Longo Talks Youngs Guys Almost Ready, WR Room & Much More
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CHAPEL HILL - North Carolina offensive coordinator Phil Longo met with the media Monday morning to discuss his unit, trying to bring younger guys along, struggles at wide receiver, and what he has worked on in himself to help this offense improve in the second half of the season.
Above is video of Longo’s presser and below are some notes and pulled quotes from what he had to say:
*This time last season, Carolina started giving younger guys more time on the field. UNC Coach Mack Brown brought up freshman wide receiver J.J. Jones as a guy who could see that opportunity this year, now it’s just a question on whether Jones, along with other young guys, are ready to take that step. Longo acknowledged Jones as one of those guys, and touched on some others as well.
“J.J. is kind of a focal point, he represents four or five guys offensively right now that are really young guys that have been working their tail off, and are developing, and I think are getting to a point here,” Longo said. “I don’t know when, I can’t tell you when they’ll get on the field, and get substantial reps, but we’ve just been very happy with the younger guys.
“The group that we were excited about them coming in, we haven’t really had any disappointments. We’ve got guys like Caleb Hood, and Bryson Nesbit, and J.J. Jones, and Kobe Paysour, and Gavin Blackwell, just to name a few of them. They’re all developing, they’re all getting to a point now where you’re starting to see what they can give you, and bring to the football team.
“I really liken it, maybe not quite, we knew a little bit earlier with Josh Downs, but last year in the first half of the season, Josh Downs was still learning, Josh Downs was still cleaning up some things, Josh Downs was still trying to get to where he needed to be from a technique standpoint, and an offensive understanding standpoint. That’s where these guys are right now, and I think we felt like Josh was ready to start playing, and we played him the second half of the season, and that built up to his performance at the Orange Bowl.
“These five guys, they’ve really done the same thing, and we’re really happy because it’s a collective group, led by J.J., that I think is improving overall as a group. I think that means the future bodes well for us with regards to some of those guys.”
*Gauging a player's improved confidence and ability can be tough when they have not seen substantial playing time on the field yet. Longo talked about how he sees J.J. Jones improved ability on the field in practice.
“Just talking about J.J., contested catches in practice,” Longo said. “Is he doing a better job when he is covered of catching contested balls? Is he doing a better job of catching the ball cleanly when he’s running against zone coverage out in the open? How is he faring in 1-on-1 situations, when we throw 1-on1’s, all of that stuff has improved for him. Is he blocking better, can he get off press better now than he did earlier in the season?
“All of these are things that are taught and learned, and you gotta get better at them. When they’re not, you address the progress by that player with that player. If you have a whole group that’s not getting better at something, you look at yourselves first. If I’ve got four quarterbacks in the room, and they’re not getting better at something, it’s probably on me.
‘If we have seven or eight guys in a room that are getting better at press release, or at point of attack, breaking tackles, or finishing second-level blocks on the o-line, and you have a collective group that’s getting better, and you have one or two that aren’t, then you address those one or two because it’s usually more about those guys. That’s how we evaluate J.J., and everybody really at every position.
“The things that they need to do to play their position, are the weak links getting better? So that the collective, they’re whole collective game is getting better, and I think with J.J. and some of the others that we’re talking about, that’s where they are, that’s why we’re excited about the young guys.”
*Josh Downs has been the only productive wide receiver in the passing game this year. He has accounted for 60 of Sam Howell’s 129 completions. Longo spoke on the challenge they have had at that position, and how they are trying to fix it.
“I think the problems that we had early on was getting off the press, so you move wideouts around more, we go into some bunch sets at times,” he explained. “We do some things where we’re switching our stems, giving receivers an opportunity to release laterally. I think that problem we’re on our way to solving, what I’d like to see is we wanna have more catch production from the receivers.
“I think as the season has gone on, Sam has a new cast out there, so he’s got more confidence in some of those guys. One of the great things about Dyami (Brown) was not only was he an explosive threat at the wide receiver position, but he also was in such great shape, so rarely did we have to take him out. He took himself out, and if we had 80 plays, he’d probably play 60-65 of them, and he was able to do that. When you have his kind of talent, you’re able to do that.
“When you’re dealing with different personnel, right now we’re playing more wide receivers. We’re playing three or four wide receivers in games to keep them fresh, so that all of them are at their peak with regards to performance. We are playing more guys, we’re moving them around a little bit more, and we’re doing some things schematically to help get them off the football, and I think we expect to see more production out of the wide receivers in the second half of the season.”
*UNC has had problems at the center position all season due to injuries to multiple guys. Longo talked about his thoughts on how beneficial the bye week is to help with those injuries, and the team overall.
“It’s been very beneficial,” he said. “If you ask me, ‘do you want a bye during the season?’ I would prefer not to have one, not everybody thinks that. I think you want to get into a rhythm of playing football, and you wanna keep getting them back out on the field. It starts with Coach Brown, the way the whole program is run, everything trickles downward, and you would hope as we go through that process, the team gets better every single week. I think that’s been a consistent deal from the day we got here, through the first season, the second season, and even this year.
“The team has gotten consistently better as the season has gone on, and I think that’s a sign of some good coaching, and I also think it’s a sign of great commitment by our players, and their focus in regards to trying to take their weak links, and make them stronger, so that they’re an overall better package.
“As the second half of the season goes on, I’m kind of excited for these guys because I think probably some of their best football has yet to come, and we’re gonna need it because we have a hell of a schedule on this back half.”
*One big point of emphasis that UNC has spoken about is learning from mistakes and getting better. That doesn’t go for just the players, but the coaches as well. Longo went into detail on him scouting himself, handling outside criticism, seeing mistakes he’s made, and working to correct them as a play caller.
“The criticism is not something I concern myself with as much as how I would criticize myself,” Longo said. “We’ve won by 50, and lost by 50, and somehow I get criticized, we all do, it’s just the nature of the game. The critical part of it that helps us is, I’ve talked to a number of coaches on the staff in the office, and outside friends of mine that I respect their opinion.
“I said hey, I don’t know if I did a great job here, or if we could do a better job of getting x player the football, or if we can protect this in a better way, or do we need to trigger this thing quicker because we’re asking too much of the o-line, you look at all those things. If you really want me to be honest with you, I would tell you that I don’t know if my play calling on first down, it hasn’t been any different than it has been the last three or four years, but we haven’t been as productive in the games that we’ve lost.
“In the games that we did not win, our first down production on offense was not as good. My first inclination is to blame myself, I gotta go back and look at all the play calls, and if nothing else, I am paying much more attention, putting a greater emphasis, probably the better way of putting it, on the first down calls, because that production, especially against a defense like Notre Dame, really can make or break the drive, particularly the first play of a drive.
“After evaluating everything, that’s the area that I felt like, I can’t tell if the play calls have been bad or good, they’ve been good schematically, but now am I asking players to do things that aren’t good, or are we too predictable on first down. All of those things I ask myself, so the emphasis right now in my mind is I wanna be an elite play caller on first down, and I think that’s the best thing I can do to help our football team as an offensive coordinator. That is my emphasis going into this weekend for the rest of the season.”
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