Story Links
Nov. 18, 2000
COACHES’ COMMENTS
VIRGINIA 24, NORTH CAROLINA STATE 17
UVa Head Coach George Welsh:
We thought that we could run the ball on them with three or four powerplays, but, boy, the way they played us, they had one safety at linebackerdepth and as soon as the ball was snapped, the other safety was coming.They had nine guys in there sometimes, and that makes it hard to run. Thesafeties were making hits two yards beyond the line of scrimmage when wetried to run, so we had to throw the ball.
We worked really hard to take away there screen plays, and I think we did apretty good job doing that. We didn’t want Koren Robinson to beat us, buthe almost did. We probably made a mistake kicking off to him all of thosetimes. We just played our defense and we tried not to show our coverage sosoon — until at least the ball was snapped. We didn’t want them to beat uswith screens and middle ducks, so we worked hard on stopping those.
I thought [Bryson Spinner] did a very good job. He ran the team well. Hethrew the ball well. He was right on the money when he had to be. He is anoutside threat for us. He played with a lot of poise. … It is nice tohave a quarterback that can get out of trouble on his own and create.That’s the big word now — he can create.
We really knew on Wednesday [that Dan Ellis would not play]. He couldn’teven take a snap and drop back. It was pretty evident then. I just didn’twant to tell North Carolina State. … I don’t know [if Ellis will playNov. 25 at Virginia Tech]. He’s not ready yet.
I think Tyree [Foreman] has done a great job for us. He makes good cuts.He’s smart. I wish we could throw him the ball more because he is a verygood receiver, but we don’t seem to be able to do that. We’d like to gethim in the pass offense more.
I’m not hung up on seven wins, but it would be nice to get it since it isagainst Tech. I think this team has worked hard. We’ve had some badoutings, but they’ve kept the faith and worked hard on the practice field.I think we’ve shown up on a couple of Saturdays — a Thursday night, justrecently — and we just weren’t in the right frame of mind. I think theydeserve to go to a bowl.
N.C. State Head Coach Chuck Amato:
Virginia showed great character and fought to the very end. That is atribute to an outstanding coach who has done an unbelievable job here.
Second-string quarterbacks are giving us fits. Two weeks ago at Maryland, asecond-string quarterback came in and won the game for them. Spinner did agood job for them today. He made the big plays. He did a great job ofscrambling. We’ve got to learn to contain that type of quarterback so hecan’t get out of the pocket. It comes back to discipline. We need to do thelittle things right. Spinner came up with a number of plays that put themin the position to win this football game. … We were going to come afterhim, and make him throw the fade and execute. He executed.
We win and we will get a bowl invitation and we may if we don’t. But we aregoing to go out there [vs. Wake Forest on Nov. 25] to do everything we canto win our seventh game.
On Philip Rivers:
He’s a true freshman. He’s 18 years old. He’s taken alot of hits this year, a lot. He’s tougher than nails. He’s a winner. He’sthe leader of our football team. But we can’t just hang our hat on him. Hedid have some pretty doggone good drives, but we won’t be good until weplay defense the way defense is meant to be played. When we score, we’vegot to learn to stop somebody and get the ball back for ouroffense, andthen maybe Philip would have done better. He might have had more at bats — and there were times his at bats were pretty good. He’s done more for thisfootball team in ten games than we ever thought. We tend to forget what hisage is. And if you count the number of times he’s been hit in the last tengames, you might not even be here writing with that pencil. You’d have asub in here doing that for you.