UNC Preseason Practice 8/20: Player Interviews

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — Classes have started back up in Chapel Hill, and North Carolina is embarking on its last week of preseason practice before full-on TCU prep starts. Returning redshirt-freshman wide receiver Alex Taylor and transfer redshirt-senior linebacker Andrew Simpson, who committed to UNC out of Boise State, spoke to the media before UNC’s open practice session on Wednesday.

Watch those interviews in their entirety below and read some noteworthy excerpts …

Alex Taylor

“I learned to just be patient. Don’t waste your time, make the most of your opportunities. I didn’t really get a lot to show what I could do last year, so it’s kind of a little motivation factor for me, just to show what I can do. I just learned to be patient in the process. Take your time. Learn what you can learn from the older guys. We had guys like JJ (Jones) and Nate McCollum last year, and I learned a lot from them. So just really building off of that and showing the younger guys now what I can do. And I feel like some of my strengths are catching, making some of those 50-50 balls, 80-20 really. So just trying to come up with any ball that gets in my way.”

“Anytime I’m on the field, whether it’s special teams or offense, just showing what I can do in those situations. (Bill Belichick) coming from the NFL, I know special teams is a huge process. We have more guys on this roster, but just finding any little things that I can do to just showcase that, and just listen to what he says in the meetings. Every little thing is important, and just trying to implement the fundamentals in my game.”

“The main thing I really wanted to focus on was just getting more explosive and faster and getting stronger. Working with Coach Moses (Cabrera), our strength condition, Coach, I feel like I have done that in a big way, just in these little few months that he has been here. I’ve been eating better, things like that. So I feel like I have been getting better. On the field, I’d say route running, just trying to get those little things, not choking my route too early so the DB can get that. I felt like I have done a little bit better with that.”

Andrew Simpson

“First off, I want to be a leader. I want to hit the field with the ‘last-play’ mentality. (Treat) every play like it’s your last. Play hard, play fast, play physical. Be a coach on the field, somebody that you can depend on when the game’s on the line.”

“Obviously, just championship pedigree with a coach like Belichick. Somebody who is going to develop you and focus on just the small things that are going to make a big deal when the time comes. So, honestly, just trying to boost my draft stock as much as I can. Trying to come to a winning culture that cares about football, that wants to win. Everything that I talked about with Coach Belichick, some of the guys on the team and the coordinators, it just aligned with all my goals.”

“In high school, I would say winning was the standard, and coming out, I wanted to go to a program where that was the same thing and where people cared. That was my biggest thing: the care factor being high and winning being just what we’re supposed to do. So going to a school like Boise State, winning was something they did and they did consistently. And just drawing you as a great football player and as a man. I feel like that was something that I was looking into deeply, making sure that there was a program that would take me from ground-up and try and build me to be a better player than who I was the day before.”