Wolfpack defensive breakdowns a team effort
NC State's patchwork secondary, specifically replacement cornerbacks De'Von Graves and Malik Dunlap, was chewed up and spit out Saturday by Wake Forest quarterback Jamie Newman and his armada of talented receivers.
But according senior defensive end James Smith-Williams, it's unfair to make them shoulder all the blame for the Wolfpack's ugly 44-10 beatdown at the hands of the 20th-ranked Deacons.
He said job of defending Wake's ACC-leading passing game downfield was made much more difficult by the failure of he and his teammates up front to put Newman under duress.
“It’s really important to get pressure on them, come with the blitzes, keep them guessing. We can’t let them get comfortable in the pocket," Smith-Williams said afterward. “Obviously we want to pressure every passing attempt. He had a lot of yards, so obviously we didn’t do our job up front.”
Newman was sacked twice, but the Wolfpack managed only three other quarterback pressures during a game that was all but decided after the Deacons jumped out to a 21-0 lead in the first 11 minutes.
The junior quarterback, playing for the first time in three weeks after returning from a shoulder injury, completed 25 of 38 passes for 287 yards and three touchdowns -- all to tight end Jack Freudenthal.
The only reason those numbers weren't even more eye-popping than they were is because Newman and star receivers Sage Surratt (nine catches 67 yards), Kendall Hinton (six catches, 93 yards) and Scotty Washington (three catches, 84 yards) spent the entire fourth quarter watching from the sidelines as their reserves played out the string of Wake's most lopsided ACC win ever at BB&T Field.
Wolfpack coach Dave Doeren said that he and his staff tried to give the secondary help by dialing up a series of blitzes and other schematic wrinkles designed to help generate more of a pass rush. But in the end, he said that his team simply didn't win enough battles at the line of scrimmage for them to be effective.
"Obviously pressure helps coverage, there’s no doubt," Doeren said. "But you can’t sit there and zero and one the whole game either and make those guys defend with no help. You have to mix it and pick your points and when you do bring it you have to win.
"You can’t just run into people. You have to work rushes and edges and beat blocks. If we create one-on-one blocks for five guys, one of them has to get to the quarterback.”
Smith-Williams said he was disappointed that State didn't get to Newman more than it did.
“I think it always comes down to execution," he said. "We’ve got to give them kudos. They did a good job up front and we’ll give them props for that, but we’ve got to do a better job.”
That won't be easy considering an injury situation that got even worse Saturday with starting linebacker Isaiah Moore leaving the game in the third quarter and not returning.
Complicating matters is that fact that the next opponent on the schedule is undefeated defending national champion Clemson.
Asked what a defense that has allowed a combined 89 points in its last two games can do to stop an offense averaging even more points per game (42.2) than Wake (37.1), Smith-Williams that he and his teammates will go "back to the lab" to try and figure something out.
"It’s just another day," he said. "We’ll come in and watch film on Sunday, scheme up Clemson and keep playing.”
As frustrating as the past two games and the injury situation might be, Smith-Williams said that he and his teammates aren't giving up on a season that still has four games remaining, with the goal of bowl eligibility still within reach.
At 4-4, the Wolfpack needs two more wins to qualify for the postseason. Besides Clemson, the other remaining opponents are Louisville, Georgia Tech and arch-rival North Carolina.
"It's just time to go about our business," he said. "We don't need a pep rally. We know what the season is. We know what we've got to get done."
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