Light it Red

Griffin Cunningham 0:10
Hey daddy gang. Is that a good intro?

Stone Boylan 0:15
I can't believe you just said that

Griffin Cunningham 0:17
wrong podcast

Ok ay, yeah, well,

welcome back to light it red

Patrick Simon 0:26
Here we go?

Griffin Cunningham 0:28
Today is the third.

We have a several exciting things that we need to talk about with our listeners. We're all very excited to talk about it too. We've got, we're going to do a quick preview and then we're going to jump right in with football.

If you haven't heard about anything going on football, you're in for a treat. Volleyball, huge on campus right now and then we'll round it out with basketball schedules. So very exciting stuff. Just to kick it off. We'll talk about women's soccer. They lost to the number one ranked team in the country, North Carolina. They lost 4-0, but the attendance record was broken. 3972 people attended Dale soccer field.

And that was you know, maybe because there were a lot of UNC fans there. They probably definitely were a lot of UNC fans there but it's still kind of a cool thing.

Patrick Simon 1:31
It was a couple UNC friends. Yeah. Went out their car at me when I was walking on Hillsborough.

Griffin Cunningham 1:35
Yeah, they travel well

Patrick Simon 1:36
Attendance Record Though

Yeah. So they upcoming they have to unranked teams on the schedule. Virginia Tech on the fifth and then Virginia on the eighth. Virginia is at home Virginia Tech's on the road.

Stone Boylan 1:50
Hopefully we can own that entire State of Virginia.

Griffin Cunningham 1:53
Get Virginia. I very possible. They're not like

Patrick Simon 1:56
vicious roadtrip,

Griffin Cunningham 1:58
the women's soccer team really isn't that bad. They just, they're not going to win against good teams, basically.

And then, you know, that's just how it goes sometimes. But like we brought up last episode, though, they are immune to road vers home. It's not like they thrive on at home. They just didn't win either way. So yeah, we might be able to take both. Um, just a quick note that I had when I was at that game, interviewed. Coach Centauro he didn't seem very surprised about this one. So it was kind of refreshing. Because usually a coach will, you know, be super upset about losing especially when the season not going as planned. But he you know, he took it in stride. Yeah, Carolina's women's you know, yeah, like amazing. Yeah, really tear yourself down like that.

Unknown Speaker 2:43
But it does, it is unfortunate that they couldn't really ride the momentum of the 00 tie against Duke. The offense is still struggling, but in that UNC game.

Unknown Speaker 2:53
Goalkeeper She's a junior transferred transferred from Louisville. She made eight saves in that game. She gave it four but she did make a save. She's working very hard.

Unknown Speaker 3:03
She was thrust in the lineup after injury to the starter. Her name is Olivia for tapas. She seems to be doing well. So we'll see how that goes. And then obviously, Jimmy's Joseph has been the only bright spot on the team. And he had the only shot on goal. So the pretty much the only source of offense this season has been her. So probably why the scoring hasn't been where it needs to be. And I will kick it to Patrick for men's soccer. So we had a decent week. But the men's team had a win versus Gardner Webb, three to one.

Unknown Speaker 3:37
That was a home win. And we had a our first Unfortunately, our first home loss of the season to Notre Dame, three to one kind of similar thing to what you were saying for the women's team. You know, same thing with the men's team. I mean, you can't really expect to beat those type of good teams. But well, unfortunately, especially was the first time last season. Coming up we have on October 6, a home game versus Wake Forest as well as a home game versus American. Just the American Yeah. That's so it's an interesting name as an American like university is that it might be like it's one of those you've seen commercials and then it's like you don't think it's actually real American. Here we are. Just like a generic, very generic. No, it's verse every single American soccer player. Yeah, it'd be a very tough challenging it's versus the national Good luck actually. Really? Oh, just American. That was American

Unknown Speaker 4:32
Qigong.

Unknown Speaker 4:35
And then we have our golf men and women. They're playing at the blessings collegiate Invitational in Arkansas. They're actually playing as we record this, so we don't currently have the results on that. But look out for those. Hopefully we win. Hopefully we went fingers crossed that out, Nick Matthews. Hopefully he can do some damage in Vic and Vic stead.

Unknown Speaker 4:58
Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 5:01
Shout out to everyone who watched and listened to last episode,

Unknown Speaker 5:05
which we'll get next cross country, cross country.

Unknown Speaker 5:10
They just ran the GOP and Invitational in South Bend, Indiana. The men finished first in the men's open five mile and the women finished in first place for the women's blue 5k.

Unknown Speaker 5:22
I did not see a whole lot of individual standout performances, but

Unknown Speaker 5:28
good that the team as a whole is doing well. Cross country is both an individual and a team sport. So picking up where they left off from last year from the women especially so that's good, exactly.

Unknown Speaker 5:38
So that's about it. That's all we have for those sports that we you know, we wanted to give them time today, but we have some bigger news on some football and volleyball fronts. So I will kick it to stone because I know you have a lot that you want to say about this game. Well, I think we all do. But we can take the good news first, from this game.

Unknown Speaker 6:03
One, the atmosphere was awesome. I think all of us read that game. I just loved being there. Even if the outcome wasn't what we wanted. Up until like, the last two minutes. I was super hyped. The whole place was energetic. Maybe it's because it's a night game. And obviously we had the you know, all black out there. And I I just loved the atmosphere. Everything was when you score a touchdown, the lights, you know, when they went to read everything that was so cool. That was awesome. I love being there. And I think another bright spot can be for where we look at the defense because that was amazing. That was fun. That was probably the best performance they've had this year. And this defense has been one that has been the top of the ACC the past two years and I honestly think they just have proved and maybe even done that for a third year in a row. Tony gibson, who's the defensive coordinator along with Dave Doran both got that side of the ball very good. Have run defense is not only the best in the whole ACC, but it's probably top 10 in the entire country. And that's not an overstatement. They statistically and if you just watch them have been awesome. Aside from like a Notre Dame game. They've been very, very good. Peyton Wilson is a stud. I know we all love him. He's so awesome. The D line and the linebacking core is just so legit. I do think we have some issues on the back half, especially with Shaheen battle corner, he led up a good amount of catches. He had an interception in that game, which is kind of given to him. But even with that interception, he's still allowed a 106 passer rating. So if he didn't have that pick, he wouldn't let a perfect passer rating both of his picks with a quarterback just tossed up in the air. They weren't very like yeah, he it was a Lucky Pick, which gives us hope. But that was one thing I looked at and got away from and I think people understand that this quarterback we brought up last episode Jake Plummer, he was doing jack there Jack Plummer. Yeah, he's playing phenomenal. Before this game, the Louisville had the best offense in the ACC. And he had by far his worst game ever. And he had a worse game than Brennan Armstrong, as much as people don't want to realize that statistically, and just watching the game, he was not as good.

Unknown Speaker 8:30
A large part of that's also like I was talking about before the atmosphere if it was so loud, and you could tell he was getting flushed to the line with his calls. There was multiple times where he'd audible out and then no one no one picked up on the audible at all. You have to go back go to each go to each receiver offensive lineman and update them on the play. And I think just that that atmosphere definitely benefited. But yeah, I mean, going from having the best offense in the ACC to an absolute blunder is definitely an encouraging sign for the defense will shout it to the pack that we the reason that we made that environment happen. So that's good. I don't know. I think we touched on it. Last game. How was your game two experiences like we talked about that in the Notre Dame where you said you said you were up on the I think it was just in the General section for this game. I was I bought tickets with my friend and suitemate and we went up. It was like nosebleed as your friends. Yes. Shockingly, I didn't know I just saw

Unknown Speaker 9:24
you have fun when you meet him like, you know, three weeks ago or four weeks ago but we had just gotten nosebleed seats in the My parents, they were able to get seats that were pretty close there on the NC State side near their bench and they had two seats, but the two seats that were also next to them were never used. So for the second half, I was able to go there and watch the game. But students section was awesome. Everything else was was so sick. I loved it. And you said you sat in the press box as well. Yeah, this was my second

Unknown Speaker 9:54
game covering for agoraphobic this year. So I was up in the press box again trying to

Unknown Speaker 10:00
Get those quotes and get that media coverage. It's pretty chilly up there. That's like something that I'm having to accommodate to like they keep it a cool like 65 degrees in there. So I don't like that as much. You're just like wearing like a sweatpants. Yeah, I brought a sweater.

Unknown Speaker 10:16
It was cool. It was a cool experience up there. I, the I don't know that the tough thing about sitting through that is just, you can't, that energy doesn't penetrate through those glass windows, you know, we're isolated up there to an extent you can hear a little bit of it but not, but you're not getting the the experience. I've only been able to go to VMI as a fan, I just got a martial ticket. So we'll see if I go to that. If I don't, I will definitely give it to somebody else. If if I go as press. Well, we can preview the martial game later. But yeah, it's a big game because there has been a change at the quarterback position. And obviously we can go into one of you can start I don't care who Well, I was gonna say offense from last game. Um, you're, you're one of the notes that I just had watching that game was poor quarterback play. Yeah, that was my big thing. And then like you said, defensive.

Unknown Speaker 11:18
The defensive effort for NC State was really great. And I just wanted to say Peyton Wilson was named Top linebacker in the ACC this week. Just a cool deserving accolade. He had 10 tackles and two sacks so we already gave him his his credit there. But you know, he's getting recognition across the ACC and, you know, that might translate into something more very deserved once he's done with his time here. That's just the we're just all just like a Peyton Wilson fan club out here. And we're kind of we're on the same page now. Yeah, I think that's that's for now one of the few things that we agree so going go into bandhgala Go into the the poor side. What do we disagree on this game? Well, I just start off the poor side of this game because we know what it is. But you think I don't also, um, well, before we start dogging on Brian Armstrong before we started disagreeing on that, I think one of the things that was also very

Unknown Speaker 12:19
difficult to watch apart from for QB play is I think the offensive play calling was also poor. I think you were you'd watch even though that, you know, you could say some of the throws were questionable and some of his decisions were questionable. It seemed like so many times it was just set up for like QB draw yeah QB despite CPB draw routes

Unknown Speaker 12:39
just things that aren't going to get us anywhere. Podcast favorite case deconstruction where's the better like there's there's he you have a good game and then he doesn't get involved again. Like I don't understand why

Unknown Speaker 12:51
the runs are old Simmons Jr. Three receptions for 71 yards that was really like the only I when I was looking at the box score like the only real big offensive highlight a powerful don't let's not go back. Now. You're going to make my point for me don't get into get into the big deal. What's the big what's the big deal? What's the big change? Big change?

Unknown Speaker 13:13
The Armstrong, benching, and before you before you think that I'm gonna side with you here, Armstrong was a little bit of abysmal, a 13 for 25, two interceptions and a 13.7. QBR really never pushed the ball downfield, like I said, that is that can be interpreted as you will, the play calling and coaching. So I'll give them the benefit of the doubt on there. But then also, there were some times where there was receivers open and he just decided to look the other way. If you go and look at the two sacks, especially one of his late game ones, it seemed like it was self inflicted just a coverage sack.

Unknown Speaker 13:48
After holding the ball for way too long, when there was receivers open previously,

Unknown Speaker 13:54
he finished the season or as for free benching, assuming they don't switch back from NJ Morris with five touchdowns and six interceptions. So I do agree with what you were saying before you make your point about how maybe the receivers and coaching fault for this game in particular, I think all season we kind of saw the same inconsistency but I'm interested to hear your defense or Griffin, do you have any input? Um, certainly, I think I think the benching in itself comes mean you can say it touchdown interception ratio. But the way the life was sucked out of Carter Finley when he tossed up that last interception to seal the games that in itself is bendable. I think that demonstrated how, you know, his decision making I'm not sure if he was trying to throw it to somebody you're just out of bounds. If he was trying to throw it out of bounds it shows you know, weak arm strength which is ironic because his name is Brennan Armstrong, but the quarterback you know you need to be

Unknown Speaker 15:00
be able to throw it where it needs to be.

Unknown Speaker 15:03
And then the whole dual threat thing. I think the offense is really structured around having a dual threat quarterback. I don't think he is that. I think he thinks he's that. And he's durable. But being durable. doesn't make you a dual quarterback. Yeah, it's very encouraging looking at the box score and seeing him being the leading rusher each game and it's not like it's not productive leading rusher. Like he's doing something. It's that they're running that QB draw, right 10 times and it's taking away from the actual run game. Yeah, absolutely. And obviously, he's not hitting his receivers. His receivers numbers aren't where they need to be. That being said, stone. What's your rebuttal of that? Because I know you're, you're an Armstrong loyalist? Well, I came in on the first episode of the podcast, and I was relatively optimistic. I made that aware. And so we're both of you, because we all want it to be and even after last game, or last episodes that we've been recording, there's been a little bit of, you know, hesitation, but it hasn't been anything crazy. And then boom, we got people posting on their social medias about MJ Morris coming in. And I think that stalking my Instagrams, I think that

Unknown Speaker 16:18
your point I posted Yeah, it was yes, he posted like MJ Morris, it was him in like a spacesuit or whatever. Yes.

Unknown Speaker 16:27
I'm walking by. And I see the signs on campus of Where's MJ Morris he's disappeared. I mean, obviously, there's like Instagram comments. Regardless, when something bad happens is going to like bench the quarterback bench to play or whatever. I have never seen an overwhelming social media campaign behind a sophomore quarterback in my entire life. I know, which is why this rebuttal, this that's why this rebuttal is gonna make you feel so much better, because it's a lot of Cashville talks coming around there. So let me explain to you why was Armstrong poor?

Unknown Speaker 17:00
Yeah, totally 100% The performance was poor in a clearly winnable game. That was so

Unknown Speaker 17:10
like you said, I think you've said it best. It took just the whole air out of the stadium. Like every drive, you get the ball back after you stopped the Louisville offense. And you're like, okay, all we need to do. We're at, you know, the 40 yard line, read the 50 yard line. We're at our own 40 yard line, hey, can we go out and get points and we barely did that. The last throw was very poor. And it wasn't poor as a throw. It was poor as a decision. He wasn't trying to necessarily get the ball out because that would be intentional grounding, which would be a 15 yard penalty back and a loss of down. He was trying to get to Rosner. Rosner was doing a curl if you watch it, but at the curl when he finished, he ran forward towards the line of scrimmage like a comeback route, a curl, you turn around and stay. So he was doing a comeback right where he ran, had a point like 10 yards down the field and came back towards the ball. Brennan through to where the curl would be the stop not where the comeback was. So when he did that, boom, pop fly. He was also doing well. He was getting sad, right? He threw off his back flop pop fly in the air boom, easy pick, I will say Rosalind did have a chance to potentially knock it away. But it what you should have potentially taken the sack down. We didn't have any timeouts. Whatever, it was definitely a poor decision. It wasn't the worst thing I've ever seen because there were other factors that led to that. But I'm not going to here. I'm not gonna sit here and say that that was a good pass. I just think

Unknown Speaker 18:39
all of the issues that we are witnessing, and that we want to go away. Like I don't all the fans think that when this new QB comes in, they're just gonna go away. And that's not gonna happen. That's just not the O line was and has been horrible.

Unknown Speaker 18:59
They have a pass blocking efficiency grade on the season

Unknown Speaker 19:04
at 107 out of 115 eligible FBS schools. That is horrendous. That's among the worst offensive lines in any power five school or even

Unknown Speaker 19:19
other lower conferences that played division one football they currently have the most hurries allowed in the ACC left tackle macarius Peak is like the only solid option. And he had his first game last week so he hasn't even been being used up until then. So they finally are trying to switch around the offensive line and it relatively works because he was the only bright spot. The running game does not exist. And I knew you guys were talking about Armstrong with you know, the scrambling.

Unknown Speaker 19:51
But even just looking at the running game itself, Armstrong is more than double the yards of the next closest halfback. So if he is scrambling, he's clearly getting

Unknown Speaker 20:00
yards in first downs. So I don't think I'm going to say he's bad for getting a first down on the run. You know, I even if it's not his game, I don't want to, you know, lower him for that, especially when he has accounts for 40% of our total team's rushing yards.

Unknown Speaker 20:16
These runs though, like you said, They're designed, not necessarily scrambles. So

Unknown Speaker 20:25
I agree we're doing these terrible design runs. But notice how you guys pointed out the design runs. What's crazy is that he's first in the entire FBS in scrambles. So he's scrambling and having designed runs. But these scrambling like the scrambles are not necessarily just because there's receivers open and he's running, a huge majority of it is due to the receiving because guys are just not getting open. We don't have a great receiving corps. Even with the scrambling, the next closest guy behind him is five, he's at 30 scrambles and first place second place is five. That's the same difference between the seventh guy and the 33rd. guy. So he's clearly above the mark in that category, which is obviously an issue on the O line and receivers. I don't think it's really necessarily just on him because that was not the case while he was at Virginia.

Unknown Speaker 21:22
Of the top 15 quarterbacks who have the most rushing yards which Armstrong is in NC State has the least amount of total team rushing yards. What that means is that he is running and accounting for more running rushing yards than any other quarterback or team that has their quarterback proficiently run the ball. So all these other guys are running it because they're getting like they're getting help. He's running it, and he's not getting any help. So even if they know a run is gonna come, he's still producing yards from it.

Unknown Speaker 21:59
And like I said, this definitely comes from the boring and safe play calling the offensive line the overall talent of all the backs. I mean, I'd said it last week, we don't have anyone that's meant to be a full time back. They need to be used in three ways. And there's the three backs that we have, and they're not really doing that. It's funny you bring that up because I actually going back to the Louisville game I had as my my number one note. Where's Kendrick Rafael? Where's it? Did he get a touch? No, he did. I think he's injured actually. Really? I heard that. You see, that might be why I don't know if he was injured the whole game. But that's not why I brought it up. Because if it was like two or three carriers or something okay, but he wasn't even I think it might happen in practice. Yeah, the the rushing. Obviously, we had the you know, that one person leave, but that it just has not been good, even when even when he was there. We don't have to bring it up. But

Unknown Speaker 22:50
it's not been great. And the receiving has been even worse. Ironically, it's been one of the worst in the entire country.

Unknown Speaker 22:57
They grayed out according to Pff, which is pro football focus as the second worst receiving corps in the ACC behind Boston College. And this is a Boston College team that lost to NIU and got blown out by 32 Louisville, we should not be on the same level as Boston College in any category ever.

Unknown Speaker 23:19
Like ever. Our receiving corps in the bottom 10 of NCAA football, that's among teams like Wyoming in navy, Navy doesn't throw the ball all they do is run it. That's an issue being a top Power Five program that is an issue. And there hasn't like we said been one consistent past catcher we talked about KC Concepcion. He had his breakout games and was quiet last week. But it's hard to rely on a true freshman to say Hey, can you come out here and produce reliably every single week as a 1918 year old, just learning like to play football? That's not how you succeed at all. Terrell Timmons was the only receiver as you brought up that did anything last game, and he did nothing up until then that was his only relevant game, you're not going to see him do it because he was terrible in any other, you know, time that he was able to get there. No one can get any real separation. One of the receivers key on the Seine, his passer rating when targeted is 14.7.

Unknown Speaker 24:26
He is not a true receiver. He's like your running back slash just throw me screens and I'll run out. So my question for you Do you think this is would you put more blame on personnel or coaching? Both big but if I look at it, I mean, do you think a quarterback can succeed when the play calling is okay? We're going to do QB runs and scrambles. We're going to run it on first down up the middle every single time. We don't have the talent running back, let alone to do that. Our receivers have the worst step

Unknown Speaker 25:00
ration and our best one is a freshman who is still learning how to even play this position. And the offensive line is having an efficiency grade of one of the worst in FBS. I just don't I don't see how anyone can succeed, like it's really hard to dial up these banger plays. But even then I still don't think they are being used like these receivers to their strengths like Lysene should not be going deep post. That's how we threw a pic. Armstrong had two picks in that game. One of them was catchable by the scene in the endzone and he didn't jump at all. And it went right over his head and boom, right there for a pick. So there's two picks could be relatively explained to one of them, like I said, was a poor decision. But I don't I don't know. What I think is bizarre is that we talked about earlier and Griffin noted it too with the QB draws and just like very mind numbingly boring plays. If coaching is the problem. Robert A's is from Virginia, he was responsible for Brian Armstrong's best season and coming in. Well, we keep saying that. But what did he do? There was a year between the year of Virginia and then this year, I brought it up in the first episode the year before, like, in between. They had that shooting there, which obviously messed up a ton of stuff was in radio, and I was not at Virginia when that no, no. But

Unknown Speaker 26:29
he his top receiver was a guy who switched from quarterback to receiver. Like that season. So he had very bad receiving corps even then, at that year, but in 2021, he was very good. But that's that's the issue is that we were expecting that to come in because the offensive coordinator was coming from I'm gonna straighten the timeline here. A name. So when and so he had his best year and I know sorry, you had his drop off year was a nightmare. No. So then But then wouldn't that wouldn't. I know you said the shooting, and also the personnel wasn't as good. But I feel like if you take such a significant step back, and one of the biggest things that the offensive coordinator is no longer there. Wouldn't you make the argument that offense coordinator might have been responsible for it? Yeah, what's happening now? So that's, that's what I was gonna say. Because I don't think that thing is is at at Virginia running Armstrong was known for airing it out. And I'm looking at I'm right here, I'm looking at an article coming into the season graduate transfer from Virginia is expected to air it out this season, because because of the previous system run by offensive coordinator, Robert, you said I, there we go. But that what I don't understand is where's this getting lost in translation, because if he's coming in with a new offensive coordinator that's supposed to have an error the or he's going into a system, that offense coordinator that he's previously worked with, in a very good season with, and then he's also used to airing the ball out. I understand that the personnel was worse, but I don't see this. The system, the system changing completely is confusing. There has to be some serious progression from Armstrong that's causing this system to have to change. Griffin, you were gonna say something you can go on, but no, you're you're good.

Unknown Speaker 28:12
I think that's a valid point. I just think as as casual spectators, not that. I mean, I would argue that maybe we aren't casual spectators. But

Unknown Speaker 28:23
sometimes there are little things behind the scenes that that we can't recognize. So I think to attribute Armstrong success two years ago, to the offensive system might be inaccurate at this point. That's how I feel. I don't know. I don't know OCS and coaches. Sometimes when you move them around, it doesn't translate that happens in the NFL all the time. So it could be like we I was gonna respond like we don't have it. Maybe David Dorn is saying, Hey, you can do some of this, but you can't do some of this. We have no idea what kind of influence he has at all, but I think is, at least in my opinion, slightly towards personnel because even just talking about the receivers again, Armstrong is top 10 and drop passes. And of the 25 quarterbacks who have at least 10 or more drops. He has the third lowest turnover where the play percentage, which means that players are dropping his passes, but he's not chucking up these random terrible passes every single play or all the time. And like we said he had his all set in 2021. His receiving grade and according to pff for Virginia was in the top 25. And his average depth of target was in the top 20. So he was chucking a ball down the field. But he had relatively deep receivers, even if he didn't have a started relatively deep, which is why we were you know, expecting at least something going into this year because we had receivers that had played before. It's not like these guys didn't play at all we had to see

Unknown Speaker 30:00
yours that were like, Okay, maybe these guys can do something Roger comes over as a transfer. Casey is obviously been the best. But like I said, I don't think you can rely on a true freshman to do all that stuff. But even just the casual mind, I think, when things aren't going right offensively for a team, the easiest thing to switch is the quarterback. And I'm not necessarily saying that they should have just done nothing and run the same team out there. Because I don't think you can. I agree that I don't think you can go after that Louisville game and say, Alright, we're just gonna do the same thing because that did not work.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai