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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME: DUKE v FLORIDA STATEDecember 2, 2013Anthony BooneCHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA ANTHONY BOONE: The season has been a tremendous ride, just a testament to all the hard work we've put in over the past couple years and just the guys really believing in the process, whether it's the weight room, whether it's the film room, and whether it's just the work on our own just as players. You know, this season has really showed the work we put in and the belief that we've had in the system that we were placed in. This coming Saturday is going to be a great game, being a local kid, being able to play in my hometown is going to be a great feeling. I'm hoping for a great turnout for the Duke crowd, what I am expecting is going to be a large crowd based on last year's Belk Bowl experience. Playing the No.1 team in the country, there's no better opportunity to showcase your talents and showcase what you've been working for all your life and basically what you dreamed about: Playing on a big stage in front of the best team in the country and in front of a lot of cameras and a lot of people. It's going to be a lot of fun and it's going to be a great atmosphere and it's going to be one of the most memorable games that I'll probably have for a long time. Q. Was there like a moment or like a week in this season where you kind of saw the freshman DBs start to get it, like a lightbulb going off? ANTHONY BOONE: Honestly I saw it in camp, in fall camp, and I saw those guys making a lot of flash plays, getting a lot of reps with the ones and twos and noticing how talented these guys are, whether they have the capability of making up with their speed and using their feet and just being real savvy and having ball skills and just being football players overall, just having the intangibles that you can't teach a player, just kind of having it. That's kind of when I really noticed that we have some pretty good freshman DBs, was fall camp. Q. Have you been impressed with the poise they've showed? ANTHONY BOONE: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's definitely a big testament to the kind of player they are. They're coming in, fresh out of high school, and just on big stages, making big‑time plays and not even like thinking twice about pulling the trigger, just being a playmaker in big situations.  That's a big deal. Q. You saw those guys close up last year in a game in Durham, but it was pretty lopsided. Was there anything in the game or watching film of that game that gives you hope that it can be a different story this time? ANTHONY BOONE: I mean, honestly we've just got to go out there and execute. We don't need to go out there and try to do too much, not try to be somebody that we're not. They're the best team in the country for a reason, but at the end of the day, they put their pants on just like anybody else does. All we have to do is go out there and try to execute the game plan you have for that Saturday, and if it's the best you have and you come up short, then you come up short. But if not then you get the win. I haven't really thought about trying to do too much, just to go out there and be ourselves and not try to be somebody that we're not and just execute the game plan we have that's been working for us all year, so we're not going to stray away from what's been working all the day, like the old saying is if it ain't broke don't fix it. Just because we're playing the best team in the country and they have a lot of great players, we're not going to try to do something we don't normally do. Q. Dave was just talking earlier about the turning point being those two losses to Georgia Tech and Pitt, and I was just wondering from your perspective, was there anything that had to be said after that Pitt loss among just the players, or why do you think you guys were able to turn it around after such a heartbreaking loss? ANTHONY BOONE: Honestly we just kind of said, our dreams that we have since the beginning of this year, the goals that we have placed at the beginning of the year are still within reach and to still just keep playing football and keep pressing and things will fall our way, and that's kind of been our MO the whole year, just keep playing and eventually things will work itself out. Q. You guys have never been in this situation before; how do you think that you guys were able to handle the success even though it's been so new for everybody? ANTHONY BOONE: I think that's the reason why we've been able to handle it because nobody has really been there before. Everybody on this team is pretty selfless, pretty humble character. I just feel like handling the ups and downs was not going to be a problem for our program. Q. Can you talk just about you signed here four years ago; what was the talk amongst players from your guys, guys here? Did you ever believe you could get to this point? And if you did, why? ANTHONY BOONE: It was more than belief, it was a confidence. It was a poise, a swagger about it that we're going to be a part of the class that's going to shock, change this culture of Duke not being a football school, not being a football program. That's the mentality that every player in my class and the class above me came to school with is that we're going to change the culture here, and it's happening in front of our eyes, and it's a great feeling. Q. Did it seem‑‑ how much work‑‑ when you look at it, it was going to take a lot of work. Obviously there's a long history of not having a lot of success in football. You guys never backed down from that, obviously. Did you realize it was going to take a lot of work, and how did you approach that? ANTHONY BOONE: Yeah, absolutely. We knew that it was going to be work, and we knew it wasn't going to be easy, but it takes a person with a lot of character to be able to kind of be a person that's brand new and change the culture. It may have not happened when I was there or when we were graduated, but it was going to happen eventually, and it was one of those things where you just kind of had to go there not knowing what was going to happen and just keep playing football. Q. What are your impressions of Timmy Jernigan, Florida State's nose tackle? ANTHONY BOONE: Oh, he's a great player. He's obviously a force in the middle. He's very, very, very athletic, and he's going to pose a problem for our offensive line. We're going to have to do a great job of containing him and get two hats on him in the run game and get some good movement on him and then on 3rd downs making sure he doesn't change the line of scrimmage and cause a lot of ruckus in the middle. Q. Leading up to the NC State game you threw seven picks combined. Since then you haven't thrown one. You've thrown five touchdowns. What do you think changed after NC State over the last three games, and is that something you see can keep going this Saturday? ANTHONY BOONE: Nothing has really changed, just going out there and continuing to do the same thing I've been doing since I started playing, going through my reads, progressions, and getting the ball out of my hands, and sometimes the luck just rolls your way, sometimes it doesn't. Q. In what may have been the two biggest games of the season or at least had garnered most of the national attention the last two games of the year as Duke was going for the divisional championship and a berth in the championship game, you completed 75 percent of your passes against Wake Forest and North Carolina for 530 yards, five touchdowns, no interceptions. You averaged 300 yards a game in total offense in the two biggest games of the season. How proud are you of that? I know it's a team effort, but in the two biggest games of the season you came through magnificently. ANTHONY BOONE: That's just a testament to the players around me, the offensive line doing a great job of pass protecting and running the ball and being able to have our two‑headed monster with me and Brandon. Just the guys around me really helped me with the success that we're having and that I'm having. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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