UC Defensive Coordinator Nate Woody Week 1 Interview

With Cincinnati Bearcats on SI here joined by UC defensive coordinator Nate Woody. Coach Woody, the summer is over, the first week is here. The implementation of the defense is done. How would you assess the overall kind of taking hold of this system that your guys have had over the past three, four, and six months, dating back to spring? Well, I think those guys have come a long way. I think during the spring there was the debate whether to go a little bit slow and make sure that they get it right before we move on and get most of the notebook in. But we decided not to do it that way, decided to throw an awful lot at them. So during the spring, they were trying to digest an awful lot of information. So when you're trying to do that, it's just not as productive out on the field. But man, those guys have gotten into their notebook. They have studied hard. They've worked hard in the film room. And they're coming along and progressing quite a bit. We had MJ Cannon tell us at UC Safety a couple weeks ago, seven turnovers, no matter how it comes, no matter the type of turnover, whether it be on downs, whether it be through the air, on fumbles, seven turnovers a game is the goal you guys are setting. Why that number specifically? You know what, I think this, I think as far as possessions, usually you're looking at somewhere around 12 possessions, maybe a little bit more, maybe a little less at times. But if you can get seven takeaways, and out of those takeaways, we still count three and outs. Because if you get a three and out on an offense, that's pretty good nowadays. So whether it's three and outs, whether it's a turnover on downs, or if it's fumble recovery, interception, just figure that's our goal. And if we have that goal, and that's something that we're really striving for, then technique will come along with that. But we'll catch up to the technique, but we're gonna really try to get the ball back for our offense and think those guys can score with it when they got it. And there might be a missed tackle here or there because we are trying to go for the ball. But if we get, we might have a couple of missed tackles, but come back and get the ball back, we feel like that's gonna be more important for us. So we wanna set our goals high, and seven is a pretty nice number. I get one for every day of the week. So- There you go. The kind of final tune-ups that you're wanting to see this week from your defense. I know it's difficult to kind of project what you're gonna see from Boston College. But internally, what are some of the things you guys are trying to clean up finally here over these last few practices? You're always trying to get the guys to understand the checks, with the motion adjustments, or the different formations, and get all on the same page. The communication part of our defense has come a long way from where we were in the spring, and we needed to. And I'm not saying that we don't still have ways to go, but those guys have covered an awful lot of ground on the communication part. And still wanna cover some more with that. But I think everybody's talking. The defensive line, linebackers, secondary, they all got something to say on particular plays. That means they're in tune to what the offense is talking to them about. Speaking of that secondary, a late addition, one of the latest additions you can kind of make in the sport of college football with D'Angelo Hutchinson coming in. What has kind of been the early impression for you on his impact so far? And just overall, what was the kind of impetus and your influence on bringing in a guy like that? First of all, I love Hutch. My goodness, he doesn't leave the facility. He's up there trying to study, to catch up in just a couple weeks, what everybody else took five or six months to learn. So he's got a ways to go. But when Ty Goodwin went down, felt like we needed to bring someone else in that could help us center too deep. And Hutch was available, and we're really happy that we got him on our roster. What's the most difficult part for a guy to kind of pick up in your three, four blitzing scheme coming in this late? Is there a natural things he could take from Louisville and apply here to be able to get acclimated quicker, or is it kind of a whole new system? There are some carryovers, a little bit. But a lot of the split coverage stuff are things that he's working on, as far as the details of the coverage. Might have been just a little bit different when he was at Louisville. Here, we may ask him to do something a little bit different than what he did there, so those are things that we're working through. And with the formations, you always have a little adjustment to make versus the formations. So he's working on that as well. Got a ways to go, but he's gonna be a guy that helps us down the road. Absolutely. One more question here for Coach Nate Woody, defensive coordinator for the UC Bearcats. So this first week, obviously, it's probably even more difficult for you guys as coaches in this last three or four years with how much turnover there is for not only your guys' team, but obviously the opponent, not having as much tape to kind of go off before. What have you kind of picked up or learned or maybe you're trying to apply this week from the past few years of game ones that you've experienced in the transfer portal era? I gotta be honest with you. I think the last several years I was at Army, and Army was a different deal. When you're at the academies, you don't have as much turnover. And so developing players was the big thing. It's still the big thing to me. You gotta go out and get players and still gotta develop them. But you gotta develop them faster. So there's a little bit more urgency in studying the film and the notebook. But how is that any different than in the NFL? Those guys come in and they got a little bit of time to go through their assignment. And if they don't know it inside and out, they're not gonna get an opportunity to make the roster. So same thing here, those guys gotta take it upon themselves to really familiarize themselves with assignment and get on to the next level of studying the opponent. Awesome, Cincinnati DC, Nate Woody, everybody. Thank you.