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CHAPEL HILL – North Carolina quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator Chip Lindsey met with the media Monday for his weekly press conference ahead of the Tar Heels’ game Saturday against James Madison.
The Tar Heels are 3-0 after beating NC Central, 45-10, this past Saturday. Most of the focus for Lindsey was about quarterback Jacolby Criswell, who was much more productive against the Eagles than starter Conner Harrell.
Above is full video of Lindsey’s presser and below are a few notes and quotes from what he had to say:
*The first question was about the progress Criswell has made, considering he didn’t arrive until the summer, was admittedly overweight, and had to learn a new playbook. But he has obviously taken strides of late.
“He’s made tremendous progress. He got here late in the summer and he got a lot of reps in fall camp early, but then you had to start getting ready for the first game, and we just felt like at that time, Conner and Max (Johnson) were ahead him from the standpoint of reps and the offense and so forth.
“What I’ve seen especially since Max went down, not that he wasn’t preparing before, I’ve seen a bigger sense of urgency probably on his part. It may be just because he’s gotten more reps. I think young quarterbacks that don’t have a lot of experience they just needs reps, they need to see things multiple times.”
*Criswell spent three seasons at UNC before playing at Arkansas last year. But he returned in the spring with no expectation of starting, which was communicated to him wouldn’t happen. But Criswell wanted to be somewhere he was comfortable, at grad school where he wanted to study, and perhaps play some football if the opportunity arose. Criswell returning was prompted when Tad Hudson transferred out of the program, so UNC needed a fourth QB.
“Coach (Brown) felt like we knew that family, knew him before I did, and wanted to be really honest about where and be real about where it is… We were trying to be really up front and honest with what we were telling them and I think we were.”
*Lindsey said that as a fifth-year player and with Criswell understanding where he was at this stage of his career, so it’s possible that might be why he appeared to play with no pressure Saturday. He was loose and “came in with the (mental) ability to get his feet wet.”
Lindsey added he had a calm demeanor, liked how he handled himself, got rid of the ball the right way.
*Lindsey said Criswell wasn’t getting many reps for a while, so they didn’t really see much from him. But he did add, “the one thing that really jumps out is his arm talent, he can really throw it.”
*Lindsey doesn’t deal in hypotheticals, so he didn’t bite when asked if he would have thought a month ago if Omarion Hampton getting 25 carries against Central was possible.
“I think realistically, whatever it takes to win. You play four quarters for a reason. We’d like to start faster, we’d like to, but I think tip your hat to North Carolina Central, they a nice job, and they held the ball on us some on offense and did a good job with that. And the second half, they weren’t able to move it much and we got more opportunities…
“At the end of the day, Omarion, we know what kind of player he is, and he’s going to be the focal point of our offense for sure.”
*Lindsey said does not have much experience dealing with multiple QBs playing “in some kind of system or anything, I just haven’t been exposed to that.”
