Confidence and Concerns for the Carolina Hurricanes
Let’s hit a a massive everybody involved. Cons and cons. But to play great defense, you need one thing above all else. That starts with a W. Confidence. What are you most confident in? What are you most concerned about? Traditionally, when we come to this time of the week, we play cons and cons and we grab a team or a couple teams where it makes sense, like, oh, this team is in an interesting turning point. Let’s put them into the cons and cons machine and see what happens. Uh, but this is the first time I was sitting around going, you know, I think every team that we have in our possibilities would be an interesting cons and cons today. So, we’re throwing all three teams football-wise from the triangle ACC teams into the cons and cons. We’re putting the Canes who were on the ice for the first time today in preseason into the cons and cons. We’re throwing the Panthers who are 0 and2 going into a divisional game into the cons and cons. And we’re going to see how that goes. Now, as always, Dennis, I’m going to let you pick the order. Who are we starting with? Getting started practice today. Let’s go there. Carolina Hurricanes. What are you most confident in? What are you most concerned about? I’ve got good news and bad news. You always take the bad news first. My concern goalie. Uh I think this is going to be the thing we track. This is going to be the thing that that’s talked about often. Uh, you hope their job is made super easy, that the, you know, the newly revamped forwards are scoring a ton, giving a ton of goal support, that the blue line is is clicking on all cylinders and and making uh making the goalie’s job as far as shots faced and everything very easy. But that’s the thing to track, right? That’s the thing. It’s it’s really, you know, been the thing to track for the last few years. Um, and it’s uh it’s where I’m going to be spending my concerns. What about you? Uh my concern is who’s going to be that number two center? Who’s going to be that second line center? Is it going to be Stank Kovven? Can he handle it? That’s the still the major question going forward for me as they move towards postseason. Are they even on the roster? It’s a good question. Confidence. What are you confident in when it comes to the Carolina Hurricanes? I said this earlier, but it’s just nice to say out loud. I’m confident in the top line. AO centering Jarvis and Eers. It just feels good to say. Um, I think that it can, uh, Eer’s skill set, specifically the speed, the carrying into the zone, all those sorts of things. Um, pairs well with what what AO and and Jarvis are looking for. Um, Jarvis, if if the health reports that we’ve gotten with his shoulder are accurate and he’s feeling great, I think he could be due for a level up. Uh, and and obviously I’ve been, you know, asking for angry Aaho. I want him to go out there and be selfish and and maybe, you know, he doesn’t feel the the burden of carrying that line as much with th those two. So, give me the top line is my most confident beast for the Canes. Me, confidence is just their their depth overall. Like they I mean the the quoteunquote fourth line today was Taylor Hall, either Jenowsky or Koki centering and Eric Robinson. That’s the fourth line in a lot of matchups that could score. Mhm. I that just their overall depth of their team and their their third defensive pair is Shane Gosspar and Alexander Disheshin as they were situated today as as as today. Yeah. Which again their overall depth I think is pretty awesome and if something happens they got some young guys chomping at the bit ready to go. It is very interesting to hear like the positive reports out of the prospects and you know there’s all like you know they might be due for a for a look this year and I’m like where where? No, I agree. They’ve earned the look. It’s just there’s not looks available right now. Um, but hey, that’s that’s my private jet takes too long to fill up with gas. That is a first class problem. Uh, where do we go next? What teams next in the cons and cons? Uh, let’s keep it pro. Let’s go Panthers. Carolina Panthers, you can lead off on this one. We start with the concerns. What are you concerned with for them? Uh, yes. Uh, is my concern. Uh I honestly going into this weekend I will say the just now they’re their injuries are piling up especially across the front because Robert Hunt Austin Corbett are both out with their injuries. Defensive front you have Bobby Brown on the injury report today. Torton not going to be playing. Pat Jones didn’t practice for the second straight day. So your depth up front has pretty much now been depleted. My concerns, my main concern, there’s many concerns, but my biggest concern is big plays. Yeah. And I think even if you look at the players that we consider some of the best for the Panthers, Derek Brown, um Chuba Hubard, right, the offensive some of the offensive linemen, even even hurt ones like Robert Hunt, Robert Hunt, they’re not big play guys. Like Chuba Hubard is a really good running back, but he is a I’m going to give you seven yards, five yards, seven yards, 12 yards, seven yards, four yards. Uh Derek Brown is like, I’m going to stuff the run and stuff the run and but they’re not like I’m going to intercept this pass and return it 40 yards for a touchdown. They’re not I’m going to take this screen pass 40 yards for a touchdown. There there’s a lot more just good solid play and I think they need big plays every now and one sack in two games. That would be another another issue. But some really good edge setting edge rushers, some really good runs stopping edge rushers. It’s like they’re that’s valuable, but I need somebody to go do something awesome. I want a highlight play. Uh what are you confident in for the Carolina Panthers? Throwing the ball to Tero McMillan. That’s it. I have the rookies in general. Okay. Uh Tedo McMillan, Prince has that one sack you talked about. Nick Scorton, some of the advanced analytics for get offs and things like that, like how quickly he’s getting off the line. Uh he’s pretty darn explosive. Uh Lean Ransom made some plays. Again, some of the Pro Football focused stuff was was really high on Ransom. Uh and ETN showed some pop in the uh the return game. I like the rookies that have been given a chance for the the Carolina Panthers. With that, we transition to the college side of things. The three teams in the triangle, the ACC teams, uh we’ll hit them in in confidence and concerns. Dennis, where do we start? Uh, let’s go. We haven’t talked really UNCC much today. Let’s go to North Carolina. I’ll lead us off with concerns. Sure. Gio Lopez. Okay. Um, and it could be an overarching passing game problem, but I’m I’m putting it on the quarterback because you’re the quarterback and and that’s where things fall. You have to strike fear into the defense that you can attack at anywhere on the field at any point in time in the pass game. And I don’t I don’t think defenses are fearing that from from UNCC right now. Uh they’re going to be fearful of the first drive. They’re going to be fearful of outside the numbers that there’s there’s some areas on the field and in the game plan that I think defenses can take their foot off the gas. And until you prove otherwise, they’re they’re going to take that attention and put it elsewhere and make it more difficult for your run game, more difficult for your short passing game, more difficult for a few other things. So, uh, Gio Lopez needs to to show that he has the full bag of tricks or else defenses are going to continue to key off. My concern is along the same lines of Gio Lopez, can they actually throw the ball over the middle of the field? Mhm. That that through the first three games of the season, you haven’t really seen I know you saw it a little bit more against Richmond, but you’re playing an FCS school. How how much can I really count on that that really getting fixed? All right. I’m just being for real. It’s an FCS school who’s not even at the top of the F. They lost to Lehi and Exactly. I’m just saying as somebody that played FCS, the top of the FCS is good. Okay, we’ll show you. Yeah. Well, they didn’t show it on Saturday. We’re not F FCS anymore. Uh but that instinctual defense will go away with time. That’s totally fair. But in But in all seriousnesses though, can they actually throw the ball over the middle of the field? Everything it seems to be outside the numbers to the left for Gio Lopez throwing the ball. There you go. Predictable. Which team do we go to next? Duker, NC State, they play against confidence, though. Oh, you’re right. We was unintentional, UNCC fans. Uh, my confidence is ironically within the passing game. Jordan Ship. Yeah. 10 catches, 149 yards, two touchdowns is a really good, solid first three games. But when you consider the passing offense that he’s been a part of, right, just under 450 yards passing total through three games, he has 150 of them. Uh, that’s going to be a really good sign. uh he the two touchdowns are I think a fourth of their totals that theirs they’re they need to get him involved more often and I think that could help a lot with our concern. So Jordan ship as a as a wide receiver is a good one. My confidence for North Carolina I think for the coaching staff having three games of tape like they can actually really figure out okay what actually can we do well at least they have some semblance of what they feel like they can do well at least in terms of what individual players can do. Again, the competition hasn’t been super tough, but the more information you have, the more you can kind of scheme and game plan going forward. What team are we going to next? Let’s go with uh let’s see. UNC’s on the road. State’s on the roads. Go NC State. You can lead off this one. What’s your concern for the the old Wolf Pack? That pass defense. Same. It’s the same as mine. Pass defense. Okay. Yeah, it’s that pass defense. I Wake Forest, we saw them struggle offensively against Kennesaw State to start the year. Early in that first half, they were popping, but then the second half, NC State’s defense really turned around. Now, is that because Wake Forest really isn’t that good outside of Dean Claybourne running and Robbie Ashford, the quarterback running? I I really don’t know. So, but the concern is still there about their pass defense. Chris Barnes had a good day. He had a couple breakout plays for for Wake, but you’re right, their passing game is not what they’re going to face in other ACC games in the pass offense. Uh, and even even Wake Forest passing offense struck a couple big plays. The 75 yard, it led to a touchdown. So, and and you there’s multiple ways to to fix this, right? If your pass rush gets to the quarterback faster, if your your coverage unit is a little bit better, but I just have pass defense as a concern, especially going into a game against Duke where Darien Mens is third in the country in passing yards. like that’s a a real interesting matchup. Uh what are you confident in when it comes to state? Offensively, it’s their diversity of their skill set in my eyes. So I think they have a really good and and combination of their physical size, especially a guy like Justin Jolie and even Noah Rogers. These some of these guys are big receivers, but also they have the speed, the skill, the even in the backfield with with smothers. The guy has some shake to his game and that explosiveness. But if you need to pound the rock for a few plays in a row with Duke Scott, you can do that as well. And there’s obviously what CJ Bailey can be a dual threat as a run pass guy. Just the diversity of their skill set. They can beat you in so many different ways. I just went with the young backfield. Uh CJ Bailey and Hollywood Smothers. Young and talented is a good thing to have in in in your backfield. Uh they can both run, right? As Hollywood Smother said about CJ Bailey, the baby giraffe can run a little bit or the the I mean that’s a joke that only your running back can make. Uh, but he said it and it it’s it’s funny and it’s true, right? CJ Bailey, he’s he’s a tall guy. He can he can sling the rock, but he can also get out there and beat you with his legs. Um, I think they’re going to need like Hollywood Smothers the pass catcher and they’re going to need CJ Bailey the runner in addition to CJ Bailey the passer. Hollywood Smothers the the traditional running back if they’re going to beat Duke. So, their their backfield versatility there is what I’m excited for. Uh, that leaves just Duke football. I’ll give you my concern. Turnover margin minus six through three games in the turnover margin. They’ve only forced one with their defense. That’ll that’ll make defensive coordinators pull their hair out. I I uh read this about the Indie or the it’s the Clemson defensive coordinator now who was the Penn State defensive coordinator and before that he was head coach somewhere else. He like mounts on the wall almost like uh like punching bags footballs in his meeting room. All the defensive meeting rooms have them because he just wants to instinctively have players every time they walk by him smack the football, punch the football. Every time they see leather, he wants them just knocking footballs. Uh so he has them like mounted to the wall. So as they walk by, right, they’re walking in, watch some morning film, boom, punch the football. They’re they’re walking in middle of training camp. Boom. Smack the football. Uh you need to get turnovers. It’s that darn important. So the fact that they’re minus six through three games, I think that’s a big part of the reason why they’re one and two. Uh to me, it’s the self-inflicted wounds. We even saw it against two lane as well. For example, line up for a field goal. Two backto-back false starts on a field goal and all of a sudden that field goal now is pushes wide just a little bit. So it just even against Illinois when I was at that game it was just I didn’t think the talent level was drastically different at all between Illinois and Duke. I really didn’t it was 1413 game at half. It was just Duke self-inflicted wounds turnovers being major part of that. What is your confidence for Duke? My confidence is their passing game with Mensah when they that Duke can make every throw. Watching him in person it’s like wow this guy can really sling it. I put their offensive line. Okay, just four sacks allowed despite a ton of drop backs and they’ve been behind in games. So, the opposing team knows they have to sling it. Just four sacks allowed and they’re fifth in the ACC in uh yards per carry running. And that’s without them having like that bellcow stud. They don’t have, at least we haven’t seen it, a Hollywood smothers. They’ve got four guys that are all, you know, 10 to 20 uh carries thus far, nobody more than 150 yards. like they’re they’ve got like a committee going and they’re still averaging 5.2 yards per carry. Uh when that happens, it’s like, well, what’s the common denominator? They’re all running behind the same offensive line. So, I’m I’m confident in their offensive
Tim Donnelly & Dennis Cox discuss Carolina Hurricanes concerns and confidence levels as they begin training camp, but also the Carolina Panthers, UNC football, NC State football, and Duke football.
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