David Cutcliffe Press Conference Quotes: Georgia Tech

DURHAM – Duke football head coach David Cutcliffe met with members of the media on Monday afternoon for his weekly press conference.

The Blue Devils host Georgia Tech on Saturday. The game will be broadcast on RSN with Tom Werme, James Bates and Abby Labar on the call. Kickoff is set for 12:30 p.m. The game can also be heard on the Blue Devil Sports Network from LEARFIELD through the Varsity app or GoDuke.com

David Cutcliffe Duke Football Head Coach
(Ref.: Opening Statement)
"Good afternoon. I hope everybody's doing well. It's been a busy couple of days, as you might imagine. I'll open up with a statement about the North Carolina game that will hopefully answer many of the questions that may be floating in your head. I know we addressed some of this right afterwards, but really it comes down to we didn't do anything consistently that wins games. We did some good things on both sides of the ball, but nothing consistently that will win you football games. For example, we lost the turnover game, two to zero. That proved to be huge in that game. Offensively, we didn't finish drives. We moved the ball, but there are no points involved when you don't finish drives. I mean, a very critical opportunity that was missed more often than it should be. We gave up explosive plays. They had seven plays, that equaled 275 yards. That's 40 yards a play. We only produce three explosives in the game. These are things that are certainly counterproductive. What's the answer? Everybody wonders, and I've told our team this and I've told our staff this and I mentioned it, it all starts here. When those things as a team aren't happening, that's the head football coach. You own it and everybody has to own their own area. You own it, and then you run to the solutions. You don't walk. You don't run away ever. You run to the solutions. The solutions occur in the planning and the solutions occur on the practice field. It's really not all of that complex. People say, 'how do you get back up?' We're not down. You don't get back up when you're not down. You don't have time to get down in college football. You can't perform when you're doing this. So, we have to find that avenue that runs up here at a high rate of speed and a high productivity spot and stay in it. That's where my mind is, if you can't tell. It's been a lot of work right now to this point and a lot more work to do those things, to find those solutions. That's where we are.

"Quickly onto Georgia Tech. Georgia Tech's an extremely talented football team. Offensively, a lot of weapons starts with the quarterback, running back and receivers, but their offensive line is playing better. Defensively, they have a lot of speed on defense. They're different than they've been in the past. They've played a little bit of both of the defenses, but here recently, they've kind of settled into a three-down front. They've got really good interior people so they can two-gap you at center. They're a very similar concept to what I've seen Iowa State do over the last few years. A lot of work is going to go into that. I have great respect for the job that they do coaching. Their young people play really hard. They're good in the area of the kicking game. They're good on defense and they're good on offense. They ran into a very good Pittsburgh team, had some bad breaks early, got behind, but that game was pretty much an outlier. We've got a lot of work to get ready for."

(Ref.: On Duke's penalties)
"Well, I have to look in the mirror. Penalties don't just come from the practice field. How well are we listening in meetings? Are we really hearing what's said? And then once we learn here, what are we doing to act upon it once we get to the field. As a head coach, you can measure that really more than you think you can. I've got to do a much better job at making sure that we're hearing loud and clear. We started that process yesterday a little better. I don't ever think we have to reinvent the wheel because we have a really good program. But, that's all me. Maybe it's trusting too much. We got great young people, but you just can't trust that it has to be acted upon. We're not going to have an abundance of penalties. We had three penalties in the kicking game. It hurt. We had false starts, so we had pre-snap penalties. It's mine and I'm going to handle my business."

(Ref.: On how to teach and coach how to handle adversity)
"The way you do that, and it's become more difficult in the climate that we practice in, you create adversity at practice. You carry them to the wall. That's the way it's always been. You want to find out what a player's got at practice, not in the game. So, if you can't get up off the ground in practice consistently and give your best effort, then it's going to show up in a ball game. There is a balance there. I think you have to, again, create some adversity that has to be overcome at the practice field. Yet at the same time, we have limited numbers, limited opportunities to create that. I go back to my era as a player, my era early on in coaching, I don't think we could create now what we created then, you understand what I'm saying. That may be generationally problematic right now. If you understand what I'm talking about. Life is hard and I really believe I'm doing a disservice to them if I don't create more adversity because you know what, life later is going to be harder than Duke football or David Cutcliffe. So yeah, we've got to find a way to turn up the heat a little bit. That way, you know what they're capable of doing."

(Ref.: On the inconsistency of Georgia Tech and if that makes it harder to scout them)
"No, not really. We know we have to be our best. One thing you know is they have talent. A lot of speed. A lot of gifted athletes. So, you prepare for that. You can't ever control what somebody's mentality is going into a game other than your own. That's where we have to put our focus."

(Ref.: On studying the film and which games the coaching staff gets the most information from)
"Well, you take it all in. You're doing cut-ups, you're looking at games. We look at games as they happen. Then we cut up, you know, different formations that our defense is looking at. You look at our formations and what they've done against other opponents across the board. You know, football is going to be, to some degree, systematic regardless of an opponent. That's where you get the red eyes from. There's a lot to look at. As the season progresses, sometimes one of the worst enemies you have is watching too much. Offensively when I was younger, I used to call it blocking ghost. You're thinking for them. You have to be careful not to anticipate too many things and then be so systematically sound yourself and focused on your own team that regardless of how somebody lines up or what they do, that you're in a good position to win."

(Ref.: On Georgia Tech quarterback Jeff Sims)
"Well, he was their starting quarterback a year ago. He's been hurt and beat up a little bit. He's just a heck of a football player. I mean, there's no counter to it. You got to play. They don't change what they're doing with him or the other quarterback, so you just prepare yourself and play."

(Ref.: On the defense's play and progression throughout the season)
"Yeah, you look at all of it. One of the first things when I went in yesterday to the defense for the first time after I had graded the film, I told them very quickly we got better. And we did. We were better at a lot of techniques and a lot of little things that helped us. I think it was 56 or 57 percent of their plays were three yards or less. That's good production. They're going to make plays when they're a good team, but you had a 75-yard score and whatever the other one was, two big, long scores. Then the offense gave up a score. So, you learn from that. Those seven plays teach us a lot, but those other 50 plays teach you a lot. I think we've worked really hard at practice. I think we've had a good plan, good versus good to get both sides of the ball physically better at the front, and it all starts there and we're going to continue that. Yeah, we rushed the passer better. We've got to be technique wise, a bit better in the back end and avoid giving up explosive throws. We have to continue to work at tackling better. This team, Georgia Tech, is very difficult to tackle - the quarterback, the running back and then receivers as well. You have to be intentional about that every week. We're going to have to see improvement in our defense to be able to minimize the damage because we're going to play good teams every week. Just look at the list. It's challenging. But this week, thank goodness we're only having to play one team and we're going to focus on them."

(Ref.: On if the young defensive line has progressed and matured)
"Yeah, I think not across the board, but yeah, many of them without question. I want to see more earn playing time. We've got some ability at those positions and I'm talking about people maybe you hadn't even seen yet. That's got to be an emphasis. That was a big part of our staff meeting today, how many folks can we get ready to play? Then we own it as a staff, but then they have to own it. If you don't play, it's not because we don't like you. It's because you haven't earned on the practice tape. I look at defense, offense and kicking, and if they're not ready to play, they're not going to play. If they're ready to play, we're going to get them in the game to some degree. That's an area where I think we can grow people is in that defensive front."

(Ref.: On facing another strong dual-threat quarterback)
"Early we really struggled with it. We've gotten a little bit better. I think you struggle against any team that has a quarterback that can really run the ball and throw it. That's where the dilemma comes in, because a plus one run gives them a better number. There's a hat for a hat in the blocking when the guy that's running the ball is the quarterback and you're now using the back as a blocker. So, a lot of people are having a lot of success with plus one runs, including us at times. You got to defeat blocks better. When everything is even in matched up and we try to gap things out and build a fence, people still got to get off blocks. You've got to win those points of emphasis or defeating a block, that's the best way to defend a good running quarterback."

(Ref.: On how much different it is to pass rush a mobile quarterback)
"Yeah, you can't rush frightened. You have to believe in rush lanes. You have to go to the proper shoulder. You have to have an element of contain. You would prefer most of the time, not all the time that a quarterback is up in the pocket because you got somebody that can defeat a block in there and get them and they get outside the pocket. We all know how fast that young man from Kansas was and we let him get outside the pocket. We minimized the damage in that game, but you have to be very aware of containment with those guys. I like quarterbacks often that move up in the pocket from my perspective, because I think you're buying time and you can throw it or you can find vertical lanes. You are all talking about things that keep me up at night and how to contain a really good athlete at quarterback is one of them."

(Ref.: On what Gunnar Holmberg learned from a tough game on Saturday)
"I think he realizes we left opportunities on the field. We're a read and react offense. We ran the ball, particularly early, well enough. You have to respond to their response. We didn't do that well enough. They decided they were going to do everything they could to stop the run. You have to respond to a response. You have to read all that on the run. They're very gifted and quick, and they got a couple of folks up front that are really hard to deal with. Your time is minimal. We've got to separate in coverage better than we did. We got stuck some. I have to help that, just various different releases and things that you need. That's a huge part of the whole concept thing. They're very aggressive natured defensively, North Carolina, I'm speaking of. Well, guess what? We got the same animal again this week that moves well and runs well and has a lot of athletes on the field. It's a test, but we have to be up for the test. We've had a lot of serious good discussions with the staff starting yesterday. Good commentary with the players. Again, it's just all of us owning it. What else can you do? It goes first to me. But my owning it means it may not be a lot of pleasant things always going on around me sometimes. So that's just the way of life."

(Ref.: On the difference between Mataeo Durant's performance in the first half versus the second half)
"A little bit of adjustment. Like I said when asked about Gunnar, we have to respond to their response. We're built for it. We've got to do a better job of doing that. When Mataeo is getting hit off the backside by a free hat and things like that, that slows you down. When we got a hat for a hat, we were really successful against them. That's a big part of it, always. Then we got to have more and more players. I think Jordan Waters has done well, but I think there's a factor of fatigue that occurs with a running back. You get hit that much and you're running that much. To be real honest with you, that was hotter than any of our games early this year because it was hot on artificial turf. We need more people ready to help and contribute and play."

#GoDuke

David Cutcliffe Press Conference Quotes: Georgia Tech

Players Mentioned

Mataeo Durant

Gunnar Holmberg

Jordan Waters

Duke information

David Cutcliffe Press Conference Quotes: Georgia Tech

Related News

Players Mentioned

Mataeo Durant

Gunnar Holmberg

Jordan Waters

Related Videos

Duke information