University of North Carolina Athletics
Postgame Quotes
October 26, 2013 | Football
Postgame Quotes • Oct. 26, 2013
North Carolina 34, Boston College 10
North Carolina Head Coach Larry Fedora
Opening Statement
"Much different feeling in that locker room tonight. A much-needed win. We played not error-free football, but we played with a lot less mistakes than we have in our previous games and it showed tonight. I thought our defense did a really nice job against them. We gave up one run for 56 yards there that hurt us, but other than that they got after it, I mean they really did a nice job. We knew that we would not hold them to 50 yards rushing, because they've got a good running back and they are going to run the football, but overall when you hold someone to 56 or 55 yards passing on 11 receptions that's pretty dang good, so I thought those guys did a nice job. Offensively, we challenged those guys when we got into the red zone to finish the drives off this week and they responded well. We made some plays down there. We continued to use both quarterbacks and I thought it was pretty effective for us throughout the game."
On how using two quarterbacks affects the rhythm of the offense
"Anytime you're moving the chains you're going to have a better rhythm. I've got to give both of those quarterbacks some praise as far as how they're handling that transition between the two. A lot of people are going to tell you that you can't do that, that it's going to mess with the flow of the game - but they really are doing a great job. It's a seamless transition between the two. They're very comfortable with it."
On the running game
"Yeah, I mean it's the same way it's always been. We're going to go with a guy and try to find the hot guy, and whoever is the hot guy is going to probably get more carries. I thought Romar [Morris] was doing a pretty nice job while he was in there. We started out with [A.J.] Blue, and Blue is a guy that's going to give us everything he's got every time. We know he's going to be where he's supposed to be. He's going to take care of us in pass protection - he's probably the best. And from there we move on through the line and whoever becomes the hot guy is the guy that gets the majority of the carries."
On what this game says about the character of the team
"I know everybody questioned the frame of mind of our kids, and it's understandable. But I'm telling you, you come back out and the guys put it behind them, which they'll do this week also. They practiced the same way they've practiced all year, they really have. [They've had] great attitudes and we're getting after them in practice, now. It's not like we're out there putting our arms around them with hugs and kisses. We're getting after it, and they've had a great attitude. They really have. And they understand what it's going to take to be successful, and tonight we got it done."
UNC Players
Bryn Renner, Senior, QB
On what contributed to his most accurate game of the season:
"Just patience. I think the whole offense did a great job of being patient today."
On the importance of the sense of urgency among the team:
"I think [the sense of urgency] was huge. I think we carried it over from the Miami game, we looked at the positives and said, you know, we're an inch away from being a great football team."
On his awareness and approach to his individual numbers and records:
"I'm not aware of them, but I think I'll look back on them after the season. We have a lot more football to play and my goal is to get this team to a bowl game. We're 2-5 right now and we have a lot of games left to play, but we can do it."
Kareem Martin, Senior, Defensive End
On what the defense did differently today that they hadn't been doing up until this point:
"Limiting big plays. They [Boston College] had that one run early on but we didn't let that phase us. Something happened on our part, it's nothing that they did. We limited the big plays."
After the last game, was there any type of talk or communication about what you all needed to do and how you needed to go about doing it [for this game] or was it one of those unspoken things that everyone knew about? :
"Oh, we knew. We knew that we played with a lot of effort in the Miami game, and we knew that there were only a few plays that really changed the title of that game and that if we could eliminate those plays we'd be a better football team."
On the sense of relief after winning the first home game in roughly two months:
"It just feels great. I think the guys are going to be able to build off of this and keep pushing forward."
Bug Howard, Freshman, Wide Receiver
On rallying the team after three stagnant drives at the beginning of the second half:
"We just went out and encouraged our guys. If things aren't going well, [we] just keep encouraging them. That was a big part of today- just having fun, getting back to having fun and playing the game the way it's supposed to be played."
On how great today felt to get the win:
"It felt great. Just going out and executing what we've been practicing on and getting it done."
Boston College Head Coach Steve Addazio
Opening Statement
"Obviously we are disappointed. It wasn't a lack of effort. We actually played pretty darn hard and physical. But we didn't play well. We played with a lot of intensity today. We were woeful on third down. Third down was really hard for us, we had some real critical penalties that kicked us into from third and short to third and medium/longs at critical times. We were working on establishing the running game. We rushed for over 200 yards but we threw for some woeful amount and we dropped too many balls. Balls hit us in the chest and ricocheted down to the ground. We took some sacks that we didn't need to take. I thought the offensive line actually protected pretty well. The combination of the dropped balls and the sacks I think really skewed our third down. We were five of 16 on third down and we left minimally four or five of those on the field and we can't do that. You can see we still rushed the ball for over 200 yards. Imagine if we could convert those third downs - that's a whole different deal going on. On defense, we let up too many third and longs, and too many big plays, and that crushed us. Screens and quarterback draws were big plays in that game. We need to execute at a higher level. We need to play better. We played with great toughness and great integrity but we didn't play well. We knew there would be disappointments along the way. I would clearly put this in the disappointment category. Credit to North Carolina they were backed up against the wall here at home and came out swinging."
On Andre Williams fumbling on the second play
"I don't know what happened on that yet. I don't know if there was an exchange problem. It never got seated. It was never in, he never had it. It's uncharacteristic, it's not something that has been a problem. It's not something that's happened."
On the quarterback play of Chase Rettig
"I think he had some good balls that were put on the ground and then some ones that throughout college football are caught. They may not be perfect strikes, but they were there. They've got to get caught, you have to help the quarterback. The thing that we want to do a better job of is when we get out of the pocket we want to be able to get the ball out of bounds and not take sacks where we don't need to take sacks."
On the Renner-Williams combination
"It was what we thought it would be. To their credit they executed some plays. Williams executed some really nice QB draws. We got after Renner and we did some good things there. But to that kid's credit, he did some real nice things throwing the ball. They had some guys make some plays for them."
