WRAL Sports Fan

North Carolina State University

N.C. State's O'Brien stands by defensive coordinator

By Adam Harris

Oct 30, 2009

North Carolina State is on a three-game losing streak, and a lot of Wolfpack faithful blame defensive coordinator Mike Archer.

Despite a rough season thus far, Tom O'Brien stands by the coach of his defense.

"Oh, absolutely.  Mike's been part of this before," O'Brien said on Thursday.  "He built a heck of a defense at Kentucky before he came here, a place where they had a long tradition of not going to bowl games, and winning.  He came to us as one of the top defensive coordinators in the country at turning the football over.

"You know, sometimes it's not the coach, sometimes it's the arrows in his quiver that need to improve."

O'Brien went on to defend Archer's status as N.C. State's defensive coordinator of the future.

"Going forward, we're going to stay with the plan," said O'Brien.  "The worst thing you can do is start changing the thing every year.  I mean, that's absolutely the worst thing to do.  Consistency is important.  Continuity is important, and that's what we're going to provide."

With N.C. State giving up a combined 131 points in their last three games, O'Brien expressed disappointment in the ability of the Pack's defense to make plays when needed.

"We have to tackle.  Our problems have come down to, we've had people in position to make plays, but we haven't made 'em," the Wolfpack coach said on 99.9 FM The Fan.  "That's a factor of, you know if those guys can't make plays, then they're not going to play anymore.  We have to get guys in there that can do it."

The lack of experience on the Wolfpack roster leaves the coaching staff looking for underclassmen to make an impact.

"We have no upperclassmen, so we're forced to play a lot of young kids," O'Brien told The Insiders.

"Maybe there's a guy or two that can help us because of injuries. You know, we've got five games left. We're trying to set the football team up so that we can win all five football games, and do that with who we have still available to play."