Locked On ACC - Daily College Football & Basketball Podcast - STATEMENT WINS: UNC Topples TCU, Virginia RUNS OVER NC State

Episode Date: August 30, 2026

North Carolina Tar Heels silence doubters with a disciplined 15-10 win over TCU in Ireland—does Bill Belichick’s new-look defense signal a resurgence in Chapel Hill? Julian Council and Kenton Gibbs break down the ACC’s key Week 0 football matchups, spotlighting Xavier Lewis’s breakout performance, Carolina’s much-improved 4th-down defense, and the impact of major coaching decisions amid off-the-field drama. Virginia Cavaliers overpower NC State Wolfpack 34-8 behind Beau Pribula’s dominant ground attack and relentless offensive line play. The conversation spotlights Des Kitchings' revenge game, questions about Dave Doeren's coaching, and the Wolfpack’s alarming lack of operational resilience.  Plus: Stanford Cardinal outlast Hawaii, Florida State Seminoles’ underwhelming win, and the burning question—can the ACC field more than one playoff contender? Don’t miss this fast-paced analysis of early ACC football storylines, tactical breakdowns, and what’s ahead for Miami, Clemson, and Pitt as Week 1 looms. Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! KALSHI For a limited time, Download the Kalshi app and use code [LOCKEDON] to get $10 when you trade $10. . Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast. Square Get up to $200 off Square hardware when you sign up at https://square.com/go/COLLEGE ! #squarepod ULTRA POUCHES Don’t sleep on Ultra Pouches. New customers get 15% Off with code LOCKEDONCOLLEGEFOOTBALL at https://takeultra.com! #UltraPouches #ad 5-Hour ENERGY Bring on the sweetness with Cotton Candy 5-hour ENERGY®️ shots—available online now at https:/5hourENERGY.com or on Amazon. Gametime Today's episode is brought to you by Gametime. Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase. Terms and conditions apply. FanDuel College football Saturdays are already packed with reasons to get excited, and this season, FanDuel is giving fans even more ways to get in on every matchup. Join all the action at https://FANDUEL.COM FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Week zero for the ACC is in the books. We'll break it all down right here on Locked on ACC. You are Locked on ACC, your daily podcast on the Atlantic Coast Conference. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome in to another edition of the Lockdown ACC podcast. I'm Julian Council, and he is former NC State Football Leonardman Kenton Gibbs. And today's episode of Lockdown ACC is brought to you by. Fandall college football Saturdays are already packed with reasons to get excited.

And this season, Fandall is giving fans even more ways to get in on every matchup. Join all the action at fandle.com week zero. And the ACC is in the books as five ACC teams were in action on Saturday, Florida State getting a win at home against Mexico State, but does not seem like Seminole fans are all that happy to beat a Pritchard 1 in O, getting a 10 point win against Hawaii there on the farm with state. Stanford, Virginia dominating NC State questions there about the Wolfpack in year 14 over Dave Doran. And then also looking at just Virginia, are they ACC title contenders?

And is 11 and 1 last year not a fluke. But let's start off with what is kind of the biggest story coming out of week zero across college football. And that is North Carolina going across the pond to Ireland and getting a 15 to 10 win against TCU and what was a very sloppy game. But one where the heels look, after all that they went through last year. all the off-the-field mess, still not knowing whether Michael Lombardi's going to come back as he's still under administrative leave. It was good for Carolina fans such as myself, and a lot of people would actually have one Saturday where the football program was not in total disarray and able to go out there and look like the more discipline team in BTCU. Your overall thoughts on the Tar Hills getting that dub on Saturday over an island. The reality is this not only look like a better team and a more cohesive team, but the reality is every win is like a baby.

your baby. It may not be pretty, but it's your damn baby. Okay, you're going to take it, you're going to love it, you're going to talk about how great it was, because again, it's your baby. The reality of this game was, did I see anything that was surprising from UNC's offense? No, not from their offense. Defensively, was I surprised by how good they were at points? Yes, yes, I was. A sunny Dykes coached offense to do what they did. I mean, TCU down horrendously. And for him to talk about Josh Hoover the way he did on the way out the door,

Josh Hoover should have posted the pulling up to my ops grave meme, like, I decided to make sure my enemies are dead. But in all seriousness, hats off to Bill Belichick, hats off to his defensive staff. As much as I joke about USC, I don't know what Stephen Belichick has going on. He's not with the team.

To have your D.C. not be there and put on this type of defensive performance, that has to be applauded. That has to be applauded. So hats off to the Tar Heels. Way to bring home a win for the ACC. And for UNC over there from Dublin. Way to go.

Yeah. And you think about it. Nowadays, my conference is better than your conference, which really the SEC. I mean, Paul Feinbub literally has a book title by conference can be your conference. That's something that is going to matter when it comes down to. Is there going to be a second bid for the ACC in the playoff? We all assume if Miami finally take care of business and wins the ACC,

that they'll be in it, but potentially could there be a second team? And we'll talk about maybe another team that announced themselves on Saturday that could be that second team in the ACC. So big to get that win for the conference in itself. But yeah, I mean, looking at Carolina, yes, that defense, I thought, played really well, especially in the second half. And if there is going to be a program in college football

where I'm not all that concerned about their D.C. not being out there, it's this one because Bill Belichick, we know last year there was a lot of issues. But we know the man can still coach football. We know he can coordinate a defense. He did that in the second half, where you look at the first half, TCU, they counted the bad snap on that punt as a rushing total. So they lost 31 yards on that. But if you take that out, they ran for 111 yards in the first half was 6.9 yards per carry.

In the second half, 22 carries, 26 yards total, which is 1.1 yards per carry. So they adjusted to the stretch play that they're running in that new Gordon Samis offense there for TCU. So be able to shut that down in second half was obviously huge. I talked about this the other day just about player development. Because you look at defensively, they're bringing guys back like Malkart Abu Jalde. They're bringing back Caleb Coss, got the big guys like Leroy Jackson, Isaiah Johnson. But who else is going to step up? Xavier Lewis was a revelation in that game with his four and a half tackles for lost to two sacks,

looking at some guys like Jonathan Agamadu, the lineback are coming and making some plays as well. Like that was encouraging from the heels defensively. And they were awful on fourth down defense last year. 75% of the time their opponents converted a year ago, one for five for TCU on Saturday, including the one that wrapped up the game, the one after the binhole fumble. That was the big one, I think, in that game as well.

So defensively, you have to be encouraged by the adjustments. You still have to be much better in the first half. Can't have to wait until halftime to see the things that we saw. And in offensively, like, I was impressed because they looked like an actual coordinated offense, unlike what we saw last year from Freddie Kitchens and from like the first play, the slip that they had to the Titan,

in Jelani Thurman for 20 yards. Like, okay, there we go. Like, they actually have things coordinated. They can't run the ball. That's concerned. It's probably only two playmakers in Thurman and Jordan Shipp, but it's week one or week zero. They get the win.

You take it. Is it change your thoughts on Carolina? Because I'm seeing a lot of kind of, what I think are overreactants to, oh, maybe we were all wrong on the heels. I was not high on them. I'm still not particularly high. I think maybe, depending on what other teams look like. I'd like to wait and see what Clemson looks like, what Pitt looks like.

before changing my prognosis on the heels. But are you moved at all by this win, even though, I mean, they got it, but it wasn't necessarily the most, I think, impressive performance. There are hot air balloons and there are anchor games, right? What do I mean by that? Hot air balloon games are you beat a really good team. Now all of a sudden people think better of you.

And then there are anchor games where a team is so bad, if you lose to them, people just think worse of you. It's not a situation where people start to think better of them. I think this is much more of an anchor game for me. I look at TCU now like, hey, yo, what's y'all got going on? What is this? Why is the Sunny Dikes Coast team running the ball 40 times? When does that happen?

Why do you not trust your quarterbacks to throw? That man is a Mike Leach disciple. Why? What is this? What is happening? So my opinion on North Carolina does not change. You know, hey, obviously they've got plenty of work in front of them, but they can work to change my mind.

They can work to make me very nervous that NC State will not get another one of these things up here at the end of the season. They can do a lot of work. NC State sure as hell did a lot of work to make me nervous about getting the sixth straight one of these. But, yeah, there's plenty of time for them to change my mind. I just don't think that happened for one game. Yeah, I am concerned about TCU. And now Sunny Dykes did change his offensive philosophy from the air raid, bringing over Gordon Samis from Yukon to be more of that ground and pound that we saw in the first half.

And certainly the weather had an impact. You know, Jaden Craig, the Harvard transfer quarterback. He struggled to throw the ball. He said post game. He didn't have any issues with the rain. You very did have issues with the rain. And I would say this, the thing for TCU and for North Carolina, it felt a lot like, not a lot, like, but similar in a way to the opener a couple

seasons ago against Minnesota where they did not have Darius Taylor for Minnesota, which changed their offense. We're not having Jordan Dwyer, the wide receiver who lit up Carolina a year ago, that changed TCU's offense. Ed Small was the only receiver who they could really. depend on, even Pippton, the tight end didn't make a ton of play. So they looked inept in the passing game. The only scoring drives they had were on the opening drive, scripted,

48-yard run that they broke open. Then they had that 33-yard punt return. I was on a terrible punt. Other than that, they didn't do anything. And you look at the mistakes that TCU made in this game, had the bad snap that led to the safety, which then had them chasing the rest of the game. They had the holding penalty that killed a drive.

They had the unsportsman-like, which I don't understand how signaling first down is now considered unsportsman-like. I don't like that, like leave that mess for the NFL. Let's not do that here in college. So I personally hate that. It better than Carolina. That's great and all, but I don't want to see that. There was a strip sack that Melkart had that Carolina ended up not scoring on.

There was a late hit on Billy Edwards after he slipped, which is like boneheaded. And then they jumped offside. So TCU made a lot of mistakes in this game. And Carolina is not going to be able to benefit from those. They only scored five points off of those TC mistakes. So Carolina had plenty of chances to close the door. but you have to give them credit because they did look like the more disciplined team. They were the team that did not make the mistakes that they made a lot last year,

which was big reason why I was concerned about Belichick and his team because things that we thought he was going to carry over from the NFL like being disciplined, like making the fewer mistakes. That did not happen last year. So does my opinion on Carolina change? Not necessarily. I still have concerns about the run game. They had 29 carries for 90 yards, just three point yards per attempt. That's not great.

Offensive line-wise, they did go against, I think, a. solid front in TCU, but they're going to have to be a lot better moving forward. Special teams, not having their kicker at the moment, Reese Furhop. That could have hurt them yesterday. As we saw Aaron Burrell missed that 42-yarder in the punt game was not great. So that does matter. There are concerns I have, and they only scored 15 points. Like, they look like a better offense as far as the coordination of the offense.

They just have to make more plays. And I don't know if they have the team speed at this point in time. But I'm not really buying the Belichick is vindicated. He still hired Michael Lombardy. That was a terrible inexcusable mistake that no. one can sit here and say that that was not wrong. He kept Freddie Kitchens, who politiced to stay around, but he did not have to be the O.C. He told Ryan Brown after a spring, you're not good enough. And then they brought in Gio Lopez. That was their decision. He's the one who alienated

the Mac players and had a divided locker room last year. He tried to operate the football program separate from the university. And he also thought he was too good for the coaches show. So there's still plenty of mistakes that Belchick has made that are not excused because they beat TCU. They're still five and eight under bill, but they at least look competent, which is the bare minimum. And I'm not at a point where I'm saying, oh, if they win six games this year, that's progress. Hell no, they did not hire him to win 10 games in the first two seasons and make $20 million doing it. Yes, they look better.

I will take that. But I'm not here to say, I was wrong about Belichick and that we all need to take a step back. Maybe people went a little bit overboard. We'll find out on September 19th in Death Valley, how good. this team potentially will be when they play against Clemson, who we don't even know how good Clemson is at this point in time. So I'm with you there. I'm not ready to change my thoughts on this team.

Still feel like they're going to probably struggle to make a bowl. But we have to see what it looks like. A team that certainly should not struggle to make a bowl or the Virginia Cavaliers after what they did to the Wolfpack on Saturday. I even think that NC State probably should be fine. But Ken, he bled for that program, we're asking what he thinks about what happened on Saturday there in Charlottesville, here in just a moment on lockdown ACC.

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going on the weekend. And Virginia certainly acted like it as they won 34 to 8 against the Wolfpack on Saturday afternoon there on the grounds. We'll get your thoughts on state in a moment, but let's focus on the winners first. Your thoughts on what Tony Elliott and this team was able to do and what was a tremendous performance from the Cavaliers on Saturday. You saw 31 years of college football playing experience in that offensive line manifest itself. That's what you saw. Physical as hell. Longest drive.

And I want to make this clear. Longest drive in UVA history. 23 plays. Nearly 13. minutes. That was a team. And I don't know where the tweet went because Gracie said he didn't delete it. I didn't delete it. Maybe the Locked on Overlords deleted it. But I said, this is disrespectful bully ball because UVA went for it on fourth in one or fourth in three or something like that. Multiple times on that drive. Multiple times. But they went for it when a

field goal would have ended the game. And they still went for it. That was why I tweeted. This is disrespectful bully ball. And so UVA, you've got to give credit to the disrespectful bullies. You've got to give credit to the guys that folded their arms and say, hey, we're going to have what we want when we want it. What are you going to do about it? You've got

to give credit to those guys. To simply say that this is, oh, NC State just melted down. Get out of here. Bo Perbula. He showed who we all thought him to be. His legs were a definitive weapon early and often. He showed himself,

to be the runner that we all knew. Oh, yeah, this is who Bro Perbule is. Running. He's not a guy that his passing sets the table for his running. It is, in fact, the exact opposite. His running sets the tone, so then you bring more bodies up, you get more nervous, and all of a sudden you have those huge, wide open windows for him to throw to, which we're seen in this game.

And by the way, what a revenge game for Des Kitchens. What a revenge game. Coach Kitchens was at NC State when I was there. He's a great, he's a good man, good man. I have nothing negative to say about the guy. He's a great dude and a hell of a coordinator to a man. So UVA, they said, hey, we're going to punch you in the mouth. You ready?

Here it comes. Oh, man, that's tough. Hey, don't worry. We got an uppercut coming right after this jab. You ready? Jab uppercut. Oh, boy. Yeah, you got to there a little bit.

And NC State could do nothing about it. So this is not about NC State. You must give credit to Tony Elliott and his style for saying, you know what, there's a Virginia way to build this thing out. And they've done so. They've done so. Like I said, fifth year left tackle, six year left guard, seventh year center, six year right guard, seventh year right tackle. They played like grown-ass men. Yeah, the get old, stay old, which we've seen in college basketball is something that we have seen from Virginia.

The last two years on the offensive line, which is really allowed Chandler Morris had the season he had last year, allow Beau Probula to be Bo Probula and a brand new running backroom. Jakel Middlebrooks, shown from Middle, Middle Tennessee State, scenes a brown out there. Like, that was, that was impressive stuff, man. And yeah, a ton of credit to Des Kitchens for finding an identity in this game. We talked about the other day, 16 guys that were on the availability report, including Rico Flores, who's expected to be their top wide receiver, who was out of a hamstring injury. You look at the Virginia wide receiver production in this game, six receptions,

90 yards, one touchdown, which was schemed up. beautifully by Deskitchens. They knew going into it that they had to run the football. And I asked, what did y'all do throughout fall camp that happened to many injuries? Well, we saw it. Physicality clearly was what they were doing throughout their training camp as they went out there and just bullied state all afternoon. Looking just at the numbers.

First quarter, this was a play split. 15 plays, 14 runs, one pass. 18 of their first 19 plays were runs. They had 100 yards rushing in the first 17 minutes of the game. You look at just the first half alone, a 30 to three run the past split, 57 to 11th in totality in the game. Like it's just, they did not respect NC State up front. Now, Michael Clark, a pack power 247 does a great job.

He was warning a lot of people who are state fans, anyone who reads their articles about the concerns that he had on the defensive front. There was a guy in Ketron Evans who played yesterday for state who may not be out there the rest of the season. And that is concerning if you had him on the field and it looked like this, you may not have them moving forward. There's a lot of guys who are going, I think, get better throughout the season, which is why I'm not going to necessarily panic about what they have up front there for state. But this was grown men versus a bunch of young guys who did not have experience.

And it showed out there on Saturday. And you're right. I wrote it down my notes. Virginia showed a lack of respect for state's front seven when they went for that fourth and one set kicking a field goal. That would have ended the game at 27 to 8. So, man, that was concerning stuff. So one more thing, like Virginia, they can run per Buella like that, because they have Eli Holstein.

If they didn't have Eli Holstein, he can't be a battering ram. There will be games where they can do that. But week in, week out, much like we saw Georgia Tech last year of Haynes King, you can't get away with doing that. The receivers will get healthy. I think Cam Gordon will be a good player for them. We didn't really see much of the tight ends like Dakota Twitty on Saturday. Like they'll have more a passing game.

It's never going to be elite in my thought. But, man, that was just an ass whooping. And that was a bad afternoon for Dave Doran. What some are saying are the worst outing that they've had under him in this 14 years, Your thought as being an alum is having watched what happened on Saturday. Hey, Julian, as an alum, as a football analyst, as a guy who likes the sport of football, DJ Elliott, you need to be arrested for impersonating a football coach. I'm going to give you a stat that you are not going to believe.

I know everybody says I talk about Coach Drink too much, but I need to talk about it right now. It's very important. Coach Drink has been an offensive coordinator, co-offensive coordinator or head coach. For 12 separate teams, Julian, how many of those teams do you think through for over 2,500 yards? And mind you, included in those teams, is a Missouri team that has,

multiple Missouri teams that had to play two quarterbacks throughout the year, an NC state team that had to play four quarterbacks in one year. How many times do you think he threw for under 2,500 yards? I'm going to say zero, because I know last year with Perbuella and Zollers, they definitely did throw for over. Chase Bryce at one year at App State did. No, no. He threw over for every year but one.

Every single year but one. What do you think that one year was? He was coaching a guy who is selling Kia's right now for at Arkansas State. What do you think the one year was that he didn't throw for $2,500? And it wasn't the year where NC State played four quarterbacks a year. Julian, I'm going to let you guess. Guess the year. Guess who was the quarterback when he could not reach $2,500 through the air?

Was it Jacoby percent? It was Bo Perbula. Oh, Perbula. Oh, well, yeah, I guess that makes some sense. And Zola's through for 2400, 44 yards. His first time ever, his first time ever as a head coach or coordinator, not going for over 2,500. Now, why is that important?

This is an actual quote directly from NC State Mike linebacker, Po Poe Poe O'Gee Re. Good. And he was talking about Bo Perbula here. Good player. We expected that, but we didn't expect as many quarterback runs from him. What? What? Now, thank God, NC State is a public university.

You know what that means? We know how much everybody on that staff is making. DJ Elliott makes $75,000 damn dollars a month, a month. And his defenders are saying, we did not expect the only quarterback who, couldn't throw for 2,500 and then Eli Drinkwood's offense to run the ball. We were shot by it. What? That's crazy.

With that being said, Julian, you talk about K. Tron and Evans not being on the field and what that can mean for this team. I'm more concerned about the fact that we have a defensive coordinator that did not tell our defensive ends, hey, this guy likes to run the ball a lot. We need to run the cue. We need to learn the Q technique very deeply for inside zone read because they're going to run a lot. Instead, we allowed

110 yards from Bo Pebula alone. 7.3 yards per carry from Boe Perbula alone. A team that on 3rd and 7 ran quarterback draw. The rest of the game after that, we didn't think to ourselves,

hey, guys, I don't think they trust them to throw the ball very much. Let's load it up and let's make him beat us with his arm. It never happened. So, I tip my hat to UVA for saying, if you're going to let us throw the uppercut all game, we're going to keep throwing the uppercut all game. I tip my hat to them.

But NC State, why the hell do you keep leaning into an uppercut? Why the hell do you, Mr. Coordinator, making a million damn dollars in this economy? 900,000, guy, the math. 900,000, correct? Yes, it is. He makes 900,000 jacked. I round it up. I'm sorry, everybody.

Guy math. Why do you, Mr. $900,000 coordinator not say, hey, guys, we're going to load this box up. We're going to have one more in the box and they can't block it all times. The defensive ends. If he pulls this ball, I can't take away your NIL. I can't take away your scholarship. You will be paying for your school for the rest of the year. If he pulls the ball and you're not there waiting to pop them in the mouth.

Why did that not happen? Because it never did. Yeah. And look, and that's only one side of the ball. Like, offensively, I want to give, again, Virginia, of their flowers. John Redsinski has been awesome for Tony Elliott since he's come over. I think he came from Air Force as a DC when Tony took over the job. Like that defense, that defense has not.

A Cam Robinsonless defense. Right. Cam Robinson's his defense dominated. And Tony said after the game, like he let him go through warmups, but he would never forgive himself. He went out there and got hurt. They have a buy week. So, okay, give him a couple of more time to get ready to go.

And then you add him to that. Like that defense was flying around, man. that team speed that they had, that was some serious stuff. What you want to see when guys have legs early on in the season, that will be something to monitor the rest of the year. But you look at just, you know, state, there's a lot of hype about CJ Bailey in this offense, potentially this season.

And they go out there first half, go punt, punt, both three and outs in interception, punt, punt, and then fumble. It was just, it was terrible. And like, we'll get to CJ, but like the wide receivers. We saw last year. Look, Terrell Anderson is now at Southern Cal, I thought he was good. Noah Rogers, Wesley Grimes, it felt like they underperform. last season.

But the guys that they brought in yesterday in that game had five receptions for 31 yards in the first half in total. That's just, that's not enough. Six receptions for 38 yards in total among the transfer receivers. Like after one game, it's only one game. It looks like a serious downgrade to what they had a year ago. And CJ certainly struggle behind that offensive line, which is experienced. We thought maybe would take a step forward.

And they never seemed to get Jane Duke Scott, the ball, get him established. I just was kind of myth by what exactly they were trying to accomplish offensively yesterday. And I'm assuming that you feel equally the same, if not more passionate about whatever the hell that was. You pay C.J. Bailey because you pay a point guard, right? You pay the point guard. He can elevate your rim running center. You pay the point guard. He can elevate your three and D wing.

You pay the point guard. He elevates your slashing small forward. That's why you pay the point guard, right, Julian? Because the point guard, he distributes and all that. to the wide receivers credit, as somebody that was there in Virginia, by the way, miserable venue to go to.

Terrible food. Terrible food. They don't even feed you in the second half. What? What is this? Why is there no food at halftime? What's going on here? Well, first saw it since 2008,

so they probably weren't prepared. It's a while since they've had to feed that many people. Yeah. God love it. The media was just sitting there like, wait, are we not getting food? But that's neither here nor there. The reality of this thing is this.

I sat there and I said, my point guard is throwing the ball to the other team. If you watch that first half, we had receivers open. Coach Roper scheme guys open in that first half, C.J. Bailey, miss after miss, after miss. And I said this on yesterday's posting name for Locked on Wolfpack, but I'm going to say it again because I need C.J. Bailey to hear it from somebody. I don't care if he hears it for me on ACC or Wolfpack. I don't care where he hears it.

The leader in interceptions in the season all time is, Blanda, who's in the Hall of Fame. The leader for all-time interceptions in the season post-merger is Vinnie Tessaverty, Hall a very good guy. The leader for Ricky interceptions all the time in the season is Peyton many. We all know how that turned out. C.J. Bailey, you have to be more mentally tough. Every game that you throw an interception early, it's just like, that's it.

It's Shane Falco and Quicksand, everybody. For those of you who haven't seen the replacements, the harder you have to fight, the deeper you sink. just let go and play some damn football. It was so difficult to keep my clean rating yesterday, Julie. We almost got demonetized on YouTube because the shenanigans I saw out of this team. CJ Bailey has to be, he was the beginning and the end of the Wolfpack's problems in this game. And everybody's going to say, that's not fair to put that much on the guy and did it out. Guess what?

When Hollywood left, you said we paned CJ. When your receivers left, you said we pay in CJ. We paying to keep our quarterback. We pan to keep him away from Miami. You do what you got to do because if I pay the point guard, he's going to make everybody else better. My point guard pissed down his leg because he had a bad turnover early. Yeah.

And with CJ playing like that, I'm worried about Richmond. Forget getting the six one of these. Forget getting the six one in the row. We're not even talking about that. I don't know if you could beat Richmond with him playing as frazzled as he did in this game. Yeah. And look, I don't want to, you know, go. and I'm not saying you are going over.

I certainly after one week, one game, I don't want to go too far either case. I think Virginia certainly has shown that, okay, that experience does matter. They have a plan for Pabula right now. I think they're going to have more of a passing game moving forward if they truly are going to be back here in Charlotte come December. So we'll see how that goes moving forward.

Like NC State, I don't know whether to downgrade them. I never believe like the whole idea that they were going to be an ACC title contender. and the whole schedule thing. This is why I asked you, what is it? Is it just, like, do they have the talent? Because if it's just the schedule, like that's not necessarily convincing me enough.

Like, yes, C.J. Bailey's back. Yes, Duke's got in a good role. I think Davey on Goss can be fine. And the offensive line has some continuity. And like, there was a lot of questions defensively, not just like with the defensive front, but at linebacker. Gary was good.

AJ Richardson, where was he at yesterday in that game? The secondary, you can't really make too much out of them yesterday because they didn't really throw the ball. Yes, there was some bust, but hell, man, when you run the bowl to a 30 to three split in the first half, yeah, you're going to get beat on play action to start the second half, man. It's just going to happen. I'm just looking at it and I'm just asking where's the talent?

That's my question going to the season. Where's the talent? Tony Gibson's not here anymore to elevate that defense. Like, where is the talent for NC State to where people thought a schedule was going to be the reason why they make the ACC championship game? I don't see the talent out there. My question is, not only where is the talent, where's the damn coaching? Where's the coaching?

If I was a coach and I heard my players say, I was surprised to see a quarterback run so much for a quarterback who was in a past happy offense and was statistically the worst ever in that past happy offense, if I heard my Mike linebacker say that, I would walk into the meeting room the next day and legitimately apologize to everybody and say, I'm sorry. I'm not going to cuss nobody out.

I don't even want to watch the film. This is on me. and I have not, I've been derelict in my duties to not have y'all fully prepared for a guy who does one thing to do his one theme. It is showing up to a Stevie Wonder concert

preparing to see him dance like Michael Jackson or Beyonce. He can't. He physically cannot do that. It is not within his ability. So to see them do, their one thing that everybody knew, And then to have your players say, man, I was surprised they did the one thing that everybody knows they can do. It has to be embarrassing.

You have to take pride in your job as a coach. You have to take pride in. And Doran as a head coach. Once again, another big game, another moment where we have to break out the depends and the rubber sheets because it's bad wetting time. You get Doran in front of a national crowd. It's bad wet in time, everybody. Again, this is a game where, you know, you may say, oh, I'm not going to throw this team in a dumpster.

Neither am I. I'm not going to say that Doran can't give us the Doran special of 8 and 4. But what I will say is this team significantly takes a hit in my book because I saw coaches be derelict in their duties in ways that I was not expecting. I saw players who are supposed to be the leader, who are supposed to be the guy and C.J. Bailey show up and say, oh, I had a bad play early. Guys, count me out.

Count me out. I had a bad play early. I got to get rhythm. And even when I get rhythm, I can't have a bad player else it's over. It's a part of operational. Operational resilience is a part of sports because it's not always going to go right. Julian, you and me know this with this show. Sometimes things go wrong.

Sometimes you hit the wrong opener. Sometimes I'm like, oh, I didn't know you were starting. My bad. And we just restart, re-rack it, and get it rolling. Not, oh, Julia said the wrong thing in the opening. I got to roll my eyes and we ain't never going to be the same again. Oh, it's 10 minutes late to record. Oh, God, he's a diva.

I can't do it. But for whatever reason, guys who are getting paid seven figures to do this cannot figure out how to have operational resilience on their end. And that, to me, is wildly disappointed. Yeah. And look, man, I've questioned why state fans feel the way they feel about Dave Doran after all this time. And you look at the history of this program. They have nine, sorry, they have 14, nine-win seasons. Dave has four of those.

No other coach has more than two. So he's been phenomenal for them. but days like Saturday, nights light the game against Tennessee here in Charlotte a couple years ago. Like, I get it. Part of the Dave Doran is. They are now 51 and 56 under Dave Doran and the ACC.

And that is just not good enough. But it was good enough on Saturday for Florida State, even though a lot of people in Tallahassee did not feel good about how they performed. And look at you, Stanford, getting that win, 1 and O, prove me wrong. We'll talk about those other two games from the ACC here in this moment on Lock.

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and the fact that there's no entry fee makes this an easy one to jump into. 10 free picks every week gives me a reason to see how I stack up. Download the Fandle app and play college football pick them for free. Only on Fandle, visit Fandle.com to get started. There were two other games that occurred in the ACC during week zero. Certainly do not have the headlines for the fanfare as UNC winning in Ireland against T. and certainly Virginia stopping NC State and all that comes from how, you know, look, man, that's just, that's tough for the state fan base to be excited and to see that happen.

And like I told you on Friday, I didn't have a great feel of that game, but I've been living here long enough, been following that program long enough to know that anytime there's hype around state, that's what happens, which that's unfortunate. I get why the fan base is frustrated by it. We now move on. I think they'll be fine at the end of the day. Stanford, we'll start off there. 37, 27, 27 winning into Hawaii.

I thought that the Rainbow Warriors would win by double digits. Look like they had a chance to win that game late, but then Micah Aliato and an offense, they could not get it done. Fumbles leads to an all-time bad beat. I'm sure you'll see it on Monday night for bad beats with Stanford Steve and Scott Van Pelt. Your overall thoughts on the Cardinal getting that one on Saturday at the farm.

Boy, was I wrong about State UVA, but boy, was I right about Stanford? I take my lickings for NC State UVA, but Tevita Pritchin, my brother, I told you you won me over at ACC Media Days, and he does it again. He doesn't. And some people say, Ken, why are you so excited about this team beat Hawaii? Hawaii is the G5 school, not too much going on over there, but very good official visits,

which, by the way, you can't make an official visit over there until after you commit. Just a fun fact. But anyway, oh, yeah, absolutely. Because I for sure would have wasted a little bit of Hawaii buddy. I want to hear about the rainbow war in football. But this was a great deal. game because Stanford did not give up. They did not give in. They stayed the course. Things got rocky. They stayed the course. They took a nice little lead. They stayed the course.

Tehada comes back and destroys that lead. They stayed the course, reclaim the lead. And then not only that, you force the fumble recovery for a touchdown, stay the course. There's going to be choppy waters. Keep rowing that damn boat. And that's what this team did. That's what this team did. And so I've got nothing but love. Tevita Pritchell is one of my favorites in the conference. Don't tell the Calgary of them that because I love Lpo. too. That's my guy too.

I like, hey, I'm neutral. You know what I mean? I know L.A. got their own type of thing going on. No-Cal got their own type of thing going on in terms of what colors you can wear and all that. But I'm neutral. I'm a third part. I like both of them. And I love what Pritchard has going on here, man.

So, you know, again, do I think they'll be great this year? No. Does this game change my opinion of them? No, but I'll be damned if I'm not going to say they showed up, they showed out, they chopped wood and they carried water for all four quarters. Because Julia, like you said, had that play going another way, had that fumble turned into a touchdown for Hawaii. We're having a very different discussion.

So shout out to those Stanford Car. Yeah, and look, for the people who are betting on the wind total going over that three and a half wind total, they had to have this game. I had my concerns because of, well, the receivers that were out on Saturday night. but the freshman wide receiver stepped up. Guys like John Anthony Hall, two receptions and 81 yards, Zion Robinson, two receptions 57 yards, Atticus Joseph, four receptions, 52 yards and a touchdown.

So those guys stepping up, it's key. Davis Warren go for 300 yards passing in this game. Offensive line will be one area to watch moving forward as they did not have their starting left tackle, Nikki Prongos or their starting right guard, Simi Pele, and then they lost their center Aiden Kielstrom in the third quarter. And when that happened, they had three straight drives out of the punt. And that's when Hawaii went on kind of their comeback.

The first nine drives for Hawaii, 37 plays, 82 yards, seven points. The next three, 30 plays, 2233 yards and 20 points. And then that final drive, of course, they ended up fumbling. And that was it there for Stanford to get that win. So that would be something to watch out for moving forward. The O-line injuries, how Warren continues to progress with those young receivers. Michael Ford looked good in that game. And I thought mostly throughout that game, they kept Ali Hado from getting in the rhythm and being comfortable.

So good job by the Stanford defensive front as well on Saturday. to get that 37 to 27 win against a Hawaii team that beat them a year ago. FSU at home at the same time wins 34 to 17 against Mexico State. But watching that game, listening to the crowd angst, reading War Chant this morning, not too many people are taking away that many positives from this victory. What are your takeaways from what you saw on Saturday? I mean, I'm very concerned about that passing defense. Tony White, what you're doing, brother?

What's you doing? I mean, New Mexico State just sliced and diced and got what they wanted. That's against Florida State. And then, and then, the biggest thing that confuses me, Norvelle is the new play caller. We know Norvelle is a guy that likes to run everybody. He wants to run the quarterback.

He wants to run his running backs, all that good stuff. Why did Oldsman and Cromwell have so few carries? He was a bowling ball of butcher, They struggled to do any damn thing with them all night long, and somehow all you could come up with for them was 14 Gary's. I'm a little bit confused by that. I'm a little bit confused by that. Again, I look at this game.

I fully understand why Florida State fans are so worried. I fully understand why there's so much angst about we won, but we're going to see better defensive lines than this. We're going to see better linebacker course than this. going to see better defensive back rooms than this. We're going to see better quarterbacks, better running better. We're going to see better. And we struggled, had to fight, claw, scrap, pray, and

work for three days to potentially get this. So, again, I'm a little bit concerned, but it is what it is. Yeah, and I am concerned to, I want to at least outlined the positives that I took away, which certainly was the run game. You talked about his moncroma. He looked

every bit of the part on Saturday. Samuel Singleton, actually, he was the one really popped to me with his ability to make some plays the speed that he has. They brought in Trey Wisner from Texas and he was the third guy. He got some opportunities there to second half. So they have three capable backs, which is something that they certainly need to have with Ashton Daniels back there, Deuce Robinson, not that involved. Neither was Mackay Danzy, but you know that those guys can make some plays.

We'd like to see the tight ends be a little bit more involved moving forward. As far as concerns, though, like offensive line, they lost the top six a year ago. brand new old line that they have now and like that they had some struggles protecting and when we get to next Monday night Labor Day concerned about them there you talk about the passing defense Mexico State was 10 of 17 on third down. Jibrill Rawls is the guy who entered the portal came back. They're paying him a ton of money. I thought he had a horrible game. Gave up a touchdown. Had a bad penalty.

It was taken out several times because he gave up long third downs. He's got to be better. Like Daryl DeRole, him and his brother Mandrell were also string. in Florida State around as they went to the portal. And then they come back, Darrow had one tackle last night. Mandrae didn't really do that much. So like those guys got to be better. And Kevin Winn, if you look at defensively at that front,

they're kind of small, wins the guy who's a five star who they brought in. One of the few wins Mike Norvell has in his recruiting of high school prospects. He played eight snaps last night. He's got to play a lot more for FSU moving forward. So I know I picked him to beat SMU. I'm not going to pull back from that pick right now. Because look, you get,

with all adages, a lot better from week one to week two and all that. But yeah, what I saw on Saturday, likely going to have Kevin Jennings and the Mustangs do whatever they want offensively. But we'll see. I'm not ready to go turn around just yet and change my pick. I have until Friday to do that,

maybe even actually Monday when we record to do that. Maybe Saturday night when we're live, I can do that. But yeah, not feeling great about the Seminoles at this point in time. But I didn't feel good about them going in the season anyways. But yeah, not great, not great at all. but we'll see how it moves forward. But that's going to wrap up this edition of the Lockdown ECC podcast for our Lockdown Podcast Network.

We're your host, as always, Julian Council and Kenton Gives. Again, y'all subscribe and follow the show for free over on YouTube and wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. Be sure to follow us over on the socials at Julian Council and at TGIF underscore Kenton. And at meantime, be safe, be happy, be whole. And we'll be back with y'all on Tuesday as we prepare for week one and the rest of the conference to join the party

as we get ready for if college football to fully be in action, all that and more coming up here on Tuesday on Locked on ACC.