Duke's Mayo bowl recap, prep for the Pop Tart bowl, and the Carolina Hurricanes

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See amazon.com slash amazon prime for details. It's college bowl season and obviously we got the big one that's happening right now. Future ACC matchup. Southern Methodist taking on Boston College right now. SMU taking on Boston College. That is a future ACC matchup.

That's in the Wasabi Fenway Bowl. Wow. Yeah. Wow.

Right? Just the names of these bowl games. Anyway, I know that's the one we all were anticipating when we started the show today.

I want to hear about the future ACC rivalry between the Mustangs and the Eagles. No, seriously. By the way, SMU leads that one seven and three in a rain-soaked Fenway Park. I feel like rain everywhere right now.

It does. It's December. Make it snow.

I know. Make it snow. I'd rather have snow. Maybe snow would have been better at Bank of America Stadium yesterday for Carolina against West Virginia because Carolina looked awful yesterday in the Duke's Mayo Bowl against West Virginia. They lose this one 30 to 10 and let's be honest. We'll get into the game itself real fast.

Everything about yesterday looked bad. Very first play of the game. West Virginia has the ball. 75-yard TD gone. 7-0 right away. 11 seconds into the contest. Completely deflated.

Done. Now I understand Carolina was out Drake May. They were without Cedric Gray, the linebacker. Without Tez Walker, the wide receiver.

Elijah Hussey at corner. I get it. But every team's dealing with transfer portal and NFL stuff.

Now some to more extent than others. I mean, gosh, look ahead to the Orange Bowl on Saturday between Florida State and Georgia. They're like 40 guys not playing between the two teams because of either NFL or transfer. That's the Orange Bowl.

So I mean, I get it. Every team is dealing with it in some way, shape or form. But everything about yesterday looked bad for Carolina. 75, 80% of the fans in attendance at Bank of America Stadium yesterday were WVU fans. I'm like, last time I checked, you're playing in your home state UNC. Yeah. Well, and that's a very Carolina Panther thing for the opposing fans to kind of outweigh the local team.

Wow, that's sad. It kind of blew my mind a little bit. I get it. It's kind of a little weak.

It's between holidays. It's a weird kickoff time at 5 30. I get that, but I expected a little bit more. By the way, Mac Brown was asked about that yesterday, and he kind of sidestepped the question. Now, in fact, it was a great opportunity for us to have the coach to quarterback communication and coach to linebacker safety communications. First time we've ever done that, and I thought it worked pretty well.

I mean, there were a few times that Connor would say, say it again or something, but because we hadn't done it before, but I thought it helped. I thought the fact that we used the videos, the iPads on the sideline will be a great help in the future. We didn't get to practice that because we didn't have a setup for it. We didn't have a setup for it at home or Providence Day in time.

So I think all that would be a help. The crowd is what it is. Give West Virginia credit for their crowd. When they're talking bad about ours, I thought theirs would be great.

I was impressed. It is what it is regarding the crowd. It's completely sidestepping the question. Now, the thing he was talking about with the communication, the head said he was referring to the Connor that he referred to as Connor Harrell, who started at quarterback yesterday for the Tar Heels. They actually were allowed to do what the NFL does in terms of actually having direct communication from the coach to the quarterback on the field regarding play calls. So he can communicate to the guys on the field, hey, this is what we're running.

And same thing defensively. So basically they're allowed to do that yesterday, which I thought was kind of cool for a ball game. That's a little side note there, but again, the game itself, first place, 75 yard TD.

You had three turnovers, Harrell making his first start through a touchdown, through an interception in the end zone. He made the right read. It was a tight end coming across the middle. He made the right read. I thought he just overthrew the ball and ended up getting picked off.

Okay. Guy making his first start. You can forgive some of that stuff, but he gave up a punt return for a touchdown to make it 14 to three. You had another, uh, when you're returning a punt or fielding a punt, ball is kicked short, hits off one of your guys's legs.

You're just shooting yourself in the foot. I mean, yeah. I mean, it's just, everything went bad yesterday. And honestly, it felt like for me watching, it felt like UNC didn't want to be there.

Mac Brown was asked that. People who aren't involved with these kids everyday don't feel this. This is the last time we'll see some of these kids. It's the last time this team will ever get together.

So you have to be really careful. Some of those kids get in the car tonight and they drive home. Uh, so the, the message was that I asked you not to quit and to fight your guts out the whole game.

I thought they did that. I didn't think anybody laid down and quit during this ball game. And that was really important. Nobody thought we were going to win the game except the ones on the team for me and our coaches. Uh, but we had a chance and we didn't finish it like we should. I mean, saying the right things, but I'm going based off of what I saw, just my perception. Maybe I am wrong, but I've been, when I coached college across, I've been in those situations where sometimes I noticed some of my players were checked out late in the season, didn't have anything to play for.

We weren't going to make a post-season bid or anything like that. And they were just like, I'm ready for this to be over with. I've been there.

I've seen it as a coach standing on the sideline with college players. I get it. I just, that's the vibe that I kind of got by the way, what a terrible way to end the season for Carolina. Yeah.

Awful. They lost five or the last seven games. They're only wins were triple overtime game against Duke who was playing with their third string quarterback and Grayson Loftus, who was a true freshman. I think he's just making his second career start at the time. Yeah.

Adam and I like to say he's from an accounting firm because his name is Grayson Loftus. And then, so you beat Duke and triple overtime and you beat Campbell and FCS school. And even in that game, I was at that game. I was in attendance in the stands. They didn't even play great up for the first quarter and a half. And Campbell stuck around with them.

I was like, wait a second. What's happening here. Wasn't until late in the second quarter that they actually started to pull away. So that's how you finished your season eight and five. You started off six and O. Mac Brown. He was asked, how do you characterize this season as a whole?

Yeah. The, the thing I just talked to Jones Angel and I talked to the team, you, you're nine and one last year, but you didn't finish well. Part of it's scheduled, but still you got to be some good teams to win. And you're six and O this year and you didn't finish well. So we got to figure out why we're not finishing well. We're so close. We don't want to hang around eight and nine. We, we said we needed to get there.

Now we've gotten there and we've got to get over that hump to get to more. So my job, the next month or six months will be to figure out why are we doing so well early and not doing well late. And you, you can look at everything and everybody's got an opinion. I'm the one that has to make the decisions.

Opinions are easy and unimportant. Decisions are what's important and they have consequences. And I'm the one that has to make those. So I've got to really figure out and I can't figure it out right now while we can't get over the hump at the end. And I've got to figure that out.

So I've been doing this a long time. So I'll look hard. I'll sit down and talk to every coach. I'll ask them their opinions because they see it every day. I'll ask players their opinions, but we got to get them fixed.

They do. They do need to get it fixed. I need to get it turned around right away because it's the second straight season where they've had an end of the year collapse. Like you said, they were nine and one to start things last year fell apart. Okay. I understand you had a first year starter at quarterback and Drake May.

He was just a red shirt freshman at the time. All right. I get it. Some young guys.

So we're trying to figure things out. I mean, Omarion Hampton was a true freshman at running back last season. Okay. Didn't have Tez Walker.

Okay. You had Josh Downs, but you didn't have a guy like Tez Walker. So again, there are a lot of things for them to figure out this upcoming off season. The next, like you said, the next six months, vital for Carolina. Yeah. Absolutely vital for Carolina. They need to figure it out. He's going to, obviously he's going to sit down with his players, his coaches.

They're going to try and figure this stuff out, but Carolina is too talented to be sputtering losing five of the last seven games down the stretch. Yep. The hashtag FireMac Brown.

Those are already populating on X and a lot of places that FireMac Brown stuff was going around. Yes. And you know what? If you're a Carolina fan, you have every right to be upset. Yeah. You can be frustrated with it. A hundred percent.

Cause you're like, wait a second. We had all this talent and we're just an eight win team. Oh, bummer. The holidays are over, but yay, your weird relatives left, but no more presents, but yay.

You have your freedom again, but there are no more desserts, but there's also no more holiday music. The new year is full of ups and downs, but however you're feeling, you can always be happy with all the content on prime video. Catch the new season of reacher included with prime. Why'd you hit him so hard? I don't hit soft. Rent or buy new releases like the hunger games, the ballot of songbirds and snakes.

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See amazon.com slash Amazon prime for details. It's a waste. It feels like a waste.

It does. We'll dive more into this at one o'clock, but yeah, you had a top three pick at quarterback in the NFL draft the last two years starting for you. You have other NFL talent around you. Yeah. You should have got more done. Simply should have gotten more done.

All right, let's shift gears. Someone who played at bank of America stadium, Steve Smith. We're going to dive more into this at 1230, but the NFL hall of fame finalists were announced yesterday. Steve Smith senior. Longtime Carolina Panther finishes last three years up in Baltimore, which by the way, Baltimore fans love Steve Smith as well.

Not one of the finalists listed for the NFL hall of fame. I am not a fan of that. I know you're not.

And again, we're going to dive more deep into this at 1230. I love Steve Smith. I get it.

NC state fans may not love him as much as me. I understand. I get it. But he walked it back.

He did. Dave are cool now. But here's the thing. If you're Steve Smith fan, you're still Steve Smith. Even if you're an NC state fan, if you're an NC state fan, you're gonna love the fact that Tory hope is a finalist.

Exactly. If you're a Carolina fan, whether it's Panthers or UNC or both, you're going to love the fact that Julius peppers is a finalist. This first year of eligibility, which by the way, I hope they already made his gold jacket for him. That was just like, all right, put him in now. The moment he retired, it was what's your jacket size. Yeah.

The moment he retired, what's your jacket size. We're going to need that. So Tory Holt, Reggie Wayne, uh, Julius peppers, Antonio Gates, Devin Hester. There's some other guys like Patrick Willis, Jared Allen, Fred Taylor, Dwight Frini, uh, hosts of some other guys.

Again, we'll dive more into this here in about 20 minutes. I thought Steve Smith should have been a finalist. I know a lot of people are going to compare him to Andre Johnson, the long time wide receiver for the Houston Texans, similar numbers overall in their careers. Um, you can kind of say like, all right, well, Steve Smith had Jake Deloam. This is not a knock on Jake Deloam.

I love Jake, but Jake wasn't one of these, one of the awesome. Exactly. He wasn't cam. Steve Smith didn't have cam until year 10 late in his season. Yeah. 10 in the NFL. Yeah.

So anyway, there's a lot of comparisons being made. We'll dive more into that here in about 15 minutes, but speaking on the positive spot side, the Carolina hurricanes got a massive win last night, five, two over the Nashville papers. They needed it, especially after their game on Saturday last week, he gets the New York Islanders.

Well, they lost five to four. Sebastian Ajo was awesome. Piotr Kacekoff, solid Andrei Sveshnikov looked like the good Andrei Sveshnikov. The guys who needed to show up, showed up.

And this is what Rob Riddle Wars asked. What do you like about his group's response last night? Well, I mean, I thought, you know, we've scored, which was nice. Powerplay was good, obviously connecting. And then I thought, you know, coach played really well. I mean, that's really the end of the day.

That's the difference. He was solid. You know, he outplayed the other guy and that's, we can get that.

And we have a chance. I don't know that we were necessarily great tonight, but you know, we got ahead and kind of just was good enough. So he was really good and the power play was good.

And that was the difference. And Nashville is a good team too, by the way, Nashville is kind of in Carolina's position, some talent. They have a really good UC sorrows who only played two periods yesterday because he got benched after giving up five goals in the first 40 minutes.

That guy's a Vesna finalist. I mean, they got some, they got some dudes over there in Nashville and they're kind of in the similar position to Carolina fighting and scratching the claw for playoff seeding and positioning and stuff like that. But Carolina yesterday, three of six on the power play, which is awesome. The very first goal of the game was on the power play. Sebastian Aho, his 500th career point, which is the only, the fourth guy, only the fourth guy in a cane sweater to reach 500 points. And he also got points five Oh one, five Oh two and five Oh three yesterday, because he had a goal and three assists.

The stars had to step up. They did again, goal three assists for Sebastian Aho, Brent burns a goal and an assist Svech a goal and an assist Jarvis, a goal and an assist Mike Bunting. I thought was effective on the power play.

He had an assist as well. Go check off 35 saves, including 15 in the second period alone, which is awesome. Nashville was down to nothing against Carolina going into the second. They had a strong push. Now they did score twice, but Carolina scored three times themselves in the second period and go check off 15 saves in the second period.

There were some stretches. I honestly thought that Nashville controlled a lot of the play, especially early in the first period. And even in the second period and then on five on five situations, but Carolina, I thought locked it down to the third period. A lot of penalties in the first two periods of this one, a ton of penalties in the second period alone had five penalties, but one of those was a double minor against Nashville.

Carolina scored on that, but there were a lot of penalties throughout this game. But the third period, the Carolina hurricane state out of the box and they they're back in action tonight. All right, Rob, Brenda Moore, what's the mentality going forward? Well, listen, we, we, we know we got to put ourselves in a bit of a tough spot, so we got to keep forging ahead and it doesn't matter what the excuse is. The excuse jar is full. So we just got to keep, you know, pushing forward and try to put our best foot forward and, and get points. I love that. No more excuses.

The excuse jars is full. Basically saying, don't matter how you do it. Just get the damn job done. Yeah, do it. Just get the job done. That's it.

Just go do it. Yep. I love that. Excuse jar.

It's full. I know it's such a dad mode thing. It feels like your dad being like, look, I mean, you haven't been making good grades. If you want this fill in the blank phone.

I didn't have a phone back then, but you know, no more excuses. Just get it done. No dessert for you. And it's the holiday season.

The desserts are on point this year. Trust me. They are, I'm feeling it right now, but simple as that. Yeah. You got a wing yesterday.

How do you back it up? They want to talk about consistency with this team. You have to back it up tonight.

They're at home against Montreal at PNC arena. That's a seven o'clock puck drop by the way. So yeah, you got to back up your good performance yesterday with another one today.

Yeah. Let's make a streak. Let's go. Let's keep it moving.

By the way. Auntie Ronta is going to be the one problem. Most likely starting tonight. Canes didn't skate this morning because they had to travel back from Nashville. Auntie Ronta, the guy that got put through waivers, cleared waivers and was sent down to the American hockey league, got sent to the miners at this stage in his career.

Hey, go work on some stuff. Got a couple of starts there. They had to recall him.

Guess what? He's probably gonna start in debt tonight. Can you pull a Brendan Armstrong like NC state? Like Brendan Armstrong got benched for MJ Morris and then the whole MJ Morris. I'm going to take my red shirt.

Yeah. Brendan Armstrong came back and played like that dude. I'd love to see it.

I think Kane's fans would as well. Speaking of Brendan Armstrong at NC state, pop darts ball tonight down in Orlando. That's a five kick off.

Man. I can't wait to see what the mascot flavor is. We'll get, we'll get into that here in just a little bit, but you want to talk about a contrast of seasons between NC state and North Carolina. NC state early on this season struggled struggle bus majorly, and they had to make a change at quarterback, Brendan Armstrong, the transfer that they brought in from Virginia at QB. Things weren't quite panning out for him in the early part of the season. Now the team as a whole still trying to figure a lot of stuff out. Casey Concepcion took him a little bit to develop. Didn't take super long, but still he's a true freshman.

He wasn't, you know, popping off right from week one, but he had an awesome season nonetheless. So they had to make a change. They went to MJ Morris and said, Hey man, I know, I know you're playing on red shirt in this season, but this team needs you right now. Morris comes in, they start three, he starts four games. They he starts four games. They won three out of those four and MJ Morris decides to, you know what, I'm going to keep my red shirt.

I'm not going to play anymore. So now you go back to Brendan Armstrong and that dude took it. He took it like a grown bleeping man, quoting one of his teammates, a grown bleep man. And he came in and he helped lead that team. That offense looked better. The defense was strong and it's amazing how they finished that season nine and three and on the high note in which they did blowing out your rival at Carter-Finley Stadium 39-20 when they beat UNC right, right there Saturday after Thanksgiving. It's amazing how that season flipped and turned around for them.

Cause I know Brendan Armstrong for him, this is kind of what made the comparison to Auntie Ronta. It's like, you know what, he got benched. It's like, okay, how much worse can it get?

He gets put back in there. It's like, all right, they've already benched me once. What else do I have to lose now? There's nothing for me to lose.

And that season turned around big time. Now I understand with tonight, there's a lot of guys in the transfer portal for both teams in the Pop-Tarts bowl and all that. I get it.

They're playing Kansas state by the way. Oh, bummer. The holidays are over, but yay, your weird relatives left, but no more presents, but yay, you have your freedom again, but there are no more desserts, but there's also no more holiday music. The new year is full of ups and downs, but however you're feeling, you can always be happy with all the content on Prime Video. Catch the new season of Reacher included with Prime. Why'd you hit him so hard?

I don't hit soft. Rent or buy new releases like The Hunger Games, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. You can even add on hundreds of streamers, all in one app with one password.

No bummers here, just lots of yay. Prime Video, find your happy place. Restrictions apply. Prime membership not required to rent or buy.

See amazon.com slash amazon prime for details. But this feels like, like I mentioned earlier with UNC, how Carolina felt like they were just, they were just ready for the season to be done. They were kind of checked out. They were kind of over it felt like, especially early. They just went 75 yards in the very first play and it's seven nothing.

Oh, long night, long night ahead. It feels like NC State is all in on this one, because you're looking at, after again, the struggles of the early part of the season to 10 wins. First year under Dave Dorn, or first, this would be the first time under Dave Dorn since he arrived in Raleigh, that they would have a 10 win season. Like there's a lot for them to play for, and they've got a ton of momentum. The way they finished out the season strong, the way they beat Clemson, the way they beat Carolina to get to nine wins and the things that Dave Dorn and his staff have been doing since that final game, rallying the people to donate money to the collective, to keep guys, you know, NIL money, the way that they were able to go into the transfer portal. They got the number one tight end of the transfer portal from, from UConn. They got a quarterback, Grayson McCall coming from coastal Carolina, and they're able to flip recruits, four star guys from UNC to NC State. They got, I think, four, four star receivers slash running back guys coming into their, in their recruiting class. Like, yeah, all the momentum right now on the off season is in NC State's favor and a win tonight validates it even further. I would love for that exclamation point. If you're a state fan, you absolutely love it.

You absolutely love it because you can say, Hey, you know what? You want to play the best football here in the state of North Carolina. You come to Raleigh.

Yep. As you can say, well, we just beat Carolina again. Like they had the last two years, they had the high draft pick at quarterback Drake May. We had Ben Finley, who was our fourth quarterback win at Keenan.

And then this year they had Drake May again with a first round pick, if not an early second round pick, a wide receiver and Tez Walker. We beat them. Not only did we beat them, we beat them. Yeah, beat them. With our quarterback who we benched.

And we had two running backs during the season say, Hey, I'm going to the transfer portal. I'm not going to play the rest of the season. They just, they have gone through so much adversity through their season and still come out winning. So I just, for them and their fans, I just really want them to be successful and eat Pop-Tarts. And I want to see Dave and whatever kind of bourbon with whatever kind of Pop-Tart. Whatever kind of cigar, whatever kind of Pop-Tart it is.

No, you got the cigar. Which by the way, I know I'm going to catch flack on this. By the way, if you want to send flack to me on X at the fan rookie, I don't like Pop-Tarts. What? I never have liked Pop-Tarts.

Okay. But you've had Pop-Tarts. I've had Pop-Tarts. I do not like Pop-Tarts. Have you had more than one flavor or did you just try one and you're like, nope.

I tried a couple. I was like, nope. Ever since I was a kid.

Oh yeah. See, sometimes you got to just, you got to find your flavor. Sometimes you got to toast them, adds a little pizzazz to it. Cause I grew up just eating them straight out the pack.

Nope. No Pop-Tarts for me. I'm not a Pop-Tart fan. Sorry. It's just not my thing.

Even toaster strudels didn't like those either. What? Okay.

We're just going to have to shut the show down. This is... Well, all right. We're going to take a break so Victoria can chastise me. That's fine. That's fine. I stand firm on my feelings. Hey, that's okay. It's my truth. My truth, Victoria. It's just so sad. It's just so sad.