dug ourselves in a deep hole in the first part of the Pittsburgh game. Very disappointing. We did the same thing offensively at Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech and Pittsburgh. Uh so offensively we we put ourselves in trouble and three of those five losses, I thought the defense played poorly against florida state. And then uh we played a pretty good game against Notre dame, they just had a better team. So um you can't start a game when you're, you have four sacks, the first four um series and then you have to short punts and They get good returns and you're down 17 nothing before the game even get started by the end of the first quarter. But then very, very proud of our team, that coaches made some adjustments which j and feel will talk to you about here in a few minutes um and our guys came back and fought a lot of teams would have quit and very, very proud of their their effort, uh the last three quarters and especially the second half, The second half, we outscored Pitt 16 to nothing in the fourth quarter, which we've always put so much emphasis on. We had the ball 11 minutes and 31 seconds compared to three minutes and 29 seconds. Um and and we just have to find a way to win. We're minutes 16 seconds left, we're on the one yard line ready to score and win the game. There's five guys on the Pittsburgh defense that clap and we have an errant snap, It's disappointing that that was missed and then we get uh we got to handle the adversity better because we lost it down. That was unfair. Then we come back and have a motion penalty that puts us in bad shape and and then obviously we, we have a third down pass that goes down to the three. Um I'm never very good after games. When I talk to you all, I tried but I was so disappointed for the kids and the fans uh that we had a chance to be the great pit team and and we had an opportunity and we didn't take advantage of it. But really and truly what the decision came down to from me is is we were one of three on fourth downs and if if we had been two or 4 or three or 4, three of 3 then we go for the fourth down there but I didn't have confidence that uh we had missed a two point play earlier where we had no chance and we had missed. We had only made one of 3/4 down. So that's why we went into overtime and then and we didn't play well in the overtime which was disappointing. Uh but proud that the coaches got the guys uh to play hard the whole game, proud that the guys fought hard the whole game and you know, we beat Wake Forest who's leading the atlantic and and we had a great chance to be a really good pit team on the road that, that's leading the coastal. So that's how close we are. I've never been more excited about the future. We got things, we gotta fix that. We haven't, I'm disappointed. We haven't, we should have that's on us as coaches. But the players continue to play and, and, and we'll continue to get better. Uh, we're not forcing enough turnovers on defense. We even dropped pass at the end of the game that would have won again. Uh, so we just, uh, kept having opportunities that we didn't do it. We are getting more pressure on quarterbacks the last two weeks. And that's something we've worked on, uh, days, Evans has come in and, and uh, putting some good pressure on quarterbacks the last couple of weeks And we held them to 95 yards rushing. So we're doing a much better job against the run. So defensively I thought it was our best game. And, and they held us in the game and they gave us a chance to win on special teams. The special teams were all good except for the punts. We've had some poor punts that were shortened. Uh, they were low and very easy to return. Um, and then we had a couple of penalties on, on the other side of the kicking game, but uh, must clean those up offensively where I looked at the national stats for three years with us on both sides of the ball with red zone, 3rd down and 4th down and two point place and we're right in the middle. So we're average and, and that's why we're sitting here five and five, you gotta get better in those areas. So this spring, one thing we're gonna do is we're gonna start scrimmaging more and Situations where we're gonna line up and and just put the ball down at the 18 of the 20 and because we've got to get better in those areas, we Gotta score more touchdowns and we've got to stop people. So those are things that we've got to pick it up. The other thing that just is driving me nuts and, and I don't know why we continue to have too many penalties and we've got officials at practice, we don't have many in practice and we have entirely too many in games. So I've got to keep working on that to try to get that stopped. And when I talk about the clapping on the goal line, that's not fair to our kids. That's not whining. The game's fast. It's harder for officials to call than ever before. But I still say that something like that should be taken upstairs. That should be reviewable because that is a critical point in that ballgame and nobody wanted to miss that. But if you got five guys clapping and you have a bad snap and SAm did an amazing job of taking that ball and throwing it out of bounds to, to keep the ball but we lose a snap uh and were rattled and and that just uh that that should not happen. Uh ty Chandler 74 yards away from reaching 1000 this season. So Todd has been a great signing for us and he's done the things that we needed to do. He needs 28 yards to reach 3000 for his career. So, Ty Chandler has had a great college career at both his programs, Josh downs needs 113 yards Uh to match Hakeem nicks is uh single season receiving record for yards for his 1200 22 yards. He needs 14 receptions to match U. n. c. single season record of 96 um catches by Ryan Switzer. Uh so he's in a great position for this weekend and Sam Howell needs 69 yards to reach 10,000 career passing yards and He would be the a. c. c. quarterback to pass for more than 10,000 yards. Um Jeremy will email you the list of seniors who are going to senior day. I will call them out for you here. Grayson Atkins british brooks, Adam buck, Carson burgess Ty Chandler tomorrow on Fox who actually came out there for senior day last year and decided to stay when they gave him a year back. So this is his second senior day Jeremiah gimbal, great Goodwin Tyrone Hopper Sam how all this will be his last game at uh at kenan Stadium kerryon johnson is, is looking at the possibilities of coming back, He's looking at some academic things. Um Nick Mackovic, Marcus McKeithen and both josh Zoo are going to go through senior day, but they're also getting coach moody to look at the evaluations for them with the NFL. If they're drafted high enough, they would like to leave. If not they'd like to stay. So that's just the decision. They'll make trey Morrison. Uh and Kyler McMichael are best friends and they want to both look at their NFL status but they they will leave Alex nobles, Hunter Shope Jordan tucker, Ray the Hasek and Garrett Walston and uh you think about these guys, uh they they've meant so much to our program and and they've been so good to us. Some guys left. Some stayed. It's very tough when you lose your coach and all the assistant coaches and you um have different guys talking to you about a different offense and a different defense and who recruited you and what you meant to them. These guys have state and they fought and I see uh Garrett Walston and to mind Fox and even Jordan tucker who didn't start the game like he wanted to there on the sideline saturday night fighting to try to win a game. Uh and I appreciate that so much. So um They go from three wins and two wins um to to to bowl games and a chance saturday to to put themselves in the third bowl game. Uh, so the transition has been hard, especially with the transfer portal. But I really, really appreciate that these guys are going to leave the program much better than they found it And I appreciate them. So that's 21 guys, Jeremy should be emailing you those names as we speak. If you have any questions about that, we will uh, Sam um, will be with the doctors this week and see if he can practice. He wants to play saturday. Uh, if he can, he will. Um, he feels like he will be 100% for next week. But he and the doctors will make the decision, uh, day to day and a game day decision on whether he'll play this weekend or not. Obviously that puts into question, uh, your, your young backup quarterbacks, so you have to get them ready to play. They'll get the heavy load of practice this week and we'll just have to decide during the week how we, how we play them. Because the most important thing is to win the game. We're playing Wofford. Um, you start looking at things that need to happen. We've had four really tough emotional games with Miami um, Notre Dame, Wake Forest and Pit, We had three, um, ranked teams in 13 days. So the guys are spent their tired. So this will be a very, very important week for us to make sure that we can get ready to play because we've got, we're improving were much better team today than we were against Virginia Tech, but we need to keep improving things and there's so many things I just listed that we've got to get better at that. This is really important for us to have a great weeks practice and and be ready to play. So for the weekend you want your seniors to go out right? You always do uh, secondly, you you can be eligible for a bowl game. That's really, really important to us As young as we are that that we get the 13 extra practices and it uh prepares you better for next week. I will tell the players tomorrow that Sanford scored 52 points on Florida and uh, Sanford beat Wofford 27 24. So, so don't stand around. And, and uh, this shouldn't be about the other team ever, obviously rival games. That gets to be more about that. But you got to play to a standard and you are how you play. And and we're getting better and and we're getting closer, but we've got to take the next step here at the end of this year, uh, to to give us a lot more momentum going into spring questions. Okay, let's begin with Aaron Beard go ahead, Aaron, Hey Mac, obviously with SAm situation, you just touched on that a little bit, but this would have been a game, you probably would have wanted to get the young guy quarterbacks in particular some work. Uh, if everything went to plan, uh, is this gonna make that part? How much you think that will change what you would have already done anyway. And this kind of game where you're trying to give them reps Aaron, you, we've been so inconsistent, you never know who's gonna show up for us. And that's, that's the scary part. We very seldom if we had a full team show up, we've been great on offense and bad on defense, We've been just the opposite. Um, so the most important thing is to win the game. We've got to win six games on saturday and, and we got to be bowl eligible. Um, and, and you, you need to jump out against teams like this and not let them get excited. Obviously the, the Sanford florida thing scares every coach in the country. It just, you say it can't happen to you watch it. Um, and uh, so we would have done what we've done against Mercer and western Carolina, try to put ourselves in a position to be ahead and then play the younger guys. Um, now, um, just depending on how SAM does this week, we have to prepare to start the other guys and play them and win the game and they've never started a game before. So that'll be very, very, very interesting for us. Thanks Mac. Thank you luciano, go ahead. Hey coach, I hope you're doing well and thanks for your time this morning, thank you And pour out of your last five games. You have had over 100 yards taken from you because of penalties. You haven't gone over 69 in any of your first five games. What has changed since then? And how are you planning on solving this issue? Yeah, I have to be careful when I talk about officiating. Um, Number one, the last four teams have been really good teams. Uh, and and normally the better athletes you play against, the more likely you are to have some penalties because they're really, really good. Coach Bowden always told me the team with the most penalties is usually the team that wins. And I laughed and said why? And he said because most penalties are on offense and if your offense is moving the ball and scoring a lot of points then you're gonna have more penalties. What we've got to do, we're gonna have some penalties. Everybody is, but what we've got to do is we've got to get rid of the stupid penalties. The things that just are lack of discipline. You're going to have some, you're gonna have a holding call every now and then and you may have a pass interference because those are judgment calls and the other thing that that we continue to do. I feel like officiating is harder than ever before because we see more of it because we've got tv and replays on every call. Um But I said it once before. I wish you all could see what should have been called in what was called after we get our reports back from the A. C. C. Office every Tuesday. I think that'd be more fair to our team and our coaches. Uh but that's not gonna happen. So we just got to continue to to do the best we can to have fewer penalties. And I'm sorry Mark. The other thing is luciano is we're an average team and average teams are affected more by penalties. You got to be good enough that the penalties don't matter. And right now they're killers The face mask on 4th and three at Notre Dame. The lack of holding call on the 91 yard running at Notre Dame, Saturday's ball on the one. I mean it just those things kill us now because we have to do everything right to win games and and if you're good enough it doesn't matter. It sounds like whining well we've got to get better. So a bad call doesn't keep you from winning the game. Go ahead. AJ the coach, you mentioned even going back to august how you need to find ways to get Jacoby and drake on the field because you had to prepare them for next year and some of those opportunities that maybe you thought you would have you haven't had. So how important is it moving ahead this weekend just to get those guys out there and let them go because drake hasn't thrown a pass in a game in two years. You called me starting six and three years. So how important is just to get them out there? Just let them go. Yeah, if Sam doesn't play this weekend, this will be the first time that both of them will get to run our offense and and we'll get to see a lot about our future. And Jacoby has been here in january. He will have been here two years and he got a year back from the covid um, super senior uh, stuff. Obviously drakes, just just a freshman. I think Jacoby has played in three games. So this would be his fourth and drinks played in two games. So you've got to look at winning the game, you've got to look at wood. One of them need to play in the next two games after this. Uh, if you get to a bowl game. And then how important is red shirting? So a lot of decision making is going to go into this week and in the next couple of weeks about the two quarterbacks because we think they're both really good. They're both very talented and as you said, Andrew, they need work and they need work and you put them in, you put them in to be in a game, you put them in to take a snap and run a little bit or, or throw a short pass. Uh, but they, neither one of them have been in competitive situations where they had to win a game and if Sam doesn't play this weekend, they've got to be in there to win the game as far as stem goes is with him walking saturday. Is this a recent decision? Maybe discussion you have with him yesterday or is this something that you've kind of known for a while for sure? Because you've hinted at it that he probably wouldn't be back. But is this something that was finalized here in the last couple of days? Yes. We, we ask all of our players really on open date on bye week And then we ask again last week. I told the guys, I don't want to tell you all something today. And then they come in Wednesday and tell me, well I've decided to leave or I don't want to tell you that they're, they're leaving and then they say I coach, I've been thinking about it, I'm not going to and that could happen. But we tried to make sure that they were 100% on these decisions before. I gave it to you in the public eye. Haven't thought Sam was coming back since last year. I have never had one thought about him coming back and he's going to be a first round draft choice. So I think he should leave. Um, and, and it again, our job is to do what's best for these young people. And if, if he is ready to leave and he's ready to make a bunch of money, then we think he should leave. We'd love to have him come back for another year. That'd be great. But we had the same thing with vince Young bench. Young walked in and said Coach that they've told me I'm gonna make a minimum 20 million. What do you think if I was your son, what would you do? And I said my son's short and small and slow so it'll never come to that decision. But if you can get $20 million dollars go man leave and we would have won another national championship offense had come back. So you can't say you're, you're in the best interest of the players and then not be when it comes down to what's best for them. Our program will be fine. These young quarterbacks are talented, they've got to step up. Sam started as a true freshman. So that's what we'll tell these this weekend. Now what I've got to decide this this weekend is how do we play them If Sam doesn't play? Who goes in first? How long do they stay? Do you leave? 1? Do you have the other because you want both of them, uh, to have a chance to show what they can do, but you still need to win the game. Thank you, thank you joe Brown good. Hey Mac you you kind of alluded to to have have another uh, Kobe and drake kind of question. Um, so it's pretty much still competition with those guys. I mean, I know they would be limited with the snaps that they get in practice for. Sam got injured, but I was just curious has there been no separation between to where you know, there's not a definitive okay, Sam can't go. So he's going in. Yeah. Uh, cl these two have taken the exact same number of snaps every practice for a year. Sam gets all the ones and they split the twos and that's been every day at practice. And there is really not separation right now. And when we've put somebody in before we put Jacoby in first, he's been around longer, he's older. Um, but we'll have to make the decision. How do you win the game on saturday and how do you get these quarterbacks the best work because they could have to play at any time. So as Aaron said that this is in a weird way we're forced to play them. So it'll get you, you'll get less sleep this week and be excited to watch him play. And that's another reason the fans need to come out and say thank you to these seniors. They need to say thank you to Sam, we will not know whether he's gonna play till the end of the week or not. That will be his decision. I told him that yesterday, so I'd love for him to play some if he can, but obviously if he and the doctors decide that he needs some more rest than he wouldn't play. But if not fans need to come out and see the future at quarterback because that's what they're gonna have on on saturday at noon. Thank you. Thank you. Excuse me, Jasmine baker. Go ahead. Hey coach, you spoke about the comebacks, not only this season and forcing pit to overtime, but also last week. What are you saying to you guys at halftime that we're seeing such a become such a dominant second half. What kind of adjustments are you personally um telling the guys to make Jasmine, we had a situation at Texas where we were down 35-14 at home to Oklahoma State And we scored with four seconds left and a half to get to 14 and we were getting booed and everybody thought we were fired. Uh I've had a situation come up when I was at Oklahoma that we got down to Kansas and I yelled at the players and I told him how bad they were and I told them they could get beat. I told them they could get beat. I told them they could get beat? Well we were number one or two in the country in Kansas was awful and we got beat And we got beat like 33-14 or something as awful and we're on the plane going home and Coach Switzer sitting next to me and I said, coach I'm sorry. We just, we absolutely blew the game. And offensively we were awful. And he said, you know what? You lost your first quarterback, you lost your second quarterback. So it's hard to win when you're playing your third quarterback on the road. But he said, let me tell you something. These players respect you a lot and they're gonna listen to you. And at halftime, you convinced them they could lose because you told them three times you can lose, you can lose, you can lose. And that's all they hurt. And they did what you told him to do. So he said, when they're down, you need to pick them up And when they're up you can get all over them. So I'm walking off the field at Texas four and we're down 34 35 14. And I felt Coach Switzer on my shoulder saying, man, it's been an awful first half, Pick them up, pick him up. So I walk into the coaches at halftime and said, Hey, Oklahoma State's done everything right, ball bounced off our helmet, they caught it and running for a touchdown. We're playing hard, we're not playing very good. So we're gonna win the game, but you go in there and pick these guys up and and tell them how we're going to win the game. And and then we walk in. All I said for the halftime speech was uh, I put 40-35 on a grease board. I said, that's the final score. Let's go win. We won 56-35. Um, So what, what I've always told the guys is number one, I can't coach a team that doesn't try. I can't do that. So you got to give, you gotta give 100%. You got fans that are paying to come and watch you play that are proud of you. I'm proud of you. But you're an extension of me and I'm gonna compete my tail off that whole game. So you need to do that. Give me that. We'll make mistakes and we can fix them. But I can't coach a team that doesn't try every play. And, and jasmine in my career, I've been really, really lucky most of the time that the guys have responded to that. And and that's what I'm most proud of. I told him, I told him sunday am I disappointed for you and and for the fans because we had an opportunity to be a rank pit team And we didn't take advantage of it. Absolute. But I'm more proud that you could have laid down and quit at 17 nothing on national tv and I can't, I can't be part of that. And and they did it. And I mean you got George tucker who struggled coming out and he's on the sideline screaming and picking people up. And you got Garrett Walston that came back and he's fighting every play. And you've got um uh, come on Fox, I mean, just that's what family's about and that's what football really teaches you and jasmine. We also say you're you're gonna have a sick wife, you're gonna have sick Children, you're gonna get fired at your job. You're gonna have bad days. And how are you going to respond? Are you gonna lay down and quit? Are you going to fight back? So I've always told them do not look at that scoreboard. You just keep playing and, and the way you play, the attitude you play with is who you are. I don't wanna hear it. I want to see it. And that's why I'm so proud of where we are. And that's why I know this program is going to be good going forward. We uh Sam got SAm and those five superstars last year that coach Fedora recruited, got us ahead of where we were as a program and, and now we're kind of back to where we are and where we should be. And that's in the middle of the pack, but we have a chance each week and everybody knows it and people don't like playing us right now because we're the program that let her buy down this year, but nobody's excited about planets. So we're headed in the right place and that's why I love these kids so much. All right. We have a time for two more. Our chance key first. Go ahead. Hey Mac, you hear me? Yes. You mentioned red shirting. Uh, and Storm is an interesting, um, subject to that matter. What does he have to do to make this year a redshirt year and see a guy that could be a six year player who might need all those years because he missed so much football. Our, it's a it's a great question. Number one, you can play in four games per year and still redshirt, which I think was a tremendous change in the rules by the N C. Double A. I would like for them now to say you can play in four regular season games and a bowl game because we're seeing enough young people opt out of bowl games that you're going to need more people for bowl games and you can still redshirt by putting a freshman in your bowl game to have enough people to be safe. Storm is if Storm can stay healthy, Storm will be an NFL guy. So he'll probably leave as soon as he's eligible to leave for the draft. Um, so I would not think the extra covid year makes it crazy. See Jacoby Creswell got the extra covid year. So he's actually the same age as drake May, but he's been here two years. He's still a freshman. So it's just crazy when you're trying to look at roster management, when you're looking at Will Que johnson Marcus McKeithen and josh's you do come back or not. It's going to be based on evaluations. So we're sitting here right now. We could lose three starting offensive linemen four because josh, Jordan tucker is leaving with roster management. We're sitting here not understanding who will have in january and we, we won't know that until after the december signing date. So, um, the thing that we've, we've told storms just play, just play and get better and have fun and, and continue to work with um, Kyler McMichael leaving. You've got uh, you've got don chapman, they got hurt. You've got day day Hollins that got hurt. But right now Storm and Tony would be your corners, uh, starting for next spring for sure. All right, we'll close up today with Jim Noble. Go ahead Jim coach noting what you said about Sanford and florida. How hard is it? Uh, when these guys look up to operate and they see one and nine we listen to. So con how hard is it to convince your guys that this will actually be a game on saturday. Well, the biggest thing is it can't be about who we play gym. It's got to be about us and when our program gets where it needs to be our fans have to come and see us play. It can't be about uh, this is a big game. This is not every home game should be a sellout and they need to come and see Carolina play when we're playing, we have enough things jim, we've got to fix that. This isn't about Wofford, this is about us fixing it now. This is the last year that were playing an FCS school late in the year and coach Fedora wind it and I understand it and I think it's a great idea. I would rather do it at the first of the year because we're normally going to be a better team at the end of the year than the beginning of the year. And especially now with the N C double A rules limiting how much you can hit more people are are that way. So we're opening up with florida A and M at home. Uh I think the week before the season starts next year, uh which we had to get special permission to do and that will be a special day at home for us. But uh the point jim is so well taken and I will, I'll talk to the team more about this tomorrow. Uh they've been spent, you play Miami last second win, you play Notre dame fourth quarter loss on the road, hard night game, you play Wake Forest, a bunch of plays emotionally spent worn out and and when and then you go on a short week and play at Pittsburgh. Uh So this would be a perfect time for us to be flat, It's a perfect time. So what I'm gonna tell them is is good teams play and they play every week and you've got to be playing to a standard. It's gotta be about you, we've got things, we've got to fix, it's got to be about getting better and we don't have a week that we can't go out there with the motion and play and and I think jim that's what makes this a unique and special week for us. Have we grown up? Are we getting better? Can we play because we like to play, can we play because we need to improve and get better? Are we gonna stand around? And everybody talked about our opponents struggle some um and and stand around and and and not play well on saturday and that cannot be who we are. We have got to play well this week and that's critical. We've gotta practice well this week, we've got to help these young quarterbacks if Sam doesn't play, the defense has to step up and get him the ball back, the offense has to give them time to to get comfortable. So that's the exciting thing about this week, that this is definitely not a week that we can stand around. We've got too much to do to get better. Alright, coach, thanks for a few minutes this morning. Thanks folks, and I'll see you Wednesday, okay