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Mac & Bone Show - Dave Clawson Interview · Mac & Bone Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We're talking about Dave Klaassen, ACC Network ESPN, and he
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: joins us here on the Mac and Bone Show.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Coach, what's going on? How are you doing this morning?
• 0:09
  Speaker 3: I'm doing great. Thanks for having me on.
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: Coach, what do you think?
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: I know you've got to have a soft spot for
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: the Deacs all your years there and the stuff you
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: did with them. Man, Jake Dickard has taken the baton,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and he is running. The latest example was blowing out
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: NC State in Raleigh. What do you– I mean, like,
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: is this– I mean, you've got to talk about this
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: team in terms of getting to Charlotte, potentially, for an
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: ACC title game, don't we?
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: Well, right now you have Miami, who's undefeated in the ACC,
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: and you have nine teams with one loss. And of
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: those nine teams, I think there's no question that Wake
• 0:49
  Speaker 3: Forest has been playing the very best football of those
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: nine teams, and they're the most consistent team.
• 0:59
  Speaker 4: Coach, I think your dog also agrees in the background
• 1:02
  Speaker 4: about Wake right now.
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, our dogs agree. I'm actually dropping my daughter off
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: at ESPN.
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: Oh, nice.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: She works there, and we're passing through the gates together.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's awesome.
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: She works for ESPN. for game day, but the dogs
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: have settled down. So sorry about that.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: I have a dog that does it every time on
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: the phone too. So that's why it's funny.
• 1:25
  Speaker 4: Coach SI.com right now has Wake Forest as a, as a,
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: as a playoff team as one of the 12 teams.
• 1:32
  Speaker 4: Do you, do you think there's a path there for,
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: for way to potentially be maybe the second team in
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: the ACC to be one of the playoff teams?
• 1:40
  Speaker 3: Well, right now, if the ACC gets a second team,
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: it would probably be Wake Forest. Now, there's a lot
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: of football left, and typically the ACC competes with the
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: Big 12 to be a two-bid team. So I think
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: if you're Wake Forest, and this is going to sound
• 2:01
  Speaker 3: really strange, you probably are a big Notre Dame fan
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: this weekend.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: You had to take out BYU. It's a good point.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: That's a good call.
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: Exactly. I think a lot of times that second bid
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: in last year, Miami got in at large. Now this year,
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: all the conference champions automatically get in. So you have
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: seven at-larges. Probably the SEC will get three or four
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: of those. A lot of times it comes down to
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: You know, is it going to be a Big 12
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: team that gets two bids or an ACC team that
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: gets two bids? And, you know, so I think right
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: now you're probably talking, you know, Miami, Texas Tech, BYU,
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: and Wake would be the four teams fighting for those
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: three bids. And there's one easy way to take care
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: of that. You just keep winning football games. And right now,
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: Wake is playing at a really, really high level. And
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: all the other teams they're competing with in the ACC–
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: I think Wake is the one team that's good on
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: both sides of the football.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: That's a great point.
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: I think SMU has a great offense. A lot of
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: these teams are really strong on one side of the ball.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: And the reason Miami is the team they are is
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: they're really strong on both sides of the ball. But
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: you'd say Wake is the one team that can score
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: a lot of points and hold you down as well.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: No doubt.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: We're talking to Dave Clawson, ACC Network, talking, of course,
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: some ACC football. Carolina gets a big win, Belichick's first
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: win over a ranked team at UNC. But, you know,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: it does feel like they're still limited a bit in
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: terms of what they can do offensively, but they found
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: a way to win. They're clearly better than last year, Dave.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Do you think there's more big wins where that came
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: from this year for Carolina?
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: I do. I've watched them on film a lot this year.
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: I had them live once against East Tennessee State. And,
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: you know, people will talk about, well, look what Gio
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: Lopez is doing with Wake compared to Carolina. For what
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: North Carolina wants to do, you know, Billy Edwards probably
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: fits their offensive system better. And, you know, Bill Belichick,
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: you know, first of all, is a great head coach,
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: but You know, he really is known as a defensive expert.
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: You know, he won a couple of Super Bowls as
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: a defensive coordinator. And they are built right now to
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: play defense, run the football. They have a veteran quarterback
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: that doesn't make a lot of mistakes and doesn't turn
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: it over much. And they've got a formula there. They
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: are a much improved football team. And, you know, Bill
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: Belichick's a smart football coach. And I think... He's made
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: the adjustment to college football, and that was a really
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: good win they had against Pitt. They made some huge
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: defensive stops, and they can run the football and play defense.
• 5:11
  Speaker 4: Coach, one staple of the Wolfpack and the Dave Doran
• 5:15
  Speaker 4: run has been the consistency of the program and kind
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: of knowing each year who they are. This year it's
• 5:21
  Speaker 4: not been that way. It's been inconsistent. What do you
• 5:24
  Speaker 4: think has led to them being inconsistent this year in
• 5:27
  Speaker 4: some of their games?
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: Well, it's hard to tell. I mean, again, that's a
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: hard question for me. I really like Dave and have
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: a ton of respect for Dave. And such a big
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: deal was made of them keeping the quarterback, C.J. Bailey.
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: But people forget that he lost his best offensive lineman.
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: They lost Hollywood Smothers. And I think part of the
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: issue with college football right now, is you no longer
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: have programs, you have teams. And when your team is
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: switching every year, it almost takes you a month to
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: figure out what your team is. You know, so for example,
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: sometimes I'd go through training camp and I'd think like,
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: you know what, boy, we are really, really good at receiver.
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: We can throw the ball this year. We're going to
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: be able to stretch people and get the ball thrown
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: down the field. And then you start playing games against
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: other teams and you find out that, you know what,
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: we're really not that good at receiver. We're just that
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: bad at corner. And maybe we're better in some areas
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: than we thought. So you always go into a year thinking,
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: this is the makeup of our football team. And then
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: kind of a month into it, it changes. And, you know,
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: I think that's one of the things that all teams
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: struggle with, but You know, obviously the Vanderbilt loss was
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: a huge loss, but then they come back, they beat App,
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: they come back, they have a great win against Louisville,
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: and Wake Forest is a really good football team. I
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: think what Wake Forest did to NC State, they're going
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: to do to a lot of people, and if anybody
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: who follows the ACC should know one thing, is Dave
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: Dorn and NC State out. His teams always get better
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: in the second half of the season.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: They do. That's true.
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: Last thing I want to ask you about, Coach, is
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: what we've seen in terms of coaches in this era
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: of NIL. be able to really make quick turnarounds. Obviously,
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: Cignetti is one that is pointed to, but heck, Eric Morris,
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: Oklahoma State, Will Stein, Kentucky, Bob Chesney at UCLA. What
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: do you think of what we're seeing from coaches that
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: are able to go there? And does that make it
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: harder on coaches' job security? Because fan bases and boosters
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: will look and say, hey, if we make a change,
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: we can do what those schools are doing.
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: How do you view this development in this new era?
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: Okay, so you have like five questions in one there. Okay,
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: so first off, the Cignetti model, if you can see,
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: it's changed how people hire people, right? That before it
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: was really hard for a group of five head coach
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: to get a power four job. Now those hires have
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: become very popular because those coaches can bring 15 or
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: 20 players with them. So Cignetti brought a bunch of
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: JMU players with him. Jake Dickard brought a bunch of
• 8:33
  Speaker 3: guys from Washington State with him. Bob Chesney brought guys
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: from JMU with him. Eric Morris was able to bring
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: players from North Texas with him. So you're almost at
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: an advantage when you're a new head coach because you
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: can now bring 10, 15, 20 players with you that
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: understand your culture, that can help teach the other players
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: in your locker room, this is what this head coach
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: is about, and help sell it to the rest of
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: the team. Hey, we won doing this at Washington State.
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: We won doing this at JMU. So the whole idea
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: of it's three or four years before it's your program
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: is no longer the case. Okay? So I think that's–
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: you see more of a hiring trend of hiring, you know,
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: John Sumrall from– Tulane goes to Florida. Like in the past,
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: those group of five guys weren't getting that high level
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: of a job. And yes, it makes job security harder
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: because now that you're paying for players, any fan or
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: anybody that contributes to the payroll expects an immediate result.
• 9:45
  Speaker 3: And the truth of it is you're paying for the
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: guys that you used to get free four years ago.
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: Like everybody's paying. So like, because you're paying a player,
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: it doesn't mean you're getting a better player. It just
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: requires that. much money to get the Zane player that
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: a scholarship used to get you. And so it's created
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: this unrealistic expectation. Like I coached against Matt Campbell in
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: the Mac. I was the head coach at Bowling Green
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: and he was at Toledo. And Matt Campbell is a really,
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: really good football coach. Like, to do what he did
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: at Iowa State and for all of a sudden people
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: at Penn State to be up in arms because halfway
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: through his first year he's not undefeated and ranked number
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: one in the country. Like, that's, again, what Cignetti did
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: at Indiana and is doing. Like, that's the needle in
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: the haystack. You're very rarely going to get that. And
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: so anyways, you know, again, you're just, you're paying for
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: the same guys you get to get for free. And
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: I think because of that, fans have a different expectation
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: immediately of their football coach and their football team.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: That was a great breakdown. It was a great answer
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: to all five of my questions. Coach, you handled it beautifully. Also, Coach,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: my man here is a Penn State fan, so he
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: feels heard by what you just said. Yeah, I tell you.
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: You're right. It's tough.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: It's like, you know, the patience thing. Everybody can point to, oh,
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: look at him, look at them. Coach, great stuff as always.
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: And congrats to your daughter as well. That's an awesome
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: job working for game day.
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, she's been to Tuscaloosa last weekend, Baton Rouge. She's
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: seen a bunch of college towns, and it's really cool
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: for me. I used to bring my daughter with me
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: on away trips. And so, you know, for this to
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: turn out to be her career choice, I think is just–
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: I'm really proud of her, and it's kind of neat.
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: You know, you have all this guilt as a coach
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: all the time you miss from your family. But to
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: see that maybe what I did has helped her career,
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: it's a pretty cool payback.
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: That's awesome. That's awesome. And tell your pup, your pup
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: was good on the radio too, Coach.
• 11:59
  Speaker 4: All right?
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: We love the passion from your dog as well. Thank you, Coach.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: We appreciate it.
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. Thanks for having me on.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Coach. All right. Be good.