLIFFE: I'll put it this way. We do have an open date after beating them because we'd probably all be on Cloud9. That's just as honest as I can be. You don't want to be that way. You don't want to be giddy, if you will, about any win. But I'm certain the squad and the program itself would feel that way. As you know, it's a huge task. But I understand exactly what you're saying. I don't know if I believe in milestones, but it would be a huge step in the right direction for this program. I hadn't even really thought a lot about that, but I'm trying to give you an honest answer. I think the thing we have to do is kind of ground ourselves and understand for us to beat any good football team, we have to play. Whether somebody thinks they're ranked or not, I think Virginia Tech should be ranked higher than they are, but giving you an honest answer, I'd be glad we didn't have to play the next Saturday, get time to get our feet back on the ground. Q. You said after the Virginia game, this is your best team at Duke. That comeback is the greatest numerical comeback in school history, 22 points down. Have you had any other comebacks like that? COACH CUTCLIFFE: I haven't as a coach, not 22. I've been 14 down. I can't remember.  Once at Tennessee against Georgia we got down, I don't remember the exact score. But it sure is a good sign when a team can do that. It says a lot of different things about a team. They have to trust each other, believe in each other, offense, defense, kicking. It means you also have to have some talent to do that, which we do, and a good staff, et cetera. It's a real positive thing to happen. I'd rather get a 22‑point lead and keep it, but in that case it was fun to see those guys continue to work and pull that off. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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