Opening Statement: I am really impressed with this Duke football team. It is an extremely well coached football team that is 5-1 and has gotten some votes in the polls. They have done a great job. We don’t know which quarterback is going to play Saturday but they have won with both of them. They have the all-time ACC leader in running at receiver and they have spread it around. I think he has 41 catches and Crowder has 38 catches and Scott’s got 36 so they move that thing around.
They are solid up front and defensively they really fly around and get after you. They have an excellent kicking game and they lead the ACC with Miami in our division so I have a lot of respect for this team and how well they play. I should say that Riley Beiro is getting operated on this week on his shoulder and will be out for the year. We will post the rest of our injury situations Thursday.
Q: How do you deal with the disappointment particularly with the seniors and with just they way things are unfolding, how do you keep them focused the rest of the way?
Beamer: There is a lot of football to be played. It is disappointing that we have lost the last two and disappointing on how we played at Pittsburgh but if you live in the past you are not looking at what is in front of you and right now Duke is in front of us. So I think it is time that we make sure we have a great week of practice and get ready to play Duke.
Q: Is there any sense of urgency or do you get that sense at all with the players?
Beamer: I think our players have worked hard all year long and other than our play up at Pittsburgh I think we have played hard. But not always well and there are reasons for that. We just haven’t played consistent. We don’t need excuses right now, we just need to play for consistently.
Q: As far as coaches do you guys need to change anything as far as your approach this week?
Beamer: No. We have had a lot of success for a lot of years and one of the things I think that is right about our program is that there is not much change in it. I think that the kids know what to expect because we are not an up and down coaching staff. So I think if we need a great week of practice and to play consistent on Saturday that is our goal.
Q: You mentioned moving Beiro to the injury list, what does that do to your running game that has kind of struggled this year?
Beamer: Well he hasn’t played a lot but his shoulder has bothered him all year long. So we will give Martin Scales some work in at fullback as well as tailback.
Q: You talked fast start to this season; they have gotten to some quick starts in the past and kind of died. Does this Duke team look different than those past teams?
Beamer: I think so. They are a good solid football team and are extremely well coached. They play with great effort and they are good. Their record is good and they are good.
Q: You said Riley’s shoulder has been bothering him, is this an injury that he had suffered in the game or all year?
Beamer: It has been bothering him for a while and then hurt it in the game.
Q: Offensively I feel like you guys made a lot of progress, do you see more confidence in Logan or different with how he played?
Beamer: I feel like Logan played well for the most part. He had three or four balls dropped. I think he battled in there
and again being consistent on how we perform around him is the key issue.
Q: I heard you say a couple times that you feel like this team is not playing Virginia Tech football, why do you think that
is the case this year?
Beamer: Well you give up kickoff returns for a touchdown and then we have a drive going and get a ball stripped from
us. Those things don’t usually happen to us so you look at it and correct it and play better next Saturday. That is the way
I see it. We look to find the reason why we didn’t win and I think some are very obvious and then we see if we can get those things correct and see if we can win the next one.
Q: In that regard, what do you do with the defense this week? Is it back to the drawing board?
Beamer: No. It is all about leverage and getting the proper gap and tackling that is what it is all about and we are going to look to get that corrected.
Q: Bud mentioned after the game, getting him out of the nickel package takes him out of things he wants to do blitz wise. Would you expect to go back to a more base Virginia Tech defense and more Ronny Van Dyke playing time?
Beamer: We are going to talk about that and have talked about it a little bit.
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