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 After recording touchbacks on six of his first seven kickoffs last week
against Texas Tech, John Deraney, NC State's freshman kicker, still had
a little bit left in his strong right leg. Boy did he. As an encore on
his final kick off of the day, Deraney nailed a boomer that carried
beyond the back line of the north end zone at Carter-Finley Stadium.
Then, with one bounce, the ball found a resting-place next to the
ambulance that sits outside the old home locker room at the Finley Field
House. Upon seeing the ball roll toward them, stadium personnel working
the area wore expressions of "where did that come from?"
"They got deeper and deeper," said Wolfpack coach Chuck Amato about
Deraney's day, which included seven touchbacks on eight kickoffs. "I
told him when the game was over if you can skip that first one (returned
29 yards) and you kick the next seven like you did (all touchbacks) then
we'll be fine."
Deraney's kicks certainly bring welcome relief to the many starting
position players for NC State who are also asked to go down and cover on
kickoffs.
"I love it because I don't have to exert too much energy before that
next 1st and 10 when I'm in there," said junior linebacker Freddie
Aughtry-Lindsay. "When he kicks it out of the end zone, I just say
'thank you man, you just saved me a breath.'"
So successful have Deraney's kickoffs been (he has 10 touchbacks in the
last two games), that Amato worries that Aughtry-Lindsay and the others
who run down on kick coverage might start to get a little bit spoiled.
"We have to be careful that our cover people don't become complacent,"
Amato said. "I told [assistant coach] Chris Demarest, who handles that,
we have a thing we say where we tell them they need to get to the
30-yard line when the ball is caught. We call that the battle line. I
told him (Demarest) that we need to tell the guys on that team that if
they don't cross that 30-yard line by the time that ball lands in the
endzone that they loafed and they'll run on Monday. It's something to
keep them from getting complacent because he (Deraney) isn't going to
kick them all out of the end zone, whether it has to do with wind, he
misses them or whatever."
This Saturday, Deraney and the entire NC State kick cover squad will
face a big challenge against North Carolina, which features one of the
nation's top return men in Michael Waddell. Before twisting his ankle
last week at Wisconsin, Waddell had four returns for 176 yards,
including a 97-yard runback for a touchdown on the opening kickoff.
Through last Saturday's games, Waddell leads the ACC and ranks 5th in
the nation with an average of 35.3 yards per return.
And even after Waddell left with the ankle injury last week, UNC
freshman Mike Mason had another touchdown return that was called back
because of a clipping penalty. Overall, the Tar Heels wracked up 246
total yards on kickoff returns.
In other words, if John Deraney isn't kicking the ball next to the
ambulance this weekend, the Wolfpack's cover team will have some work to
do.
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