Why Dave Doeren believes Georgia Tech win can be catalyst for upset at Miami
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- N.C. State upset ranked Georgia Tech, sparking multiple national and ACC awards.
- Coach Doeren urges focus on practice, execution and mentality after emotional win.
- Wolfpack travels to Miami as 14.5-point underdogs with slim playoff and bowl hopes.
Negative commentary surrounded N.C. State football for weeks after losing four of its last five games. Then the Wolfpack put together a well-rounded performance to upset an eighth-ranked and undefeated Georgia Tech team at home.
Suddenly, head coach Dave Doeren is the Bear Bryant National Coach of the Week, among other awards. Duke Scott earned recognition from the ACC, Associated Press and Maxwell Football Club. CJ Bailey received National Quarterback of the Week recognition from three organizations. CBS Sports named Kurt Roper its ACC Offensive Coordinator of the Week. Teague Andersen grabbed an ACC nod, too.
Those successes, however, are temporary and the challenge now is to replicate them.
“I think winning does a lot of things,” Doeren said. “It improves your mood. You tell the staff and the team this, the water even tastes better when you win. … I’m excited for them that they got that taste. Now I’m also on edge with them about, ‘Hey, you gotta let the win go, just like you let a loss go.’ We gotta get back to how you win a game and remember what it took to make that happen.”
N.C. State heads to No. 16 Miami (7-2, 3-2 ACC) for its final road game of the season and second consecutive game against a ranked opponent. The Hurricanes are considered one of the ACC’s four teams most likely to make the College Football Playoff. The Wolfpack (5-4, 2-3) would like a say in that.
Its success hinges on the same factors as the win a week and a half ago: Practicing hard and practicing well, executing plays in the game, having eye discipline, overcoming difficulty and maintaining faith, the team’s word of the week. Doeren said it deserved to be the team’s focus heading into the final stretch of the season and its final road trip.
This season has been an emotional roller coaster, but Doeren said his players are resilient. They have overcome a lot in their personal lives, having faith that they could, and now they’re trying to do that on the field and finish well. The Georgia Tech game was one step toward that goal.
“Faith obviously has a lot of meaning in the football world for us. It’s believing in the journey and never flinching in the face of adversity,” Doeren said. “Playing on the road in an NFL stadium against a team that has all these accolades, you can’t achieve anything you don’t believe can happen. For us, it’s faith in the journey, faith in the plays that are being called, faith in the player, the teammate, the brother that you’re playing with.”
The ACC features parity from top to bottom. . Doeren said there is no easy out. The margin of error is slim, and can come down to one play. It’s rare to see numerous 30-point blowouts. Five teams have lost only one conference game; Miami, Louisville and Clemson are not among them.
That parity can be difficult when a team is on the top — see Virginia’s loss to Wake Forest — but it gives other teams hope for success. It’s a competitive conference and that’s what makes it special.
For N.C. State, it enters Hard Rock Stadium as a 14.5-point underdog but six of the program’s last games against Miami have been decided by an average of 7.4 points. There is a chance for the Wolfpack to win if the focus, effort and attention to detail are the same, if not better, than what it put on film two weeks ago against Georgia Tech.
There’s a lot on the line for both teams. Miami wants to keep its playoff hopes alive, either as the league champion or an at-large recipient. N.C. State, while unlikely, Pro Football Focus and playoff simulators say has a shot at the ACC Championship and the conference’s automatic bid. But it’s definitely still fighting for a bowl game. Those are still important to the program.
“You’ve got to show up every week,” Doeren said. “You better have your guys ready to play. … It’s very competitive, well-balanced, and there is no bottom. These teams that are at the lower half of our conference, from a win-loss standpoint, a lot of their losses are one possession games, and they’re fighting till the end.
“Every single play that you have right now in the ACC, it’s anybody’s game, any Saturday.”
This story was originally published November 10, 2025 at 7:22 PM.
