From the 8/10/02
Macon Telegraph:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">
N.C. State hoping for breakout season
By Joseph Person
Telegraph Staff Writer
If history holds, N.C. State will finish a game or two above .500 this season, go 4-4 in the ACC and spend the Christmas holiday at some second-tier bowl on the East Coast.
It will be a nice, little season - certainly good enough to keep coach Chuck Amato employed at his alma mater - but nothing more, nothing less. The problem is the Wolfpack players are sick of these nice, little seasons.
"I think what's missing is winning the games we're supposed to win," said free safety Terrence Holt. "As long as I've been around the program, we would always come up with a big win and then couldn't put it together and beat the teams we're supposed to beat.
"Until that happens, the program is not going to be thought of as turning the corner."
During Amato's first two seasons at State, the Wolfpack has gone 8-4 and 7-5, with middle-of-the-pack 4-4 ACC marks earning it trips to the Micron PC and Tangerine bowls, respectively. And just as Holt pointed out, the 'Pack has displayed a maddening tendency to follow up an emotional win a lackluster loss.
In 2000, State took down Georgia Tech 30-23 in overtime to run its record to 4-0 at the end of September, then proceeded to drop three of its next four games. Last year, the 'Pack became the only ACC team to knock off Florida State in Tallahassee, scoring a 34-28 victory at Doak Campbell Stadium. The next week State lost at home to Maryland 23-19.
But many ACC observers are picking this season to be the breakthrough year for the Wolfpack, which boasts the league's best quarterback in junior Philip Rivers and a speedy defense spearheaded by middle linebacker Dantonio Burnette, a senior from Northside.
When Amato learned that media members had picked his team behind only Florida State in the preseason poll, he said: "We lost two out of our last three games and you people have us ranked second in the conference."
State's window of opportunity to join the ACC's elite could be a small one. There's speculation that Rivers, already married with a newborn daughter, will take his considerable talents to the NFL after this junior season.
Though not blessed with a textbook throwing motion, Rivers still manages to get the ball down the field. He's already passed for 5,640 yards, more than any rising junior in ACC history. For the time being, Rivers says he's staying for four years, while Amato is trying to stay in the present.
"I live for today. I'm not going to worry about things," said Amato, the longtime Florida State assistant. "If he throws for 10,000 yards and 40 touchdowns, 'God bless you, Philip. Maybe I'll go with you.'"
But if Amato really wants the program to go forward, he needs to take a closer look at his scheduling strategy. State's five non-conference games are against two Division I-AA schools (East Tennessee State and Massachusetts), a Navy team that went 0-10 in 2001 and two other middle-of-the-road programs in New Mexico and Texas Tech. Combined, those five non-conference opponents went 22-33 last year.
Said Rivers: "Those games are just as big as Florida State at the end of the year."
Amato figures Rivers will move the ball on every team State plays, but the catch will be stopping people. The Wolfpack ranked sixth in the ACC in rush defense last fall, and that was before all-American linebacker Levar Fisher departed.
Rivers claims to have noticed more of a swagger in his teammates last year after the Florida State win, even if it didn't translate into a strong finish. He hopes the new attitude will help State take the next step under Amato this season. If not, there's always the new Continental Tire Bowl down the road in Charlotte.
"We've got a lot of young guys that are cocky. That's the word to use," Rivers said. "We're big and bad and we're coming in there not just to be another team on the schedule."
In recent years, however, that's precisely what State has been.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Interesting, but honest synopsis by Joe Person here IMO. Yes, State has been getting it done in the past couple seasons, but has been plagued by inconsistency. The Pack needs to learn how to capitalize on big wins and not try to ride them for the whole season. And how much will the weak OOC schedule hurt them in the minds of the bowl scouts?
