Coach Dave Doeren says NC State’s traffic jam of talent is ‘not a bad thing’ to have
N.C. State signed 20 freshmen to its class of 2021.
There’s a chance not one of them plays any significant snaps this season — and that’s a good thing, according to head coach Dave Doeren.
Thanks to the NCAA granting an extra year of eligibility due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there are super seniors on the roster. The Wolfpack was already expecting to return a lot of veterans, so there seems to be extra bodies on the team in certain position groups.
With the added depth returning, plus the incoming recruits, more than 100 players will all fight for playing time this fall. Those returning, though, won’t be easy to dethrone. That means some talented freshman will have to wait their turn, and Doeren is alright with that.
“We’ll have some really talented guys fighting to get on the field that may not, and that’s OK,” Doeren said. “If they have to redshirt and learn from some veteran players, that’s not a bad thing for us to have that situation.”
That could mean a guy like wide receiver Micah Crowell, the top rated player in the class, a guy who enrolled in January, could do more watching this season than catching. Doeren didn’t expect to have Emeka Emezie and C.J. Riley back for their super senior year, adding that the receiver room is “a little heavy.”
How heavy? Junior wide receiver Thayer Thomas said there are 21 guys in the receiver room and about 15 of them could contribute.
Linebackers Jordan Poole and Caden Fordham also enrolled early. They both made big plays in the spring game on defense. Poole, the No. 15 player in North Carolina according to 247Sports, and Fordham will have a hard time cracking the rotation with what’s considered the best linebacker group in the ACC — Isaiah Moore, Drake Thomas, Payton Wilson — playing in front of them. Not to mention reserves like Vi Jones and Jaylon Scott, who started a combined five games a year ago.
Doeren knew a few years ago that the classes of 2018 and ‘19 had the potential to make 2021 special. With the logjam at so many positions, however, the class of 2021 has work cut out for them to play a lot of snaps. In the projected two-deep, the only positions where freshmen pop up are at quarterback and center. Redshirt freshman Ben Finley, who played in one game a year ago, and true freshman Aaron McLaughlin backup quarterback Devin Leary. Junior center Grant Gibson is backed up by rookies Lyndon Cooper and Ethan Lane.
Taking a back seat
Cornerback Shyheim Battle thought he was ready to play in 2019.
Now having started a year and entering his third fall camp, his honesty about the situation is refreshing. Looking at film from 2019, Battle admits he can even see the difference in how he moved.
He didn’t have the confidence or the mindset to go out everyday and compete for a starting spot.
“I had to take that back seat,” Battle said. “I wasn’t ready.”
And it was more than just going out there and making plays. In the 12 games he started a year ago, Battle never played in front of a packed house. The biggest crowd he played in front of was 10,000 at a neutral site in the TaxSlayer GatorBowl. He did travel to every game in 2019 and stood on the sideline in front of hostile crowds. He admitted he might not have been mentally ready to handle that as a freshman. Now he’s in a better place, mentally, to adjust. And if he needed any other reminders that he wasn’t ready back then, there’s always that first time he saw Boston College running back A.J. Dillon up close.
“He was like 240,” Battle recalls. “I was only like 175, yeah I didn’t want to touch him. That was my wake up call.”
Not ready for prime time
The good news for the younger players is they can see action in up to four games and 2021 will still be a redshirt season.
For the guys who have done it, looking back, it turned out to be the right call. Of course, coming out of high school where guys are used to never coming off the field, redshirting can be a humbling experience. With depth and experience across the board, a lot of these guys probably won’t have much choice. It’s a credit to the roster Doeren has built and the guys remaining healthy.
Coming out of Rocky Mount High in 2019, Battle thought he was ready to play, so did defensive tackle C.J. Clark. Both players saw action in just four games and took a redshirt. Battle started all 12 games last season and now realizes sitting, watching and learning was the best thing for him.
“In all reality you’re just not ready yet,” Battle said. “It’s really not your time. “So I would tell those guys to stay mentally focused.”
Standing on the sidelines for most of 2019 pushed Battle through winter and summer workouts, knowing he didn’t want to just be a spectator in 2020. He was one of just three players on defense to start every game a year ago.
Clark was the No. 2 player in the class of 2019, but only saw action in two games, on special teams, his first year. He was playing behind two future NFL draft picks in Larrell Murchison and Alim McNeill. At the time he handled the situation as best he could by learning from the guys ahead of him.
“The person that’s in front of you, there’s a reason they are in front of you,” Clark said. “I just learned from the older guys. Watching what they did on and off the field. Just taking advantage of that and learning from them.”
Moore has noticed so far that Poole and Fordham have bought into the program and trust the older guys in front of them. When Moore was a young player for N.C. State, he learned from guys like Germaine Pratt, Jerod Fernandez and Airius Moore. Now Moore is one of the best leaders on the deepest team Doeren has ever had. If the young guys don’t flood a guy like Moore with questions daily, it would be a wasted opportunity.
“If they don’t take advantage of that, that’s on them,” Doeren said. “It’s something we will point out as coaches and our older players do a good job, you (see) that at practice, they help the younger guys, they talk to them, they coach them. Sometimes younger guys think they know everything and they have regret not taking advantage of a learning moment like that. It’s definitely something we’re hopeful that they get a lot out of that, standing and watching, which is hard. These guys are used to playing every snap in high school. If they are not getting those reps, hopefully they get them mentally.”
This story was originally published August 6, 2021 at 1:47 PM.
