University of North Carolina Athletics
Assistant Coach Quotes
January 10, 2007 | Football
Jan. 10, 2007
Charlie Williams, wide receivers coach
On whether he was expecting Coach Davis to call:
No, not at the time. But, as you know good things happen and when I got the call I was excited about the opportunity to get back together with him, especially when he started talking about the other guys he was going to get back together.
On how many of the other assistants he's known before:
I have known John - for a pretty long time. We did an internship with the Dallas Cowboys when Butch was there, and Chuckie's dad gave me my first job. I went to school in Colorado. So Chuck Pagano, his dad gave me my first job and we coached together for a year at Miami.
On the coaching community:
It's a small world in the community of coaches when you are flying around going to different places and hooking up with one another, and it's an even smaller world when you don't have a job.
On what led him to accept the job:
Everybody that I talked to that I am pretty close to that I asked about this job, everybody, to a man, said that I'd be crazy not to accept. They talked about Chapel Hill; they talked about the quality of living, the school systems and everything. For me to have this opportunity to get back with Coach Davis is a great thing because I've learned so much from him, and I know there is a lot more learning ahead. I watched him even when I wasn't with him, turn programs around. I left to go to Tampa Bay, maybe a couple of years before he left to go to the Cleveland Browns, and when he left, those next two years they went back-to-back to the national championship, so that speaks for itself.
On UNC's potential:
Well, the sky is the limit. If everything can come together the way that we envision it, the way that we think it can, it can be a beautiful thing.
John Blake, associate head coach, recruiting coordinator, defensive line coach
On his plan for the immediate future:
I think the thing that is important is that we focus on the players that we already have recruited here and make sure that they get the feel and understanding and direction that we are going in as a program. I think the most important thing is that we make sure the kids here at North Carolina - that they feel a part of this institution and then we go from there. But again, I think our focus, the plan that coach Davis and I will put together is that we go after the best players in the country, that is, the best players that fit what we want to do here for a national championship Most importantly, that they want to be good student-athletes, so, we have a criteria with regards to the type of player we want to recruit to North Carolina.
On if North Carolina will be the sole focus:
No, we're going to go everywhere. We're going to hit those key guys. Certain days it will depend on Coach Davis' schedule because he's going to be flying quite a bit. It's a tremendous team effort though. I think when players come in and evaluate your football team, they look at the cohesiveness of your staff and how you get along as a football staff, and if they can see that, they can see that there is something special going on here at North Carolina.
On the recruiting task at hand without a full staff:
It's always better in numbers because you cover more ground, but we have a system in place that gives us a chance to go out and focus on key guys. If you get the key guys, you have a good recruiting class. You can have ten good ones and one great one or you can have three or four great ones and so many good ones and you've got a great class. You've got to get the guys who make great plays even when you don't coach well. If you get a bad call, he can still make a play. That's the kind of guy I like.
Steve Hagen, tight ends and H-backs coach:
On Davis' coaching style:
He's aggressive, fundamental, and it's fun. The kids will love it. It's strict and structured, but it's the right way to do it. It has proven itself. I wasn't with him in Miami, but he won, and when we went to the Browns we won, so it proves itself.
On whether Coach Davis likes a lot of input from his staff:
Yeah, I think he likes it. He's got a direction, and he knows what he wants to do, but he doesn't rule with an iron fist. He wants what is best for the program at all times, so he definitely is willing to have input, but he also has to make the last call. He has the most knowledge about what is best for the whole program within the university. I may just have a suggestion based on my needs, but he's got the global view of it.
On what Coach Davis has that makes coaches want to coach under him:
He's a winner. He's organized, he's demanding and fair, he's structured, he's all the things it takes to be a great leader and a winner. He has won everywhere he has been.
On what Coach Davis will bring to the University of North Carolina:
I don't want to compare him to who was here because I don't know him, but what I will tell you is all I do know about him. He's going to bring a demanding structure that is going to put the kids in position to win football games, and if they don't buy into it, they are going to have to go, which is good, that's what you want. It's easy to be an assistant coach under that type of structure. It's no different than your own children at the elementary school when the teacher sends the kid to the principal's office and the principal doesn't deal with him and sends him back. Now you've got problems. In this type of situation, we don't have those issues because Butch handles all of that stuff. This isn't his first rodeo, he's done it before. He is good and we'll win. We will win.
Chuck Pagano, defensive coordinator
On what Carolina's successful NFL players help show:
It shows that they can still put out NFL players when they are not winning in college. I think it is just a matter of bringing a group of young men together and teaching them how to play as a team, to play as an offense, play as a defense, and play as a special teams unit and then tying that whole thing together and playing great as a team. In the NFL, you've got great players from some of the most obscure, tiny colleges. How they got there, everybody has got their own story. But I think blending everything together and getting those kids to play as one and as a team and play tough, smart football, then I think that not only will you send people to the NFL, but you will also start to win and you will see the product of that.
On if UNC is a sleeping giant:
Absolutely. I spent four years at ECU in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and I had a chance to sit back and see what Coach (Mack) Brown did here and see what he had built before he left for the University of Texas. I look at the players that are in the NFL, some of the more dominant, perennial Pro-Bowl players like Julius Peppers that have come through here, and it's great. Another reason I did come here is because of the quality of life and, geographically, where it's located. I am from the West, I grew up in Boulder, Colorado, but you can't find a finer place to live and to raise a family. The atmosphere, the academic and athletic integrity of this school, where it's located - there are just too many great things here that if we go out and do what we're supposed to do, as far as recruiting goes, we'll attract great players here, and we'll start to build this thing and get it to what Coach Davis is saying. Yeah it is a sleeping giant.
Sam Pittman, offensive line coach
On his prior connections to the staff:
My connection with Coach Davis really was John Blake. I was his offensive line coach at Oklahoma the last two of his three years. That was my connection. Larry Zierlein is a good friend of mine, and Larry Zierlein was Coach Davis' offensive line coach with the Cleveland Browns. Those are the two guys, probably the only two guys that I knew. To be honest with you, when this thing first started happening, I was setting in, and I don't think a lot of times guys are willing to go into the MAC and hire coaches. When you go to the media and say, "I got this guy from here, this guy from here, this guy from Northern Illinois," some guys just won't do it because they think the media will beat them up for the choice. I came in and interviewed like everyone else, and I'm here and dang happy to be here. I believe that things happen for a reason, and I believe you won't be too worried about the offensive line here for the next few years.
On whether the likelihood of having more talent at UNC than he had at Northern Illinois increases his confidence:
Obviously, you would like to level the playing field as much as you possibly can, and then go ahead and schematically do your thing. But I always thought that if we could get on a grand stage, if we could get to be the main attraction and not the opening act, that we could be something special at Northern Illinois. It was special at Northern Illinois, and I had a great time there, but I also thought that if we could level the playing field a bit more, then we could have even more success. Certainly, I don't want to take anything away from them because we had two great backs there that could play in the ACC without any doubt, so I don't know. I'm excited to see what happens.
On his preferred blocking schemes:
We're going to do the zone schemes. We're going to run the stretch a little differently than most people do because I like to pull guys. If we have guys that can run, I want to pull the center, I want to pull the guard, I want to pull the tackle, but I'm not doing it for dressing. Everything we do is going to have a reason behind it. I want to do that because I want to be able to down black, take the angles, kick out here and roll the center around, so if we're going to inside-zone scheme, we're going to run it where we can fit two to possibly three double teams.
We're not going to go say "all the sudden, now I'm at Carolina, and I got a guy that's as good as their guy." If we can slap two on him and then come off and do things, we're going to try to find out what we call "can't-be-wrongs"; we're going to call the right play where we can get double teams or angles. We have been a big inside-zone or stretch team and a power and counter team with several different ways to do it: by changing one guy here and there but yet cutting the defense in the "A-gap" or in the "C-gap" or something where the safeties can't come fit down outside on us. Obviously people say, "Just throw the football if they do," but there's going to be a point in time when it's third-and-two that you want to cram it up in there and make a statement. So there are a lot of different entry points for the back where you can stay away from a safety creeping down, you can maybe split the "C-gap" and maybe hit a homer at the time. We don't have our coordinator hired, so obviously we're going to do as a staff what is best for our football team, but to answer your question, in the past it's been the inside zone, the outside zone, the power and the counter, and the one back draw.
