Pat Narduzzi talked to the media on Thursday about running backs, superstitions and more. Here’s the full rundown of what he said.

Narduzzi: We had three really good days of practice. We liked our kids’ attitude, as I always do. I can’t ever gauge, ‘is a team ready to come back and get a W?’ from a practice. But I do like the attention to detail we had this week, so we’ll see where we go with that. Obviously, I think Georgia Tech’s a good football team, got a lot of respect for what they do, how they do it, and they’ll be ready down there. They had a week off, they’ll be fresher, they’ll have some new stuff on offense, defense, they like their tricks on special teams, so we’ve got to be ready for everything and I think our kids are.

Todd Sibley; he had to get helped off last Saturday. What’s his status?
Narduzzi: We’ll look and see. He’s not out for the year. He’ll be okay. He’s running today.

Do you see your running game taking off - not taking off, but getting better after what you did on Saturday?
Narduzzi: I do. And Sibley was a big part of that. I liked what I saw out of him. He’s big, physical and he was running hard and running with a little bit of an attitude and confidence. So I liked what we saw out of him. And A.J. is good. And V’Lique ran with a different attitude as well. So I think it’s coming along. We’ve got a couple extra linemen that can sub in and help us out as well. I think that’s a positive. It keeps some guys fresh.

Will Vincent get more carries this week?
Narduzzi: We’ll see. We’ll see. I’d like him to.

You talked about mentality for Carter, but he’s not the biggest guy and you were running him between the tackles a lot. Is there ever a part of you that worries about that size -
Narduzzi: He might not be our short-yardage back, but he’s a guy we can - you know, I like what he does in there because, let me tell you, he can run on the outside and go, but if he hits a hole inside, it’s just a matter of time before he hits one and it’s gone, because if he hits one and there’s some holes that look like Qadree Ollison had last year and Darrin Hall had, he’s going to be gone. Is he going to break a million tackles? I like how physical he was, regardless of his size. There’s a lot of guys that size in the NFL that run hard.

So he’s starting to figure it out. It takes time to figure out how to play with your pads down. You can be small and still be physical.

Has it been a growth process for him, just learning to be a tailback?
Narduzzi: It is. It’s a learning process, and again, it’s not like when you’re down on scout team, and he was a scout team tailback, we noticed him there a year ago and said, ‘Hey, let’s give him a shot to run the football.’ There’s no responsibility; it’s, ‘read a card and go,’ you know? But now you’re reading a three-technique or you’re reading the end, you have to fit inside the pullers and there’s more of that stuff that you really have to do; it’s not like scout team. So he’s learning all of that, and I think every week he gets a little bit better.

Are you getting the second-level blocking from your offensive line that you’d like to have?
Narduzzi: You know, second-level blocking from the O-line, you know, the first thing we’re worried about is the first level, you know? To me, if you get to the second level too quickly, then you probably didn’t take care of the first level. Those guys usually are taken care of, a puller or a fullback or something like that or by formation - if you spread them out, then second-level guys are out wide and away from the box. But we’ve done a pretty good job. You can’t get them all the time. I look back, just last week with Quarterman making plays, just sometimes you can’t get a hat, based on the way they’re aligned. And that’s how we aligned. We don’t want our backers to get blocked. We want to be quick enough to that hole that you can’t block us. Something that’s accounted for, but we’re there so quick - if you get there too quick, then you turn a D-tackle loose. I know how it is on the other side of the ball: you can’t always get everybody if they’re lined up right. We always talk about the backs ‘BYOB’ - be your own blocker. They have to make somebody miss, too.

Do you like the unbalanced looks that the offensive line has? There were more than a few against Miami, more than you have done in the past, whether it was Ulizio and Carter on the same side or - Kenny was talking a lot about that in-tempo helping. What did you like out of those?
Narduzzi: We liked it against Miami. Can’t tell you we necessarily like it against Georgia Tech; it depends on the front and how they adjust. Those are all things that you sit in those meetings and try to digest and, ‘Hey, what’s good, how are they going to adjust to this formation, how are they going to adjust to this backfield set, this unbalanced set.’ And again, the crazy part about that is, sometimes you don’t know what they’re going to do. They may screw up because of what you’re doing. You may get the wrong looks even if - the first time they may give you one look, the second time they may give you something different. So it takes time just to figure out what they want, and is the time worth the mass? We kind of saw some looks against Miami and what they would do, so we felt good about what some of those formations would do for us.

Sibley had the success taking the direct snaps; do you feel like Davis and Carter can handle that role as well?
Narduzzi: Not as good as Sibley could. Sibley’s just got the different deal. Obviously, he was in there for a reason: because we felt comfortable with him doing it. You don’t ever feel comfortable with a tailback back there, whether it’s ball-handling - you want to - you have your guy you do it with and you kind of keep it to that.

It seems like such an easy thing to do: catch a snap, look ahead and run.
Narduzzi: You would think so, but no. It ain’t so easy.

You’re on the road this week so you get to call the coin toss. Do you have a strategy on how to break this streak?
Narduzzi: Yeah, we’re going to call ‘hails.’

There’s no strategy. I don’t care what we - it doesn’t matter. It’s just funny. I laugh at our guys all the time; they fight about heads or tails, these captains do - ‘It’s going to be this this week, I’m telling you, you’re wrong again.’ So we’ll find out.

A lot of old-school coaches, even if they win the toss, they’ll defer. Do you prefer to defer?
Narduzzi: We like to defer, but we’ve received all year so it doesn’t matter. As a matter of fact, we did play defense once. Central Florida wanted the ball. We’ve played offense every week except Central Florida. They took the ball which, to me, when they take the ball, it just kind of tells you, okay, let’s get it on.

I wouldn’t even say ‘old school’ - I think most people do defer. Maybe it is old school. I always want to put our defense out there. If you stop people, which we haven’t had a chance to get that look; Central Florida, I think we went three-and-out. But if you can stop them and pin them, you give your offense good field position. Last week, we started at the 17-yard line. We lost the field position by 205 yards last week because of turnovers and field position; a lot of times when you kick off, you get the ball inside the 25-yard line, go three-and-out and make them punt it, give our offense the ball at the 40-yard line. It always helps. It’s hard to drive a long way. Those 80-yard drives are far and few behind.

Did you see a different resolve from your team this week after losing a close game?
Narduzzi: I feel good with where our team is. I think our kids are good. I think they’re upset and ready to go. I like an angry team. I don’t like a happy team.

You joked when you sat down about being superstitious; are you superstitious?
Narduzzi: EJ didn’t have to remind me that he wasn’t here, I can tell you that. I was getting ready to walk in here and I was showing EJ a video and I was like, ‘You know what? Jerry wasn’t here last week. He had something he had to go run down the city. That’s just unacceptable.’ Tell your boss, too.

I am superstitious, yeah. I’m superstitious with a lot of things.

What do you do with the coin flip then?
Narduzzi: I don’t care about the coin toss. It’s about winning or losing. I don’t care how you win. But when your top reporter doesn’t show up, it’s a problem.

What are you superstitious about, if not the coin toss?
Narduzzi: Whatever leads to a win or a loss.

Do you have a song you listen to before the game?
Narduzzi: I don’t listen to much music before the game. Usually there’s no time.

Is it like a meal thing or a night before thing?
Narduzzi: It’s everything. It’s everything. Captains, at the meal, we sit in the same spot. They’ll be like, ‘Hey, you’re not allowed to sit there. You sit over there.’ We have a game captain every week and they have to put him in his place, make sure he sits in the right spot. There’s all kinds of little things. It’s not just me. It’s players.

After a loss, do you flip it?
Narduzzi: Oh yeah. Like, Coach Andrews had a beard growing - he said, ‘I’m not shaving it.’ He came in on Sunday and it was shaved off. So everybody’s got something. I think it’s natural. If things are going good, you don’t want to mess it up. I got a brand new briefcase five weeks ago, new Pitt script, new colors; that thing’s sitting in my backseat, I’m like, ‘I’m not changing it right now. Things are going really good right now. I’m not changing the mojo.’ Probably this weekend I’ll change it.