The Wolfpacker

November-December 2023

The Wolfpacker: An Independent Magazine Covering NC State Sports

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24 ■ THE WOLFPACKER never said anything about it. He would get mad at me because I would say, 'You good?' and he would say, 'Coach, stop asking me. I'm good. I'm here, let's work.'" That mindset wasn't a surprise. "That's just him," Beasley said. "He wants to work, and he wants to get better every single day." Beasley trains dozens of quarterbacks and said Morris is different from the oth- ers. Some play the position because of the attention. Not Morris. He genuinely loves football. "It shows how much love and passion he has for the game," Beasley said. "Some of the quarterbacks that I train are in it for all the glitz and glamour that a quarter- back gets. MJ, he does it because he loves the game. He has a crazy passion for it." 'He Never Really Gets Rattled' After his junior year at Pace Acad- emy, where Morris' film and numbers weren't eye-popping, his recruitment took a turn. A year earlier, he was the top quarterback in the class of 2022, but he fell — and some of his elite offers started to dissipate. Morris returned to Carrollton, where he could play his final season at the place where he began his high school career. In June before his senior year began, Morris committed to NC State. Although he had his college destina- tion locked up, Morris wasn't content. When he returned to the Trojans, King said Morris quickly regained his leader- ship role on a team full of familiar faces. But in addition to its new coach, Car- rollton had a new offensive system, too — reminiscent of the one that King had used with Trevor Lawrence at Cartersville (Ga.) High. King said he and his staff threw a lot at Morris, but the young quarterback un- derstood everything shown to him. That allowed the Trojans to run the offense without any restrictions. Morris was a playmaker in his final season at Carrollton. He accounted for 3,089 passing yards and 33 touchdowns with a 63.1 percent completion rate. In addition, he rushed for 602 yards and 7 touchdowns, and he even caught a pair of scoring passes, too. King said that Morris' athletic abil- ity, along with his mindset on the field, set him apart from other quarterbacks in Georgia. Any time Morris had a mental error, it didn't carry over to the next play. He would shake them off and move on — an elite characteristic for a high school quarterback. "He never really gets rattled," King said. "Even if he makes a mistake, his eyes are always set, I guess you could say. He's never really distracted from the task at hand." Morris' senior year showed he was back. With his injury problems behind him, he proved he belonged on the na- tional radar as an elite quarterback. Mor- ris left Carrollton as a three-star quar- terback and the No. 28 signal-caller in Previous Quarterback Changes Have Brought Success It hasn't been often that NC State changed quarterbacks in the middle of the season for any non-injury reasons — well, at least not since last season. A year ago, head coach Dave Doeren and then-offensive coordinator Tim Beck were forced, for the first time in program history, to use four different starting quarterbacks in a single season: Devin Leary, Jack Chambers, MJ Morris and Ben Finley. Injuries were the main reason for those changes, with both Leary and Morris seeing their seasons end prema- turely. Despite the quarterback changes and a loss in the postseason game, the Wolfpack finished with an 8-5 overall record. Interestingly, five of the best seasons of the past 50 years have been powered by a non-injury quarterback change. Two ended with eight wins (1972, 2023) and three ended with nine wins (1988, '91, '92). Other changes have portended good things for the future. Famously, freshman Jamie Barnette relieved Jose Laureano in 1996 against Alabama and nearly pulled off an upset in the Crimson Tide's only visit to Carter-Finley Stadium. Barnette maintained the starting role the rest of the season and for the next three years, becoming the Wolfpack's all-time leading passer, until his replacement, Philip Rivers, completed his career. In 1972 and '73, Lou Holtz had the luxury of having the final two years of All-ACC selection Bruce Shaw at quarter- back. A fine drop-back passer, Shaw didn't always have the skills needed to run Holtz's favored twin-veer offense. But young Dave Buckey, the first true freshman quarterback to start at NC State since before World War II, did. Injuries plagued Shaw from the first game of the 1972 season, and Buckey was often inserted to run the Wolf- pack's productive ground game with running backs Willie Burden, Charlie Young, Stan Fritts and Roland Hooks. When Shaw broke his arm in the '72 season finale, NC State installed Buckey as the starter for the Peach Bowl. In 1973, he started over Shaw, the senior, although they effectively split duties at quarterback, with Buckey handling the running game and Shaw handling the passing. Holtz's choice for starter was more style over performance. In those two quarterback-fluid seasons, the Pack went 8-3-1 and 9-3, respectively. That 1973 ACC championship team averaged a school-record 272.3 rushing yards per game, 409.9 total yards per game and 33.2 points per game. — Tim Peeler Coach Lou Holtz promoted Dave Buckey to the starting lineup ahead of the Peach Bowl in 1972. The Pack defeated West Virginia 49-13 and went on to claim an ACC title the following year with Buckey as its starting quarterback. COURTESY NC STATE ATHLETICS

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