Players Tuesday: Kelly, Ezeudu, Gray, Nesbit & Howell

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CHAPEL HILL – Tuesday during game week means several North Carolina Tar Heels were made available to the media to field questions about the previous game, themselves, their position groups and units, and to look ahead to the next contest.

For UNC, that meant what didn’t work on defense and did work on offense from the loss at Notre Dame this past weekend, in addition to this weekend’s tilt versus No. 10 Wake Forest, which visits Kenan Stadium for a noon kickoff. The game will air on ABC.

Below are the full videos along with some notes and pulled quotes from interviews with Cam Kelly, Joshua Ezeudu, Cedric Gray, Bryson Nesbit, and Sam Howell:

*The Tar Heels struggled defensively at Notre Dame on Saturday night, allowing 44 points, 523 total yards, 28 first downs, and 293 yards rushing, which was 186 above the Fighting Irish’s average going into the contest. What have the conversations been like on defense since that game?

“Pursuit, getting to the ball, different angles. Make sure we get the ball tackled,” Kelly said. “We watched film there are some great things we did, and we need to keep that consistent. Looking back at a lot of things we could fix during some of these big plays that happen. We're working on it, and we’re going to get it done.”

*So what are the easiest things to fix on D?

“We’re doing a bad job of tackling. Getting the ball down and running to it, that's the easiest thing,” said Kelly. “Because you can control your effort, and the way you run to the ball and tackle it down. that's the easiest thing for us to fix right now but all these mistakes are what we need to fix. It's the little things that lead to big plays so we're just working on that right now but, pretty simple things to fix.”

*Ezeudu said he’s at full health now, though he missed a game and a bit of time in some others trying to recover from an injury. UNC is also finally healthy at center, where Brian Anderson and Quiron Johnson are both at full strength now. Ezeudu says that bodes well for the final month of the season.

“I feel like we’re all at full health, and were all ready to give everything we got these last four games,” he said.

*The offensive line has been much better opening holes for the conventional ground game to have more consistent success in recent games than was the case earlier in the season. This is part of the line’s mission. They knew they weren’t collectively getting the job done, so they got together and made a pact to get it right, and it has.

“Like I said earlier we knew what we could do as a whole offensive line, and we knew we weren't doing what we should have been doing,” said Ezeudu.” It was after the Duke week we sat down we talked about it, and we said from now on we want to prove and show everyone that we are still the same offensive line.

"We have all done good things in the past, so now all we had to do is put everything together.”

*The Tar Heels allowed Notre Dame to statistically play well above what were its season averages in every fashion during the loss in South Bend, and they have been highly criticized for the collective performance since. Gray says several things needs correcting, but focused on one main thing Tuesday, November 2, 2021

“I think the biggest problem was we weren't as assignment pride as I thought that we should have been,” Gray explained. "I think everybody took their turn on some plays not being in the right spot, and it showed giving up 44 points. But we just gotta go in and look at the film, correct these things and get back to work.”

*Two more Tar Heels entered the transfer portal Tuesday, with WR Emery Simmons and DL Kristian Varner deciding to move on. It brings the number to five Heels having entered the portal in the last two weeks. So, when guys decide to leave, what do the other talk about, how does it affect them?

“Most players on the team respect other players’ decisions,” Gray said. “We’re all pretty close on the team. We all understand that some things might be better for them. So I understand where my teammates are coming from, I fully support them and their decisions.”

*Two more Tar Heels entered the transfer portal Tuesday, with WR Emery Simmons and DL Kristian Varner deciding to move on. It brings the number to five Heels having entered the portal in the last two weeks. So, when guys decide to leave, what do the other talk about, how does it affect them?

“Most players on the team respect other players’ decisions,” Gray said. “We’re all pretty close on the team. We all understand that some things might be better for them. So I understand where my teammates are coming from, I fully support them and their decisions.”

*Bryson Nesbit didn’t enroll last January, he arrived in Chapel Hill in the summer. But he caught his first career touchdown pass late in a decisive win over Georgia State, which was UNC’s second game, and appears to have earned a spot in the rotation at tight end. Nesbit played a season-high 22 snaps in the loss at Notre Dame and caught three passes for 50 yards. For the season, Nesbit now has five receptions for 125 yards and that 47-yard TD in the second game.

Immensely talented, it took Nesbit some time before he grasped what was needed to get on the field more.

“The big thing for me was really just getting the playbook down,” Nesbit said. “Our playbook has so many different options to it, so it probably took me about two or three months to get down what I needed to do, and it just kind of went from there.”

*Tight ends must also learn to block somewhat like down linemen, and that was also an adjustment for Nesbit. But as he says, he wouldn’t be on the field as just a receiver.

“The biggest thing strength-wise is definitely my blocking,” Nesbit said. “I came in here more as a receiving tight end (but) I’m trying to mold myself into being an all-around tight end. Blocking is probably the biggest part, and then receiving was definitely hard, too. I think I’ve been doing a good job at getting better on all my receiving aspects.”

*Blocking, though, that has taken more time.

“I wouldn’t be classified as a tight end if I only went in there to catch the ball,” he said. “It definitely helped to keep practicing, keep getting the fundamentals, and eventually I was able to hold my own on the line, and playing time came from that.”

*Howell noted Bryson Nesbit when discussing why the offense was so affective at Notre Dame, so he was then asked more specifically about the freshman tight end and how he has seen him grow since arriving in the summer.

“I’m super excited about Bryson,” Howell said. “He’s a guy we’ve been trying to get out there on the field, and he’s gotten to a point now where he’s confident, he knows his job, and he’s playing really good football. So we’re going to continue to use him.

“He’s a guy that works super hard. He’s always watching film, he’s always running extra routes, always doing anything he can to get better; always asking how to get better. Really, since he’s gotten here, I’ve never seen him not working.”

*The conventional ground game issues are certainly a thing of the past now, as the offensive line has blocked better up front and the runs between the tackles are getting the Tar Heels bigger chunks of yardage than they were earlier in the season. Joshua Ezeudu said the group being healthy is a key as well as them having pride and deciding that simply had to be better. Since that talk, the conventional ground game has been more as it’s designed. What has Howell seen from those respects in leading the running game to the point where it has been consistently productive over the last few games?

“It’s a very prideful group, and that’s how you want those guys to be,” Howell said. “You want them to take pride in everything that they do. And (offensive line) Coach (Stacy) Searels does a really good job with those guys, and I think they got a lot of heat early on, and really, it all wasn’t on them.

“But they take a lot of pride in what they do, so they just wanted to come out and just try to make a statement every single week. Not prove anybody wrong, (but) prove themselves right. They love to compete, and probably after the first few weeks of the season, they flipped a switch and had a different mentality and started truly attacking every single day, whether that’s from a preparation standpoint or on the practice field.

“Once they made that switch, they’ve played a lot of real good football.”