Panthers are bad, Pesce could be back with the Canes, and ACC football matchups this weekend!

Speaking of Matt Ruhl, I actually saw this sentiment on Twitter.

I'm not saying I share it, but I saw this sentiment on Twitter that actually said that Matt Ruhl is a better head coach than Frank Reich. Nope. Nope. Nope. That's a bridge too far for me. That is way too far. Nope.

We don't need that bad juju here. That is a bridge too far for me. I mean, but there are... I nearly passed out. It was late, so I could have passed out.

It might not have been due to that, but I could have passed out. All right, it is Friday. It is time to chat up with my friend Luke Takaka, the news and observer columnist, hockey maven, all of that.

I appreciate your time. I hope it was a personal best today, sir. It was not, but we're working on it, as Matt Ruhl would say. You know, we've got to keep working on it.

So we're going to keep working on it. Let's spend two minutes, because it's all it deserves right now, on the Panthers. Do you have a theory as to why they're absolutely this pathetic? Yeah, I mean, they've got a rookie quarterback. They surrounded him with an offensive line that was dealing with injuries and wasn't prepared to block for a rookie quarterback. They have one decent receiver, and even that's an aging veteran. They traded the one good receiver they had in this misguided effort to trade up for number one in a year where there is no clear-cut number one player. They picked the wrong one probably, although I will say this. It's way too early to judge Bryce Young. He's surrounded by nothing. I'm not going to pass judgment on him for a while here.

They're certainly not putting in a position to succeed, but you also have a franchise that every summer says it's one player away from contending in a terrible division, and then by November is the reason the division's so bad. So, I don't know. No, it was good. I will say this, Adam. I will say this, and I would bet any amount of money on this, although there's no way to prove it. The Panthers would have more than one win if Steve Wilks were coaching. Oh, I agree. I agree.

You and I are on the same page. I was team Steve Wilks from the beginning. I thought he earned the job, and we could sit here all day long and debate whether or not he really had a chance at it. In my opinion, David Tepper was never going to hire Steve Wilks, and I'm not saying that for nefarious reasons. I think David Tepper was always going to hire an offensive head coach. He was always going that route. This franchise has had basically defensive coach after defensive coach after defensive coach.

Chances, I will point out that they have gone to two Super Bowls that way. So, yeah, but that's all right. That's all right, David. In most cases, you hire the opposite of what you had. Now, I don't know what the opposite of Matt Rule is. You hire a coach who's accountable. Maybe that's the opposite of Matt Rule. You just hire a coach that accepts responsibility.

Well, I don't know if they did that. I was just about to say, where are you going with this? I don't know that Frank Reich was the wrong hire. I think the combination of Frank Reich and Bryce Young and the personnel decisions that were made, and what has to be at this point, constant interference from the top in terms of the major, major decisions by an owner who thinks he's George Hallett and is actually, you know, George Burns, George Costanza.

There's very little reason to expect that it's ever going to get any better. You look at Charlotte FC. This is an expansion franchise, an expansion franchise. You get to pick the guy who sets the standard for your entire future and then go through three coaches in three years. And the first coach, what lasted?

First coach lasted 10 games, right? It's just, it's insane. It's insane. The outbreaks of leadership in Charlotte have to stop at some point. I wonder if how much time each week is taken up with the Reich-Fitterer-David Tepper meetings.

Let's move on to something else. Let's go to the Carolina Hurricanes who will play in Florida tonight and then in Tampa on Saturday. Brett Pesci is on the trip. So I don't expect him tonight. I would expect him tomorrow so he doesn't have to play back-to-back games. And I guess he wouldn't have to play back-to-back games. But once he gets back in the lineup, you're not going to want to take Brett Pesci out unless you have to. So I assume he'll play against Tampa on Saturday.

So when Brett Pesci does draw back in Luke Tkach, who comes out? Well, you know, you're setting me up for this because you know what I'm going to say. Okay. You're just, this is good sports radio talk. Thank you.

I'm going to say Tony D'Angelo. I agree with you. I know, but it's a controversial case because, you know, it's not going to happen for one thing because he's too important to rot on the way he uses him on the power play.

And obviously he loves him. But I just, I feel like you have the best chance to win with, with Orlov and Chasul on the ice. And that's just my opinion. And my opinion doesn't count for anything and where any of the decisions are made and I'll stick with mine and they can stick with theirs and maybe they'll be right in the end. I agree. I just don't know how you can look at that the way the parents shake out and say, Tony D'Angelo is the best fit for this team right now. Yeah, I agree from this standpoint in that while Dimitri Orlov has played better, he has definitely played better of late. I just don't think Tony, Tony's got too much of a go, go, go mentality to cover for Orlov and the inevitable Orlov.

Okay, I probably shouldn't have pinched here. Who's behind me? Oh, nobody.

I know Jalen Chatfield will be there. Or the inevitable Dimitri Orlov shot into traffic that doesn't get through, which is the other thing we've seen a lot of, which baffles me. But yeah, and look, Dimitri Orlov's gotten better, right?

We knew this would happen. It happened with Brent Burns. It happened with Dougie Hamilton.

A complicated system or a simple system in some ways, different system, but it takes some adjusting. It's not something you can, especially as a defenseman, necessarily step in and look like you played it for a million years. So I will think Orlov will continue to get better.

And I just think right now where they are with the goaltending situation being what it is, I would lean defensive on the blue one. All right, let's get to MJ Morris, who made the decision to redshirt the year after all, after playing four games. So can he stay at NC State as the presumptive starting quarterback next year?

No, absolutely not. This is, it's a redshirt, but it is in all effects and for all intents and purposes, a redshirt and drenching. You cannot walk away from your team after turning a season that was headed to the bottom of the ocean after that Duke game. I give, I give the players credit.

I give Dave Dorn a lot of credit. It would have been so easy at that point to give up because there was no reason to believe that team would win another game except by accident. And they beat Clemson and they beat Miami. And now you've got some momentum and now you've got some mojo. And now I'm Jim Morris wants to register.

If I were a player, I would never want to see that guy again. You're going to quit on us like that. When we finally got something going, we finally figured out how we can win with this group. We finally got some attitude and we've got an identity and this is how we're going to win games. And we've beaten good teams. They didn't beat, you know, Campbell and Virginia, they'd be Miami and Clemson.

It's not Clemson, Clemson, but it's still a good team. And then you're going to walk away in the middle of all that. I mean, the only person who comes out of this looking, you know, vaguely good, I think is, is, is, um, Brennan Armstrong, who's been a good teammate, done the work, who's accepted a different role.

And now he gets the chance to do what he was brought here to do. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm curious to see how that goes with him entrusted with the full role. But in general, generally speaking, I just, I don't think MJ Morris can come back. I don't know how you can. I mean, I think he can.

It really depends. I'm not sure how we, uh, my understanding is that there are, he has supporters in the locker room. Maybe not on the coaching staff because I thought it was pretty transparent yesterday that Dave Doran is baffled by the decision. Although I think you could take this back a lot longer than just this year. If, if I were MJ Morris based on last year and, and I played well, then I got hurt and then they bring in Brennan Armstrong and tell me I'm going to redshirt and learn behind a veteran quarterback.

I mean, I might've been mad then I, that, that could be dating all the way back to last year. Like I'm not, to me, when I looked at that decision last year, I went, why do they need Brennan Armstrong? I thought MJ Morris was the future.

So why are we waiting another year for the future? And maybe it was a miscalculation on what this year's team could be because, and they felt like they needed just a veteran guy who was more steady. I don't know, but if I, I would have been really mad about that situation if I were MJ Morris.

Yeah, I think that's fair, but I also think that's a long time ago. And if you were going to leave the time to leave was, was then, um, you know, the reasons for ringing, bringing in Brennan Armstrong, I mean, you can, you can come up with a few, but in the end, if you're MJ Morris, the reality is they brought in another guy ahead of you. But you didn't, you know what happened? Brennan Armstrong struggled and you got a chance to play, so you've got what you wanted all along and now you're walking away from it. So that part of it, I'm from a winning team, from a team that suddenly winning with your quarterback. That's the scenario. Every quarterback says they want, I want to lead this team to victory. Well, now you've done it and now you're going to walk away. I just, I look, that's his prerogative.

It's a very 20, 23 thing in the NIL era. Uh, if you want to, you know, player agency and that, that part of it is fine. Like I support the fact that NJ Moore should be able to make this decision, but there are consequences that come with this decision. And one of them is you are walking away from teammates and I don't think you can come back from that.

I would, I, as a teammate, I would have a hard time with that, whatever his reasons are. And that's just, to me, that's the reality of being part of a group and part of a team that's starting to have some success. And you're going to walk out.

That's great. You have the right, you're going to do what's right for you. We all got to do what's right for us, but that doesn't mean you can come back next year and pretend like nothing's happened. Luke Tecott, before we let you go, a couple of weeks ago, we were looking at this Duke Carolina game and going, Hey, this could be the biggest Duke Carolina football game ever like that they have ever played. We're thinking about potentially two ranked teams, blah, blah, blah. Now I'm not, I think it's a very good game and it might be the one time where both of these teams at the same time are really good. Because I think, well, at least defensively Duke is really good.

Offense is struggling, but both of these teams are really good. This still could be the best Duke Carolina game in terms of the quality of the players that we've ever seen. But your thoughts on this one that doesn't have great stakes other than North Carolina can't screw it up to just to at least give them a chance, or did Virginia, I guess, Louisville clinch last night? I don't know that they mathematically pledged, but they are, they are on the edge.

Here's the, here's the thing. One, I would, I just, just for footnote that I do think there were a couple of games in the sort of cut cliff, the door overlap era that were where the talent level was pretty high. That said, this was supposed to be a playoff game for the second spot in the ACC title game. And the winner was going to go to Charlotte and the loser wasn't. And instead it's like a playoff game to see who goes to El Paso and who goes to, I guess, three sports, not in the mix anymore, but. I would like Duke to go to the holiday bowl just so I could go three years in a row covering three different teams. I think that's my best shot at getting into the holiday bowl hall of fame.

So I'm all for that. But yeah, it's disappointing because both of these teams were onto something. And really, if you go into the, the end of the third quarter in Tallahassee, everything was still out there for Duke. They just obviously once write letters out of the game, Florida state keyed off.

And that was that. And I don't, I don't think Florida state's the fourth, third or fourth best team in the country looking at them, but I also can't argue that they've taken care of what's in front of them. And there's, you know, deserve credit for that. A lot of other teams have it and maybe they'll end up winning it all anyway. But, um, and Carolina, I mean, if Carolina loses a third straight ACC game as a double digit favorite, you seriously need to consider dropping down to the Sunbelt.

Wow. Relegation promotion, relegation. How do you lose to Virginia and Georgia tech? And then theoretically Duke as well at home this time, it's just, I, this is, this is a game you got to win just for that reason alone. Forget the fact that it's Duke. Forget the fact that you still do have something to play for.

You cannot lose three ACC games in a row as a multiple touchdown favorite and look yourself in the mirror. I, on Tuesday, we did an exit poll because in honor of election day, since we're really not, we really didn't elect anybody around here. Uh, there was a Durham mayor. Uh, there, there was in the Fayetteville mayor. Everybody else was, everything else was just like little County things. Um, we did exit polling just to kind of goof around.

Uh, Mac Brown did not have favorable numbers in the exit polling. Yeah. I mean, I get that.

I mean, fans are angry. I think when you look at Mac's second tenure in the, in the holistic view in the global view, he came here to do, which is to put UNC football back on the map. Yeah. Yeah. The, the, the, this season, when you really did have a chance to, to make the CFP you did North Carolina had every chance to be undefeated or 11 and one going to the ACC title game beat Florida state, get into the top four.

It was all out there. You got a potential Heisman trophy candidate that doesn't happen very often. And there's something to be said for putting yourself in that position. Unfortunately, there's also something to be said for throwing it all away in games. You never should have lost. Yeah.

I mean, they should have beaten Virginia should have beaten Georgia tech and they would be nine and Oh, go into this game and we would be looking at this game way differently, but we're not because seven and two Luke to cock. I appreciate your time, man. I will. I'll see you at the rink at some point. I Carolina plays more. They have more home games to play this year. Right?

I have a couple. Yeah. You're not going to be at Duke Arizona tonight, the biggest game of the basketball season so far. No, no, no.

We have a youth soccer obligations. Ah, the second biggest game of the season. Absolutely.

Thanks, man. All right. Basketball. I don't go to basketball games.

Luke knows better than that. No, I go to hockey games, right? And soccer games sometimes. Yeah, but I don't. It's not like I'm not covering the soccer game. I'm just kind of I'm just kind of melting into a beach chair and watching and enjoying and just kind of losing losing myself in the in the youth soccer of it all.