Pat Narduzzi talked about defending Duke and a lot more at his final press briefing of the week on Thursday. Here’s the full rundown of what he said.

Narduzzi: Another good day. We’ve had three really passionate days of practice, I think, with our guys. I like where they are. I kind of told them last Saturday that they saved some stuff, so we should be times two Saturday night. Good week of practice, obviously playing a great Duke team. I really think it’s the best Duke team we’ve faced since we’ve been here, on really all three phases of the game. It will be a challenge. We’ll have to bring our A game to have a chance Saturday night.

And also, you know I’m not going to talk about injury situations, but Kenny is back, ready to go. So I’ll talk about guys that I know for sure will play and Kenny will play. I think he’s 100%. He looks great.

He had a full week?
Narduzzi: Full week. You guys saw him Tuesday and then it was even more on Wednesday and Thursday. I thought it was really, really good on Tuesday so I’m excited for that, and again, Nick is always ready.

What defines a passionate practice in your mind?
Narduzzi: That’s a good question. I mean, this game is half mental and half physical, and you can go out there and physically do what you’re supposed to do but you better be into it. You have to be into the game. There’s got to be emotion and energy, and I think we lacked that last Saturday. You just can’t throw your helmet out there and win a football game. You better have the insides to it. So we kind of talked about that, and again, I think that sometimes goes with your opponent. Some guys turned their emotion and passion off when maybe they’re not playing who they want to.

But you put the tape on, you watch Duke, you better bring your passion.

Is there a notion to having another team’s number, regardless of the pedigree of the programs?
Narduzzi: No, I don’t think so. I don’t think so at all. I think sometimes it just happens that way, period. They’re a good football team, we’ve been in some battles and, call it luck, call it whatever you want to call it, we have to go play. I don’t care what’s happened in the past; last year doesn’t matter or the year before or the year before that or the year before that or 15 years ago will have no impact on what happens at 8 o’clock on Saturday night.

Over these past five days, how do you think the guys have internalized whatever lessons came from the Delaware game?
Narduzzi: I don’t know what they’re feeling inside but I think they know. I think they saw it. You learn from your experiences; we all do. And I think when you go out there and you do that, they need to know why and I think they all know why. I had one guy say, ‘Hey, it’s my fault, Coach. I apologize.’ It doesn’t matter who it is, but it’s an attitude that you have to go out there with and the message didn’t get shared amongst the team. The coaches got the message to them but then it didn’t stick. Those are the lessons you learn. I think they all know that internally and externally.

Do you feel like this team is ready for ACC play?
Narduzzi: I sure hope so. I sure hope so. It’s what we work for. These are the games you want to play in. Besides opening up in the ACC, this is what you go for, this is what you play for. You could lose every nonconference game, it doesn’t matter; these conference games are the ones that matter. Are we right where we want to be? No. But last year we were 1-1 and won the Coastal, so we want to be 1-1 in the ACC after this weekend and then just keep plugging away and do our job.

When you’re playing a team that can do so many different things offensively, how do you prepare for a team that can do that many different things and can you throw too much at your guys?
Narduzzi: That’s always the thing you try to juggle. We’ll always go into a meeting, whether it’s offense or defense, and say, ‘Hey, what do you guys not like? What’s confusing you?’ Because the worst thing you can have is a confused football team out there. But Duke does a lot of great things. Them adding the option, it’s just like, come on, man. So we’re practicing Georgia Tech and Duke on the same week, and that’s not something you normally do. You have to spend extra time on the option; if you don’t spend extra time on the option, then you’re going to have problems Saturday.

But the rest of it is stuff that we’ve done last week, the week before, the week before as far as stuff. Quentin Harris is really good at getting that ball out; it’s hard to get sacks so you better cover them up, so you’re working on coverage skills, because you’re not going to get home. You can blitz all you want; you’re not going to - it’s going to be tough.

Can you run down what you guys will do to pass the time on Saturday?
Narduzzi: We’re going to let them sleep in, first of all. They don’t get to sleep in very often. But we’ll let them sleep in and we’ll have breakfast, then we’ll have meetings, offensive and defensive, some in the meeting room, some walk-throughs. We’ll have a special teams meeting after the offense and defense meeting. Then we’ll give them a little break in the middle of the day; they’ll go up and hopefully take a nap. Probably the same time you get your nap. So we’ll get nap time, which I think is important. Our guys are used to taking some type of little nap sometime between 1 and 3. Then we’ll get into our normal schedule, get ready to get over to the stadium.

How much of your ability to run more of a pass-based offense has relied on the veteran receivers you have?
Narduzzi: It’s a big part. You’re going to use your tools. Two years ago, I sat out there down below in preseason camp, talked about our receivers and I thought they were good; we just didn’t get the passing game going like it is right now. And we had two backs and the run game is what we fed it. So it’s always based on that. Then you have a group of offensive linemen that you thought, for the most part, were better pass protectors than run blockers. We kind of know what we know. We watch tape every day. But we’ve got to become better run blockers. We’ve got to run the football this week. I don’t think we can go down to Duke and throw it 55 times and have a chance to win the game. We’ve got to be able to run the football.

Did the UCF game give you confidence that if the game does become a track meet that you guys are more equipped to keep pace than you were even a year ago? Last year’s game with them was kind of weird and you weren’t even a throwing team.
Narduzzi: No doubt about it. We have to score points, period. They score points, we have to score points. We have to match their points, whatever it ends up being, whether it’s 3-2 or 38-39. Do I have confidence that - you know, I think our kids understand as the game goes on what you’re going to do, but it’s like, I had confidence in the Delaware game, too, we were going to score one more point than they were. You have confidence. Your kids, you’re with them every day. Our kids have character and they’re going to find a way to go down there and hang in there against a good Duke football team.

Last year’s game was a shootout, but after that it seemed like the defense tightened up and they’ve been much better since. Do you think they were just maybe embarrassed by giving up 619 yards?
Narduzzi: 619. Thanks for reminding me. You know what? When you watch the game, there’s some, you know, just some stuff. We just - it comes down to focus and details. I mean, you could just watch two plays back to back, they lined up in a formation and the Mike linebacker’s sitting right there in the A-gap. The first time they run the play, they run a fake outside zone that way or a fake sweep that way and the quarterback ran inside zone for 20 yards. The very next play, they come back and run the same exact play and we make it for a yard loss. It’s the same play, the same defense. It’s called focus and execute, do your job. You bite on all the eye candy - they’ll have jet sweeps going, they’ll line up in empty and have jet sweeps going everywhere. They’re going to do those types of things, but it’s just having focus and doing your job. 11 guys doing their jobs.

Again, just like every week, is it what they did or what we did? You know, sometimes maybe they’re really, really good and it’s what they did. But for the remainder of these ACC games, it’s going to be what we do. It’s about what we do on the field Saturday night.

Has the week provided any clarity for the “OR’s” at tailback?
Narduzzi: Not really, I mean, we’ll find out. You just asked me an injury question. We’ll find out as the game comes. We’ll find out.

With David Cutcliffe, the talk around him is always his role as a quarterback whisperer. Your specialty is on the defensive side of the ball, but as an opposing coach, in what ways is that apparent in the things that Duke does and the way that they operate? In what areas or facets of the game can you see that?
Narduzzi: You see it in every facet. Just look at, they’ve given up one sack. That’s crazy. I don’t know how many teams in the country have given up one sack after they’ve played four. That’s ridiculous. Alabama got one sack, just so you know. Alabama got one. They’re the number-one team in the country; they only got home one time. So what does that tell you? He does a great job with the quarterbacks and their offensive scheme, period. And again, they’re going to line up in empty 25 times on Saturday, besides lining up in the Georgia Tech offense. So they’re going to spread them all out and put them all in the box and run it. But they’re lining up in empty and they have five guys that can protect and they’re taking on whatever it is, and the quarterback’s getting the ball out. He knows where to go with the ball, their receivers run precise routes; people have them covered and they still catch them because of his accuracy in where he puts the ball.

We’re going to have to play great coverage on Saturday. We really are. Because they know where they’re going. And they don’t do so much. They added this option to part of their game, but their other stuff is not so much. If you look at our hit chart, they don’t have a thousand formations. Last week against Delaware, we didn’t know what we were going to get. You got quads, you got stuff all over the place; I don’t want to call it a bunch of junk, but they had all kinds - you know, Duke’s offense is not junk. They run a lot of great stuff and they know what they’re doing and, ‘If you do this, we do that.’ They’ve got it pretty good. So that’s Coach Cutcliffe.

Because Harris gets rid of the ball so quickly, are teams backing off a little bit and not wasting time blitzing?
Narduzzi: There’s nothing more frustrating than blitzing six guys up in the air and just watching the ball go that way over there. Like, ‘Coach, why didn’t you send me over there?’ But then they’ll hurt you when you do that, too. Got to mix it up.

Are teams backing off or are they still trying to blitz?
Narduzzi: No, they’re still doing the same thing. You do what you do. I don’t think you can change a whole bunch. You have different packages in that you’ll put in against them, but for the most part, you have to play defense.

You said you need to play great coverage; how would you assess your coverage through five games?
Narduzzi: Pretty good, besides some nitpicking holding calls, which really bother me because they haven’t affected the play at all, whether it’s an overthrown ball - we just have to keep our hands to ourselves and play with discipline there. We can’t give them five first downs by penalty.

You talked a lot about the penalties from the Delaware game on Monday, but how do you take stock of the first five games in totality?
Narduzzi: You know, I’ll do that after six, how about that? When we get an open week. Without an open week, you really are moving on to the next week. But I like where we are. You opened up in the ACC; I don’t think we played our best game. I wish we could play them again tomorrow. I’d like to play Duke at noon and Virginia at 7:30 if I could. I think we’d have a different story. I think Duke is a really good football team so I want to play them first. But I just don’t think we’ve - I think in the ACC, you play a game like in the opener, one team is going to be happy and one team is not going to be happy. They didn’t play their best game either, so I know they got a lot better since then as well. We had a lot of young guys play in that game.

Then you look at the Penn State game; we played okay but just didn’t make a play that we needed to to win that football game. So I like where we are. I like this football team. I like the character. I like the adversity we’ve gone through, really, the last two weeks - really, three weeks for that matter. Our kids are going to fight to the end. That’s what you have to love about them.

Will the ACC refrain from scheduling conference games in the opener now?
Narduzzi: Probably not.

Maybe you won’t have to do it every year?
Narduzzi: I don’t know. They give me the schedule, I say, ‘Thank you very much’ and we go take our toys and go home and play with them.

There’s a bill that’s due to be proposed in the state legislature about college athletes being permitted to profit off their likeness. I don’t know if you’re familiar with it or if you have an opinion.
Narduzzi: I’m a little more familiar with it, but you guys get to go - you’re on your phones looking at Twitter and checking it out; I really don’t - I heard that, I heard Florida, I heard California, there’s a lot of stuff going on. I don’t know much about it. I don’t want to speak on something that I’m not educated on. If I’m educated on that, Duke will kick our tail on Saturday if I’m reading about that stuff.

But it just seems like chaos. I think it’s chaos. I think our kids should be paid. I think there’s got to be some type of structure to it. It can’t be that the local hardware store says, ‘I’m going to get Chris Peak, he’s my guy, I’m giving him a grand a week to play and he’s going to do a commercial for me.’ I don’t know what they’re doing, but it can’t be like that because someone else is going to come in and say, ‘I want Chris Peak to play for me. Hey Chris, we have a hardware store and we have a liquor store that we’re going to start sponsoring.’ Where does it end? I think it’s recruiting. All I have to do is get all the boosters around and then it just sounds like it’s going to be chaos. And if it becomes that chaotic, I’ll be going to the NFL where there’s at least a salary cap and everybody’s playing with the same rules, you know? I’ll be in the NFL. That stuff’s crazy. That’s all I’ve got to say about that topic.

Did Tipton have surgery?
Narduzzi: Tre Tipton is out of the year. He had surgery.

This week he had it?
Narduzzi: Yeah, yesterday morning.

Is he going to get another year?
Narduzzi: Yeah, I think he has a chance to if he wants to get that. Again, another tough, tough deal for Tre. He’s an incredible kid. We’ll miss him on the field and off the field. He’s one of our leaders and the kids really respect Tre.