Sam Howell speaks after UNC's 31-6 victory over Syracuse on 9/12/20
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00:00All right, guys, we got Sam Howe.
00:03Hey, Sam.
00:11First question will come from CL Brown.
00:16CL, go ahead.
00:20Hey, Sam, I was wondering with the explosive plays in the second half,
00:24what kind of opened up for you guys?
00:26You weren't able to get those big chunks of yards in the first half, but
00:30those possessions in the second all rolled together.
00:32Yeah, really, we just had to come together and settle down.
00:35We kind of weren't playing like ourselves in the first half.
00:37They're doing a little bit some different things on the defensive side of the ball.
00:40So we just had to adjust a little bit at halftime,
00:43just come out ready to go in the second half.
00:46What kind of adjustments did you make?
00:48What did you take away that Syracuse was doing effectively in the first half?
00:53Yeah, well, with their secondary, they're playing really deep.
00:56They're kind of bailing on everything.
00:57So we knew our deep game wasn't really gonna be there.
01:00So we just had to take the underneath stuff and just take what they're giving us.
01:02So once we settled down and started doing that, things started opening up.
01:06Thanks.
01:08Okay, JB Ricks, go ahead, JB.
01:12Hey, Sam, congrats on the win.
01:14That first drive, you guys looked like you had the flow.
01:17It looked like you guys had the excitement of finally playing somebody other than
01:20your own teammates.
01:21And then after that, the offense just went into a funk.
01:25How much of the atmosphere or lack thereof was a catalyst in you guys
01:30not being able to keep that rhythm that you established on your first drive?
01:34Yeah, I wouldn't blame it on the atmosphere.
01:36Really, there was just a couple plays.
01:39Really, we were killing drives with one play, one mistake.
01:42We were just killing drives off of that.
01:43So we just gotta stay consistent and play clean football every job.
01:46Because at any time, we can have one bad play and it kills the drive.
01:50And that's what was happening a lot in the first half.
01:53So we just gotta make sure we can stay consistent and
01:55just play consistent football.
01:58I appreciate you.
02:00Okay, Greg Barnes, you're up next, Greg.
02:03Sam, given the known quantities on this offense and
02:06that you played with all these guys, when you go through a period there where you're
02:10not executing at the highest level, I'm assuming there's no stress.
02:16There's no worry about it.
02:17You just know that we didn't get it this time.
02:19Next time, we'll be more confident and it'll move smoothly.
02:24Yeah, definitely, we just gotta come together as a team.
02:29It's our mistakes, it's not anything that they're doing that's causing problems.
02:32It's us causing our own problems.
02:34So as long as we clean those problems up, then we'll move the ball.
02:37Yeah, there really is no stress.
02:39We know what we're capable of doing on the offensive side of the ball.
02:41So we just had to do what we had to do and just limit the mistakes and
02:44we start moving the ball.
02:46And Max talked about how he expected mistakes to be early in the season.
02:52Did you guys expect there to be some rust you'd have to work through anyway?
02:56Honestly, no, I think we've got a lot of time to repair.
02:59So I'm not gonna use the excuse that there should be mistakes.
03:02I think we hold ourselves to a high standard.
03:05So we gotta clean those mistakes up and I'm definitely not gonna use
03:09what's going on as an excuse for the mistakes we had today.
03:13I think there's a lot of things that we could have cleaned up.
03:15I definitely could have played a little better,
03:17turned the ball over twice today.
03:19So we gotta clean those plays up.
03:21But yeah, overall, we had a good game on offense.
03:23But definitely, there's no excuse for the mistakes that I had or
03:26our team had today.
03:28Thanks, Sam.
03:30All right, let's go to Brendan Marks.
03:31Brendan, go ahead.
03:34Hey, Sam, I was just gonna ask,
03:35what did you see on that second interception, the deep toss?
03:39Did it just get hanged short?
03:40Did a guy come out of nowhere?
03:41What was it you were looking at there?
03:43Yeah, I was trying to look the safety off.
03:45And I thought I did a good job of that.
03:47He kind of flew to the right side of the field.
03:48So I thought I was gonna be able to get a throw in there to De'Ami.
03:51But I mean, the kid's a good player.
03:53So I shouldn't have thrown the ball, even though I tried to look him off.
03:56But yeah, he made a good play and I'm gonna learn from it.
03:59Thank you.
04:01All right, last one, Gregory Hall.
04:03Go ahead.
04:04Sam, what did you see out of Javante Williams and
04:07Michael Carter that got things going in the second half to kind of open up
04:10the offense for y'all?
04:13Yeah, those are two really good players.
04:14They both had a really good game today.
04:16I mean, a lot of people talk about the passing game and the receivers.
04:19But Syracuse, they're playing very soft in the secondary.
04:23So our running backs had to take advantage of it.
04:25Really, those two guys are the engine of this offense.
04:28I mean, if we get a run game established, we can play with anybody.
04:32And credit to the O-line, O-line did a really, really good job all game long of
04:36keeping me clean in the pocket and giving those guys holes to run through.
04:38And then the rest is them just making plays in space.
04:41I don't know, they made a lot of people miss today.
04:43Javante ended up having, I think, three touchdowns.
04:46And Michael did a really good job getting us into the red zone and
04:50stuff like that.
04:50So I'm definitely very proud of those guys.
04:53And they're gonna have a big year, both of them.
04:55Michael Carter ended up being your number two wide receiver today.
04:59How does that help the offense in total,
05:01being able to get those swing passes to them and get them in open space?
05:06Both our running backs,
05:08we're trying to kind of implement them in the passing game a little bit more.
05:11I know everyone's so worried about our receivers, and
05:14our backs are some really good receivers as well.
05:16So if we have all our receivers and the backs included in our pass game,
05:19along with our tight end Garrett Walsh, and then we're gonna be really hard to stop.
05:22So that's kind of something we've kind of worked in the offseason,
05:23just getting them involved in the passing game.
05:25Because last year, they really weren't involved in the passing game a whole lot.
05:28So that's something we try to work on in the offseason.
05:31Thanks, and I like the bling, too.
05:33Appreciate it, man.
05:34All right, Sam, thanks so much.
05:38Yeah.